the last things or so

I don't know what to call this post so I am telling you this here because I am writing this first and whatever the title is, just know that its creation and delivery has come after whatever is about to be written here. Which I also don't know what it will be but that's how I write this anyways, all together and at once with the words and thoughts being same-same, same tempo, same rhythm, slowed only by transliterating synapses to syllables.

So.

This is our porch view from Jungle Heaven and I put it here because do you see the small pathway? Right, good, so think about pathways and walking and adventures, because part two of our weekend was a jungle safari, fording the same river as our elephant ride and passing the lightning tree and two of our guides sandwiched the white girls so we didn't get lost although there were branching trails around us. We walk-ran run run run ran-walk-runrunrun-walked our way to viewing point one to see a tiger but we just missed it, sweat pouring from our bodies, looking like we were taking river baths sit rhinoceroses. We hiked through grasses taller than our heads, me at the back being dampened by everyone else's sweat that stuck to it and white sandy patches of trail were heat waves of hot, shoes squelchy and wet. Arrived at a second viewpoint and this was "time to be patient because lots of tourists are like rush and go but you need to listen and wait", said our guide with the long singular dreadlock down the back of his head. We sat in the dirt and practiced squishing ants as huge flies buzzed around us. Our body temperatures finally slowed down,  no longer drip drip dripping sweat, more like a steady sheen. Eventually we got adventurous and me, Vita and Bailey climbed the lookout point tree and our guides and Dinesh called us monkeys and laughed in breathy whispers to not scare the suppose tigers. It was awesome. Breeze through the leaves, dappled sunshine, slight sway. I closed my eyes, wedged my leg in a branch gap and hooked my arm above me and could have slept. 

No tigers in sight but deer and birds and tree climbing sufficed, rhinos in the distance and lookout points and epic heat and a bonus river swim at the end. Rivers, I have decided, are the most refreshing. Much appreciated. 

And on our ride home, crossing a bridge by foot so as to spot the crocodiles (which we did) there were also wild elephants on the other side. I wish I could have captured that view for you, the low wide river and river bushes and hills sloping steeply behind it and two elephants, huge and ear flappy, eating in the centre patch of grasses, timeless, amazing, full of grace of the animal kingdom sort. 

Deep breaths, finger snapping appreciation for planet earth. And temperature.

My right hand looks this now, from Wednesday.

The girl (Omvica) who did it charged us way too much but she chattered in English and was 15 and could speak French and Spanish and a bit of Thai and good Chinese and English and Hindi and Nepali and she smiled and said I want to make it beautiful for you and the ink smelled like tea tree leaves and something else good and fresh. 

Afterwards Nura took us to buy saris (sarees) and it was a four part process of wrap and fabric and measurements and tailoring. We left small piles of dried henna on the shop floors, peeling the old colour, looking at the orange ink designs and waiting for it to darken, and it has darkened now. The fabric and chiffon and hand embroidery and colours have been matched and are under construction, so we will pick up the saris (sarees) and wear them out on Saturday for our last night in town. We oooh'd and ahhh'd each other and every colour has seemed to match who we are, midnight and bright and shiny and dignified, beautiful. Dinesh today said "I do not know why it is or what but it is something in our minds maybe and we just think women in saris are just so beautiful" and I agree, and I will never be able to wear it as naturally as the women here but I am so grateful to be able to share it, to try on, to feel the weighted beads and walk just a little bit taller. 

 The view out my window looks like this now, Kathmandu now. We left Lamahi on Tuesday night and had 11 hours of bumpy roads, routine now, familiar now, and then a dinner break at 10:30 and the women in the restaurant who kept it open for us wished us all safe journey and safe journey sounds to me as buen viaje did last year and amongst my face pressed to window glass to look up at stars and lightning behind hills and the occasional snatch of river roaring below I turned safe journey over in my head and the way it has been said to us so far. 

Midnight and a half found an accident on the highway and placed it for us, so we rolled to the side of the road with nothing else to do but wait so we did, rolled and tucked and bent and curved into some kind of sleep, until van door slid shut and we moved out, using our whiteness, our tourist-ness as a reason to bypass security checks and at one point two army men jumped in and we drove them to the next stop and they hopped out and tapped our van and we drove faster and the streets were empty, just empty, and shop doors closed and guarded with roll-y metal doors and we staggered back in to the Eco hotel and now breakfasts are fruit and Nepali yogurt (literally just so delicious) and vegetables and variety and there are so many more white people around and sounds. 

This is from the day I had to say goodbye. 

Here is some of the space where I would put words if I could, if I knew how to start. 

Here are some words: 

mothers group tikkas and flowers, pressed in hand and hibiscus, smudge foreheads and touch hearts, tell them thank you, you are so inspiring, this is amazing, we will carry your stories in our hearts, thank you because if I said more I would cry and I wipes under my eyes anyway as we turned and left the large and shady mango tree and wave wave wave 

and the kids ran out and ran to us and ran with us and we played against the teachers in a game of musical chairs under the holy tree with Nepali drum beats and danced and laugh laugh laughed and dusty bare feet and chanting names and sweet honey rolls for lunch and how do I tell you thank you for your students and time and how do I tell you we are probably not, probably not coming back and how do you say that 

walk down stairs and there are my students and I cannot look back I cannot say goodbye not one more time and I do not and the jeep bumps us away and this is the last time I see these faces and spaces and land and cows and rivers and infinity bridges

and pasta for early dinner at home, heavens door, and pack the big van and go and say thank you family, take one last picture how do I say I love you like this and hug Deepa and Surita and how do I say bye but in the van and through the window I namaste one last time

one last time

and we drive and drive and our eyes leak and drive me drive. 

And somehow something somehow sometime maybe someday I know I must come back I cannot shake it I cannot stay but I will come back. is that okay

Look!

I found the little prince again. I did not think I would find him in Nepal and then when I was buying 

these pants, he appeared, and now these are my favourite pants. 

It's funny because I saw these pants/the design during our first stay in Kathmandu and I said: mark my words these are my pants, I will find them again when we return. 

And in a different location than originally found, I found them, and the little prince, and now I can't help the feeling of right time right place, and now I also can't remove the little prince's words: just because I'm gone doesn't mean I've gone away.

And now I feel the need to tell you that like the fox, like the flower, this place has tamed me. This place I have made my own and it has made me and it might just be the three week rule talking, but maybe that is not such a 'just', either. And maybe this is how I know, when I find myself thinking of laughing stars and small planets full of lessons and lamplighters and what makes a rose one rose, not a wall of roses and wells in deserts and walls and snakes and moving your chair every minute of every day to watch the sunset. 

It is Friday now, and I leave on Sunday. 

I do not know how many times more I will write here, for this. So this is maybe, not the last of the things for my 29 days in Nepal. Maybe. 

As is: safe journey. 

I will see you again. Soon.

-k

in the jungle, the mighty jungle..

...we sleep in mud walled, tin roofed rooms with beds with resident red ants and princess canopy mosquito nets

in the most humid heat or hottest humidity I've yet experienced, easily above 40 degrees, and then humidity, and it is nighttime now. 

Oh oh oh, feel that. This is Jungle Heaven (hotel) in Bardia National Park, (south)west Nepal and this is where I am, this May 25th, no wifi, thank goodness, quiet and nature and hot hot. 

But never fear, because 

life is okay, and isn't that just the truth. 

Because today I rode on the back of an elephant and we rocked with every enormous step of her enormous legs and her tail would switch when I placed my hand on her back and I ran my feet over her sides and it was tough skin and coarse hairs and soft grey and pink in folds and nothing more than this and her eyes like billiard balls of soul and a trunk like evolution remembered function and hilarity at the same time and strength plowing on and on. 

We crossed muddy swirling rivers and stomped delicately through jungle forest ground, a pathway from times before, and I have scratches on my swinging legs from where the trees told me namaste and smack smack get that ant and flick that bug and rock and rock back and forth. 

Get this: the jungle...sounds like a jungle. it is real. and alive. The bird calls and howler monkeys and the occasional branch snap from unseen wild things and even the sun sounds like the jungle. I have been placed back in the world when humankind did not exist and how this will exist long after we finish our weird and wicked journeys here. Maybe not the rhinoceroses(because screw you poachers, and the market that demands it *really mad face*)one of whose path we crossed today, but what will likely outlive us is the way the sun settled itself between bare branches of stark trees on grasslands by edges of jungles and rocky banks of drying rivers, and the leaping of the tall deer and the scurry of the smaller ones and creepy spiders dangling on shoulders and tree stumps and elephant dumps...this will be here. At least that is the kind of timelessness I believe in...or maybe I am just hoping. I am just hoping so much that we don't mess this up for every other living creature around us, whether they are massive rhinos that grunt and charge you and then think better and bundle off crashing intothe bush   (adrenaline like this is what my ancestors faced down sometime, in ancient days of caves and wild and everything the same, prey predator hunted hunter)or the human-whistle-tune-bird that echoed in the distance, or the geckos that spring across the white washed wall in front of me, or the crickets roaring up around this jungle darkness, all. 

Watch your step, humans. There is so much more to where we live than just us.

In other news: it is one week until our last night in Nepal all together. 

Whatever/wuteva don't matter I don't care nope not affected by this hahahha noooooooopppppeeeeeee  

*stares at you* 

Here is my face from yesterday, our last day in the classroom: 

And I didn't cry ... probably because we will be returning on Tuesday for lunch and a final meeting with the teachers so I have postponed all my feelings until then so lalalalalalalala can't hear you don't tell me it is time to go. 

But it is, and by the time I post this and by the time you are reading this (a different now than the now I'm living this...now) I will be even closer and maybe this makes you happy (finally this crazy girl is coming home) but maybe it makes you look at your month and say wait that crazy girl is coming home? Where did the time go.

...and I just misspelled something in that last sentence and autocorrect was all: the word you want is 'here'. And I was like, no I promise I want where...

but here is where

 the time went.

time went here. Here. 

Truth: I am still here. And will be yet. And here is where I was and here is where I am and here is where I will be. 

I want to roll my body in paint and high five the wall I am looking at and I want to scratch the surface of the earth and get it under my fingernails and run my face over the tufts of grass around the path and I want to make something to tell me that I am here. 

The locks on the doors here are strange and simple and intricate all together, and this place is jungle heaven and in Lamahi, we learned yesterday that our hotel name literally translates into 'door to heaven' or 'heaven's door' and this is something. This is maybe how I've been feeling the divine every time I am greeted by namaste here and I think heaven is on earth where you learn to create yourself and your space into a broken and changing harmony, create who you are in space and person and place and peace and pain. That's what I think, what I take in every time I breathe  deep on the rooftop and right now feeling the sweat roll over my body because the power has turned off now and my fan is no longer the nighttime percussion to the wind instruments of the insects, feel so complete(ly) the heat, and that is everything I feel, I need, knowing I am constantly on the threshold of heaven for myself. 

And maybe I overstep and maybe this sounds too self-serving but I write this as a pinprick in the sky, less, because the only air I breathe is mine for a moment and if you asked me to (let) go, I would, and this life is not mine to keep but mine to live. That is all I can do.

Here. 

-k

future imperfect

If I had words for today, I would need words for yesterday, for such a string of yesterdays that stretch back and back and back. Back so far I could not tell you when they began or who began them or if there was a beginning because these days I cannot put my finger quite on anything, not words or emotions or thoughts, no matter how I try. 

So it goes that watching the bridge disappear in a square pattern behind us today, looking through that centre to the small dark green glimpse of beyond, feels like this. 

And so it is that the word belong appeared today in conversation and so it goes that I cannot help but sink into this place of recognition for me. 

And yes I know that we still have one week left in Dang and a further five days after that still back in Kathmandu, but at some point or other I am cornered by these thoughts on leaving. And I wrote and wrote and wrote today trying to figure out my thoughts on leaving and I asked how will I leave this place? 

These three weeks of momos and spicy sauces and dirt roads and black tea milk tea and rice and eating with my hands; of shopkeepers calling out namaste and children bowing their hands to their foreheads and children holding my fingers, the thin small boy from today who played with my hands and I chattered at him in English; of sunsets in hazy continental colours and the stars and the moon rise and squat toilets on bus rides and sunburns on my shoulders; of waving hands and reluctant smiles and saris and bangles and being white and market place bags of peppers and gourds; of prayer flags, incense, a perfectly un-placed sense of divinity and reality in the everywhere, the everyday; of bumpy roads and rusty jeeps and mud huts and water pumps and luxuries like clean sheets and air conditioning and kindness; of beads of sweat become rivers become laughter and glopping cement and the tink of bricks and sore hands and dirt on skin and river currents washing away; of serene cow faces and ugly bull horns and goats and goats and chickens and colour; of light, and skies, and people. The people. Always.

And I do not know how (i will leave)on the inside and yet: 

and yet I will. 

I will go and stay and leave and go and stay and leave until one day when I will ask myself how will I leave this place and I will not be able. I will not say, "I will", and I will not leave. But this day is not today, is not yet. I do not feel anything but the words 'I will' pressed deeper than everything else...maybe they were there first. Maybe I will always need them. Maybe. 

And maybe I am just thinking too grandiose for one small candle in this infinite universe and maybe I am. But maybe I am also trying to understand the how's that have grown into my journey, followed by the "will I leave" from that question.

And this happens, it does, especially since Nicaragua, this how game, this battle of the I wills. Because for all the leaving that is approaching like the dawn in a midnight sky, I know my I will's are followed by this, one word: return. 

But this one word I cannot promise for here, for now. I can dream it, for all the possibilities created in these last weeks, but I cannot say it. (Perhaps I never can, because life doesn't listen to plans, but the certainty scale is tilted differently in this case). 

And still. I know. 12 days. You do not need to tell me Kelly look at all the time you have! Look at it. Be there for it. 

This is something I do, know how to do. This I will do. This I promise you is not an earthquake for me; this does not stop me, to look at time, to acknowledge expiration dates....but that's not right now is it? There is nothing that will expire about this (except maybe my visa, technically), not within me, not without me. I just am telling you now that I see that I will leave. Soon. And I see it. And I see it. I know it is there. I know I will leave. 

It does nothing but sit in the corner and colour by number until I am back in an airport, and even then it will move behind me quietly and maybe just curl up under my seat and even when I return (.) home? it will still just be there on the edge, the periphery, noting all the ways here is not there is not this is not that, not 'home', not how it is called, changed by name now, and then it will sink in, with clean roads, and tall houses, and no chickens, and white people, and traffic lights, in the morning that does not sound the same and whole grain bread and catching my foot tan disappearing in socks, soft carpeted floors, my fingernails clean, no need for bottled water. 

This I know, and this I see. And I raise you the bet that however these next days go, they will not falter for knowing I will leave. This is like asking: How could we ever live less knowing we will die? Is not each moment designed exclusively for now and for you? 

I will not say carpe diem but I will say I do not have realize tattooed on me for nothing. 

Real eyes, like Buddha, like sunshine, like the divine you see in the you in me. 

I am here. 

I 

am here.

And I will leave.

And this is not that, is not perfect, is not wrong, is not the end.

This is. 

-k

today is May 19th

and I just wrote and immediately lost a good long post about this weekend, so instead I will give it to you like this: 

On Friday I met this Danish guy, the only other white person somewhat around Lamahi (go figure) and had a staunch discussion on democracy (huh), free trade (...mhmmm) and why the world is the way it is (he says: human nature to need someone to step on. I say: aiya). He doesn't think there is much (if any) suffering in Denmark, and I am raising an eyebrow even still. That's right, go wave your liberal institution flag around. I'm sure everything will always work in favour of capitalism and free trade and market liberalization and one day we will all definitely not be scratching our heads wondering why we stayed stuckin systems   systems systems of structural injustice. 

And then we went out out out out into the countryside to Deepa's house where I was struck motionless by dust swirls in afternoon light by red red blossoms in a green green tree and swallowed again by feelings of how on earth does our world even work and I thought maybe it was hopelessness but it isn't, it isn't. It is a sliding and realizing and I know one day my ideals will probably crumble and I can't avoid the steps the rest of the world seems to be taking but i'll try and try and try and in the process wonder if (Danish par example but not as scapegoat people) ever consider themselves so obviously as white people and where do lines divide and do they do they do they make a difference and where where how.

We tries Nepali...liquor....for no idea of what else to call it, and it reminded me of the candy fizz, and so that's how that went.

And we met Deepa's daughter and Dinesh told us her story (Deepa's), and I was overcome with the desire to wrap her and her tiny daughter in a hug and make her safe in this violent world somehow but nobody can do that, no one person can do that and she never asked. And again I wonder where the line goes between asking and needing and crossing and bleeding.

The food was spicy and amazing and we sat on plastic chairs and here I understood why people can sit and look and watch and I want to lose all sense of time someday and do just that. 

Saturday we drove to our hotel resort an I was overwhelmed by the luxury which even still is maybe 3 stars in Canada but soft pillows and a pool (!!!) and being served soft drinks when we first arrived four hours away from Lamahi and then the pleasure of sitting by a poolside, even if it was crowded, positively packed, with stating Nepali men. Because white women in bathing suits doesn't, I gather, happen often. And I could excuse most of the staring on account of that but still I tailspun into a small feminist thing about the male gaze, in all its manifestations. 

Aha. 

Food was not rice or roti (!!!) and we stayed up till a late 10:30 just hanging out. Bedtime, wake up to the sounds of our gecko friend stuck in the windowsill, 

and it is May 19th. 

And I woke up struck by this fact that May has slipped through my fingers somehow and so, a little bit, has this year, even though this present 2013 is not the same 2013 as two weeks ago, as two months ago. 

So that...happens.

And today we went to Lumbini.

The birthplace of Lord Buddha. 

I looked into temple cores and Buddha statue eyes and travelled by rickshaw and sweltered in humid heat and crickets blasted around us and it was quiet and it was not and I swear the Buddha could see my soul and I think now I'm still not sure how I feel, perhaps like someone has reached inside and a little bit gently but more firmly then anything brushed who I am and said this is who you are even to the parts I don't know yet. 

And time eclipsed itself and now now now we are home again, Lamahi with its bus horns and rice-or-roti and our wonderful hotel family and it is impossible but also not that I missed this room and this place. 

it is may 19th. 

how

even

do these things...

happen.

place. 

That is what I am uncovering here. Place and space and how it relates, identity, divinity, uncertainty. Poetry. 

This place.

ah.

-k

Tharu food from Friday. 

Nepali spirits.......

Our wonderful Friday evening hosts. Deepa is beside me. 

see you yesterday

[but first let me say that I am friends with the most prolific email writers in the whole entire world. Dhanyabad, you beautiful people. My name is safe in your mouth. 

And also that I have finished White Teeth (thank you, afternoon heat and ceiling fan for giving me the chance to do so).]

is what class 10b called to me as I left for lunch today. See you yesterday. Future present, past imperfect. The way it definitely is.

Look! 

I have received my first note from the students! The group of boys most okay with hanging out around us and most excited to introduce us to everyone and their peers and practice speaking and revel in it and debate in quick Nepali what the right word is for what and speak anyways and try and teach us so many Nepali words all together helped in our last brick-brigade line and then gave me that note. Said "when you are leaving for your country we will very much remember you". 

*takes deep breath and looks at all the feels* 

Today we technically finished what we came here to do on the construction agenda, brick walls all laid and communication between us and the two workers finally at a hilarious and decent level. Highlights from our last days on the scaffolding: our older Dhai ( brother, because he always called us "sister") dancing to some Hindi music we were playing, several times, and the way he smiles fully with all his teeth, our younger Dhai telling us "no problem" while fixing potentially fatal bamboo and twine set ups...also telling us "no dancing" as we perched precariously on the edge, making younger Deepa laugh when concrete dripped on my head, holding older Deepa's hand, shaking the brick dust from my eyes, going down to the river for buckets of pani, water, (...there's a river, standing between...), the way our Dhais flip flops squish on the concrete mix, how they tap-break the bricks just right, the way the string contraption works for leveling the walls, ska-wulching the cement on a new layer, looking at the walls and thinking, my hands touched those bricks. I laid some of that foundation, I took part in creating that space. Perhaps a little less efficiently then our Dhais, perhaps not ably to carry as many bricks on my head as our Didis and Ammas (sisters and mothers)who helped out, but still. That is something. 

This is my foot tan of the last 6 days at the worksite. I am amazingly proud of it, being of the persuasion that awkward foot tans are excellent. 

...

When the boys came to help, they swirled around in a whirlwind of energy and fast talking youth-ness. They asked me what religion I have and I stopped fully for a moment, looking at the patterns of brick stack in front of me, trying not to fidget. Am I a god(s)less creature? Am I some heathen foreign woman with no divine direction, no moral code, no religious institution behind me? So I answered "I don't have any", but I don't know how to translate it, if it does. How many times have I tried to put words to whatever truth it is I live by, and how many times have I never been able to. How I have not found a name that suits, one that fits more than Kelly Grace. And what else is grace? But how I do not know. In our cold white north, our massive country of leaves and stays and fresh water and misplaced senses of belonging, how I've looked and kept an eyebrow raised and still not found a way to say how it is I believe (if). And how it has not mattered in the way of who you are as you where and how and if you have a religion too. I will stop to let whatever time of day it is cross the street and let it be. I just don't know for me, and not like an agnostic not know, not a denial, but also not some confession of truth, either. 

....bet that was least expected after a picture of my feet. 

Though here now I am willing to write (willing myself? Or just wanting to?) that I believe in my groove, in the real eyes I've told my skin to never forget and who was with me when that happened, in all the stages of its happening, and how I will change with it when I need to and how this is okay too, and ending words with whys and ys, that made me want to write us, because y and u is so close together and I believe in these things meaning something if they do, do because fundamentally they are, if you let this life get to you and the sweat to bead for you and hearts to leak for you and with and around and there for you and here. For you. 

These are the things, at least some, that sunsets like last night remind me of and make me feel, the way you can put the stars on a map and think you know the way home but identity does not happen like that. This I promise you, of all the promises I may have made before, we are not like clay pots intent on shattering, more like mud roofs, where when we slide, you can make castles and mud pies. This is 

how it makes me feel

to be doing what I am currently doing. 

So bug bites, scratch on and remind me of my human in me, this skin and these feet and these blister thumb hands. 

-k

morning light

It was more of a silent jeep ride this morning on the way to the school (which I need to write down the name of, because it is quite a mouthful), and I was sitting in my thoughts like they were something comfortable, an old leather armchair or a hug from a soft person, and still I was looking at everything and the morning light was almost too beautiful, spreading over....everything. Is there a way to describe how the fields look, how the hazy distant hills look, how it all looks. 

Hmm. 

Apparently not. 

This is disappointing because it was so beautiful, so light and clear. That's what it was: clear. Easy to think and breathe. 

Yesterday was a very tired work day, with slow productivity on everyone's part. It was muggy and humid after the thunderstorm that rolled through yesterday. Have I written that yet? I don't think so. 

Here are my feet in the middle of the pouring rain back at the hotel. 

We were caught on our jeep ride home for the intense hail, luckily just after we got off the roof, and then the thunder rolled and cracked when we returned. That evening was the coolest we have been all trip so far. 

We have had the chance to meet two of the girls who were pioneers in getting rid of the bonded system (legally, at least) in Nepal. They were on their way to do a workshop in northern Nepal, and after they left, Dinesh shook his head and lecture-ranted about how the big name charities are using these girls too much for publicity, for their story, so much so that their own education is lacking because of it. Where do you draw the line between activism and education, self care and story telling? Is there a line? Not to mention the fact that there are now so many girls with similarly heartbreaking stories of being bonded and no longer now. 

One of the toughest things of the many CP and more generally just this kind of work (development, charity, social justice, whatever you want to call it) have to face is the choice, the saying no, the turning down. Ah.

 We also got the chance to sit in on a new mother's group meeting, housed in one of the mud huts (but if I could only speak in better words for the reality), not able to understand the language but still following keenly. Or, at least, I followed as closely as possible, though the rest of the group seemed a little dazed and sleepy. The women (as they seem to be always) were dressed colorfully and beautifully and when they moves the red bangles on their wrists would jingle quietly. When it came time to elect a president, secretary etc, they were all head bowing and reluctant to accept nominations, but when they stood up to acknowledge and accept, no matter how much they were laughing about it, you could see the fierce and proud determination in their eyes. 

We have also been making progress with  the kids in that they are approaching us more openly and playing games with us. Stella Ella ola (best game I've ever played , and I've played many), and then today was a huge circle of frisbee tossing. 

There is this slowly growing group of boys who take every moment they can to hang out near us. Most of them know my name, which is awesome. Today they called me beautiful. 

I have an excellent funny foot tan now, from my sandals, which are damp and sandy now because we stopped on the way home today to swim in the river. Okay granted every travel health clinic ever says not to swim in the fresh water, but we have already crossed off fresh fruit eating and not-sufficient hand washing, so there's that. But it was the most amazing, refreshing swim...ever. Mostly because it was unexpected and we were drenched in our clothes and the current was strong and there were buffalo in the muddy banks.

Just wonderful, to dunk my head and swim and kick and pull my white short away from my body because modesty and stuff, my hair all river-dried and wavy now.

Enjoying very muchly the cold watermelon in the afternoon and the black tea with lemon and lunches from the mothers. Food here is a constant reminder that you have a mouth. Mmm.

Here is a high five and a reminder to read books for fun, because aside from hot afternoon naps, I've been reading again. Current hit: White Teeth. Hilarious and biting and excellent. 

*high fives you* 

-k

if I had enough words

I would try and capture the last two days effectively, beautifully, in some way where you could be here with me, in some way so you could feel the sunburn on my shoulders and see the pink-red dirt under my finger nails and the warm cement under my legs and the very small small breeze surrounding the birds chirping in the trees and the hazy sunset through the hazy heat of the day just leaving now. 

Yesterday we arrived. In every sense of the word, waking up with the power cut, breakfast in the gecko room, our rusty jeep waiting for us outside. We piled in and held on, keeping our heads ducked so as not to brain ourselves on metal bars. Silly Canadians being too tall for Nepali jeeps. We bumped along the road and watched it disappear behind us as we drove, waving at everyone we passed, getting head-ducking smiles and waves in return. 

We drove through Lamahi and into surrounding tiny villages and past cows and cows and cows and goats and running chickens and houses built of mud and thatched roofs and bicycles leaning beside scooters leaning beside piles of hay, past the Creating Possibilities Dang office and reluctant men who waved at us anyway and around a corner and signs with beautiful Nepali script that I wish I could read. 

We turned another corner and drove straight into what seemed like some kind of gathering. The rumbling jeep stopped--Dinesh calls to us to get out. Surprise on all of us, it was our welcome ceremony. The mothers from some of the 12 women's groups CP supports were all lined up with wreaths of flowers, hibiscus, marigold-looking, and purple dust-paint to smear across our faces. Namaste, namaste, welcome. And looking into the women's eyes and receiving the flowers they pressed into our hands, namaste felt like it could not be a more appropriate greeting. 

I see the divine in you.

The light in me recognizes the light in you.

Yes, yes it does and it did and all the school children and students were gathered too and a drum beat somewhere behind us and turning to face the community gathered just for us I swallowed tears (which autocorrect wanted to be 'years' and I think that works too) sprung from somewhere touched inside of me because of the colours, because of the light, because of the words I could never say, hands pressed to heart, amazed. 

And when we crouched down to take pictures and some of the students sat down with us they took our hands and held them just casually. Dhanyabad, thank you, it hardly feels enough. 

We toured the classroom we would be helping with construction on--we are working on the second floor now--and then went to meet the teachers. The English teacher walked and chatted with me as we went; he seemed genuinely happy that we were there and excited to have us help out in his class. He sat us down, called me sister, introduced us to how the school works and why they are all gathered here for us. As a learning opportunity, as a chance to practice English, as a piece of cultural exchange, to boost the confidence of the students in speaking with white people. Most of the students are Tharu, one of the many different ethnic groups in Nepal. Which means their first language is Tharu, second language (if they have access to schooling) is Nepali, and third language, for one period of the day, is English. Practice hellos, my name is, the little things. Again I am confronted with the overwhelming desire to be able to speak more Nepali, more languages, know more. Even though Dinesh himself said it does not matter for us to learn Nepali because we are not here very long, I wish I had, wish I could. We are picking up some simple words (pani, eta, water, brick) but that only takes us so far. Give me time, more time, and I will learn your language because how else can you be more fully present? Even though deep breaths and smiles and laughs still connect all the same. 

After meeting with the teachers we started to transport bricks up to the second level of the classroom building. Not for long was it just us though, because the grade 10s, 7s, 6s came to help out. They lined up and worked their way through introductions, handshakes, head bows, "my name is" "mero naam...". It was funny (interesting? I wish there was a more appropriate word for this) to see the different confidence levels with different students...generally the male students were much more inclined to use English and use it confidently, something that will be interesting to watch when we help out in the classroom. We made an assembly line of students and volunteers and some of the mothers to pass brick by brick up the line. Hand claps to erase the dust, slow counting "eik dui teen" and laughter between all of us. Receive with left hand, pass with right, both. 

We did two rounds of classes for brick passing and then because it was Friday the students had a half day and slowly filtered away, leaving us with the mother's group for lunch. Served on folded leaf plates, we had this delicious coconut rice pudding and spicy potato mixture. Absolutely delicious, and eaten with our brick-dusty hands. Count how many times I have said or will say delicious and try to understand just how very true every one of them is. 

We left shortly afterwards but carries several of the women back to the CP office with us. We were then given a short tour of the small space in the pretty orange building (cold Pepsi as another welcome treat) and took off our shoes to chat via Dinesh about the mother's group and their scarf-making, taking up space as we were in the small workshop. 

It is fascinating to get the Nepali side of how these things go, or at least the Dinesh/CP side of micro financing and things and how they choose to run this program. And always the most difficult part is how do you choose. How do you choose which students to support, how do you say no, how do you say wait in line, because every need is a valid need but not everyone sees that. Especially not when you are separated by an ocean or distance or urbanity or time, especially when you don't have to confront these faces and children and eyes and lives every day. How perilously easy it is to just flip the channel, close the book when you are not here. 

Returning home, because this lodge is certainly home now (and I think I'll run away with the hotel owners son because he speaks in occasional English words and is the most respectful kid), we dove into some deliciously fresh watermelon, a super sweet bonus on top of our day, our faces cracked with pink-purple and sweat lines. This heat here is something else, dry breezes over dry land and sunshine like hot copper over us. 

So these are the words I have found so far. 

Today was our first full work day, a day off school for the kids so it was much quieter. We moved bricks, balancing on our head, laid brick with slabs of homemade cement, tried to stay cool in 40+ degree shade. Drank water, electrolytes, got dusty. So much dust and dirt and sweat, just dripping down your face, neck, back, hands, collecting brick dust in elbow creases, sprinkled over chest, mixed in with your hair. Physical physical work with evident results. Check out the wall we have now added to. 

The masons we are working with are incredibly patient in letting us learn with them; we are all getting fluent at gesture-communication. Watering down the bricks, mixing the cement, slabbing it down layer by layer. Literally brick by brick this is happening. Our hands are just making it to a little bit faster for the women who have been working alongside us in the first place, stacking bricks 9-high on their heads, dumping bags of concrete mix.

I feel like a sidekick in doing this, knowing long after I'm gone they will still be chipping away piece by piece at this construction. It is a wonder everything and anything gets done in such heat, with such an apparently enormous task ahead. 

But that is just the way of the world sometimes. There is no rushing these things. It will happen as it happens. Mark the progress, cross off the calendar days and eventually time will be on your side. 

It is an early morning start to hopefully avoid the worst of the day heat, so here is to that. 

keep going, friends

-k

it is evening now and

I'm standing here just below the roof waiting for the wifi to connect, which is always a fun game, in the Swargdari Hotel and Lodge in Lamahi, Dang district, Nepal. 

And I'm covered in a travelling layer of sweat because hot hot heat hot dust heat hot and I am looking up at the stars, a world away from everything. 

And I watched the sun set behind its glow of heat and dust, and the children waved hello from the roof next door, and the bus ride was only 10 hours, of which half were spent laughing hilariously because dehydration and heat and buses seem to do that to us. 

And I just...I can see the stars. 

-k

167% like

We were sitting on the terrace of the monkey temple this afternoon looking out over Kathmandu Valley when I had that thought.

 I 167% like how common it is to hold hands.

And this applies to everyone, but most refreshingly (counter-North American-ly?) to men. Even though apparently Nepali culture is quite homophobic (more difficult for gay men, I've heard, then lesbians), at any given moment men walking down the street holding hands, clasping thumbs or pinky fingers is entirely "fine"/normal/whatever other routine word you want to apply here. Or else on shop steps, one guy will be lying propped against the legs of another man and everyone is just chilling, and everything is fucking fine, and even though it is not quite as "okay" to be gay here, HOLDING HANDS DOES NOT MEAN A THING outside of casual friendship/affection/niceness. 

(internally struggling with articulating myself clearly enough here without stepping on toes or blatantly using entirely the wrong/inaccurate/offensive language)

And I'm just thinking of back home and hand holding and what that seems to say   and how very much not the same it is here. Imagine if two heterosexual guys just walked down the street swinging their interlocked hands together....except that I don't think many westerners would even be able to get over the fact that they are holding hands to assume they are 'straight' guys.

I mean, I hold my friends' hands often and will rarely ever hesitate at doing so no matter who it is but I know when I walk by people holding hands, whoever they are, I insta-assume they are "together". NOT THAT IT EVEN MATTERS but I think hand holding is such a casual connection and way of being like hey I like you as a person (or a lover, and a lover, etc etc but this makes everything more complicated) that I wish there did not have to be anything surrounding it. And by anything I mean that insta-assumption of oh you must be a "couple". Screw you all, maybe I just want to hold hands. And maybe if you could break the ridiculous barricade of masculinity in (is this too essentialist?) North American culture, maybe some guys would too. 

On the one hand, I guess you could justify hand holding back home as a sign of (*shudders*) possession/this person be mine so stay away, but on the other, can't we all just let it be whatever it is and not try and announce your (*shudders more*) territory to the world? 

That you can just hold hands and just be HOLDING HANDS no matter who you are. Like...world, why you gotta be so define-y about things? Why do I need to be either/or for you? Why you gotta look at me like that? 

AND in Nepal, on the visa form we filled out and on all official documents now, they have male/female/other as your choices for gender. So you don't even need to be either/or. 

(Oh, except I guess saying you can be "other" is wince-worthy....as in, yeah, you have the choice of being something not divisible to our gender binary and therefore not quite the same...though I suppose this could also be seen as a fairly liberating choice like yeah, that's right, f*ck your gender binary.) 

This, I think, begs the question then on what the deal is with homophobia in Nepal...and what does that even look like? Which actually makes me want to investigate homophobia everywhere and society and how people react and in what ways and why...is it a challenge to patriarchy? Is it too "untraditional"? Does the rural/urban divide factor in, and if so, how and where? What is/is there a culture of homosexuality? Of homophobia? How does it manifest in different parts of the world? And how do you define "tradition"? What and where and is there a divide between rhetoric and reality, policy and practice? 

Any ideas, opinions? Am I being too caveat-ish and convulsed? Did you follow those thoughts down to here? 

Perhaps this isn't the most appropriate forum for such a discussion but forget "appropriate". Who else but "the man" defined appropriate anyways? Who else but the--

OKAY I WILL STOP HERE BEFORE I GO TOO FAR DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE. 

Just...hold hands. Love love. Forget your definitions of things and people and just let it be whatever it is, let who be whoever who is, all the way through all of the matrix's of our strange realities. 

namaste folks

-k

PS there is a three day bandha (strike)in effect starting tomorrow. We will then be heading out either EARLY tomorrow morning to Dang before the highway jams, or else Saturday.  Check here for more info on that http://nepalbandainfo.blogspot.com/

PPS also follow the DWC in Nepal blog for the less Kelly-shaded view of life...also more pictures, also if you just want to know what we are doing and not necessarily rabbit-hole rants and thoughts on all of the things, as evidently I am prone to: http://dwcvolunteersinnepal.blogspot.com/

So I thought

this would be a pretty cool spot to blog from, even though I will upload this later. We are currently in the Garden of Dreams in Kathmandu, surrounded by some seriously dreamy garden space. The black and grey birds, similar to our crows, are chatting around us, flitting between the shadows on the tall leafy trees. A fountain is dripping through its tiered basins, and still you can hear the city streets outside.

All of this is here for about three dollars. The day heat is threatening to overwhelm, but in the shady spots with this little breeze, suggestive of the clouds bubbling in the sky, makes it okay. Such luxuries will not exactly be provided for us when we leave to Dang.

Which looks like it may happen a little later than planned on account of the bandha/strike tomorrow. Nothing to fret over, as usually these strikes are a way f opposition parties to demand space and start talks with the people in power, but it will slightly interrupt public transportation rounds. Likely we will be able to continue with everything as usual, because the tourist areas rarely get struck too hard. It will be interesting to see how strikes happen and what they are like in Nepal... perhaps we will have to venture out and converse with the strikers. I wonder if the streets will be quiet, which shops will stay open.

So yesterday was quite the day, so much so that I wasn't sure how I wanted to write about it. (I'm taking much for granted in being able to blog this often....once we are in Dang it will be significantly more difficult to access consistent enough wifi...or so I've been warned. It might be a case of writing posts but just not publishing them until we return. Who knows?) It was our first foray onto public transportation as a group...which was a fantastic experience. I think just personally I've been mentally preparing for a team that rejects every "cultural experience" on account of western standards/expectations, but so far these girls have been wonderfully open and flexible and excited about everything. Trying new foods, eating with their hands, crossing the road even....I am quite proud. Rock on, team.

I know I haven't ridden every kind of public transit, but I have a guy feeling that managing Nepali buses is a feat and a half. Wow. All decked out in colourful tassels, Nepali music blasting through the mini can interior, no idea how or when to get off...now that's my kind of ride. Forget the space and awkward silences and scared to brush toes of the TTC or translink.

We headed to the CPN offices for our official orientation. Of course we had to finish our chiya (tea) first, and then take our time chatting. I thought it was an excellent conversation/presentation on how CPN works. It was nice to have a transparency talk, to start to understand how and why they work as they do. And it is killer to see how not-by-choice dependent they are on the wishes of donors in terms of who they can support. And yet you could not meet two more positive and practical people then Nura and Dinesh. They are invested in the long term goals for the girls they support, looking beyond a gr 10 education to helping provide a bit of vocational training as well.

And you can see it. There were a few girls living in the flat above the office space, and the girls were just so smilingly proud to show their rooms, the view from that balcony. It was amazing. One of the girls, Laxmi, works as a part time office administrator with Nura and Creating Possibilities and it makes me the most happy. I wish I could capture the feeling in that house, from the hostel that Dinesh's wife is in charge of for some of the other students CP supports in the city to the art on the walls and beautifully carved doors....wow. What a soft, beautiful energy in that place. And I think it reflects much of what CP is about, a friendly, local, genuine effort to make walls and lives a little bit easier, softer around the jarring bits.

I am so proud and humbled to be working with them. I think there is so much to learn from Dinesh and Nura, so much to learn from everything in general. I would love to be able to stay longer and work in their office, help them with English things, website things, just learn learn learn. And I think in part why I'm so drawn to this space they've created is because it is probably one of the most collaborative spaces I've ever seen in the charity/NGO/non profit/development sector. They have a handful of different sponsors from around the world, each with a cause in mind for support, and they manage to make it work, looking to partner with different schools and places to make it happen. Not without difficulties and some steep restrictions, but still. They are not bitter or resentful about the red tape--rather they are innovative in stretching boundaries and finding corners to fill, and so productive. And even STILL they aren't mindlessly working through things with forced smiles...there is a serious degree of consideration and criticality they take to what they do (re: Dinesh's opinion on Next Generation Nepal and how they function and the problematics of the book Little Princes. Haaaaa.)

I need to wipe the stars from my eyes but it is really difficult because I've never had the privilege of working with an organization quite so closely. Oh the possibilities that seem to be growing and growing in front of me. *makes a bunch of Kelly noises because typing them won't quite translate* I'm very happy to be where I am. I am very happy that DWC has enabled me to be in this position. AND IT IS ONLY THE THIRD DAY.

Let there be light.

We left the office for a bit in the afternoon to visit the Pashupatinath temple complex. As non-Hindus (and wearing leather sandals, taking pictures), we couldn't get inside the heart of the temple but we walked around the outside of it, all the intricate building details, the incense, the burning funeral pyres by this small leg of the Ganges river (if I have my facts straight). I still can't really trust myself with words to describe it, and I can't understand why, if it is a hesitation to smudge that kind of place of worship with words and thoughts or if I am just not going to be able to accurately capture the EKG-type ups and downs, contras and counters in that space. Nimble footed crippled beggars sliding over huge stone steps, traditionally coloured and bearded ascetics charging rupees for pictures, debris floating in the river being picked at by small children, the loud phone blaring sounds of hymns, the mutt-scruffy dogs sniffing around shrines.

There is this centre for the elderly, the first and only of its kind in Kathmandu, like a lost and found for old people. An orphanage, I think, was what it was called. (Aside: there seems to be no way to politely say "old people". any suggestions?) We wandered through it (our guide being one of the students from CP), namaste-ing these crinkly, listless, slow-wandering old folk. I don't know what to make of it. At the very very least least, it is a place for them to go.....but I don't know. I feel distant and acute at the same time when thinking about it, step by slow step leaving the compound, grass peeking through the uneven stones.

I'm not certain how one would find things in Kathmandu if you didn't have someone who could tell you where to go or you weren't up for wandering. The side streets are begging for exploration and rightly so. The colours, the children, the flags strung between windows and life that goes on, even the way the sunlight slants through the dust.

Just...all of it. Recalling the things that have happened is bringing back the yesterday-present feelings smacking me in the back of my heels, dogging me across the street. I think I was just touched yesterday, in the side walls of my body kind of way, not a tingling but a melting without heat, a collection, a clay pot spinning.

Dinesh sat with us when we returned, and we all shared stories of our lives, of different small things, missing flights, how you just have to let it be sometimes. Dinner was wonderful-rice and dhal and pickles (but prepared Nepali way, so hardly even pickles) and an omelet for me. Delicious. Broke out my ugali skills in eating with my hands...or at least just my right hand. Rice is definitely more difficult to consume single handedly then ugali. A tasty mess.

Bounced a basketball around outside as the sun set. Did I describe already how these sunsets aren't quite like other sunsets? Like dropping muted colours into warm grey water. And then it gets dark. Just that.

Our bus ride back at night was a riot: a crowd and feet and body parts and laughing Nepalese people and us as tourist ducks and this big-eyed tired tiny human beside me for part and no streetlights and holes in the sidewalk and eventually home, past fluorescent store lights over closing up shop wares, an entire boar's head, red insides just there, the fruit carts rolled away for the evening. A star or two, amongst the dark.

So that was Monday.

This is Tuesday:

a garden of dreams and bright bright sunlights and shady spots and ATMs that worked and fearlessness and crossing streets (which is something I recognize that I will be saying quite a bit, just because it is quite the most unreal experience I've yet encountered) and long lunches under awnings trying Tibetan food and wandering into narrow narrow narrow streets and the smell of donut pastries on the street and market smells, because market smells, and the colours and colours and coura of legumes and vegetables and things and saris and brass pots and carpets and scarves and this is where the tourists stop showing up and finding another temple and pigeons everywhere and getting smudged on the forehead, yellow-red, flower petals sprinkled, the prayer wheels turned, bells rung, ohm. Namaste, return through gradually widening streets and yes, sir, I promise I'll be returning because that cashmere is the most soft, softest, ever, and I realize now that I want to burn incense on the regular and also flowy pants. That'll happen. And Nepali music. This I will seek out when we return after Dang.

So the evening has passed, is passing, our wifi maybe here or not. As is, as will be.

namaste

-k

"this makes me feel..."

One of those moments for the history books, not that this kind of history has ever or could ever or even would ever be written, and not quite sure what the title would be.

Pre-read warning: out will come the personal politics.

Today we met with Dinesh (program director) and Nura (administration and everything else) from Creating Possibilities. First off, they are fantastic people. Super friendly, cracking jokes, laughing at our silly sarcasms, showing us around like friends and not tourists. Over a delicious lunch of momos (which google autocorrect wanted me to write monks.....awkward) they shared some cultural traditions (apparently many/most/old-time Hindu women get their nose pierced on the left side because it eclipses some rogue emotions/beain synapses and makes her more docile....though this is up to interpretation and debate), talked a bit of politics, and Nura had all these sincere moments of sassing Dinesh so hard it was hilarious. Also super nice to see such a casual and chillin' working relationship. It is evident that they both love their work and enjoy with whom they work. Not to mention how small and interconnected and dedicated their team is (a total of 4 CPN staff).

[One day I will explain the chaos of crossing streets in Nepal (the one and only rule being don't get hit) and the way the wind picked up the purple blossoms in a blossom storm and finding a Kenyan Airlines sign while wearing my kikoy pants and telling things by candlelight in a lode-shedded room. One day I will explain the yelling and honking and creakily tall buildings and ditches and flags and 100% cashmere, trekking, nepali tea shops, the taste of tea, incense burning softly and fully.]

Andbutso we arrived back at our hotel and sat down for some chiya (Nepali tea), everyone chatting. Nura turns to me and asks "so why did you choose to come to a developing country and volunteer and do these things?"

So I said some things, a bit about Nicaragua, how I'm always up for new experiences, especially when they involve worlds/realities I've not yet encountered, how much I love what I'd done/felt had worked out positively while in Nicaragua. Told her that this came up because of a TA (holla atcha Will) and it sounded like quite the experience. Told her that what CPN does is close to my heart, education and children and girls and women and rights and literacy and self-dependency and effect. Told her that I want to see how it works in Nepal, the difference of textbook and reality, reality to reality.

And she looked at me and said "this makes me feel so much better" because how can anyone "change the world" and think they know more, although this was Nepalese-ly worded (super diplomatically, that is) as "I'm glad you see this as a learning opportunity and experience" because "some people have very different attitudes".

Aiya.

I credited my excellent peer influences back home (world unmaking conversations) for sharpening my criticality of these things, that this whole 'volunteering' business (in all the senses of business as business as business) is shifty at the best of times, especially due to states of mind, attitudes, approaches, complexes.

And it is not that I am unaware of the criticisms and where they come from for volunteering abroad/"in the developing world". I am quite constantly surrounded by difficult attitudes and underlying systems of privilege that perpetuate all of the shit ever. But I've never quite fully realized the effects of it until that conversation today, and the relief that saturated Nura's voice when she said she was so glad I was not there thinking I could change the world.

And I am not saying this to toot my own horn (fuck that shit) or get pessimistic but instead just to express how personal and affecting these things really are. By these things I mean something along the lines of the 'white saviour industrial complex'/the development 'industry' perpetuating the idea that you in your rich (white) privilege can more effectively "save the people" then the people themselves/assuming west is best (practice)/"they" vs "us".

There are countless devastating effects of such shit, (people being in a "worse-off" position then "before", aid dependency cycles, vast amounts of ethnocentric stereotyping and perpetuation, support for an industry, a world system built on inequality, injustice, the list goes on): this I know, or at least though I was generally aware of. But seeing the relief on Nura's face knowing that I wasn't there to snooty-kid my way around the 'poor rural people', the 'voiceless women and children', and that I am vastly and intensely invested in learning more on their operations, motivations, tactics and actions....I don't know. I don't even know what it was, except to make every article criticizing the voluntourism industry so very and unfortunately real.

And I'm so glad she asked me and so glad we had that conversation because thus far it feels like no one has challenged it, us, what we are here doing. I wish there was some way to communicate how vitally important it feels to be questioned and to enter into this kind of dialogue, ESPECIALLY because the "change the world" trope gets recycled way too much in this kind of volunteer work. And it was not accusing, not angry, not doubting. Just hesitantly hoping for something else, something different.

Fuck how I wish this dialogue could be had more openly in the volunteer-abroad world. But how could "start a critical and open dialogue on social justice issues cross-culturally and check your goddamn privilege before all else and be open to learning and listening and creating a space for justly funded, worded and manifested action" ever stand up to something like "improve your global citizenship and come help change/save lives"?

I don't know how flashy or attractive you can get the former to be, not when the latter is held too close to the heart of too many overly zealous, under-ly critical and well-but-perhaps-misplaced intentioned people? (aka too much of the institutionalized culture of global citizenship from, in my experience, dangerously and especially North America).

So I'm not sure what all of this is supposed to mean or even if I am expressing myself as clearly as I want to be. Whenever these issues come up around volunteering/development/etcetc, I'm either entirely knee jerk or else too cautious with my words to want to speak up.

I think what I want to say is stop telling me and other volunteers that they are "saving/changing the world". I am certainly not. Not even close. Not even remotely. That is not the attitude or vision I take to what I am doing and that is not what I want to go walking around in. I am no saviour and never ever fucking want to be. "I ain't about that life", one cos accurately say. Nor am I doing anything more or less than anyone else is capable of. And I am hardly a changer of anything--far as I know, I haven't torn down the institutions at work around us, as much as it may be part of my antiestablishmentarianist regime. (I also can't believe I just used that word in a workable sentence).

Perhaps I am just want to travel, experience culture, open dialogue, stay critical, honest, and empathetic in appropriate turn, realize my ability and check my privilege. How I choose to do this, how I manifest this into my life is way different then you or s/he or they or anyone else for that matter.

"Difference and danger are two very separate things."

So...does that make sense? Got any opinion on it? Need to call me out on something? Please leave a comment because this is always a conversation I will get into, especially since I am here now.

Always there is room for improvement. Always there is room for growth, and change.

Always there is room to do something differently.

Go be that difference. Whether it means dedicating your life to it or at least being consciously aware and acting in accordance to it, let the stars shine where they may and suns rise when they must.

You are not static, or glue, or bulletproof. You are not the reason why and you are not the reason why not.

I am battling some massively sleepy eyes nanow, so I will let this be as is and hopefully the sting and ouch and wish-Ida-known will fade, fall away fast.

Oh these mere mortal mornings of ours.

keep going
-Kelly

ps enjoy the vista from our rooftop in Kathmandu