1st of December with my students

No one knows how these girls manage to find out teachers' birthdays, lock away the information in their memories, then throw a magnificant surprise party in class, all while pushing through piles of homework. Their attention was far more than I have earned, but it was a joy to spend this first day of my twenty-fifth year with them. We only made it through about a quarter of the day's lesson, but we all enjoyed the break and cake.

dreams and poetry

A few months ago, as an assignment related to an article on lucid dreaming that my students had read, I asked them to record their dreams that week in the reading journal they keep for my class. When I collected them, I was stunned by the poetic nature of these writings. There is something so unique about their expressions of abstract images through limited English vocabulary. The writings were also a beautiful way for me to learn more about my students' backgrounds. I've included a few examples below.

I saw in my dream, the sun was shining it was

too hot I was running....

Once I saw a child his eyes were blue he

took my hand and we went to the sky he showed

me the world and said, Do you know what is

the secret of blue color?

I see his blue eyes and I could say anything.

He put his hand on my eyes, my eyes became

blue and when I see the world with blue eyes

I realize what is the difference between

blue and black, then I wanted to say it

for that child, but he wasn't there

again I run and run...

But nobody was there. I had lost my eyes.

My eyes were black, this are not mind...

when I was crying my roommate woke me up and I

know that all of it was just a dream.

-Afghani student

I saw last night that I am in our garden

and my parents are sitting beside the garden.

My mother said: Razia be careful about the vegetables.

I am very happy and I am watering the garden

and I wet the wall and I smell the wet mud.

Both of my brothers are laughing at me.

And I wake up......

-Afghani student

One night, I had a dream about my family.

I always remember in my mind because it was a good dream for me and my family.

The dream expressed about my living at the countryside.

My family lived in the country near mountains, lakes, fields, etc.

My father was a farmer and my mother cleaned house.

My sister provided food to pet animals, like dogs, chickens, ducks, pigeons...

For me, I sat under the tree to read a book with fresh air.

My family was a happy family.

-Cambodian student

Some days ago, I dreamt a terrible dream about war.

The war was the independence war of Bangladesh.

I saw that the enemies entered into our area.

The people of that area were running to save themselves from the attack of the enemies.

I got frightened.

I tried to flee away by running, but I couldn't run.

I tried again and again.

But every time I failed.

At last, the enemies caught me, but they didn't do any harm to me.

I saw many dead body and destruction of lands.

My heart was beating.

When I awoke I was afraid.

I never forget that dream.

-Bangladeshi student

Thailand- Tanja - Tigers

It seems that a disproportionate amount of my posting this month has involved cats, especially considering the fact that I'm admittedly not a cat lover. However, in the course of this past week of Eid break in Thailand, spent with my dear friend Tanja Cesh, the only interesting photos I managed to snap were of cats, in a variety of sizes.

The first feline encounter involved these tiny newborns discovered in the garden of my host-mother's house in Mae Rim, Chiang Mai. The mom cat was no where to be seen, but the yapping dog (whom I remembered well from 3 years ago) drew our attention to these two little creatures. They were quite cute.

Our next Thai cats were a bit larger. On every song taew ride (a pick-up truck with two opposite-facing benches in the rear bed), we had seen ads for the "Tiger Kingdom" - a recent addition to the array of Chiang Mai animal theme parks, which I honestly find rather sad and disturbing. The tiger place hadn't existed when I was here as a student in '07. Tanja and I admitted that, despite the very obvious tourist-trap nature of it, the chance to touch tigers was probably a once-in-a-lifetime kind of thing.

So with my host mother and a Thai friend we showed up, paid our $10, and hung out with tigers - yes, inside their kingdom. I won't tell you about the stories I heard later that evening at a guesthouse, about visitors who have been mauled at this very spot, and how the park will deny it if you ask... Oh Thailand.

However, praise God we were all spared by our large, sharp-toothed (and handsome!) friends. Really, it just felt like were were hanging out with really big, less-crazy versions of Monkey (our little Chittagong cat). This one below had assumed the exact position of many living-room cats I've known.
Maybe I'll edit my earlier comment about not being a cat lover. Big cats are a different entity. Just look at this one below. Glorious.
I think I've had a respectful admiration and kindred affection for tigers since learning as a child that I was born in the "Year of the Tiger" - according to the Chinese lunar calendar. Actually 2010 brought us back into the year of the tiger, so perhaps this visit was appropriately timed.

During my personal time with the tiger (during which one of the trainers stands near with only a little stick for protection), I went ahead and did the hokey pose that the white people on the Tiger Kingdom's many posters display...

(I didn't feel as relaxed as I look)

Tanja got the ticket to play with the youngest tigers - Lulu and Lola. This one below was chewing on a toy Simba.

All in all, it was a fun and worthy excursion. I liked the effect of the photo below - taken by one of the trainers of the adolescent tigers - where it looks like the tigers are free and we're the ones in the cage. A potentially philosophical musing...

(A final cat note: Monkey is pregnant. Her 9-story leap accomplished the instinctual task. Monkey has shamed us. We're sending her to the village next week to live with our maid's sister.)

Festival of Lights

Deepavali, or Diwali, is the largest Hindu festival of the year, commemorating the story of the lord Rama's return from a fourteen-year exile, and the defeat of the demon-king Ravana. It is named the "festival of lights" after the celebretory act of the people of Ayodhya, who brightened the kingdom with earthen oil lamps and fire crackers to welcome Rama along with Sita and Lakshman.

The first flames that I saw that evening of the Puja were the candles that lit my friend's darkened room when the power went out (as it does every night). We were in the middle of applying our festival make-up. For the holiday, I had been invited to the home of Jorna, a young Hindu woman who cleans at the university. Before heading over to her home on the public bus, I stopped by AUW to have my lovely Sri Lankan student Aaraby (below) help me perfect the pleats of the red silk sari I wore for the occasion. Having others tend to me by dressing me in the several yards of fabric makes me feel like Mary Lennox in The Secret Garden.

Jorna and I arrived at her humble home to be greeted by her beautiful five-year old daughter Tisha who would be the subject of most of my photographs that evening. Tisha saw my sari and promptly hopped up on the bed to be wrapped in her own bright orange fabric. I learned that evening that Tisha lost her father five years ago. Jorna, who is older than me by no more than a few years, is already a widow of five years, working long days to provide for her daughter who is the world to her.

After the saris were on, little Tisha and I were ushered into the home across the alley to have our faces made up like dolls... I've opted not to show any close-up shots of the bright pink eye shadow that my new friends insisted on spreading thickly from lash to brow. I didn't argue - we were all having fun. However I also made a point of not looking in the mirror, as I didn't want to risk offending my artists by giving away my embarrassment through an accidentally expressive facial reaction. It's just that pink isn't really my color.
When the darkness was heavy over the town, we stepped out into candle-lit the streets that were quickly filling with neighbors clad in glitter and sequins.

My friend Jorna was beautiful in her bright teal sari with golden embroidered beads. Her usual cleaning-service garb consists of a red polo shirt with black pants and scarf. Up close the synthetic sari fabric and plastic jewelry betrayed the poverty of its owner, but in my opinion, together with her brightly dressed Tisha, Jorna looked like royalty.

Then came the viewing of the shrines set up around the neighborhood. We three walked proudly through the small streets, throwing our heads back at the hilarity of the comments people were making about the bideshi, the only foreigner present, dressed in a sari. Jorna's brother was our chaperone, soon accompanied by his "best friend" who became the third person of the day to ask if I could take them to America. It's a common question, and admitedly a hard one to respond to. My claim that America would not give them the perfect easy life that they imagine is a hard one to sell.
At every shrine, a whole company of curious onlookers would move aside and insist that the Bideshi madam take a photo in front of the victorious Rama.

After the fifth or sixth stage, little Tisha was wilting and Jorna and I took turns carrying her (not easy to do in a sari, I learned! How'd my mom manage to keep kempt all those years with three little ones?) Jorna's brother was very upset that I should be carrying the child. "Put her down!" he kept shouting, while Tisha and I bounced happily along the edges of the crowded streets. Several times the elder brother's insistence won out and poor Jorna had to reclaim her weary daughter, handing back my much lighter purse.

At one point we were directed into the home of the brother's friend, to whom (I'm sure) the brother had promised a visit from the bideshi lady. I know Jorna was thankful for the chance to rest her feet though, so we sat and enjoyed diluted mango juice served by the man's mother.
Tisha suddenly revived when the outside music began to drift through the windows of the small home where we were taking our brief rest from festival-viewing. As she lifted her tiny hands to dance, a precious smile spread across her small face. Watching her twirl and laugh, I wished to be a child again...

Back at Jorna's mother's home, the other women of the family were preparing some rice, lentils, and roti. Jorna kept trying to express how ashamed she was to be serving me such a humble meal, but I enjoyed every bite of it - in fact it was wonderful to have a break from the fried foods that are the typical fare of special occasions.
At the end of it all, on the CNG ride home with Jorna and her brother, I was absolutely exhausted. I dropped my tired head onto Jorna's shoulder, and she wrapped her sisterly arms around me. I realized that was the closest I'd felt to anyone in quite some time; and yet we stand worlds apart in terms of wealth, education, life experience, language and faith. What I longed for most of all that evening was to have the language comphrehension to hear more about her sorrows and triumphs as a single mother. Then I would tell her how that evening she had blessed me with a welcome that surpassed even the lights of Rama's Ayodhya.

the cat came back!

Unbelievable.
So three days ago, the cat defenestrated herself - leapt from balcony of our 9th floor flat - and as we found out moments ago, she survived! The physicists were right: she reached terminal velocity, instinct kicked in, and she walked away unharmed.
We used to sing a song at CPEC in Dhaka when I was little. "But the cat came back, the very next day, they thought he was a gonner but the cat came back, 'cause he couldn't stay away..."

Well, Monkey is back - she was filfthy, and had lost all her apartment-cat fat in three days... so it turns out she's probably not best suited for the wild.

As you could gather from my previous post, I wasn't too beat up about the little creature's flight. Alyssa and I spent our morning runs chuckling about what intensity of mating instinct it must take to possess a cat to leap from nine stories high. Alyssa's refrain over the last few days has been, "Oh Monkey, will we every see your furry orange face again, or hear your plaintive mew?" And we both admitted that chances were slim. Fatema (Monkey's more kind-hearted mother) refused to up hope, and she posted signs around our building with Monkey's picture. Apparently a guard from the next building over said that they'd seen a new orange cat added to their mix of felines over there, so Fatema headed over there this evening. I was definitely dubious. The only way Monkey would have gotten out of the building would have been to leap, and with all the barbed wire walls and concrete, I just couldn't see the terminal velocity rule working out for her...

I'd just finished making dinner tonight when Fatema's voice entered the flat, "Monkey's home!"

Unbelievable.

It's definitely her. There are lots of orage cats in Bangladesh, but there's only one orange Monkey. Her orange fur was turned quite grey, but Ms. Fatema took care of that with some Pantene ProV.

Happy reunion....

for Fatema and Monkey at least.

the defenestration of monkey

This vignette is a somewhat of a tragedy...

When I moved into our three-bedroom flat 2 1/2 months ago, I met my three other roommates - Fatema, Suzanne, and Monkey the cat - or Cat the monkey, as you wish.

Monkey and I had a rough relationship. I've never been a huge cat person, and I think this spazastic little creature picked up on this cold attitude of mine rather early. And she was cold to me in return. I like to get up at 5am and have peaceful mornings. Monkey tries her best to sabotage this silent solitude. Monkey meows and I ignore her. Monkey knocks a glass off my bedstand, shattering it to the floor, and I angrily shuffle her out of my room to clean up the mess. The stench of Monkey's litter box taints the taste of my coffee when I wander out to the veranda for sunrise. So goes our relationship.

Monkey was spayed a couple months ago, but has still had a couple bouts of going "into heat" - wherein her abnoxious-factor skyrockets. The cries become higher pitched, and her over-affectionate purrs turn in an instant into violent biting and scratching. She went into heat a few days ago, on the same weekend that she had started (at least in my view) to target me deliberately as her nemesis. Friday, she deposited her excrement under my bed on my LL Bean hiking back pack. Saturday, I caught her in mid-urination on my bed, and grabbed the skin of her neck (this is the only way she allows us to transport her) to run her out to the veranda, her wet trail continued in drops across the living room. Well, it was official, we weren't really friends, although I admit, having Monkey around always made for interesting conversation pieces with roommates and guests.

Fatema and I returned from the market on Saturday and after some time in the flat, we realized we'd seen neither hide nor hair of Monkey, and the search began.... She's definitely not in the apartment. Neighbors haven't seen her (plus the door was locked and there's just no way she'd get out of the apartment without the door-opener noticing. The guards had no news either...

We live on the 9th floor, and all our windows/verandas are open - all the time. Monkey was in heat, and desperate for a man-cat. My firm belief is the poor little Monkey defenestrated herself. "Defenestration" means "to throw out of a window."

I learned this word on an episode of "Radio Lab" - a public radio program of interesting stories/talks around a theme. The Radio Lab theme several weeks ago was on "Falling," and interestingly enough, one of the sketches was about cats falling out of high-rise apartments. Some NY veterinarians did some research on the statistics of the high number of cats they inspect who have fallen from windows. Their research had some fascinating results: cats that fell from the 2nd story and below were mostly fine; cats that fell from between the 3rd and 8th stories had the lowest survival rate; however, cats that fell from the 9th floor or higher, had just has good a chance of making it as the ones that fell from the 2nd floor! Physics can explain this baffling statistic: the cats would reach terminal velocity by around the 8th floor. Once there, they no longer experience the sensation of acceleration and they are able instinctively to pull their legs underneath them, stretch out their legs like a flying squirrel, and slightly slow themselves down before landing in a little belly flop, and most often, walking away unharmed. One cat in New York fell from the 42nd floor and walked away with minor bruising and a chipped tooth!

Alyssa and I have been calling Monkey's name on our runs in the morning. We've seen other cats, happily playing in groves of trees and flowers by the peaceful residential streets where we live. Because we didn't see any sign of Monkey on the ground nine floors below, it is my belief that she is doing just fine wherever she is. Cat the monkey is a wild animal. She's a survivor.

I have to admit, I miss her. Yesterday morning a big live cockroach greeted me in the kitchen. Cat was the best exterminator we could have asked for - chemical-free and all - and prior to her flight, the only bugs greeting me in the kitchen were upside-down and unmoving. Still, I saw the looks on the faces of those free cats in the Khulshi wild, and they seemed to be living the life. I like to think that Monkey has already been adopted into their warm community. Sure, it would be nice to have her back for a visit, but if she chose to taste freedom by leaping out of the window, knowing she'd probably survive, I'm inclined to respect that decision.

Godspeed, Monkey, wherever you are.

calling Khun Paw

How is it already November?!
I admit that I'm a little overwhelmed by long days at school, losing inspiration for creative lessons, getting behind on grading, watching a student cry over a solid "C" on midterm exam...
Without doubt, my days have been joyful and full of interesting stories, but I do wish I could find more time to write about them. But instead of buckling down for long narratives during these busy days, I'll post a few snippets during my morning cha (tea) time, before I get back to grading...

Last night I used google call phone to call my Thai host parents from the semester when I studied abroad in college. It had been three years and needless to say, "Khun Paw" sounded rather shocked to hear my voice. It was an interesting conversation, as he doesn't speak a lick of Engish, and at 80 years old, his hearing is a little weak. But I managed to communicate my exciting news to him - that I will be in Chiang Mai in two weeks!

Tanja and I have decided to meet up again before she heads back West.

My conversation with Paw, translated to English, went something like this.

"Sawat dee ka, Khun Paw, this is daughter Christa"

"Chi-taa! Where are you?"

"I'm in Bangladesh"

"Where has daughter been? Where did daughter go? Maa and I were so sad that we didn't know where you were."

"I'm really sorry, Paw, I missed you both much much. I'm coming to Thailand in 2 weeks! Do you still live in Mae Rim?"

"Yes, daughter, we still live at street 5, tambon Maesa."

"I'll see you there in 2 weeks! Is Mom well?"

"Yes she's well."

"Ok. See you in 2 weeks!"

So I'll try use the remnants of my Thai language to be able to get Tanja and I from the train station (after we do the overnight train from Bangkok to Chiang Mai) to my host parents' for a bizarre reunion. Even in my convo with Paw, the Bangla was creeping in quite a bit. My brain's poor Broca's area is going to be getting quite the work out, but I'm looking forward to the time to reconnect not only with the language, but the hills, the culture, the food, the people, and Tanja!

"hanging our shirts" and other weekend rituals

"Coming home after school, flying my bike past the gates of the factories.

My mom doing the laundry, hanging our shirts in the dirty breeze..." - Simon and Garfunkel

One of my favorite weekend rituals, on sunny Saturdays in Chittagong, has been the several-hour long process of doing laundry. We are extremely fortunate to have a washing machine that even spins our clothes at the end of the cycle, significantly aiding the drying process. The machine takes hours to fill with water, and though I can't say my clothes turn out that much cleaner after the long cycle, I know that the results of my attempts at hand-washing would be dismal in comparison. The important thing is how they smell when I pull the freshly spun cloths out of the plastic machine in the kitchen. I love the smell of laundered sheets. Then up to the roof for the best part, during which Simon and Garfunkel's line from "My Little Town" about hanging shirts in dirty breeze always starts humming through my head. The breeze doesn't feel so dirty here, but the thick film of dust on my dresser, after a few days of open windows, often argues otherwise.
Still, sun-dried sheets, with the lingering scent of jasmine detergent, make my whole life feel cleaner. After laundry, I re-hang my clothes, feeling immensely satisfied by my little almira (closet) neatly arranged with colorful salwar kameezes, saris, ornas and one or two Western clothing items.
So far, nearly every weekend here I have been honored to receive an invitation for tea or lunch (often both) in Bangladeshi homes. Usually, these generous invitations come from cleaning staff at the university campus - the few women with whom I can regularly practice my limited (but hopefully expanding!) Bangla vocabulary. The homes are simple but inviting, and I often feel more comfortable in their community-oriented neighborhoods than in my high-rise building of closed apartment doors. While we sipped tea at one home, a "mashi" (auntie), pictured below on the right, asked to adopt me as her daughter, since she only has sons. "Abar ashbe," - "Come again!" they always say as I leave. Of course, I tell them, "Abar ashbo." I will come again because, as I wish I could express to them, they are the women who have made me feel most at home in Chittagong.
In addition to being fed delicious spicy curries in Bangladeshi homes, weekends in my own apartment also revolve around making food to satisfy some craving that hit one of us teachers during a long day at the office the previous week. A couple weeks ago it was hummus and baba ganoush. I fell in love with the recipe from a hummus blog - yes, a website exclusively dedicated to middle eastern chickpea recipes: http://humus101.com/EN/2006/10/14/hummus-recipe/

On the first batch of hummus, the electric blender caught fire, so the second batch was rescued by a nice large mortar and pestal to blend the dark chickpeas, homemade tahini, garlic, cumin, and lemon. This recipe turned out quite wonderfully. Gone are my days of over-priced, store-bought hummus!
Since my weekday meals usually include many delicious Bangladeshi curries and over-cooked vegetables ordered from a cheap place near campus, I feel deprived of raw fruits and vegetables. I love having the luxury of extra time to sit at the table on weekends, chopping and chatting with flatmates. The colors of fresh produce here still blow me away.
Fresh jasmine laundry + sweet tea and talking + smooth-textured tahini + and bright purple cabbage + time to enjoy the sensory explosion = perfect weekend.

Rain

Before leaving Maine, I found a masterful drawing I had created as a four-year-old in Ishurdi. It's a picture of a girl in the Bangladesh rain.... with a nice big smile... and a crown, of course.
Last weekend Alyssa and I found ourselves caught in one of the beautiful, cleansing downpours of the Bangladesh monsoon season. I suppose sometimes they're not so cleansing - namely when they overflow the sewage gutters along the roads' edges. But on this particular Saturday, after a week when the heat had rested heavily on our Chittagong days, everyone seemed to welcome the downpour. Seeing these kids splash joyfully down the street brought a flood of sweet memories from days on Iqbal Road in Dhaka, where my brothers and neighbors and I used to take to the outdoors with the fall of the first fat drop on the cement roof.
The rain certainly hadn't discouraged Alyssa and I from proceeding with the day's plan to find our way to the Chittagong War Cemetery. I had been hearing for weeks that this spot was one of the few neat public "green spaces" in the city, and this fact alone cancelled out the potential morbidity of visiting a graveyard. Still, we found the clouds and thunder appropriate to the occasion. The burial ground honors the memories of a several hundred Bideshi (including Brits, Americans, Nigerians, Japanese, etc) and Bangladeshi World War II soldiers, sailors and engineers.

We walked the rows in the rain, reading the epithets of beloved fathers, sons, brothers, friends, and the Biblical or Quranic verses sending them onward.

Soon the sun came out again, and the neatly planted flora seemed to appear out of nowhere - their colors suddenly vivid under the brightened sky.

How lovely are the rains when they gently summon these coveted colors, but kindly desist from flooding the homes of those on the river banks...

Tanja and the Malumghat holiday

Over the Eid holiday, a dear friend from my other life (the life with snow and lobster) visited me in Chittagong... no big deal, right? You should all come visit! Tanja did happen to be in the right hemisphere, which made this reunion a little easier - and what a sweet one it was! I had stayed with Tanja in Boston back in March while I interviewed for this job at AUW. At that time she was beginning to imagine this journey she'd take to South Asia to partner with anti-human-trafficking organizations that focus on income-generation projects for vulnerable women and girls (Int'l Princess Project, Made by Survivors... see under "links"). She's been in India and Bangladesh since August 1st and is headed next to Nepal and S.East Asia. It was incredible to sit here in my apartment together, remembering our conversations over the past year, now seeing her photos of what we'd only imagined back then. Besides that, we still reminisce about the fact that I was eleven years-old when we first met; Tanja used to take me out for ice-cream in Bath, Maine. A dozen years later I'm negotiating with a rickshaw-wallah to take us downtown for dinner. Several times we broke into spontaneous laughter over the fact that years ago we never would have guessed we'd be in Bangladesh together... very far from Woolwich.

Tanja's visit couldn't have been timed better, since she arrived a few days before my week-long holiday from teaching. On Monday before break she spoke to my smiling, captivated students about her experiences. One student asked her, "Ma'am, what is your greatest ambition?" The students were moved by Tanja's answer, which revealed her dedication to combatting injustices against women.

On Tuesday, we left for Malumghat, to spend four days at the guesthouse and campus of Memorial Christian Hospital. Apart from being close enough (3 hour bus ride) for us to avoid Eid traffic, Malumghat was for many reasons the best choice for a relaxing time away from the city. Also, I had been eager to revisit this place that is an important landmark in our family.

My first visit to Memorial Christian Hospital was in February 1988 to welcome the perfect gift of my brother David into our family. Above, my mother and I are just getting to know little bitty David. Because of that old photo, I was immediately able to recognize the picnic table during this recent visit (pictured below).

Malumghat was indeed the most peaceful place I have visited in my short time here so far, and I have a strong feeling (plus some hints from others who live here) that there are few places that compare.... unless you're a doctor, in which case it's not so quiet. Surrounded by rice paddies, and flowers, and everywhere green, the campus is a paradise after weeks spent in the deafening beats of city traffic and construction.

It felt like it had been years, rather than weeks, since I had locked my arms in streamline position above my head to dive into my favorite form of H2O. I miss swimming, so the pool at the hospital campus was one of my favorite spots. There I met some wonderful little playmates, Silas, Naomi and Seth (children of Dr. Stephen and Monika Welch) who shared my affinity for aqueous fun.

From Malumghat, we took a day trip down to Cox's Bazaar, where first we visited a Burmese market. I had an engaging conversation with an educated Burmese-Bangladeshi shop owner about the current political situation in that junta-run state across the border.

And finally, we saw what Cox's Bazaar is most known for: the longest natural sea beach in the world. My parents actually got engaged here, so again I found myself on sacred ground in my pilgrimage of family landmarks.

Alyssa and Tanja (below) and I enjoyed the late afternoon sun by splashing in the Bay of Bengal in our salwar kameezes. We were so fortunate to find an abandoned stretch of beach; apart from a few cows, we weren't accompanied by the usual crowds of curious onlookers.
The week of respite and adventures wrapped up last Sunday, when Tanja and I took our final CNG ride back to the airport at Patenga beach in Chittagong. On the breezy ride back to my home in Khulshi, already missing my friend, I watched the river boats float quietly in place - their captains away with families for the holiday.