The Ghosts of Dedap Road – 1

“Tell me the scary story again, Ravia!”
“Which one?”
“The one about the suns.”
“When the sun came up in Singapore today he split himself in two as he has done every day since time began. ”
“He did that just today?”
“Yes, Margaret, he has done it every day since time began.”
“But Ravia, how do you know the sun is a he?”
“These things are known.”
“So why did he split himself in two?”
“You must be patient and I will tell you. He becomes two suns, one dark and one light so he can rule over the two universes. The first universe is a place of dark misery and everyone who walks that lonely world would rather be in our bright happy world. That’s why sometimes things happen we can’t explain. The people of the other universe are trying to come through. We must not be afraid when this happens. We must simply go about our daily lives. They will cry out in the darkness and we must not acknowledge them. They will move things and break things and tempt us with paradise. But you must listen to what I say, Margaret. If you ever acknowledge their existence they will have you. They will take your place in this world and you will be doomed to walk the desolate plains forever under the dark sun.”
“Is it really true?”
“Yes, it is just as I say.”
“How do you know?”
“My mama told me.”
I thought about that for a moment.
“Ravia?’
“Yes, Greta?”
“Why would God make people live in a place like that dark universe?”
“It exists for us Margaret. It is there to show us how wonderful our living world is and to remind us to appreciate all we have on this earth.”

I was sound asleep when I awoke to the sound of breaking glass. Was I dreaming? The house was still and dark when I opened my eyes. My older sister slept in the twin bed across the room. I could hear her steady breathing.
“Sadie!” I whispered “Sadie, are you awake?” She moaned in her sleep and turned over. I pulled the covers up over my head and strained to listen for other sounds in the house. My whole body was rigid with fear.I should sit up, I thought. I should get up and see what that sound is. Was that footsteps? There was a creak on the stairs. I froze and held my breath. Who was in the house? Were they going to murder us in our sleep? My heart beat fast as I lay under the covers. I couldn’t hold my breath any longer and I let it out in a long sigh. There was a click and a whir as the air conditioner kicked in. Good, I thought, then whoever it is wont hear me breathing and they wont come in here. But the sounds were gone. I let myself breathe again slowly in the safety of my blanket cave, hyper-alert to every settling noise of the house.  Eventually, the fear dissolved into troubled sleep.

Starting a new series

Dear all five of you who haven’t given up on me and still read my
blog. Tonight i’ll be posting a new series which i’ve been working on
secretly. After much deliberation and worrying, i’ve decided to take
the risk and post it for public consumption. The story is partly
autobiographical but with a good dose of poetic license. Look for a
post in a few hours. The series is set in Singapore and entitled: The
Ghosts of Dedap Road. N, i got your message and my readers have you
to blame for my blog revival.

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A whole new way to blog

Set up by Broom in the hopes that this will make her Girl blog more.

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Coming out

Broom is in the other room calling her dad. She didn’t want me to be in the room with her. Why do I feel like I’m the one coming out? Stay tuned…

a post is coming

I can feel it like when you smell the dust rising just before a thunderstorm. Why am I telling you this? To put pressure on myself to actually write this one.

Elections I remember

On the eve of one of the most extraordinary US elections in my lifetime, I am pondering the presidential elections I’ve been alive for.

In 2004, a group of us sat hopefully in front of the TV in a tiny one-bedroom flat in Brooklyn. We watched on pins and needles as Ohio looked to be leaning toward Kerry and then Bush and then…cap in hand, John Edwards and a long-faced Kerry announced that they were conceding the election to a man we had desperately hoped would be knocked off of his evil perch. We were stunned because all of us felt that this election meant the difference between lives saved and lives lost. We could not have predicted the sheer scale of actual lives lost those 53 million people who voted for Bush now have on their consciences. We braced ourselves, nonetheless, for 4 more years of needless war, of violent rhetoric, of suppression and censorship, of isolationism, corruption and big oil.

2000 was a wake-up call for my generation. Supposedly one of the most exemplary democracies in the world turned out to be deeply dysfunctional.  When George W. Bush took office, we were only nine months away from an event so shocking, it would forever alter public discourse in our country and indeed the world. What a comedy (tragedy?) of errors that led to the moment when this idiotic despot-in-waiting would be in power at this defining moment when America needed leadership of the highest caliber. It was the perfect political storm that has gone on for 8 years too long.

Aside from the upset victory he snatched from the first George Bush, Clinton’s eight years in office were blissfully uneventful by comparison. The worst crisis his administration faced was because of an extra-marital affair. I suspect that nowadays, most Americans would gladly trade our current problems for those days. I guess that’s the great paradox of history: it gives us the gift of perspective and insight only upon hindsight.

We’ve had a rough decade, and we’ve been humbled and tempered in ways that are not fun as a nation or as individuals. Culturally, philosophically we still face huge maturity gaps. But I expect that four years from now, I will remember this election day with pride and excitement and a real hope for the future of my beautiful country. Obama for President.

Happy Birthday Broom!

Dearest Broom

I remember the first birthday I celebrated with you. There were oceans and continents separating us, but I found a local sushi place that would deliver and ordered long-distance. I was going to surprise you but then I realized that you needed to be home when it arrived. So I had to ruin the surprise. Your first reaction was that I had ordered too much food and you made me change it to half the amount, but you were still happy and surprised. What you didn’t know was that the sushi was just a decoy for the real surprise which was a huge bouquet of bright autumn flowers and a poem I had written just for you. I was sad that I couldn’t be there to see your face when it arrived while you were eating your sushi. Today as we celebrate together, it feels as much like my birthday because I get to see your reaction in person when I surprise you with your birthday gift. I love you broom and I look forward to a hundred more birthdays in a hundred more lifetimes.

TG

Shopping for Clothes – India 3

The first several hours after arriving in Mumbai are obscured in hazy clouds of jet-lag and involuntary naps. Broom’s mom had laid out two nightgowns for us to change into after our showers. It was a small thing, but I remember feeling very grateful. When Broom’s mom came home from work she greeted me with a warm smile and a hug as though I was part of the family. Or at least such vague, hopeful thoughts flitted rebelliously in the back of my mind. Perhaps she was only greeting me as she would greet any other friend of Broom’s. I kept reminding myself not to read too much into anything.

I remember eating a delicious lunch of marinatedBombay duck(which is actually a fish, not a bird, for those not familiar with maharashtran cuisine). During the meal, Broom kept secretly prompting me to compliment her parents on each of the various dishes. Not that I needed much prompting. Everything we ate was delicious. After lunch I have no recollection of climbing the two flights of marble stairs to Broom’s bedroom. Nor can I remember collapsing on the bed. What I do remember is that it was dark outside when Broom tip-toed into the room and woke me up with a stolen kiss. She brought Chai and glucose biscuits on a tray to help ease the transition out of that sweet jet-lag induced dream state.

“Come on.” She said, “We’re going shopping.”

Mother Sister Cousin India – Part 1

The waiting is almost unbearable. Endless flights airport food, two days of sleep stolen by the fear of entering someone else’s personal space.  On the last leg of the journey from Canada to Mumbai I am one of only a handful of white people. I am so sleep-deprived now I accidentally sit in the wrong row. A woman admonishes me and I move to the row I’m supposed to be in.  I notice that the food on this flight is world’s better than the fare from Canada. The aromatic spices and sweet sharp flavors fill my senses and give me some hope of things to come.  Some of the passengers glance at me curiously and at one point I catch the flight attendant staring at me. Is it so odd? A white woman flying alone to Mumbai? Even in this day and age? If they knew my mission here, the story that brings me to this place, they would be more than curious. For some, I imagine that simple curiosity might turn to a morbid fascination or perhaps outright hostility and loathing if they knew.  I make myself as comfortable as I can and wait, sleeplessly for the long flight to end.

I can feel the landing gear rumble to life beneath me as the jet touches down at the International Airport in Mumbai. She is there already waiting for me. Will her parents be there? Will I meet them at the airport? Will they already know me or know the truth about us? I am filled with so many emotions – excitement, worry, hope, fear and then I see the crude shanty towns built up alongside the runway. Filled with people so poor and desperate they would erect such homes they can make with whatever materials they can find in any open space. Even here where they would be the first to die if a jet were to veer from its course. How must it be to hear the thundering jets all day long carrying the people whose privilege and wealth is beyond your comprehension to destinations all over a world you will never see? My problems are not so big.  I decide at that moment that I will find joy in every minute I spend here in this new land, so foreign to me and yet strangely familiar. The tropical humidity wraps me in its warmth like India embracing me a long lost daughter who has wandered a thousand years from home.  I have been here before. I’m certain.

Chapter one and a half: Coyote

I once bought a homeless man a ticket to a fringe theatre production. His name was Coyote. He sat next to me during the show and he smelled rank. It was just after pulp fiction had taken movie theatres by storm, and it seemed that all genres of entertainment were influenced by Tarantino’s propensity for over the top blood and gore. I don’t remember much about the actual play and I’m pretty sure that even for a fringe theatre production it was quite bad. Two things about the peformance stand out in my memory. One: At some point the performers were throwing around a bloody heart. Two: Coyote was loudly heckling the players between long swigs of cheap whiskey. I sat next to him feeling alternately embarrassed and wickedly gleeful.

I don’t know why I did it. I saw him sitting outside the theatre on a bench and he was singing…not particularly in tune and not quietly. I was with friends who I didn’t feel very connected to. I remember looking up at the moon which was particularly bright that day. I remember noticing that there was a street lamp just below it that looked like a second moon. And just below the street lamp was Coyote. My friends who had been raucously cavorting with each other in the flirtatious undercurrents of youth suddenly became silent. Perhaps because I was doing the unthinkable. I sat down next to Coyote and he stopped singing. I introduced myself and we chatted for a while. I asked him if he had a place to stay and he said he stayed with his sister but that he couldn’t stand to be at her house for very long and that after a few days he had to be “on the road”. He asked my why I was talking to him. But before I could answer he said, he was invisible and usually people couldn’t see him. He said he only discovered this fact about himself when people started walking right through him as though he wasn’t there. Particularly in crowded places like the doorway of a city bus. I asked him if he wanted to see a play.

Afterwards, he said he wanted to give me something. I was leary and told him that he didn’t owe me anything that I had an extra ticket anyway (which wasn’t true). He reached inside his ragged overcoat and pulled something over his head. He leaned in close and I took a step back involuntarily. “Thank you for seeing me” he whispered and put something in my hand. “Wow, creepy.” said one of my friends. “It was nice of you to buy him a ticket.” “yeah man! that was totally cool.” “What did he say to you?” “He smelled like sh_t” I stared at the object in my hand. I looked up at the street lamp that looked like a moon. I thought I saw a slight movement in the shadows behind the bench. But I didn’t see Coyote anywhere.

I remember thinking that fate is fragile like thin ice on the surface of a river.