This Month's 2 Mag

Hurray hurray! After long last, it has arrived!

Waaaaaaayyyy back in... May? June? Turner and I wrote up a list of "lessons learned" when taking your baby overseas. I'd shot approximately 6 zillion photos while we were in Asia at the beginning of the year, so we came with the whole package: wisdom and illustrating images. Above we see the cover - ours is the "Baby On Board" feature.



That's our Sloaner and Turnbuckle, yukking it up on the beach in Tamil Nadu back in February. Turner isn't sure whether the open button on his shirt is giving off the "casual dad on the beach" look, or if it just radiates "slob". You may weigh in with your opinion in the comments, if you like.



The next pages feature a buncha photos from our Asia travels. We gave them about 45 shortlist photos to choose from, and interestingly enough all but one of the art director's choices were pictures taken within 48 hours of one another, and all in the same little town in south India (Mamallapuram, ftr).

But that other photo? It's the one near the fold on the left side of the page:



Who's that guy holding our daughter? ...Why, it's Uncle Phet!

The original photo is here - as you can see, Ji Hong is also in this photograph. Alas, they cut him out! Fame and fortu- wait, just fame - is DENIED! Boo!

But you know, the more we pondered the spread, the more it started to seem like they used this photo to make it look like Sloane was being bounced on the knee of some local dude in Bangkok. We'd explained to the editors that we were living with friends and this picture is even titled, "Beef place with Phet and Ji". ...It just seems funny to have someone we know so well in a lineup of photos meant to illustrate being very far away from home, and seeing Phet there, stripped of our shared context. Sloaner herself took one look at this photo and exclaimed, "It's-a Uncle Phet!" Yes, dear!

Enter Turner with the voice over:
In January of the year 2006 we flew to Bangkok. There we met a man named... Phet. His English was very understandable. When we asked where he was from, he would say only: "Pape". He and his family took us in and let us live in the guest suite of their meagre 3000 sq.ft. flat for ten weeks... On Saturdays we would walk to the end of his street to eat a thin gruel of noodles, fish, vegetables, spices, shrimp, pork, and three kinds of rice, with iced coffee on the side... He taught our daughter to walk. ...This is the only photograph of him we could find.

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Categories: Asia 2006 | Family | Work work work

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History Lessons

Years ago, and I'm talking years and years ago now – like, probably 15 years ago – John Johnston was on his way across Canada. At Winnipeg he decided to do a day trip to Fort Garry. The guide was dressed, as guides often are at Canadian sites of Historical Importance, in period costume (as a blacksmith, as I recall). They were taking a trip back to 1875, and everyone was given an explanation of Fort Garry's importance – in westward expansion, in trade and policing, and as an administrative centre for what was, at that time, Metis country and bald prairie.

 

The guide explained that the Fort was an important, working, nearly self-sufficient community, and everyone living there had to have something to offer – no layabouts or loafers, no dead weight. And then he looked around the group. "As newcomers, you have to have something to offer. It's 1875 here at Fort Garry: what skills do you have that could be of any use to us?"

 

The group looked around, one to another. The Winnipeggers of the group were a buncha lumpy civil-servant descendants of Ukrainians and Scots, most probably. The German and Japanese tourists hoped to hide behind the language barrier. Shuffle-shuffle went the feet, the feet of late 20^th century occupants of the first world: service industry paper pushers, none of them could shoe horses, or read the weather for farming, or build anything that didn't come with instructions from Ikea. Of this big group of people, nobody could think of anything they’d have to offer to the 19^th century frontier.

 

And then John – good man, our JJ, as always - stepped forward. In his best cockney shipboy accent: "I kin read n' write, sir!"

 

The blacksmith exploded, laughing: "…Yes! Excellent! We always need people who can read – most of us here are illiterate and they’re always sending orders from Ottawa that we can't figure out. …Anyone else?"

 

...When we got to Bangkok, I thought it'd be good to pick up some work while I was here... some editing would be great. Lots of NGOs and international agencies in town, it shouldn't be too hard. Well, you should watch what you wish for, because thanks to Phet's networking, within a month I'd landed two contracts. Now I'm neck deep in the thick of it and wondering what the hell I was thinking, taking on work when there's markets to be explored and Thai food to eat, and a swimming pool to enjoy and all the wonders of Bangkok lying here at my feet. (In short, I'm an ungrateful wretch!)

 

John's quip has been bouncing around and around in my head, but in my voice the tone is more whiney and snivelly: I sure put my foot in it - I can read and write, sir!

 

 

Categories: Ash | Asia 2006 | City Planning | Work work work

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India: Mamallapuram, Auroville, and Chennai

Many, many, many more Flickr photos now posted, here. Stories en route from somewhere in the foggy post-India recovery portion of my brain.

 

Categories: Asia 2006 | India

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Ashley Bristowe, Global Snobizen

As we stepped off the plane I figured we should hit the bathroom before wading into the customs lineup. Chennai’s Anna International Airport: as I walked up the hall from the plane and through the glass hallways, I sussed it out: not bad, not bad… newish but not sparklingly ‘global’ in feel, various television screens telling us to head for the customs clearance desks and from which belt to gather our luggage, friendly-looking Indian Police officials with giant guns and miles of decorations leaning in doorways, watching us pass.

 

So the toilet, the toilet… where is the toilet? And then I saw a sign, toilet this way, with an arrow, just before the giant lineups to get our passports stamped, so I hung a right.  And there it was, in all its welcome-to-India glory: the shithole bathroom indigenous to every transportation hub on the Subcontinent. I can’t believe that I was expecting a standard airport bathroom: shame on me and my terrible sieve-like memory!

 

Oh, it was everything I hadn’t remembered and more: Despite the entirety of the rest of the airport being a sealed and air-conditioned international space, they managed to build this bathroom on an outside wall, obviously to allow for the circulation of hot jetfuel-scented air and the free passage of the obligatory 1001 flies. Single tinny fluorescent tube lighting the whole place. Water all over the floor, even way over by the door. An ill-hung mirror, the back silver of which was fading away in a sort of top-down watermark smear. And of course, in the stall itself, the lock, broken; holes in the door (though this let in some badly needed light – I should have been more grateful); dripping hose with cracked blue plastic pail underneath; and brand new toilet with stained, side-slung seat (though I should give props where due: usually there’s no seat at all). It goes without saying that there is no paper provided, ever, anywhere in India. As I did my business I balanced the baby on one hip and held the bags over my head: there was nowhere to put her or them down.

 

When I was a resident of India, the filth and refuse bothered me, but I could live with it. You have to. When you’re young you can sort of say to yourself, okay, they’ve got this caste system that no one will properly explain, but it seems to prevent anyone from actually caring for washrooms, except in private homes. You end up going to that place in your mind that says, “Well now Ashley, don’t be such a judgmental asshole, this is their culture and you are the outsider here.” No matter what the venue or business or locale, a bathroom with even the vaguest hint of public access in India is, always, a complete disgrace. Ainsley and I finally snapped one day on the Shatabdi train between Delhi and Chandigarh and, armed only with paper towels, a bar of soap, a credit card (to scrape up the grime), and the water provided in the basin tap by India Rail, we scrubbed that bathroom from top to bottom and emerged damp and exhausted, but jubilant and grinning: BEHOLD, THE ONLY CLEAN BATHROOM IN INDIA, AND LO, WE MADE IT SO.

 

But after a while – and I’m talking about a few months here – if you have any sense of cultural relativist decency, you do, finally, bow to the seemingly endless parade of revoltingly spartan and broken water closets and give up your pretentions. Without actually going “native”, as Rudyard Kipling so condescendingly put it, you do suck it up, so to speak. And in truth, this is a survival tactic, and being inured to the filth is a precious resource in the battle to preserve your sanity here. If you know me personally, I’m sure you’ve heard the ol’ busride from Leh to Manali story, which features a terrible case of the shits and me, half-collapsed and feverish at a bus station urinal, looking over to realize that a man was masterbating in the gloom, looking at my hunched and sickened self. Yeah… so. Can you see that getting to a zen place as to the quality of public toilets can save your soul? Yes. It truly can. And I know this. But it does take time, a long time.

 

Now, I’ll remind you that Sloane and I are only going to be here for 10 days this time ‘round. And as such, I fully realize I don’t have the dubious ‘luxury’ of attending to the whole wearying process of having my snotty superior spirit broken on the matter of public toilet cleanliness. I’m going to blame my stubbornness at least in small measure on being a mother and having my baby ‘on board’, but I’m holding firm and this is my decree on this day: good god the toilets in India are awful, and I won’t apologize for my snobbery. Wet, dank, dirty, insect-infested, unserviced, broken, neglected, abandoned: you’d hardly think that there were a billion people in this country, all of whom, I assume, have to shit once or twice a day. Really, you’d think that the Indians would’ve really had it all figured out by now on these matters. (Which, considering the age of the culture and the history of civilization here and whatnot, begs the chilling question: What if they do have it figured out, and this is it?)

 

So I’ll be unrelentingly bald and cold when I say: shame on you, the management of Chennai’s Anna International Airport – you are running an AIRPORT. People pay hundreds, if not thousands of dollars for the privilege of transportation via airplanes. And as the air terminal, you are the first and seminal welcoming can-can line when people arrive in this country – and given the uncompromising filth we’ll find everywhere else, there’s no worry that we won’t encounter “the real India” in this realm. So the very least you could do is break us in slowly. For the love of god, renovate and maintain your goddamn toilets, I beg you.

 

 

[You know, it’s only fair to report that I’ve seen and used plenty of public toilets in Canada that totally rival the Indian ones for disgustingness. The around-the-back gas station toilet at the Hwy 6 corner mart in New Denver, BC, leaps to mind (mainly because every time I end up having to use that bathroom, I think to myself: “I should never complain about the toilets in India as though Canada is so much better, because this one SUCKS.”) So I should be kinder – but for now, I won’t be.]

Categories: Ash | Asia 2006 | India

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Tamil Nadu Or Bust!

Onward to Hindustan! Tomorrow Sloaner and I get on a creaky early-morning flight to Madras, to meet up with Turner (already "in station") for the final leg of the India research.

The plan: We'll spend a few days in Mamallapuram, a temple town on the coast south of Chennai, and then head on to Pondicherry at the end of the week. On the weekend we strike (slightly) inland, to Auroville, the "experiment in international living".

              

         Ha ha ha - can you tell I'm no Photoshop expert?

It's all in the name of research. ...And self-aggrandizement of course. Who can resist us when we are carrying such a lovely strawberry-blonde baby? We're putting to the test the notion that you're treated "SO" much better when travelling with a child in India. Turner has been trying out the radical idea of "wearing clean clothes" and reports that the difference in treatment is marked. (Myself, I'll be testing the whole "not punching men who pinch my ass" technique, since the retailation-in-a-crowd thing on this matter once started a small riot at Dusshera in Delhi, from which we were saved by police brandishing lathis. I have never been so glad to see a lathi being swung in my direction, I tell you. In any case, hopefully the ass-pinching vector will experience a decided downswing with aforementioned baby on board. We can only hope.)

Turner is giving a talk in Auroville on February 19th at their Matrimandir - reading from the first chapter from The Geography of Hope, "Down At The Windfarm". So if, y'know, you're in the area, drop by!

You know I'll take a bazillion photos and collect up some good stories to tell. Internet access in India is, as I recall, "the shits" vis a vis reliability, so I'll make no claims on posting regularly and whatnot from the Subcontinent. We're back to Bangkok on the 24th, and I'll post stuff then, if not before.

Jaye he, jaye he... jaye, jaye, jaye, jaye, he! (Be careful this link doesn't burn your eyeballs out.)

(Crossposted with The Geography Of Hope's website.)

 

Categories: Asia 2006 | Book Tour | India | Work work work

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Bangkok Scenes And Burned-Out Eyeballs

New photos up on Flickr, here.

Don't eat me, Mr. Giant Shiny Garuda!

 

Zoom! Tuk tuk madness...

 

Categories: Asia 2006

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Reading Material

When you come to Thailand, you'd have to be blind not to notice the many, many, many pasty & paunchy white men sauntering around with gorgeous Thai ladies on their arms. It seems sad. And... well, pathetic.

I stumbled onto this Bangkok blog last night, and lost an hour to it. Straightforward, well-written, it's everything a guy would ever want to know about Thailand's sex trade and a variety of topics concerning relationships between foreign men and Thai women. Not exactly my cup of tea, but it's clear, clean, honest writing.

 

Categories: Asia 2006

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Overheard At Muay Thai

So I don't know about you, but I'd heard of Thai Kickboxing before I'd ever been to Thailand. I'd heard that it was some kind of extreme sport, and the main jist of most stories centred around the fact that the boxers are allowed to basically do anything to win, including kick each other in the nuts.

Men say that women can't picture that kind of pain. I say to them: have you seen a woman go through childbirth? Yeah. No. I guess I can't picture your 5-minute doubled-over hyperventilating pain, and you can't picture my 20 hour labour. We'll call it uneven and leave it at that.

But, yes - getting canned: even if you can't empathize with the actual experience, most girls are told by their moms at some point that if they REALLY need to physically defend themselves and there's no other way out, kick a guy in the balls. They get to make bigger money and start wars and father children they don't support, but there's this one chink in the armour? DANG. That's a pretty serious gap under the armpit. Kind of makes you understand why men aren't that hot for even having their 'nads slightly jostled in the wrong way.  

So it makes muay thai sound pretty hard core, to hear that the fighters can bash each other in the crotch. Hence the infamy.

Karen and Bauer had one night left in Bangkok, and decided that they wanted to see some kickboxing. Alrighty sez I, and arranged to come along. When Thaba heard the plan, she mentioned that everyone who comes to visit them in Bangkok goes to see muay thai, and most people are satisfied with their kickboxing experience after the second or third fight. I'm familiar with the phenomenon of getting "enough" of an experience, when attendees with perhaps a more nuanced understanding of the event are just getting warmed up. Bullfighting, for example. As a tourist in Mexico or Spain, it sounds like a good idea to go see a bullfight. How daring! ¿Cómo usted dice? ...So local! So authentic! Okay, let's go.

...And after the first fight, you get it. You know what's going on, you can identify the picadors from the conquistadors, you've seen them actually kill the bull, and it's not at all like the Bugs Bunny where he should've taken the left turn at Albequerque. But you've paid $20 or $30 or even $100 for the ticket, and the true fans all around you are having a great time, cheering and yelling at each other in Spanish. So you stay, and try to stick it out.

But eventually the certainty sets in: I want to leave. And you do. You shoulda left after the first bull. So when I heard this news from Thaba, I knew of what she spoke. I wouldn't be shy about jumping ship on the muay thai early on in the rounds, if necessary.

I met Bauer and Karen at Lumphini BTS and we walked over to the venue, where we bought the 3rd tier Foreigner-class tickets (the cheapest seats at 1000B, vs. 150B for Thais in the same class of seats. Methinks they're trying to make some money off the falang) and headed into the 'stadium'. When I say 'stadium', don't think of an American college football stadium. Don't even think of McMahon stadium in Calgary before the reno. Picture instead a circular, tiered Roman stadium, but small. And with an aluminum roof. And wooden benches, erected over what looked like a decidedly malarial swamp of muddy filth and detritus from the stands. Then, fill the stadium with approximately 4000 screaming Thai men, wrigging their fingers at each other and jumping up and down, betting like mad and tearing out their hair. Also insert view-blocking advertisements, about 200 low-watt fluorescent bulbs dangling from the ceiling on wires, and a quartet of musicians in matching neon-green jackets who thump drums, a bell, and an oboe along to the tempo of the fight.

(When we chose our seats, an older guy came over to ask us where we were from and tell us a bit about the event. He pointed out that we'd chosen excellent seats: right in front of the music booth, so no one would stand in our way. Music booth? we said, expecting a dj or sound effects or something. But then the squealing band stuck up their tweedley tune and we all looked at each other: Huh? Karen: "Hey! A band! I love live music!" Approximately two minutes later, as the full force of the repetitious and honkingly grating nature of the "music" was becoming abundantly apparent, Bauer: "When Thab said people only lasted one or two fights, do you think she meant because of the fighting? Or because of the music...?")

Basically at a night of muay thai you get to watch a roster of wiry guys in fancy shorts bash the hell out of each other. Which makes it not that different from North American boxing, except in Thai kickboxing they can kick. KICKboxing, see? And use their elbows. And trip their opponent, if they can manage it. One guy actually got knocked out cold, and I had a weird shiver run through me when the paramedic chucked him on the chin to see if he was conscious, and his skull rolled around like a teatherball. We only lasted one more fight after that one, four fights total. Aside from the music, the mosquitoes were eating Karen and I alive. And really, there is such a thing as "enough" Thai kickboxing, especially your first time out.

And as it turns out, I don't think you're allowed to go for the balls. I didn't see any punching down near the family jewels, and there were plenty of opportunities. Imagine the disappointment in that small part of my brain still devoted to hating men (I had to sign out a 99-year lease on that section when I transferred into Women's Studies in undergrad).

I never really claimed to be a sports photographer. And I'll remind you that we were in the cheapest seats. But I think you get the point.

So, but really, the highlight for me was when the drinks lady came around. We were approached by a little woman calling out quietly, "Beer? ...Beer?" When she came over to show her wares, her tray held bottles of water and green tea, and then open cups of what looked like brightly coloured kool-aid. There was very clearly no beer on the tray. I don't know what I was thinking - I chose the green cup.

Ash:    How much? Thao rai?

Lady:   Thirty five baht.

I'm thinking that 35 baht is more than a dollar, but enh - supporting the local economy and all that. Plus I'd just dropped 1000B on the entry ticket; at this point, what was another buck?

Ash: Okay.

Pulls out money, pays with a 100B note. Lady starts digging for change in her waistbelt.

Meanwhile, Bauer and Karen are looking over the drinks situation. Bauer nods at the tray with a suspicious glance: you want any? Karen decides she wants a bottle of green tea, and with a shrug Bauer hands it over. Meanwhile, the drinks lady hands me my change: 65B.

Ash: Thanks.

Karen: How much for the green tea?

The lady waves us off, yes, no problem. She makes a move to leave.

Bauer: Wait. What?

Karen: Huh? How much is it?

Lady crouches down again.

Lady: ...Fifteen baht.

Karen pulls out the money, hands the lady a 20B note. But something's going on. The lady seems to be indicating that Karen has already paid. Which would make sense, if my drink wasn't actually 35B, and had been 10B or something like that, and Karen's is now 15B.

Ash: What's going on here? I think she's saying we've already paid for Karen's.  

Bauer: We're ... not... sure. Karen chose her drink after you got your change. I think there's a mistake somewhere.

Meanwhile, some of the men in our vicinity have started to take notice of our situation. They start calling out advice in Thai. Lady pulls out fifteen baht change and hands it to Karen. Everyone is confused by this point.

Ash: [sipping my drink] Why is mine 35 baht and hers is 5 baht?

Bauer: What do you mean?

Ash: [more sipping] Well, hers is packaged. It's got a recyclable container. It's made by, like, a multinational beverage company. Mine is just a glass of juice with some ice. Mine should be cheaper. ...Unless...

Ash suddenly puts the cup down. Everyone looks at my cup of green juice & ice, now 1/3 gone.

Bauer: Well... uh... well!

Ash: What the hell!

Lady suddenly comes back. Hands me a 20B note. Is talking to me in Thai. I don't know what she's saying. I'm distracted, looking around at the ceiling and pillars nearby, trying to discern if there was any alcohol in the kool-aid. I'm thinking, I didn't taste any alcohol...? But purple jesus works that way too... you can't taste it... hmmmm. Lady is still talking. Bauer is looking at her like, We got nuthin', here.

Ash: [starting to laugh] Make her go away. I just want her to go away, now.

Karen: ...Well, I paid 5 baht for mine. She gave me 15B change. And you paid a 100, but she gave you 65B back. And now she gave you 20 more baht. So yours... yours was fifteen baht, in the end. She said mine was fifteen but maybe she meant five, and yours was actually the one that was fifteen baht.

The lady is still talking to us. The men are still calling out friendly advice. The lady pulls out coins, starts to gesture with them. Bauer's still looking at her, friendly, but noncommittal. The lady stands up, still talking.

Ash: Make her leave. I just want her to go away.

Karen: [To the lady] Kap koon kah! Thank you! We're fine, we don't need anything. Thank you! [Turning to us] So yours was 15B in the end. She must have said the wrong number. Or tried to overcharge you, but it all got too confusing, so she refunded your money.

Ash: But... wait. 15 baht? ...That STILL makes mine 3x more than yours. [Absentmindedly picks up the glass of juice, takes another sip.] ...Aahhh! What the hell am I doing? [Slams the cup down with a crash, on the bench.]

Bauer: [Watching, bemused, this whole time] ...Like, I don't know! I don't know what the hell you're doing! The beer lady comes and you get what looked like a 10 cent glass of freshie, full of ice from god knows where, and it's A DOLLAR. And you paid her, and drank it up! The mosquitoes are the least of your problems! You're breaking all the rules! No ice! No open cups! What did you think you were buying!?

Everyone is doubled over, gasping, at this point, we're laughing so hard.

Ash: [Picking up the cup] I'm... I'm not going to drink this. [Goes to pour it out, under the bench, into the malarial cesspool below.]

Bauer: No kidding you shouldn't drink that! Now you know how all that shit ended up down there! 'Nice cold glass of bright green freshie for a dollar? ...Weeeelllll, yes! Don't mind if I do!'

 

...Lord. That made my night. And for the record, I didn't get sick or drunk or anything, so maybe it really was just green kool-aid. Very expensive green kool-aid.

 

Categories: Ash | Asia 2006 | Friends

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Wherein I Brag At Length About The Super-Accomplisher Of A Baby We Produced

This is the post that, when Sloane's future siblings are teenagers and looking through my blog archives for ammo in the "The World Hates Me, My Parents Don't Love Me, I Wish I'd Never Been Born" phase of life, will provide enormous ironic twist-the-knife comfort because this! is! it! : the post wherein I go on and on about Sloane in a way that apparently you never do about your subsequent children.

As an oldest-child, I don't know what it feels like to be one of those younger siblings. I was first, firstfirstfirst, and everyone loved me, memememeeeee, SOOOOOO much, and I was EVERYONE'S favourite. There are a billion pictures of me as a kid. And all of my parents' friends knew me and loved me and remember me fondly even now. Ainsley had to wear MY hand-me-downs. And I was always there during storytime to shout out the right answer when John and Ainsley were TOOOOO slow to answer stuff like, "Where's the sun?" and "What do you think happens next? ...NOT YOU, ASHLEY." While I, of course, have the complaint that my parents were far stricter with me than they were with my brother and sister (to quote Krishna, I broke the ice so they could waterski through), it's really the only legitimate bitch I can make about being the eldest. Otherwise, it was pretty much pure gold. I highly recommend being born first.

Now Turner, on the other hand, was born second. And he thinks that being second of two kids is really the shaft. He's not alone in this - every younger-sibling person I've ever known thinks it sucked. So I'm not pointing any rainclouds in my in-laws' direction; it seems that being the younger kid blows no matter how great the parenting. (For the record, I think Turner's parents did some great parenting. Thanks for producing the lovely boy I got to marry, John and Margo!) I mean, people get past it, of course, and go on to (in most cases) lead productive lives and whatnot.

Anyway, on with the post about Sloane and her newest feats of genius and physical skill. Which was, ostensibly, what this post was supposed to be about. She being our oldest (and only, at this point) child, it is of course earth-shaking whenever she learns something new, and certainly a day doesn't pass without many photos being taken of the darling girl. So rest assured that there'll be lots of well-founded griping when siblings come along and are able to balance spinning plates while performing amazing feats of calculus with one hand and giving Mama a footrub with the other, and get NO credit for their talents. Of course.

Without further ado, I present the list of what Sloane, aged 10 months and two weeks, has been doing of late:

• The real money: walking, which includes turning, bending down and picking stuff up and standing back up again without falling, stepping down from a slight height (the lip of floors are different heights here) and turning backwards to crawl down from Ji's mattress. I don't know how fast kids are supposed to go from first steps to full walking, but I sort of expected it to take a bit longer than it's been for Sloane - elapsed time for her being 6 days
• catching a rolled ball, and sometimes rolling it back (like, in a vague towards-Mama direction)
• can correctly answer, by pointing, the questions, "where's your teeth?" and "where's Mama's teeth?" and "where's the baby?" (thanks to Thab for this training!)
• instead of learning the signs for "water", "banana", and "more" that we've been trying to drill into her for months, Sloane finds it much more expeditious to point exactly at what she wants and then poke herself repeatedly in the chest: That. Give it to me. ...That. Give it to me.
• However, she has a great handle on the sign for "Dad" (swiping the hand down one cheek, like stroking a beard - we created this sign to signify Turner, because Sloane was fascinated with his beard from an early age), and looks around, asking for him, all the time

Oh boo, there's no way to properly convey how AMAZING it is to watch your child learn. So I'll leave it at this: Go Sloaner go!

Proud Ah-ma and Sloaner. "'...Scuse me, there's somewhere I gotta be with this ping pong ball..."

 

Categories: Asia 2006 | Mom-ness | Sloane

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Snobby! Indian! Ladies! of Soi 2

I have mentioned about the Shiva statue in our complex, but I may not have told you that probably half of the residents here are Indian. I'm talking about born-in-India people uprooted for business reasons to Thailand. Mostly families, from all areas of India - Mangalore, Chennai, Delhi. Mostly Hindus - hence the Shiva statue, and also the seperate Ganesh and Krishna shrines elsewhere on the grounds, and the spitted paan dots on the pavement near the front stairs, and the Indian sweets on sale at the corner store. But best of all, the Snobby! Indian! Ladies!

Snobby? So snobby. All those exclamation points are richly deserved.

I'll try not to go into a reminiscingly rambly post about all the perceived trespasses I've ever endured at the hands of Indian ladies over the years. Because there've been many. Scary and cruel upper-class British people have nothing on "heartless" when it comes to the Indian lady mob mentality. I'll just say this: I'm friendly. I have a big smile on my face and I'm carrying a gorgeous toddler. I say hello, I wave, I ask people's children's names and compliment their eyes/shoes/size. And yet, the ladies here Give! Me! Looks! SNOBBY looks!

...How snobby? SO snobby.

I realize that I sort of brought it on myself. See, I wear salwaar as often as not, and I wear them with regular tshirts and tank tops. Salwaar are the billowy, baggy drawstring pants women wear as part of what's called "punjabi suit", or just "salwaar kamise". In the Indian mind, they're part of a locked set: salwaar on the bottom, and then the kamise - a long, flow-y shirt-dress that falls to your knees - on the top.

(Oh, and a dupatta. That's the scarf that goes backwards around the neck. I could never really bring myself to truly accept the dupatta and only wore it under duress on special outings, in India. Despite my cultural relativist leanings, my feeling towards the dupatta was summed up quite nicely by a fellow student at the Landour Language School, my first week in India. A Swiss girl, she was in India to study meditation. She'd gone out on the advice of some of the professors and had some salwaar kamise made. I met her at Char Dukan on her way home, and she was struggling with the flimsy dupatta, flapping in the slight breeze. I complimented her on the new duds, whereupon she said, "Yess, it'z niice I guessz... But ziss sing! [pulling at the dupatta in disgust] It iz soo... stoo-pidd!" Yes. My sentiments exactly. It slips off your shoulders, it falls on the floor, and I couldn't help but picture mine getting stuck in a fan intake, leading to my inadvertant strangling-by-dupatta. I'm sure I was glaringly, obviously underdressed according to my fellow Shimla-ites. But you know what? It's not like I was going undercover or actually trying to don a disguise when I wore salwaar kamise. I wasn't fooling anyone in India: I'm white. Nobody was going to mistake me for a Punjabi lady, all up in her soot, browsing in the market: no. So I never worried too much about the dupatta.)

See: giant pants, under long dress-like top. Also scarf-like dupatta. Most women, me included, don't look this glam in salwaar kamise. But you get the picture.

I got really attached to salwaar in India, and brought a few pair home with me, which I wore until they fell apart (though their companion kamise-es are in perfect condition, unworn and packed up in a box somewhere). Very comfortable, the drawstring sits at your true waist and the rest just hangs there. Nice heavy hem at the bottom to pull the fabric earthward. A fan-like design of folds across the front hides a lot of fabric in the garment, so you can move every which-way and not worry about being constrained. They're lovely. It should be said that they kind of make your ass look big, and I can't really disagree. But I'm usually looking at myself from the front when I face a mirror, and Turner really likes them on me (like, really), so let's be honest: who else am I trying to impress?

In Canada I don't generally wear salwaar outside the house. For one, the material is too light, built for hot weather and Canada's dang cold most of the year. But also, I'm aware of the fact that Indian people would regard me as being half-dressed. Or inappropriately dressed, perhaps is a better way to put it. I'll mention it again: the salwaar and kamise are a set. They're worn together. You don't wear just the bottoms when you go out in public.

Anyway, when I got pregnant, I ran out and found a Punjabi tailor in northeast Calgary and had her make me six pair of salwaar. I got them made in heavy fabrics that would stand the Canadian winter, and I practically lived in those salwaar for the next year and a half. I got rather used to them as my standard everyday uniform.

When I was packing for Thailand, I threw four salwaar into the suitcase. Enh, I figured Thais wouldn't know the difference, they're just baggy pants, really. And these salwaar are fancy silk, shiny and luxuriant. No one would think anything untoward, except perhaps that my ass looked a little big.

But I hadn't realized, before we arrived, the nationality composition of Thab & Phet's complex. I probably would've brought the salwaar anyway, but may have just worn them indoors, if I'd known. I dunno. In any case, the salwaar are perfect for this weather, so I wore them every day in that first week of acclimatization while we were getting our bearings. And I slowly started to notice that I was getting very pointed, very snobby (So! Snobby!) looks from the ladies around the compound. They'd look down their noses at me. Then shift their gaze very obviously to my pants. And then back at my face, before turning away with a clear look of disgust. It didn't take long to realize what was up.

In Canada, on the occasions that I've actually left the house in salwaar and been called on it by Indians in the grocery store, it's been in the form of, "Ah? Salwaar? Have you been to India?" It's generally friendly, somewhat amused, perhaps a little surprised. I got the point of course, but overall it was a friendly interaction. Here, however? No. Not friendly. Pointedly UNfriendly. I stopped wearing the salwaar outside.

But then? Then. Then I realized that it didn't matter that I wasn't wearing the salwaar outside anymore. Because? Indian ladies? They're gossipy and judgemental. And they'd taken notice of who I was from the waist up, and it didn't matter that I was in jeans or gouchos. Because they'd STILL give me snobby looks (Snobby! Snobby, snobby, snobby!). There goes that asshole who wears the salwaar without kamise, they were clearly thinking. It was enough to make me finally confront two of the women, sneering at me from the stairs. By that point I'd gone back to wearing the salwaar. Because, like, it obviously didn't make a difference. I'd wrecked my fragile standing with the Indian ladies of Soi 2 and there was clearly no going back. So, fuck it: the salwaar are the best pants for this weather anyway.

I stopped on the stairs, newly surprised by their undisguised looks of distain. "Yes. Indian pants. Salwaar."

They ignored me, while still staring (a curiously Indian skill).

I looked around me, very obviously indicating that there was no one else, I was talking to them. "Hello?" I said. "Hellllooo?" My body language was all about the notion of ME talking to THEM. I was smiling, but it wasn't a fun moment.

Finally one slowly blinked, and said, "Hellllo." And turned away. The women pouted at each other, briefly: How uncouth!

Most of the time the ladies were so! snobby! that I just had to laugh. I actually laughed AT a woman in the elevator. I just have to guffaw. Because, like, C'mon you people! We're in THAILAND. This isn't my country, but it sure isn't your country either! I'm sorry that you feel you have some divine right to this pattern of tailoring for pants, but give it up already! Oh ho ho. Did I learn nothing from living in India for a year and a half? Yes, apparently I learned nothing. I will never live down this repuation, now.

Anyway. Yesterday I was heading out to meet Bauer and Karen for lunch and an excursion to the Royal Palace. I was wearing jeans and a tshirt, and a hat. As I got into the elevator an Indian man inside looked me up and down and suddenly exclaimed, "Wow, you are looking thin!"

I looked at him. I'd never seen him before. Like, I'd never consciously laid eyes on him and registered his existance before this moment. I said to him, "I... see you are wearing a purple shirt today!" Because...? Like...? ...What else do you say? The other man in the elevator, a Thai Chinese business guy clearly with the Indian guy, just looked down. "I see you are wearing a beige shirt today," I said to him, not to be boxed into a corner. The ride is short from the 5th to the ground floor; I didn't have to let an awkward (for me) silence descend. "...Yes, I am," said Mr. Thai Chinese business guy. Indian guy in the purple shirt beamed.

I was still at a total loss as to who he might be, this Indian man. I finally had to decide that yes, I'd truly never seen him before in my life. I mean, thanks for the compliment and everything, but in all my years of dealing with Indian men, I'd never received a spontaneous compliment from a knowing stranger such as this. Like, he'd clearly seen me before, knew exactly who I was: his manner wasn't that of someone who was speaking to a stranger. But how? When? He wasn't creepy about it: clearly it was a sincere comment, meant to be taken well.

Walking away from the elevator, though, it came to me: I realized... that... the ladies, they'd been talking about me at home! Not just amongst themselves - they were bringing their bitch sessions about me and my salwaar-wearing self into discussion with their husbands and families. ...And about my ass? Yeah. That it looked big in the salwaar. I bet, I'd bet $1000. This guy was seeing me at close range, in jeans, and I guess the difference between my skanky salwaar-wearing big-ass reputation and the lithe goddess of denim he saw before him was just too much. He clearly had to say something.  

...You know, we all have those fleeting ideas that people are watching us, talking about us. Once you get out of junior high though, more often than not these ideas are just paranoia. Nobody is talking about you. Everyone is far too busy wondering if anyone is talking about them to actually talk about people, themselves.

So when? People actually are talking about you? Being mean and condascending and rude? And you're an adult? It's disorienting. You think (or at least: I think), "I'm exaggerating, I'm making too much of this.They don't care as much as I think they do." But then some stranger up and tells you (me) that your ass isn't looking HALF as fat in those jeans. And you wonder: is it better to be paranoid, or to be right?

 

Categories: Ash | Asia 2006 | India

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As Seen On The BTS

I don't think I need to tell you that I disagree with the new Siam Ocean World advertising campaign on the skytrain:

 

Categories: Asia 2006

Comments [11]

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Ohm Nama Shivaai

So as I told you in the previous posting about our daily routine, every day or so I take Sloane around the complex on a tour. And of all the places to visit, her all-time favourite is certainly the Shiva statue.

Shiva is one of the main deities of Hinduism, known as the god of destruction. However, Shiv "embodies seemingly contradictory qualities, being the destroyer and the restorer; a great ascetic and a symbol of sensuality, the benevolent herdsman of souls and the wrathful avenger," or so say the various hinduism websites I consulted for a concise description of what Shiv's all about.

Most of my personal experience with Shiva occurred, not surprisingly, when we lived in India. Shiva's home is in the Himalayas, and since Mussoorie and Shimla are both situated in the foothills of same, there was no shortage of serious devotion to Shiva going on in the midst of our daily lives. Our friends with a better handle on things-Hindutastic can correct/clarify my take on all this in the comments - Carla and others, please feel free to speak up.

One of the first things you'll hear in traveller circles when you arrive in India is that pot is legal. I'm no kind of enthusiastic when it comes to marijuana, so this news had little interest for me. I realize I'm uncommon in this reaction however, and for decades there's been hoardes of eager imbibers heading for Hindustan to get a bit of ganga. For a reason that was never entirely clear, Shiva likes pot. Or smokes pot. Or created pot in the first place. Or something. I never asked for the details on this point. In any case, part of the reason why marijuana is quasi-legal in India is the legal argument of Shiva devotees requiring access to the herb in order to honour Shiv.

Before I go any further, I should mention that although people will tell you that pot is legal in India, this isn't entirely true from what I understand. Certainly foreigners travelling in India have been thrown in the clink for possessing hash and marijuana, and there are fines and deportations that come down on minor offenses. So I get the sense that there's a sort of fine line - if you keep it quiet, like a Shiva devotee would, and you don't, for example, smoke up huge coners in public places while blowing the smoke in the faces of stern-faced local folks (who might then be tempted to trot off and return with the cops), you'll probably be okay.

If you're a connaisseur and/or truly desperate, there's always the option of the bhang lassi, which is a sort of yogurt drink laced with slow-acting hash that packs a wallop. But some people get sick on those because you can't really guage the amount of hash you're injesting, and if you're sitting on a hot patio in the Indian sun and only sipping at your yogurt drink over a few hours' time, I don't have to spell out what might go wrong in the heat when it comes to a milk product. The bhang lassi was certainly something I heard about (usually in the context of a story about how the imbiber had one, it didn't seem to work, so they had another, and then finally gave up on the buzz and went to bed, only to awake six hours later high as a fricken kite and terrified of their own teeth, whereupon they felt it absolutely necessary to wake up the poor Norweigian backpacker in the next room and tell them the intricate details of how, this one time, their next-door-neighbour when they were little was backing up the car and stopped on the garden hose while the sprinkler was on and no one could figure out what had suddenly gone wrong... usually a story like that), but I never sought out the bhang lassi, and it wasn't on any menu I ever saw in my travels around the subcontinent. I suppose if I'd been interested I should have spent more time in Israeli backpacker hotels or perhaps in Manali. In any case, I think bhang was technically legal, but it only takes have a second to size someone up vis a vis their lifelong devotion to Shiva... if any of this described you: Tevas/Birkenstocks, MEC backpack, nalgene bottle, Lonely Planet/Rough Guide in your pocket, and a nationality other than Indian - yeah, you're not a Shiva devotee. You're just a pothead. Drink up that last bit of lassi and please move along.

But I digress. Back to the Shiva story.

Our servant Nazko was a Shiva devotee. She was a Pahari woman from a small village at the bottom of a valley about 30km from Shimla, and she was quiet but serious about her respect for Shiv. There was an Indian serial drama about Shiva on Wednesday nights and when it was time for the programme she'd knock quietly on our door, and with a grin move to the floor below the television and switch around the channels. The show itself was, to Canadian eyes, seriously campy and Shiv would appear with a cut-the-film-and-insert-shot-of-a-sheet-of-paper-featuring-bolt-of-lightning-and-now-back-to-our-program flash that made Harriet's Magic Hats look like a miracle of editing and technological prowess. But whenever Shiva showed up to sternly admonish the villagers or to intervene in some farming accident, Nazko would become very grave, and raise her hands in prayer to her forehead, and intone, "Ohm nama Shivaai!" We just needed to see that once to sober us up as to the camp value of the program. From then on we kept our snickers to ourselves.

Now. Our flat in Shimla was part of a larger compound owned by a joint family. It had a school and a number of seperate apartments, all constructed as cliff-clingers off the main path in Upper Kaithu. We rented a spacious (for India) flat that overlooked the whole of the Annandale Valley. When Sonia Gandhi arrived in Shimla to campaign for Congress during the 1999 election, we watched her fly in by helicopter and alight at the pad on the golf course/polo ground down in the valley below. In the evenings Turner and I would have 'libations on the porch' and watch the 4:40pm train make its choo-chooing way into town along the shoulder of the north ridge, across the valley at Summerhill. And on those rare days when the mist would lift, to the west we had a spectacular vantage point for gazing upon the whole of the craggy and incomparable Himalaya that so captured Rudyard Kipling's imagination. ...What I'm saying is that we had a million dollar view.

We also had hot water, and a telephone, and privacy, not to mention the servant - Nazko - who came attached to the flat. In short, the apartment was perfect for us, and after ten days of househunting when we first arrived in Shimla, it was certainly and by far the best available accommodations of anything we'd seen (a pool which included two adjoining hotel rooms that didn't get any sunlight, though there were mirrors affixed to the ceiling and horizonally on the wall beside the bed; the unfinished room above my Rotarian sponsor's house, an hour's drive from Shimla proper; flats that didn't have kitchens, flats that didn't have running water, and finally the terrifying Visiting Scholars Residence at Himachal Pradesh University which was a purgatory of malaise so profoundly depressing that Turner and I still talk about it today as The Worst Place On Earth, bar none). In truth, when we finally found our flat, it seemed like a true godsend. It was with giant smiles and trembling hands that we readily and gratefully agreed to pay the equivalent of $400 Cdn per month for the privelege of living at Rikhye Nivas.

We'd moved from downtown Toronto in a one-room apartment for $500/mo all the way across the world to a placed with two bedrooms and two sitting rooms, two bathrooms, a walk-in closet and a balcony, and we'd downscaled in price. We knew full well we were being ripped off by Indian standards. ...But you know what? We aren't Indian. And we had sure put every ounce of effort we had into finding an apartment. This one was the only apartment that was even marginally adequate for our needs. And furthermore, I was on scholarship, and my award could cover that rent with plenty left over to provide for our living expenses the rest of the year. So there might be a fleecing going on, but overall there was no harm done, as far as we were concerned.

At some point, Nazko asked us what we were paying in rent. We knew that the amount of our rent was more than Nazko's salary in two and a half years, but we told her, truthfully, the price of our rent. Well, Nazko was beyond appalled. She really loved us and we really loved her. And she ended up taking the overcharging-of-our-rent very personally. She was incredibly pissed off at our landlord, the nephew of her benefactor. She would mutter under her breath about how criminal was this rent. And how it was stealing. And how it was wrong. And that Shiva would eventually set things right.

Well, as the months went on, we sort of forgot about this grudge Nazko was carrying around on our behalf. And then one day we received word that Turner had won two National Magazine Awards back in Canada - one of which came with a $5000 prize, something like that, a big whop of cash. We were pretty excited, very happy for Turner. And Nazko of course wanted to know what all the ruckus was about, and we told her.

And she got this huge smile, like she's been waiting to hear this news for months. She closed her eyes and prayed, "Ohm nama Shivaai!" And BEAMED at us. Shiva is to be thanked! He has corrected the imbalance! This is your reward for the exorbitant rent!

...I think Turner and I can be forgiven if we didn't seem to immediately grasp the apparently direct connection between the $400/mo and the award Turner'd just won for a story he'd written more than a year previously. But Nazko was thrilled all day. And told everyone in the neighbourhood about how Turner had won a big writing prize in Canada that came with money. And that Shiva had fixed the extortion by rewarding us.

The more we heard the story her way, the more it seemed like it was at least as good an explanation as "coincidence" or "these events are unconnected - it's all just life's rich tapestry". So we came around. And to this day we explain to people about how Shiv helped Turner win his first National Magazine Award.

Lobby view of the shrine here at Ekkamai Soi 2.

So I guess it's appropriate that our girl has become a fan of Shiva. I ring the bell for her and bring my hands together in namaste to the statue, intoning, "Ohm nama Shivaai!" And Sloane claps.

 

Categories: Asia 2006 | India | Olden Days

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Our Bangkok Schedule

Our days are rather fluid, here, but this is our schedule, in general:

7-8am          Wake up. Sloane comes into the big bed to have her boob breakfast, and we play around a bit, read a few books. Then it's out into the world, the wilds of Thab & Phet's apartment. We head into the Fun Room to look at Ji's toys, fiddle with a few more books, toddle around. We go back and forth between the Fun Room and the kitchen, where I prepare a bottle to suppliment Sloane's breakfast, and do some dishes, and so on. On days when she's really full of beans, we take the elevator down to the second floor of the complex, the Wunderfloor that hosts the pool, the kids' play area, the little corner store, and best of all, the Shiva statue, and its bell.

9-9:30am      Sloane goes for her first nap of the day. My day's work starts in earnest once she's down. Sometimes I'll sneak a peek at the email in the early morning while she's babbling to herself and wrecking Ji's carefully-constructed block towers or his painstakingly-drawn art taped to the cabinets. But once she's down for the morning nap I'm at the computer and starting on the day's errands: logistics for the research schedule (which includes everything from hotel reservations to chasing down contacts within the Tibetan-government-in-exile to calling Vandana Shiva's office), organizing blog work (photos, articles-in-waiting) for thegeographyofhope.com, sorting photos, and folding laundry & other household cleaning.

10-10:30am   Our sooper-dooper nanny, Kitt, arrives for the day. On specific occasions she comes earlier or later, depending on our schedule. But on the average day she arrives while Sloane is sleeping. Kitt's job mostly involves keeping Sloane occupied and happy, but when she first gets here she cleans the kitchen and sweeps the flat. Does the morning dishes, and tidies up in general. Eventually everything's done and we both set to reading, waiting for Sloane to wake.

11-11:30am    Sloaner wakes. Lunch, work, playing.

2:30-3:30pm   Sloane's second nap. After she's down, Kitt tidies a bit more, and then heads home for the day. I rush around while Sloane's sleeping, getting things settled and finished up; when she wakes my work day is done.

4pm or so       Thab and Ji come home from school. Sloane and I are on our way out for the afternoon adventure: the heat of the day has passed, so it's a good time to go exploring in the neighbourhood and beyond. Sometimes we have dinner out on the road, and sometimes at home after we get back.

6-7pm            Return to the flat, get Sloane all bathed and rubbed, and tuck her in for the night.

 

Categories: Asia 2006

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Karen and Bauer

Intrepid travellers: the Foster-Bauer-ses.

So far: foot massage, check; Bangkok transit system adventures, check; Chatuchak Weekend Market madness, check; swimming here at Ekkamai Soi 2, check; food food and more food, check; hotel craziness, complete with 7am vaccumming-outside-the-door wakeup call and lying brochure, check! The Asia trip is right on track, it seems.

Categories: Asia 2006 | Friends

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One Or Two Things About This Labyrinthine Helix Of Friends I Found

So tomorrow evening Bauer and Karen arrive in Bangkok. They're the only people I know who said, "We're going to travel for a year after we get married", and then actually jumped ship, quit their (obscenely high-paying) jobs, gave up their (penthouse) apartment at Yonge and Eglinton, put all their (lovely) stuff in storage and truly got on the plane to Hong Kong yelling Sayonara, Suckers! ...Okay, maybe not th