Trust and smile

Don't you just love the name of a school in Cambodia?

It sings on a clean white sign propped against a brick wall along an endless red rutted swampy road.

Down the road from a pagoda wat where friends and relatives create a cremation. He was 70.

He survived the genocide. That says something. 

The rainy season brings endless pleasure minus pain to natives and aliens.

Milling around is an art form here.

TRUST and SMILE.

Practice with friends and strangers. 

hello june

Goodbye May. Pound out your bright beautiful future. 

A Turkish man with a hammer. Gypsy music. 

Only madmen and pilgrims travel alone.

We began in India. Wandering no name alleys, streets, villages, rivers, valleys, mountains.

Darkness whispers, Who's there?

I received a reprieve from death row one night in Vietnam. My sentence was commuted to life without parole. A South American writer said parole means speech, word, a word of honor.

Parole is the condition under which you are free, with a language and human awareness.

Human freedom is unconditional.

Memory fades into living color remembered with absolute infinity. Desperate hands fold across heaving chests, feeling abandoned sucking air injuries. Stop the bleeding. Start the breathing. 

It rained yesterday. It was long sweet and slow and heavy. Streets became quiet. Everyone huddled in corners of their mind. 

Why is nature so cruel, they cried. Nature laughed, Hahaha. Human tears fell like rain. Tears flooded their memory of nothing.

Today the sun came out. It was hot. Humans cried, Why is nature so cruel. Nature laughed.

 

Scientists say old memory is not destroyed, but that many copies of the same memory could exist in parallel.

They say your memory is only as good as your last memory rather than based on your initial memory.

Speak memory.

“Years ago, I broke a bunch of roses
from the top of his wall.
A thorn from that is still in my palm,
working deeper.” - Rumi 

A Jungle Story

Once upon a time in the long now there was a continent, a land mass floating on water. It was labelled Asia by white people on dusty maps. Deep inside Asia were vast lands, rivers and mountains.

Overtime, a historical bandit with a reputation for laughter, magic, fear, superstition, and insatiable appetite for peoples of diverse languages, customs and cultures lived in jungles and forests. Others preferred living in distant and remote mountains. 

Jingle, jangle, jungle. Using natural materials they created musical instruments, simple weapons, homes, fish traps, snares and tools like looms. The women had babies, wove cloth and prepared food while the men fished, planted crops, domesticated animals. Children played and learned life lessons from nature in extended families. 

One day a boat filled with white men sailed down the river to a village deep in the jungle. They wore shiny clothing, spoke a language the people didn't understand and carried weapons which made a lot of noise and scared the people.

They pretended to be friendly by offering gifts. The leader of the village welcomed them. They had a party.

Every day more white people came down the river on boats named Destiny. They were on a quest for gold and slaves. Owning, using and discarding slaves had proven to be an essential part of their historical evolution on other continents. Their mantra was, Cheap labor, Cheap raw material, Cheap goods, Cheap markets and much Profit.

They said, We are civilized and you are savages. We have religion. It is called Wealth.

We are on a mission from the great chief. We control fire. We control time. We control people. We control nature. We have machines. We take what we want.

The village gave them hospitality and shelter and friendship. The white men were greedy. They took control of the village, the people and the jungle. 

Every day the white men marched their slaves deep into the jungle singing, We control Nature. We shall overcome.

They spread diseases. They planted fear. They planted envy and jealousy. They manipulated villages against villages. They divided people against people. Divide and conquer. Against each other. History had taught them well. 

They harvested wealth in the form of people, precious stones, rubber and every raw material of value. They were never satisfied. Their appetite grew and grew.

If we want to survive we move to a new jungle forest tomorrow, said a village shaman. Far away.

This is the story they told the people one night below stars singing with their light.

Brick Boy in Nepal

 

My name is Brick Boy. I live, work and die in the Kathmandu valley. The valley contains hundreds of brick factories. Millions of people like me work here. It's our fate.

A woman I never met carries them at a construction site in Bhaktapur. Exciting.

Labor.

The factories are owned by rich people. We plant, harvest, cull, clean, stack, carry, haul and sell bricks. Bricks are an essential way of life. They get formed, stacked, sorted, assembled, counted, controlled, and used. Like me and the others.

We are a tool of production.

I've got a mind to give up living and go shopping instead.

My future is safe and brilliant.

Chinese Factory School #8

Good afternoon students. My name is Mr. On. It rhymes with song, gong, long gone.

It is 17:10 p.m. If it was 18:01 p.m. I would say good evening, however it is still afternoon. It is late in life. Class will meet twice a week for two hours. Show up on time, do your assignments and be prepared. Nothing more, nothing less.

We are gathered here today in the glorious Chinese Communist Party People's Appliance Factory #8 to begin our basic simple English lessons. Your supervisor informs me that you are here both by choice and chance. You have the choice. This is your chance. Am I clear? Do you understand me? Choice and chance. 

Now. I know. Most of you have been working since early morning in the factory. It is the end of another long mind numbing grueling tedious day on the killing floor. English has brought us together. You face unique and amazing challenges to acquire a foreign language. To use said target language with meaning. To hopefully become fluent. It will require your undivided attention, focus and electrical energy. 

You will practice speaking, reading, listening and writing. These are the four basic skills. Writing and speaking are active. Reading and listening are passive in your learning process. 

Learning occurs in the context of task-based activities. In other words you learn by doing. You do and you understand, as we say, said, did, done.

We will cover, in exhaustive detail, four important appliances and their English A/C D/C lets see connections. They are: washing machines, air conditioners, vacuum cleaners and microwave ovens. 

These machines are now essential in everyone’s life. You know this because it is your job to put them together. It’s like English, putting words together makes a simple sentence. Some have meaning and some are gibberish. Many words are useless idiomatic semantic syntax which is not the same as personal income tax.

Open your head, heart and mouth. Eat English.