iTunes Music Selection This Morning:
Leona Lewis wailing "Bleeding Love" in the background... now Mat Kearney's hip-hop "Undeniable"... Colbie Caillat singing her sensually carefree "Bubbly" and finally, Paolo Nutini's soothing, evocative, "Rewind".
--------------------------------------------------
Yesterday early evening Leah was in her personal heaven.
She'd spent the afternoon at Aarya's Guna Ghola party at the Hyatt, the only girl invited to share the important occasion with her friend from school and their shared Sunday art class. Aarya, of course, was dressed as a Hindoo princess, complete with diamond brooch (that her Dad said was going right back in the safe deposit at the bank after the ceremony). They were playing delightfully among the exquisite white chocolate and ice cream bar while the parents were eating and drinking out on the Hyatt lawn.
But when Marcus called, we remembered that Moa was on her way over to our home for a sleep-over. She got there even before we got home, of course. Although, immediately, the two of them were out running around in the backyard, freed from their parents' constraints and swilled w/ the pleasure of simple friendship. They took our Apso-Shitsu, Gumbi, out back to race her on a leash on sunken floor of the recently drained big pond (so it can be waterproofed around the boulders). Girls' joy with a puppy amid nature. Does life require any more?
Far from their child's view, Geeru was still digging out around the rock garden while I watered the bamboo and transplanted evergreen trees.
The setting sun was fading in the western sky and the slight crescent moon was shimmering a few degrees north on the horizon above the Vishnumati mohan (source) ridge.
Then, her dear friend, Choyang, the Rimpoche's daughter, also from her Second Grade class, came through the backyard door and Leah leaped w/ pure childhood joy. More girlfriends on a Friday evening and life was complete.
Before long, however, we had to go inside to find matches or a lighter, as Leah wanted to make another small campfire by the boulders once the sun set.
As we came back to the garden, from somewhere in her child's clear joyful mind, and, no doubt, her reading of "Winnie the Pooh", appreciating, as Winnie often does, the need for some serious thoughtful, adult-like statement to mark this important Friday evening ("my fourth most favorite day!"), out of the blue, Leah said to her friends, "Give me liberty or death!"
Was it a 2nd Grade history lesson, I thought, or, as she later told me, something she'd heard on some obscure TV show?
I said to her, "Sweetheart, I think it's 'Give me Liberty or Give me Death!'"
Patrick Henry's famous cry from the American War of Independence, as everyone American school kid knows.
To which she turned to me and asked in that mellifluous, charming, unforgettable, seven year voice,
"Daddy, aren't there any other choices?"
To which I replied, "I sure hope so, dear..."
"I sure hope so..."
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Springtime, Good Work, Leah Rose and a Sacred Garden
To the joy of her fans, spring has sprung once again in Kathmandu already. Even before the 15th of February, the usual date of the seasonal transition here, spring was charmingly in the air at the start of the month.
According to the meteorologists, this was the warmest winter in decades in Nepal and getting MUCH warmer now. Already, the peach & apricot trees have been flowering in the backyard. These gorgeous pink, red and white buds have opened with their usual magic to delight the eyes and swoon the bees.
It's been so warm during the days that I've been watering my young bamboo out in the tail end of our land (where Leah and I are in the process of creating a bamboo rock garden over the coming years). I'm half expecting my beloved bamboo 'tusa' (shoots) to come up even before the end of the month.
Arise young Phyllostachtus, Arise, Species of All Orders! Spring is in the Air!
When not in the garden on the w/ends or at UNDP working on the civil society initiative. This past weekend I attended a workshop in Godavri w/ our 16 NGOs who will be implementing our 'Democracy Dialogue' (Loktantric Sambad) initiaitve out in the districts after this facilitators training of trainers (TOT). We've chosen an impressive & diverse collection of 'historically marginalized' commpeople from all over Nepal with special emphasis on the Indigenous, Dalits, Madhesi and people from the remote regions, like Rapti and Karnali out in the MW/FW of Nepal. It's a great project that will definitely allow these communities a serious opportunity to participate in the writing of a new Nepali constitution. I've been working, basically fulltime since November, and finding much fulfillment in helping to create this program w/ colleagues here in UNDP.
I also had a enjoyable lunch w/ Kai Bird critiquing his fascianating new book. Kai's let me read chapters as he produces them -- a memoire about his and Susan's divergent family histories. While Kai was raised of good Tillichian Protestant American stock who became Arabists while in the US State Department, Susan is the daughter of Austrian Holocaust survivors. It's a double helix of 20th century realities where the personal drama is interwoven with the agonized history of both Europe and the Middle East. Kai's childhood in East Jerusalm ensured that his life would be fixated on a just and peaceful resolution of that painful world epic, alas. Although there is no simple paradigm, Kai struggles to find an optimistic end, while I encourage him to live in the reality of the unresolved dilemma. Personally, I enjoy the intellectual & creative play of trying to query and refine his story; it's such different work than i've done before, but I love the interplay of words & ideas on a subject that is close to the heart...
Besides my avocations, Ms. Leah's been in a cheerfully good mood these days. When she's not playing w/ Gumbi or Kali, her favorite dogs, she's been helping me in the garden in the evening after work and school. She a serious gardener and loves, as much as Shaku & I, being out in the cultivated wilderness we've created behind our home.
I took the other afternoon off, so Leah and I were digging out the large boulders in the far back tail of our land. Ms. Leah Rose has this 10" bamboo stick that Tek dai made her. It's her instrument of choice. She pounds it with a flat stone into the hard soil to loosen the soil, then tells me to dig there! I'm her slave. Leah Das (as the Hindoos would say...).
Then, when we're done digging out the hard, baked soil between the boulders, she starts to preparesa camp fire. She loves the warmth of the fire and light of the flame after the sun sets and the stars twinkle above in the quiet of the neighborhood. She's already built a few fires out there among the big boulders, where she's placed her ring of stones. It's actually quite a good campsite. When the real Moso bamboo ("Crouching Tiger" type) comes up there in a couple of years, it'll be truly beautiful and sacred place.
According to the meteorologists, this was the warmest winter in decades in Nepal and getting MUCH warmer now. Already, the peach & apricot trees have been flowering in the backyard. These gorgeous pink, red and white buds have opened with their usual magic to delight the eyes and swoon the bees.
It's been so warm during the days that I've been watering my young bamboo out in the tail end of our land (where Leah and I are in the process of creating a bamboo rock garden over the coming years). I'm half expecting my beloved bamboo 'tusa' (shoots) to come up even before the end of the month.
Arise young Phyllostachtus, Arise, Species of All Orders! Spring is in the Air!
When not in the garden on the w/ends or at UNDP working on the civil society initiative. This past weekend I attended a workshop in Godavri w/ our 16 NGOs who will be implementing our 'Democracy Dialogue' (Loktantric Sambad) initiaitve out in the districts after this facilitators training of trainers (TOT). We've chosen an impressive & diverse collection of 'historically marginalized' commpeople from all over Nepal with special emphasis on the Indigenous, Dalits, Madhesi and people from the remote regions, like Rapti and Karnali out in the MW/FW of Nepal. It's a great project that will definitely allow these communities a serious opportunity to participate in the writing of a new Nepali constitution. I've been working, basically fulltime since November, and finding much fulfillment in helping to create this program w/ colleagues here in UNDP.
I also had a enjoyable lunch w/ Kai Bird critiquing his fascianating new book. Kai's let me read chapters as he produces them -- a memoire about his and Susan's divergent family histories. While Kai was raised of good Tillichian Protestant American stock who became Arabists while in the US State Department, Susan is the daughter of Austrian Holocaust survivors. It's a double helix of 20th century realities where the personal drama is interwoven with the agonized history of both Europe and the Middle East. Kai's childhood in East Jerusalm ensured that his life would be fixated on a just and peaceful resolution of that painful world epic, alas. Although there is no simple paradigm, Kai struggles to find an optimistic end, while I encourage him to live in the reality of the unresolved dilemma. Personally, I enjoy the intellectual & creative play of trying to query and refine his story; it's such different work than i've done before, but I love the interplay of words & ideas on a subject that is close to the heart...
Besides my avocations, Ms. Leah's been in a cheerfully good mood these days. When she's not playing w/ Gumbi or Kali, her favorite dogs, she's been helping me in the garden in the evening after work and school. She a serious gardener and loves, as much as Shaku & I, being out in the cultivated wilderness we've created behind our home.
I took the other afternoon off, so Leah and I were digging out the large boulders in the far back tail of our land. Ms. Leah Rose has this 10" bamboo stick that Tek dai made her. It's her instrument of choice. She pounds it with a flat stone into the hard soil to loosen the soil, then tells me to dig there! I'm her slave. Leah Das (as the Hindoos would say...).
Then, when we're done digging out the hard, baked soil between the boulders, she starts to preparesa camp fire. She loves the warmth of the fire and light of the flame after the sun sets and the stars twinkle above in the quiet of the neighborhood. She's already built a few fires out there among the big boulders, where she's placed her ring of stones. It's actually quite a good campsite. When the real Moso bamboo ("Crouching Tiger" type) comes up there in a couple of years, it'll be truly beautiful and sacred place.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Films, Stars and Thoughts on the Modern Life
once again, life is a compelling show in kathmandu. although practical communication or blogging by internet isn't helped by the 12-16 hours without electricity.
last night, for example, we didn't have 'bijuli' when we came home although, in my sleep i saw a flicker (or felt the electric blanket warm up...) b/n midnight and 4 am -- but it was off again in the morning when we got up. for much of the past week we've neither had it in the morning when we get up nor in the evening when we get home. such is the reality of the 'developing' world (or, in our case, it's a bit of a receding world, since we had better electricity some years ago...).
of course, it's actually lovely to stroll our midnight garden watching the darkened silouettes of the conifer trees (those magnificent himalayan deodars and bhutanese spruces...) under the bright full moonlight rising behind shivapuri ridge. i like to circumambulate our home when we come back in the evening when there's no man-made light to disrupt or violate the shadowy landscape. i meander imagining life a long, long time ago, observe the brilliant stars overhead, proud warrior orion and the ever-flowing big dipper shimmering in the blackened sky. i often sit for awhile on the bench on the hillock behind our house while kali, our big black 'puppy' races up to lick my hand. it's easy in such darkness to recall the currents and eddies of my own life, my children's lives, my parents, not to mention the unusual world i've etched out over these past decades.
'only connect', said forster; 'only reflect', jung would have said...
one's own life is a lot to take in... so, after awhile when the gazing, internally and externally, wanes, thoughts and memories floating along the river of time, i trundle down the slope, past the natural boulder garden, below the leaf-less jacaranda trees, the big city lights glowing a few miles below our home, and head inside to the beckoning warmth of our home, through the back kitchen screen door, under the grape and kiwi trellis, to where shakun and leah are busy doing homework upstairs.
and, to be honest, there are other days when it'd be nice to simply come home to watch a new movie in front of the morso stove after a hard day's night... after all, once we've seen the magic of cinema, the hellenic stars are homeric in scope and depth, but, ahhhh... was there ever a greater star than katherine hepburn?
for 'these days' (a great jackson browne song, no?), i feel like i'm juggling a series of lives. i still have a bit of work on joshua's college financial aid applications, although i've gotten most of them out the door these past couple of weeks. given the cost of these schools, without someone else's cash, it seems hard to fund a four year private college. of course, my beloved offspring (or whatever world he sprung from...) wants only the best, if he can get in (good luck, mate...), which pushes up the price tag, naturally.
as mom used to say, "if you have to ask the price; don't bother!" (thanks, mom...)
then, i'm trying to plan a trip to the states in march. i'm going to hang w/ my boyz over their spring break and see my folks w/ them in southern florida, then take the boyz to see my dear old amherst/thailand/greek friend, jeff lansdale, in honduras, where he's lived nearly as long as i have been in nepal. i'm trying to keep it to a three week turn-around w/ a flight back and forth over the gulf (eithad airlines).
of course, it'll be great to have this time w/ josh & ezi, as i feel the ache of their non-presence in our home and lives more often than i care to admit. sometimes i tell shakun that i can't remember them with us anymore. she thinks i'm losing my memory, but it's their loss i feel most. the simple joy of their faces, their smiles, their joys. they will, forever, be children in our lives...
tonight, i try to make more time for 'sophie's choice' by candle light. what a tragic story unfolds in my hands. i remember the movie, of course, but the novel is even more absorbing, agonized and literary. of course, the tragic, twisted tale pulls me in. i think i've become more attached to my own ancient identity over the years. maybe living as a stranger in a strange land, as well, sends me deeper into that family history of being strangers for so long elsewhere...
actually, after coming close to the dharma (buddhism) years ago, after years of bookish study and the perpetual romance of the 'other', like the elliptical path our lives sometimes tread, i rebounded back from a fuller commitment to another sacred world, even such a precious one -- but still another one full of the formal hierarchy and man-made structure that any religion creates. so, at the end of the day, i am what i is, with the enormous weight of that rich and agonized history sitting on my greying curls -- as it's weighed on many generations before me.
so, as such thoughts flow, the stars shimmer and, occasionally, the electricity returns, we will have the movies to entertain us and teach us to empathize with others, as well...
have you seen 'the reader'? yowza! i've fallen (of course...) for kate winslet, either in 'the reader' or 'revolutionary road'. i'm done, it seems, with those spry, impish, charismatic cinema women, like cate blanchett as a forest queen in "lord of the rings" or any of leah's disney or pixer damsels! now, nothing like a depressed, manic, suicidal woman to get a alienated modern man stimulated. at least on the silver screen these days, it seems that there are sophies all around... ;-)
one of aja's joys is that all of your latest films show up here in pirated copies ('only for the weinstein brothers viewing') that cost a mere 50 cents on the mean streets of kathmandu.
but, of course, the weinsteins don't provide either the popcorn or the promise of electricity...
last night, for example, we didn't have 'bijuli' when we came home although, in my sleep i saw a flicker (or felt the electric blanket warm up...) b/n midnight and 4 am -- but it was off again in the morning when we got up. for much of the past week we've neither had it in the morning when we get up nor in the evening when we get home. such is the reality of the 'developing' world (or, in our case, it's a bit of a receding world, since we had better electricity some years ago...).
of course, it's actually lovely to stroll our midnight garden watching the darkened silouettes of the conifer trees (those magnificent himalayan deodars and bhutanese spruces...) under the bright full moonlight rising behind shivapuri ridge. i like to circumambulate our home when we come back in the evening when there's no man-made light to disrupt or violate the shadowy landscape. i meander imagining life a long, long time ago, observe the brilliant stars overhead, proud warrior orion and the ever-flowing big dipper shimmering in the blackened sky. i often sit for awhile on the bench on the hillock behind our house while kali, our big black 'puppy' races up to lick my hand. it's easy in such darkness to recall the currents and eddies of my own life, my children's lives, my parents, not to mention the unusual world i've etched out over these past decades.
'only connect', said forster; 'only reflect', jung would have said...
one's own life is a lot to take in... so, after awhile when the gazing, internally and externally, wanes, thoughts and memories floating along the river of time, i trundle down the slope, past the natural boulder garden, below the leaf-less jacaranda trees, the big city lights glowing a few miles below our home, and head inside to the beckoning warmth of our home, through the back kitchen screen door, under the grape and kiwi trellis, to where shakun and leah are busy doing homework upstairs.
and, to be honest, there are other days when it'd be nice to simply come home to watch a new movie in front of the morso stove after a hard day's night... after all, once we've seen the magic of cinema, the hellenic stars are homeric in scope and depth, but, ahhhh... was there ever a greater star than katherine hepburn?
for 'these days' (a great jackson browne song, no?), i feel like i'm juggling a series of lives. i still have a bit of work on joshua's college financial aid applications, although i've gotten most of them out the door these past couple of weeks. given the cost of these schools, without someone else's cash, it seems hard to fund a four year private college. of course, my beloved offspring (or whatever world he sprung from...) wants only the best, if he can get in (good luck, mate...), which pushes up the price tag, naturally.
as mom used to say, "if you have to ask the price; don't bother!" (thanks, mom...)
then, i'm trying to plan a trip to the states in march. i'm going to hang w/ my boyz over their spring break and see my folks w/ them in southern florida, then take the boyz to see my dear old amherst/thailand/greek friend, jeff lansdale, in honduras, where he's lived nearly as long as i have been in nepal. i'm trying to keep it to a three week turn-around w/ a flight back and forth over the gulf (eithad airlines).
of course, it'll be great to have this time w/ josh & ezi, as i feel the ache of their non-presence in our home and lives more often than i care to admit. sometimes i tell shakun that i can't remember them with us anymore. she thinks i'm losing my memory, but it's their loss i feel most. the simple joy of their faces, their smiles, their joys. they will, forever, be children in our lives...
tonight, i try to make more time for 'sophie's choice' by candle light. what a tragic story unfolds in my hands. i remember the movie, of course, but the novel is even more absorbing, agonized and literary. of course, the tragic, twisted tale pulls me in. i think i've become more attached to my own ancient identity over the years. maybe living as a stranger in a strange land, as well, sends me deeper into that family history of being strangers for so long elsewhere...
actually, after coming close to the dharma (buddhism) years ago, after years of bookish study and the perpetual romance of the 'other', like the elliptical path our lives sometimes tread, i rebounded back from a fuller commitment to another sacred world, even such a precious one -- but still another one full of the formal hierarchy and man-made structure that any religion creates. so, at the end of the day, i am what i is, with the enormous weight of that rich and agonized history sitting on my greying curls -- as it's weighed on many generations before me.
so, as such thoughts flow, the stars shimmer and, occasionally, the electricity returns, we will have the movies to entertain us and teach us to empathize with others, as well...
have you seen 'the reader'? yowza! i've fallen (of course...) for kate winslet, either in 'the reader' or 'revolutionary road'. i'm done, it seems, with those spry, impish, charismatic cinema women, like cate blanchett as a forest queen in "lord of the rings" or any of leah's disney or pixer damsels! now, nothing like a depressed, manic, suicidal woman to get a alienated modern man stimulated. at least on the silver screen these days, it seems that there are sophies all around... ;-)
one of aja's joys is that all of your latest films show up here in pirated copies ('only for the weinstein brothers viewing') that cost a mere 50 cents on the mean streets of kathmandu.
but, of course, the weinsteins don't provide either the popcorn or the promise of electricity...
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Darkness in the Human Soul: Vernichtung
'She took his dictation with care, but because of his runaway fervor, in some haste, so it was not until she got down to the job of typing it out for the printer that she began to glimpse seething in that cauldron of historical allusions and dialectical hypotheses and religious imperatives and legal precedents and anthropological propositions the smoky, ominous presence of a single word -- repeated several times -- which quite baffled and confounded and frightened her, appearing as it did in this otherwise persuasively practical text, this clever polemic which voiced with breezily scurrilous mockery the sly propaganda she had half heard more than once over the Bieganski dinner table.
But this word that so alarmed her was a new departure. For those several times he had made her change 'total abolishment' (vollstandige Abschaffung) to Vernichtung...
And she was still repressing the very meaning of Vernichtung until that moment in the drizzling dusk of Sunday, when hurrying with the bundle of typescript to meet her father and her husband, Casimir, in a cafe on the Market Square, she was smitten with horror at what he had said and written and what she, in her complicity, had done.
"Vernichtung," she said aloud. He means, she thought with stupid belatedness, they should all be murdered.'
Sophie's Choice
William Styron
1976
But this word that so alarmed her was a new departure. For those several times he had made her change 'total abolishment' (vollstandige Abschaffung) to Vernichtung...
And she was still repressing the very meaning of Vernichtung until that moment in the drizzling dusk of Sunday, when hurrying with the bundle of typescript to meet her father and her husband, Casimir, in a cafe on the Market Square, she was smitten with horror at what he had said and written and what she, in her complicity, had done.
"Vernichtung," she said aloud. He means, she thought with stupid belatedness, they should all be murdered.'
Sophie's Choice
William Styron
1976
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Papu's Life, Sanchi, India, June 1980
THERE WERE MANY MOMENTS DECADES AGO AMID THE PASSAGE BETWEEN A WORLD IN THE WEST AND HOME IN NEPAL...
ALL OF THEM WERE PART OF THE (POST-GRAD) EDUCATION OF A YOUNG AMERICAN.
TODAY I OPENED AN OLD JOURNAL AND FOUND THIS VIGNETTE WHERE PAPU'S LIFE AND MINE INTERSECTED.
NO SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE, PAPU, JUST ANOTHER TWO RUPEE DAY IN THE LIFE OF ONE OF G-D'S PRECIOUS LITTLE CREATURES..
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Papu! Duo Pani, Papu." (Bring us two glasses of water.)
Papu scrambled around the wooden makeshift tables outside and disappeared behind the stacks of Nova soda bottles.
It was late already. The sugar cane juice stand had just shut off its electricity. The dusty road was quiet. The Sikhs had ridden their Enfield motorcycles back to the nearby industrial city. Only a few tea stand restaurants ("hotels") remained open. Most of those who stayed were the young employed with a bit of cash to spend. They sat drinking a local rose water brew, listening to the latest election results by radio.
Papu reappeared from the shadows. "Duo pani.", he announced proudly, then sat down grinning.
Papu. Such a funny name. "Is Papu his real name?", I asked my local companion, sitting with me that evening in Sanchi, India. He turned to the boy and asked my question in Hindi.
"No, Deviram is his name. Devi is a female goddess and Ram is Ram [a legendary figure, hero of the Ramayana]"
"How old is he?", I asked. (again in translation)
"He doesn't know. Maybe 10, 11 or 12. That's his older brother over there making chapatis (round, flat bread).
"How many children are there in his family?
"Papu, ....?"
He says he has 3 brothers and 2 sisters. His father works as a gardener at the nearby Archeological Gardens of the Sanchi Stupa.
"How many hours a day does Papu work?"
Well, he starts about 6 or 7 am, then stays here until 9 or 10 pm. He's a poor boy. He doesn't go to school. He's a Scheduled Caste (Dalit -- the "Harijan" Gandhi spoke of as the "Children of God"). He can't afford to go to school. There he'd have to pay; here he gets paid.
"How much a day?", I inquire.
Two rupees.
"Two rupees??!!?"
Yes, labor is cheap in India. There's a lot of unemployment. Papu's happy to have work. He makes a little money and gets his meals free. For him this is a good life. There are many worse off than he. He knows that. His father, after all, makes 180 rupees/month, without meals, and, you know, he has to support a whole family on that.
Trust me, this little boy isn't complaining...
ALL OF THEM WERE PART OF THE (POST-GRAD) EDUCATION OF A YOUNG AMERICAN.
TODAY I OPENED AN OLD JOURNAL AND FOUND THIS VIGNETTE WHERE PAPU'S LIFE AND MINE INTERSECTED.
NO SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE, PAPU, JUST ANOTHER TWO RUPEE DAY IN THE LIFE OF ONE OF G-D'S PRECIOUS LITTLE CREATURES..
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Papu! Duo Pani, Papu." (Bring us two glasses of water.)
Papu scrambled around the wooden makeshift tables outside and disappeared behind the stacks of Nova soda bottles.
It was late already. The sugar cane juice stand had just shut off its electricity. The dusty road was quiet. The Sikhs had ridden their Enfield motorcycles back to the nearby industrial city. Only a few tea stand restaurants ("hotels") remained open. Most of those who stayed were the young employed with a bit of cash to spend. They sat drinking a local rose water brew, listening to the latest election results by radio.
Papu reappeared from the shadows. "Duo pani.", he announced proudly, then sat down grinning.
Papu. Such a funny name. "Is Papu his real name?", I asked my local companion, sitting with me that evening in Sanchi, India. He turned to the boy and asked my question in Hindi.
"No, Deviram is his name. Devi is a female goddess and Ram is Ram [a legendary figure, hero of the Ramayana]"
"How old is he?", I asked. (again in translation)
"He doesn't know. Maybe 10, 11 or 12. That's his older brother over there making chapatis (round, flat bread).
"How many children are there in his family?
"Papu, ....?"
He says he has 3 brothers and 2 sisters. His father works as a gardener at the nearby Archeological Gardens of the Sanchi Stupa.
"How many hours a day does Papu work?"
Well, he starts about 6 or 7 am, then stays here until 9 or 10 pm. He's a poor boy. He doesn't go to school. He's a Scheduled Caste (Dalit -- the "Harijan" Gandhi spoke of as the "Children of God"). He can't afford to go to school. There he'd have to pay; here he gets paid.
"How much a day?", I inquire.
Two rupees.
"Two rupees??!!?"
Yes, labor is cheap in India. There's a lot of unemployment. Papu's happy to have work. He makes a little money and gets his meals free. For him this is a good life. There are many worse off than he. He knows that. His father, after all, makes 180 rupees/month, without meals, and, you know, he has to support a whole family on that.
Trust me, this little boy isn't complaining...
Kabir's Soulful Thoughts
I laugh when I hear that the fish in the water are thirsty.
You do not see that the Real is in your home, and you wander from forest to forest listlessly.
Here is the Truth!
Go where you will, from Benares to Mathura; if you do not find your soul, the world is unreal to you.
Kabir, poet
1440-1518
You do not see that the Real is in your home, and you wander from forest to forest listlessly.
Here is the Truth!
Go where you will, from Benares to Mathura; if you do not find your soul, the world is unreal to you.
Kabir, poet
1440-1518
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
News Flashes in Daily LIfe
I know friends prefer a brief written highlight or update from the darkened state of our lives in Nepal, rather than me sending an email clipping from the 'Guardian' on Kate Winslet's acting… so since I have a bit of time at the moment, let me slip into my natural blogging identity for a moment…
Hmmm…
Ok, not a great start.
On the weekend, I delved into ‘Sophie’s Choice’, the astonishing novel by William Styron that was made into a movie 25 years ago w/ Meryl Streep & Kevin Kline. A career bursting film for both of them that must have won a few Academy awards. It is an incredibly heart-breaking, soul-wrenching story set in 1947, but full of the agony and crisis of the Holocaust's shadow in Brooklyn. Stinko, the young, insightful Southern character who tells the tale is keenly observant that he has entered Sophie and Nathan's world that summer in NYC with the passionate couple living overhead and their stories flowing, drenching across the pages. I’m only 100+ pages in, but it’s a great read that, I'm sure, having seen the bitter movie, promises more pain ahead.
These nights, I actually enjoy reading by candle light from 9 to 11 pm, while Shakun finishes up homework w/ Ms. Leah Prajna Rose. I try to read Leah a book or two (how quickly we can get through a stack of her charming child’s picture books…) before dinner, then Shaku takes over with the serious writing & math homework. By that time, I’m feeling too tired to do my addition or subtraction, so I leave it to the girls to do the heavey lifting w/o me.
Although, given our present circumstances, I am a bit worried by the risk of fire when we have so many candles burning bright in the night. Last night, I came in when Shaku and Leah were already asleep about 11 pm and put their candle out. Earlier, when Giru, our Man Friday, had brought in our evening tea, he accidentally knocked the candle next to Leah’s bed over into her reading bag. There was a moment’s uncertainty, not quite panic, until he lifted it out, still burning, and put it back on the candle stand. I told Shaku this morning that we should get more enclosed candle stands, the types with glass around them, so I won’t worry at night about the real risks of returning to the 19th century in Kathmandu.
On the social prominence side of life, I am proud to say that I gave a talk at Leah’s class last week on “Bamboo and Other Living Plants”. Of course, I was anxious and uncertain, facing a class of seven and eight year olds on my own, but without too much undue self-flattery, I was a hit! The class was enthralled for nearly an hour and a half at the various bamboo that Leah & I had brought to class, plus the dozens of leaves that I’d picked from our garden that morning and in the dark the night before. I knew, of course, that Marcus would love the thin, 5', reed-like ‘Chimonobambusa’ bamboo, which earlier only the Shogun had been permitted to grow as horsewhips for his trusted steeds. This was so precious that I personally carried it in to the school, heroic, like Moses’ rod before the Pharaoh. All Leah's classmates enjoyed touching the leaves of so many textures, sizes and colors. Leah stood with me as my assistant throughout the talk, offering information and proudly knowing the answers to many of my questions to the class. Ms. Mathema referred to me as the local ‘botanist’ in this week’s 2nd Grade newsletter, although that’s more than a bit of an exaggeration. As you know, I just like to sit near bamboo to feel good about the world…
Anyway, most importantly, I think I scored serious points w/ Leah as she's been holding my hand and walking around the yard and home from school with me since then. After all, who knows the secrets of a seven year old gir's heart...
Also, on the professional front, my colleagues and I finished a two day workshop yesterday at the Park Village with the sixteen NGOs we selected for our civil society outreach initiative under this UNDP “Support to Participatory Constitution Building in Nepal” Project. They were selected out of 148 applicants to work with grassroots ‘historically marginalized’ communities to provide submissions & recommendations to the on-going Constituent Assembly. The NGOs spent two days in groups of four discussing and revising the objectives, strategies, activities, beneficiaries and budgets in their proposals. Hopefully, we’ll get the proposals approved by UNDP next week, then start in the facilitator’s training for these “Loktantric Sambad” (Democracy Dialogues) at the community level.
To say the least, I’m thoroughly enjoying this process of getting resources out to the most disadvantaged communities in Nepal so that their voices, too, may be heard above the fray. We've set up almost an NGO unit within UNDP, fully supported by the powers that be.
With Sila, my wise Kenyan colleague, Binda, our local Indigenous legal eagle, Deevya, our Tamang monitoring/evaluation specialist, Surendra, the grassroots Tharu activist, Kalpana, the UN insider among us, plus the ever-resourceful Saku P. to take of all of the essential arrangements, we make a merry band of fellow travelers who enjoy our work and working together.
Such is the local worldview in Kathmandu, all the news that's not fit to print in the NYTimes, nor heard on CNN, Al-Jazeera or BBC, today, Wednesday, February 5th, 2009.
Bye!!
Hmmm…
Ok, not a great start.
On the weekend, I delved into ‘Sophie’s Choice’, the astonishing novel by William Styron that was made into a movie 25 years ago w/ Meryl Streep & Kevin Kline. A career bursting film for both of them that must have won a few Academy awards. It is an incredibly heart-breaking, soul-wrenching story set in 1947, but full of the agony and crisis of the Holocaust's shadow in Brooklyn. Stinko, the young, insightful Southern character who tells the tale is keenly observant that he has entered Sophie and Nathan's world that summer in NYC with the passionate couple living overhead and their stories flowing, drenching across the pages. I’m only 100+ pages in, but it’s a great read that, I'm sure, having seen the bitter movie, promises more pain ahead.
These nights, I actually enjoy reading by candle light from 9 to 11 pm, while Shakun finishes up homework w/ Ms. Leah Prajna Rose. I try to read Leah a book or two (how quickly we can get through a stack of her charming child’s picture books…) before dinner, then Shaku takes over with the serious writing & math homework. By that time, I’m feeling too tired to do my addition or subtraction, so I leave it to the girls to do the heavey lifting w/o me.
Although, given our present circumstances, I am a bit worried by the risk of fire when we have so many candles burning bright in the night. Last night, I came in when Shaku and Leah were already asleep about 11 pm and put their candle out. Earlier, when Giru, our Man Friday, had brought in our evening tea, he accidentally knocked the candle next to Leah’s bed over into her reading bag. There was a moment’s uncertainty, not quite panic, until he lifted it out, still burning, and put it back on the candle stand. I told Shaku this morning that we should get more enclosed candle stands, the types with glass around them, so I won’t worry at night about the real risks of returning to the 19th century in Kathmandu.
On the social prominence side of life, I am proud to say that I gave a talk at Leah’s class last week on “Bamboo and Other Living Plants”. Of course, I was anxious and uncertain, facing a class of seven and eight year olds on my own, but without too much undue self-flattery, I was a hit! The class was enthralled for nearly an hour and a half at the various bamboo that Leah & I had brought to class, plus the dozens of leaves that I’d picked from our garden that morning and in the dark the night before. I knew, of course, that Marcus would love the thin, 5', reed-like ‘Chimonobambusa’ bamboo, which earlier only the Shogun had been permitted to grow as horsewhips for his trusted steeds. This was so precious that I personally carried it in to the school, heroic, like Moses’ rod before the Pharaoh. All Leah's classmates enjoyed touching the leaves of so many textures, sizes and colors. Leah stood with me as my assistant throughout the talk, offering information and proudly knowing the answers to many of my questions to the class. Ms. Mathema referred to me as the local ‘botanist’ in this week’s 2nd Grade newsletter, although that’s more than a bit of an exaggeration. As you know, I just like to sit near bamboo to feel good about the world…
Anyway, most importantly, I think I scored serious points w/ Leah as she's been holding my hand and walking around the yard and home from school with me since then. After all, who knows the secrets of a seven year old gir's heart...
Also, on the professional front, my colleagues and I finished a two day workshop yesterday at the Park Village with the sixteen NGOs we selected for our civil society outreach initiative under this UNDP “Support to Participatory Constitution Building in Nepal” Project. They were selected out of 148 applicants to work with grassroots ‘historically marginalized’ communities to provide submissions & recommendations to the on-going Constituent Assembly. The NGOs spent two days in groups of four discussing and revising the objectives, strategies, activities, beneficiaries and budgets in their proposals. Hopefully, we’ll get the proposals approved by UNDP next week, then start in the facilitator’s training for these “Loktantric Sambad” (Democracy Dialogues) at the community level.
To say the least, I’m thoroughly enjoying this process of getting resources out to the most disadvantaged communities in Nepal so that their voices, too, may be heard above the fray. We've set up almost an NGO unit within UNDP, fully supported by the powers that be.
With Sila, my wise Kenyan colleague, Binda, our local Indigenous legal eagle, Deevya, our Tamang monitoring/evaluation specialist, Surendra, the grassroots Tharu activist, Kalpana, the UN insider among us, plus the ever-resourceful Saku P. to take of all of the essential arrangements, we make a merry band of fellow travelers who enjoy our work and working together.
Such is the local worldview in Kathmandu, all the news that's not fit to print in the NYTimes, nor heard on CNN, Al-Jazeera or BBC, today, Wednesday, February 5th, 2009.
Bye!!
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