Be the rhythm, said a woman with flaming hair.
They meditated in the weaving village.
Lucky loved her passion for silks.
Elephants danced with zodiac symbols.
Weavers click clacked threads.
Beauty has no tongue.
Practice is allowing everything in your life to wake you up.
I am your masseuse. I’ve lived in this Bursa hammam since 1555.
In a large domed room sunrays shafting at precarious precious angles slant along humid walls glancing off mosaic tiles singing blue, green, yellow reflections. The dome has a perfect eight-starred symmetrical hat surrounded by sixteen stars in a geometric pattern. At night stars sing their light. They give me a pleasant headache.
This is where I live and work. I raised my family here. I will die here. This is my fate in a water world where tea and conversations meet in companionship, community and conspiracy.
After the hammam and noon prayers men went to a teahouse. They whispered stories, gossip, myth, legends, fairy tales, innuendo, lies, half-truths and fabulous fictions as small silver spoons danced in glass.
Someone else writes this with a Mont Blanc Meisterstuck 149 fountain pen. He drinks thick black Turkish coffee. A silver embossed glass of water waits for fingers to leave condensation on its surface. He turned to a stranger, “Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death and sweet as love.”
“If you finish the water it means the coffee’s no good,” said a stranger.
Lucky distributed providence to oral storytellers engaging tongues, dialects, foolscap, and fading footsteps behind shadows playing cards and slurping tea. Eyelids were heavy deep visual reminders studying down all the daze.
Such a grand and glorious saga, sang Zeynep, a heroine in a vignette.
I am a short story. You are a novel.
By day I am a gravedigger, said Lucky, and a literary prostitute after dark.
We bury our successes and failures in the same grave.
On your grave are two dates separated by a dash. What’s important is what you do during the dash. Is life a dash or marathon?
Go with your flow. Flow your glow.
Zeynep the heroine
Red clouds on a soft day. Japanese kamikaze snappers.
Rivers and sensation perception. Small people big voice. Orange monks. Women oranges. Street love.
Serenity of sitting one afternoon in Boua Mon's village. Paper village.
The world is a village.
In this real zone dust dances with laughter. Women gossip, cook, swaddle infants. Joy and connections away from Disneyland myopia circus.
How it works in Laos. Unspoken. Men make the rules. Women take care of the home.
Below the surface. Subtitles.
Women worship in temples, men sit around drinking beer.
A village maintains the other world.
Morality, ethics, behavior.
You don't leave the village.
Everything I need is here.
Symbiotic symbolic relationships.
Meditation awareness.
Gentle undying nature.
Once upon a dream there was (is) present.
Ink said, hello now a few words in simple English hilarious.
Since July, representing an English language company in Mandalay, he facilitated English and Creativity with Grades 1 & 2 every afternoon at a private school in the rural countryside.
Two Burmese brothers owned the new school with 500 students from G1-11. The Brothers Grim - this ain’t no fairy tale.
The last five months were joyful then…
In the last week of Now I Remember, (seven days past) while Grade 2 was drawing and coloring houses, dragons, dinosaurs, sun, trees, flowers, river, fish, boats, rainbows, people and dreams – pain, suffering and stupidity said hello.
100 Grade 11 male and female students gathered in a semi-circle on the cement patio outside the primary classroom. They faced steps and ornate golden script atop the cheap grandiose building:
Developing Youth, Character and Future Leaders Through Fear and Intimidation.
A stack of papers with all the names waited on a desk.
Headmaster brother in a white shirt and purple patterned Longyi, held a 4’ bamboo stick.
His voice echoed into hearts and minds - you failed the exam. You will receive your punishment.
Taking a paper from the stack he called out a name. A girl stepped forward, climbing two steps with her back to the crowd.
He measured the bamboo stick against her buttocks, coiled and unleashed the blow. Whack!
Her face stiffened. He coiled. Whack!
A small tear graced her left eye.
She rejoined her classmates.
99 passive students waited to feel sharp stinging lashes.
Primary assistant teachers oscillated between helping students and watching the angry headmaster swing his bamboo stick.
Name after name.
Chattering with friends, children colored a large red heart floating over a blue river.
Brother #2 entered the classroom.
Why is he beating the students, said the foreign teacher?
They failed the exam. Whack!
Parents want us to punish their children. They see we are doing our job. Whack!
It’s part of our culture. Whack!
Maybe we’ll change it in two or three years. Whack!
The foreign teacher and thirty children practiced meditation.
Breathe in and out.
Inhale suffering and exhale love.
Mindful awareness.
Mindful seeing.
Mindful attention.
Mindful presence.
Calm abiding.
He hugged each child. We created a loving environment.
You are a beautiful rainbow and a genius.
I love you.
Our time together is finished.
You are in my heart.
How slow can you go?
Slower than a breath.
Slower than stillness.
Slow slower and slower.
One night star bright moon light senses our mutual loneliness.
Star shows me scar marks on her wrists. My father died. I lived with relatives. They beat me. I tried to kill myself. Twice. I ran away. I became strong. I decided to live.
I met a man. I got pregnant. I had my son. He is 17 now. I studied Lao massage and worked for three years.
A good fool is hard to find.
Acrobatic spine torso. Ride the pony. Flexibility. Drive it home until dawn.
We are buried deep inside narrow dark muddy passages.
We are surrounded by women gossiping, telling stories in the market. They discuss the Lao woman with a tall foreign man. She inspects green beans. With theatrical brilliance she throws them back. Disdain. Too expensive. Poor quality. She negotiates greens, bamboo, vegetables.
You don't see foreign ghost spirits in this market.
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