Unaccustomed Earth : Jhumpa Lahiri

The book opens with the quote "Human nature will not flourish, any more than a potato, if it be planted and replanted, for too long a series of generations, in the same worn out soil. My children have had other birthplaces, and, so far as their fortunes shall be within my control shall strike their roots into unaccustomed earth."

There are eight stories in this book, about Bengali immigrants to America and the lives they live as they bridge old home and new home.  These stories do wonders to break into lives of the model immigrants to the US.. who work and produce and pay taxes and do not break laws. However, thinking of all the characters in Tagore's stories, and in Ray's films.. these stories help to bring to life some of the dilemmas of preserving culture, integration, settling into a new place.

The stories are longish.. the last three follow the lives of two Hema and Kaushik.
Unaccustomed Earth is about a woman, her father and his new found love; Hell-Heaven about unrequited love outside of marriage; A Choice of Accommodations about lust in marriage; Only Goodness about guilt, alcoholism in the family; Nobody's Business about love and lust and cheating.

Lahiri develops her stories gently and then in the end there are 'sledgehammer conclusions' as one reviewer put it. 

 I started reading stories in Junot Diaz' Drown, about Dominican Republican and wondered if his characters could be compared to Lahiri's characters. Similar themes of love, displacement , cheating, lusting but different encounters with the immigration.. Lahiri's characters are nice and middle class; Diaz' are not.

The book is worth a read.. and reread.

Guilt, depression, fear, detachment and pampers...

The taxi driver told me that he wished that he could look after his parents - they still send money for him from Canada. He quoted one of the Bible verses about honouring mother and father.
A man told me I would get blessings , another relative told me it is a good thing that I do not have a family of my own. Two friends tell me to take a break, make arrangements.
My generation of middle class Hindu boys learned mantras, mathematics, science, to talk nicely, take our drinks. We were told to respect and be obedient to our parents. Some of us were, some were not. They never told us though.. about when the time would come to shift the role, to become the parent of the parents.


Guilt
So.. life changes drastically. Great uncertainty.. the people who gave you life and the mother who had labour pains and cared for you.. need you now to care for them. You are not ready though.. and you want them to be well. You have been arguing with your mother to go to the doctor, but it is not a child who you take to the doctor.  So as things change, guilt is there at the resentment building up because roles are changing and you not ready.. especially as the family dysfunctions surface. 
Guilt stupidly.. because you do not tell the friends you know, for whom either parent have died.. that you are caring for the parents.. bTheir pain at the loss of the parent.. they want you to cherish yours.. and so more guilt..  you still have your parents.. they do not have theirs.  Guilt that knowing you better off than some other people, who have less resources and are dealing with more intense situations.


Depression
The powerlessness at not being able to cure the pain or ease the discomfort. The fatigue of not being able to sleep.. of trying to be alert while also trying to manage your life. All the other issues take their toll.. worries about finances.. about how much time to manage the work, about trying to keep jobs about ; about future medical care ;; about my own aging.. and health and the things which need fixing but cannot be fixed as yet.. as the little energy is focussed on ensuring a healing environment.. Shame every time you quarrel with the sick parent..  And then trying to find ways of not burdening other people, because there are no ways of fixing the situation really..

Fear
Being afraid.. that the pain and discomfort might get worse, that you would not be in a physical or financial position to offer comfort and care. Fear that you might die before them and that they cannot get the care they deserve. Fear that medication will not be easily available. Fear that family dysfunctions would reverse the progress being made..

Detachment
At some point.. realising that... the best way to care,, is not about love. Love brings all kind of distractions (or hate.. or apathy depending on the relationship with the parent). Detachment is important so that things can be done efficiently.. so that you accept what is inevitable and not worry about the future. that the here and now.. do this, do that, bring this, bring that.. not worry about what they were like in the past.. or how the roles have shifted... Detachment is about not wishing for blessings; or thinking about the labour pains which brought you into the world;.. it is about being human and being able in a position to try to do the best you can

Pampers..
Learning about pampers and thanking God for Underwear Pullups Extra Large at $3,000 a pack.  Starting to find ways of changing routine, of planning. Of catching a nap when the sick are sleeping. Of sleeping with one eye. Of finding ways of exercising. Of resisting the urge to indulge in sweet. Of planning menus in  your head.. Of being reassuring.. of not making the parent feeling ashamed at their loss of control.. of trying to return control to the parent when necessary so that they do not become frustrated or depressed at the shift in roles. And also.. of not indulging in the sweet, the sugar.. of being careful.. of taking note so that you do not also become ill, or that you manage any physical or mental illness carefully so that you do not become unable to do the caring duties.

Tek a drink fuh pagwah

Phagwah morning. The first house after the service finish at the mandir. The jhandhi flag was there... and close by, the table with the vodka and rum on it with the bowl of ice. I was fed up, the year before one of my relatives wanted to kill his parents on Phagwah Day.


Other memories of people who were drunk.. and being scared of people who might seem 'funny' who switched into violent behaviour. 
 One of the opinionated Hindu men who used to give lectures at the mandir about everybody and so on.. was taking his drink. I hollered on him.. what example was he setting.. nuff people vex with me.. how could I talk to a big man like that.

Same day we were singing at another place.. with a shop.. which was not closed and alcohol was being sold..  I lost my train of thought when I thought of the letter I had written because some Carib was sponsoring a Phagwah Celebration event. After the letter, the event's name was changed. But it was pointless,, because there are Hindu people who profit from the misery inflicted on Hindu families.

That was the last day I played Phagwah.


Phagwah is one of the interesting Hindu Festivals which people are not sure whether it is religious or cultural.. though in Hinduism all activities and events are 'religious'.

But one thing with the Hindu people .. is that rum is a part of the celebrations for many people. Not meat really.. though we hear in the old days the day after Phagwah was kangan and some people in my family used to kill a sheep.

But things evolve.. the Hindu intoxicant was bhang (extracted from the ganja plant) and Lord Shiva 's devotees use bhang in the worship. Bhang though, is different from ethanol and its derivatives.  Bhang was banned in the British colonies and the old folk remember times when there was a drying of the leaves and so on.. replaced by the white man spirit.. rum.

The tradition holds then.. the men singing chowtaal going around.. teking they drink or having they quarter in the bag. I remember one old man who sang with us before Phagwah.. he would take his tups and come .. and his breath on the high notes used to make me dizzy.

So all the nice tales, of Hindu people having fun.. nice joke of men by the end of the day.. fighting. Or forgetting the words of what they singing..

This having fun has come at a cost as alcohol use has wreaked havoc on many Hindu families.  Some people though, usually curb their disgust.. and try not to say anything.  I will not demonise people who use alcohol.   I cannot hide my disgust and rather than get into a fight with anybody on Phagwah Day.. I opt to stay home.

death of young man; his father and uncles

"De gyal wine musee de really sweet".. his uncle said. "He was strong, nuttin de wrang wid he".. another uncle said" "I was there with him since he was a baby" the uncle said.
"He is the biggest son and the best son' the father said.
"Dat is a f..g wrang ting he do".. his uncle said
"If he dead in a accident, it would ah bettah" .. another uncle said
"No. wait on de f..g post mortem.. you aint know how he dead yet".. another uncle, me in denial , said

"De gyurl call he on de phone.. one of he frends buy a round of beers -  he frends dem say he walk away and lef dem".. another uncle said

"He is good looking, he could get any gyurl.. " the other uncle said
"I dont care.. bury or cremate" the father said
"You could take the ash and bury it " one uncle told the father
"Nah.. Hindu, let the ash in the sea.. let him go" the uncle said

"He was wrang.. really wrang to do dis.. he had no reason.. love always deh, nuff mo woman deh" one uncle said angrily

" V.. killed himself last night.. " the father told each uncle.. in phone calls since last night

Kumar and the woman who is not Miss India Worldwide..

830am. Saturday.. 44 bus.. heading up the East Coast. Soca playing. I jump in the front seat. Church Road. Driver in kangol and shades. Driver change to some other dancehall tunes. Name Kumar on the windshield with the phone number. A photo of Kumar and some children.  On the Dashboard, right hand side.. murti - Lord Krishna and Lord Vishnu and the fresh flower; on the left hand side, white woman with bikini and long hair.. no fresh flower. Hindu religion allows that.. the temples at Khajuraho have lots of sex images.

Sheriff Street. Stop light. The bus is full of men and loud noise through the window. Over the road, three women.. one of them her skirt is blowing up. She trying to keep it down.

The Men are loud.. probably like the men and women who cheer on the beauty pageant contestants (or boo or mock or tear apart those they think should not win the beauty pageants)

Kumar is there too.. the loud music also in the bus.. I ask Kumar.. what wrong.. why they don't you  leave the woman alone?

The woman, Kumar said.. should know better. She should not wear a dress which blow up. I said to Kumar.. what if is your sister.. Kumar said that his sister would not dress like that.. the women .. all of them , were looking at the bus in fear.

The bus rile up though.. and the whole journey.. all the young women on the road, regardless of how they were dressed were targets of the language of rape.. violence..

And we hear this Sunday morning that 'Guyana' get in.. there is a Miss India Worldwide or something like that.

Guyanese women - including women and girls who are beaten, raped, harassed are told that the beauty pageants are good for them.. that the men like Kumar and his passengers in the bus will respect and love women more because of the pageants and the prominence given to the women and girls

Men don't need to participate in pageants.

(There is some MBC Miss Phagwah too.. something about the Hindu festivals and the degradation of women)

I asked Kumar what if a man called out to him wanting sex and so on because the man think Kumar dress nice and looking for sex.. he looked at me funny but kept driving..

I mourn for all of those who believe that women have to participate in beauty pageants to get respect and for Guyana to get fame. 

Coconut oil and soursop milkshake..

The lady look at me smiling.. she seated on a stool sipping her drink like in the movies. I was wandering around craving sweet.. resisting the urge to go for the Red Cherry Milkshake which seems to be averse for my stomach.. Stress over the last couple of months seems to have taken its toll so ....

So I see the place.. with blenders and so on, and the lady looking at me and smiling.. and I say okay.. give me the soursop milkshake... The lady smile and say.. yeah.. the soursop taste nice.. that is what I having..

And so we start gaffing.. while the girl in the grass skirt over her jeans.. blending up the milkshake..

The lady from Essequibo.. she come down but did not bother with Mash.. I told her I worked too. She say soursop good for you.. I say yes.. some people tell me how soursop and coconut oil and noni good for your beauty..and that coconut oil working for me as well on my skin

She smile.. and say - coconut oil.. she used to use as a child, her grandmother used to make.. but now.. not now the smell.. I say true true.. but the clear one dont smell.. lady peep she blackberry.. and put it back..
not like some people, dey answer back text and so on while dey talking to you..

Soursop milkshake come.. and it is nice.. and I sipping and the lady sipping.. and we gaffing.. no there is no place like this in Essequibo.. and she comes when she in town.. and that yes.. the elevator in the mall look scary.. she dont want to go alone.. i did not say.. leh we go up den.. but i say no, i does take the steps for exercise..

Our milkshake half way in the glass.. I see she looking to see how fast I drinking and I doing the same.. she say she got a cough.. I say ginger good for cough.. she say yes.. and we gaff and she smiling and the milkshake going down..

I have meh salt bag on the counter ( I heading to market).. I ask her what causing her cough.. she say.. is fan, that last night her husband had to take off the fan and it help her cough..

I finish off meh milkshake quick quick.. I say yes.. fan aint good, try the ginger.. and I say.. was nice talking.. have a nice trip and yuh right.. this milkshake nice.. and I pick up meh salt bag and head down to Bourda Market .. to my favourite vendor who does tell me ting like .. she cant believe nice man like me dont have wife and .. dat i look like i does lie plenty to woman and so on.. ( i never bother to compare her prices with anybody else)

Religion, politics, Shivratri 2012

My horoscope (Scorpio) say dat I must not talk about Religion and Politics today because I will lose friends .. or something like that. Well yep, I will talk about Religion AND Politics and how I vex bad that Hinduism in Guyana now seems to be aligned with the oppressors rather than the oppressed.

Shivratri was Monday.. I stayed home. I know many devout devotees of Lord Shiva went to temple.. and some not so devout devotees of Lord Shiva also went and then there were others who went because it would look bad if they did not go.

I heard that Shivratri should have been celebrated Sunday night.. but that is how it goes with our Hindu calendars.. depending where you are, who taught you, we get all these wonderful nuances of faith and ritual.

Nothing wrong with that..

A lot of people go to the Cove and John Ashram .. big celebrations there and I am sure during the days when people felt that Hinduism was under threat, the Ashram flourished...
And so it is , Hinduism is now closely aligned with the "Indian' party.. not only quietly supporting but celebrating the style of leadership which has us constantly in fear and behind where we could have been as a society.

The Hindu organisations have always been political in Guyana

It is no secret that the Guyana Hindu Dharmic Sabha is aligned proudly with the PPP.  In the old days , the Pandits' Council and Maha Sabha never spoke against the PNC .  Other Hindu leaders like Swami Aksharananda seem to have caved in to the populist Hindu support of the PPP (and to the fear of the return of the bad old days of the PNC).. so there is no more public objection to the oppression and corruption.


Shivratri .. worship of Lord Shiva, the destroyer.. Cove and John Ashram sought to honour former President Jagdeo.  Hinduism is diverse like that.. you could pray to who you want. Maybe it is that the Hindus who attend the Ashram have benefited from Mr Jagdeo's policies.. that there is no poverty around them, that the police who serve them do not take bribes from them, that the places they go for health care are efficient, modern and up to date. Maybe there is a higher literacy rate among the Hindus who attend the Ashram, and that the experience of poverty is different and that the Hindus are grateful to Mr Jagdeo for allowing Roger Khan to rescue them from the terror, without ever having any investigation into the cause of that terror.. or of trying to reform the police force which is supposed to serve them.

Hinduism is diverse like that.. we are allowed freedom in our worship and in our selection of who to worship. Some of us have to keep our distance from our Hindu sanghs.. because we could end up being part of the support for the oppressive leadership.

While reflecting on the style of leadership which some Hindus in Guyana choose to revere, it was good to note that in Campbelville.. one street.. some quiet revolutions were going as the chowtaal gole I normally sing with.. the gole was able to move between different mandirs.. including a mandir whose history is one of rejection of the PPP oppression. The young members of the gole were happy to be able to go .. freely and without fear that they would be told that they should not go.. and it was as it should be.. one gole, three mandirs in the Community.. and the gole sang everywhere. This happened because of one young man's desire to move people out of the fear they had at going to 'certain places'. 

Lord Shiva blessed us in different ways... His blessings are no doubt without discrimination. We Hindus in our diversity should remember.. that we will never prosper  though when other law abiding citizens do not have access to the  prosperity which is supposed to belong to all of us.

we need rigging

Comrades
I need to clarify some statements I made about rigging of our national elections. We in the ruling party have been confused as you rightly know since that night in November - it is too painful for some of us to remember when we realised that something was wrong and that we were actually winning or losing the elections.

Comrades.. as many of you have indicated in rum shops and pussur pussur way.. you were not going to vote for us.. and we deliberately set cussdeo out to ensure that everybody get a cussing up.

It was a confusing day - many of our polling agents reported that they were being harassed and we had to let them know that Kwome, Otinga and the 14th disciple of Jesus - were actually working for us and not the traditional opposition as in the old days... and that the bombastic intimidation tactics were meant to harass opposition voters, not our voters. We therefore realised too late that our voters did not want to vote because they felt intimidated by these former opposition agents who were using intimidation tactics who got confused.

We tried to send out our party agents to correct this misconception but then we also got confused as to who our real party agents were, and who were the opposition ones since we had a lot of cross over candidates.

Comrades, so that is confusion number one to clear up and we now clear it up.

Secondly..  some of us said voter apathy and how we have to fix things up and do grass roots work. That is stupid.. I do not agree. Our experienced polling agents told us that we had not 52% or 54% but 53% of the vote.. yes.. in fact we had a landslide victory.  Why 53%.. well 53 is the first prime number after 50% and that is a good number for us to work with.. to believe in .. it is solid, cannot be broken down into any factors.

So we know that 53% is the number we intended to get.. but unfortunately.. something got wrong in the communication and the jumbie votes did not come in properly...and the confusion about who is to intimidate who and so on.. well things got mixed up.



Comrades.. we need rigging to keep us going in these rough and unchartered waters. Without rigging as you know, we cannot move forward. Rigging is needed and I cannot see how my party could ever govern without rigging. Comrades, we all know that ships need their rigging in order to move forward.. and we need rigging to do the same.

To sit in or not to sit in - UG 2012

Two young women came up to me after the class. They wanted to do their assignment on race, and aggression in Guyana. Another woman wants to look at Clubbing in Guyana and who gets the money. I am anxious to see what the other students will do in their assignments. One of the guys is thinking about doing his assignment on hip hop dancing in Berbice. There are other students who travel from far to attend the University and to make the class.


Another woman who will give birth soon wants to continue her education and to manage motherhood and the University education.

I met a lecturer before the class who is fed up with the circumstances at the University. She is a graduate of the University and remembers the protests when she was a student. She is also appalled at the apathy of the students who seem not to understand the larger picture. Another graduate of the University is active in the Union and he realises that there are multiple issues, and that the termination of Mr Frederick Kissoon is the least of the injustices being perpetrated against people at the University.

It has been a strange year personally. The protests at the University of Guyana after the termination of Mr Frederick Kissoon have included academic and non-academic staff and some students. I say some students, because I had a large turnout for my first lab session today. I am a part-time lecturer and I realise the importance of the actions of the staff. But I feel that the PPP are determined to destroy the University .. the last of the legacy of Cheddi Jagan. I do not know if there are any PPP students at the University and how they feel about their situation and who they blame for it.

I have to do the lab part of the online journalism course. One of the rewards has been meeting people who value education and who are also sacrificing to finish a degree. Some of them think it will be easy, it is true. I do not know that I could sit in when I think of the students who travel from far to come to the class pursuing dreams which I have already fulfilled for myself.
At the same time, as I told the academic and non-academic staff, I feel like closing down Georgetown again central.. so that the point could be made that Cheddi's night school was meant to be a legacy to all those who still aspire to higher education. I wish I could find a way to do that without impacting on the young woman who wants to pursue a law degree and the young mother-to-be who 'does not want to stay home'.

cold breeze,fyah bun and pigeons

This week I had to get up early to go out every morning to town.. 6-ish or so. I know many people do this daily. I set the alarm for an hour earlier and manage to get up.. it is strange though doing the surya namaskar in the pre dawn darkness but at least I face east.

The mornings have been cool and facing the seawall and walking down Churchroad to get the minibus.. breeze blows.. cold and nice... to wake you up some more. The minibuses are there.. full with early morning people .. most buses are playing hymns and gospel (yeah, even the ones with the flowers on the murti on their dashboard).. though one morning one bus (with a flower on the murti of Lord Krsna on the dashboard) had some of the music with the lyrics about man overpowering woman.

Walking down empty streets and seeing the early morning.. people going home after work, people now starting work. Coconut water vendor.. I dont think I can stomach coconut water so early. The people we pass, we say morning sometimes.

One morning though, street empty.. then round the corner.. hands flying, hips swaying, loud lipstick as only one of the 'gay/trans/antiman' could do ,
was like I could hear him even though he aint saying nothing..
and then a young woman start from the avenue across the road fyah bun.. and a whole set of cuss,
and the man respond in kind..
but I try a thing.. in between the fyah bun.. and the 'you cyan win' fuh keep a man u c..ksucker u..' I said morning.. and i got a nice polite loud "morning  morning" back from the man who was swaying fast fast down the road behind me.

and Bourda market.. I did not know there were so many pigeons in Georgetown. They are there.. rubbish heaps.
One morning a lady.. in a kind of skimpy red dress showing off her tatoos.. with a bag throwing grains for the pigeons.. something I like watching about people feeding birds.. and remembering when some pigeons sat on my head in Trafalgar square to eat corn I had placed there..probably Mary Poppins

and on the mornings when I feel low.. something about watching those pigeons in a flock.. lifting off from the roof of Bourda Market ..