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After 2 days cooped up in the hotel environs, I have cried “uncle”, turned tail, and beat a retreat back to Tissa, where the bed is free, the ground is relatively level, and there are movies and PUPPIES for entertainment! Very disappointing to have to curtail my work at AnimalSOS, when that week was one of the Absolute Musts & highlights of this whole journey, but I was useless to them, and the environment there (perpetually wet, slippery tiled floors in the pens, treacherous, hole-pocked and uneven ground everywhere else, and 1,000 boisterous dogs) antithetical to healing a sprained ankle… so… I will return after Thailand and make a better show of it. The good news is, after initially issuing an apologetic “no room at the inn” verdict, Kim is reconsidering, and may try to squeeze Eeyore in after all - if so, we will scoop him up (IF we can find him, Inshallah) and take him there as we make our way to Negombo (I fly to Thailand on the 10th).
On the way here yesterday, we did a brief morning safari at Uda Walawe, which is known primarily for its elephant population. Between near-drought conditions and it being morning (NOT the time safari, despite what one might think), we only saw about 9 elephants, all of whom were on the other side of the electric fence demarcating park boundaries, and all of whom were so emaciated and saggy, it was really sad, rather than wonderful, to see. We came across a small gaggle of pea hens, one of whom was so disoriented and unsteady she barely managed (or bothered) to get out of the way. Dinesh teared up, stopped the jeep, and in a highly Irregular gesture, furiously cut a 5 gallon water bottle in half and put the halves out, full of water, on either side of the road (after making the Tracker (ranger) swear he would retrieve the plastic on his next pass through that area). What should be enormous lake and marshlands in Uda Walawe are presently dry, cracked moonscapes, and all the park’s creatures are suffering terribly. Nature, in tooth and claw. Global warming, in tooth and claw. We did drive through an incredible downpour on the way (oh, for the windows left behind in D’s bedroom!!!), so there is some hope of reprieve on the way. Yala National Park is scheduled to reopen its safari season October 15, and when it does, hundreds of people around here will suddenly come to life, have purpose, pay off their shop tabs. It is strange to behold, this seasonal stasis, where everything is put on hold and scores of men seem, for months at a time, to be just Waiting for Something to Happen. I have studied my fair share of post-colonial societies and understand to some degree the effect such histories have on the development of nation states, the character of a nation borne of such relationships, institutions, and power structures. Despite this, I am noticing certain judgements arise in my mind as I observe this stasis from the Outside - a combination, I think, of itchiness and unease with my own prolonged “lack of productivity”, and a deeply ingrained protestant Work Ethic (of which I am no shining example , yet a product of!). I find myself judging what I see as a pervasive passivity and lack of initiative on the part of D and his cohorts - this even as I myself am so disinclined by the intense heat to Do Something Useful (to study my Sinhala course, to work on my CV for upcoming job search), opting more often than not to lie in a limp and stupefied heap under or in front of a fan with my mind evaporating most uselessly! It is the sense that they are waiting to be rescued, while they spend what little money, and what great amounts of time, they have numbing out with drink or weed, cigarettes, youtube, and gossip. I find myself awash with internal dialogs where I can somewhat justify my own relative inertia, (due to my constitution’s lack of extreme heat tolerance and because right now there is little (little, but not nothing!) I can do to advance My Agenda at the moment), while I rail at them “But this is your LIFE! If you don’t Do Something it will NEVER get any better than this!! Why not use that wifi to do a free English (French, German, Swahili, whatever!) tutorial series online, or figure out how to make your website, or SOMETHING other than watch idiotic youtube videos and wrestling matches!!!” I don’t know - I am definitely sympathetic to what I imagine the effects must be of living in prolonged poverty, in a corrupt system, in terms of one’s sense of possibilities and prospects in life, and exacerbated by the dependence on a volatile tourist trade and an unwieldy-seeming socialism… I am reporting here my observations of my own mind,attitudes, etc,as much as anything… just Another Interesting Glance in the Mirror, I guess, as I try to crack the code of the Sri Lankan psyche and comprehend my relationship to it!!! In other news: … the puppies have grown SO much in one week, and now Tissa plays with them sometimes, which is delightful to see as she’s kind of a down-trodden sad sack of a soul! I’m going to ask Rani if we can build a dog run at the side of the house, as the puppies will soon be too big and energetic to stay in The Nest, and they are a nightmare to try to track and control when they are out!!! … people are continuously, and very strongly, advising me NOT to get water on my sprained ankle. a BIG Ayurvedic no-no, apparently, but I’ve no idea why. … Dinesh walked in on me while I was flossing my teeth the other day and was horrified “WHAT are you DOING???” “flossing my teeth” “STOP IT!!! oh, that is VERY BAD…” and walked out as if he could not bear to watch me harm myself in such a manner!!! #onemillionstyles&flavorsofbeinghuman
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 I’m feeling a little haunted these days, still unsettled by an encounter we had back in Tissa last week, and troubled that I’m troubled by it. The W5’s aren’t that important, but we crossed paths for a while by a traveling couple in search of accommodations - more specifically, a middle-aged matronly Irish woman and her young(er) long curly-haired & bearded Sri Lankan boyfriend. A mirror of sorts, and they, or my reaction to them, freaked me out. A wave of judgement and criticism washed over me, and I found them profoundly unappealing, maybe even abhorrent! Not them personally, nor their relationship, of which I knew no details, but the specter of them, the assumptions their being together brought so immediately to the forefront. It kind of horrified me to think that this must be how Dinesh and I appear to strangers, that we must engender the same assumptions (“what can they possibly have in common?” “she must have money and is buying sexual companionship” “she’s too old/he’s too young” “that’s just Wrong” etc). My mind was trying so hard to distance and differentiate myself from her (note the adjective "matronly"), Us from Them… a defensive reaction, obviously, because the meeting triggered a confrontation with my own unease about my relationship with D. Even in the moment I knew my discomfort wasn’t about them, but about us. And that is troubling. I am confused. Uneasy. At once connected to this person and staring rather hopelessly across the yawning chasm between us. Language and culture. Class and education. While it can all feel quite immaterial at times, when it seems we are just 2 spirits or 2 bodies meeting in space and time, when it feels like (or even possible that) we are really Seeing one another, and Meeting… but it is not insignificant, not in the day to day, and not in the long run. I have been telling myself that I just need to stay present, to be patient and let things become clear; that as long as I am honest I can “do no wrong”… but really, what does honesty mean when you barely speak the same language?! Expressing the simplest (seeming) emotion can be like describing a sunset to one who was born blind. Exasperating, futile-feeling, sometimes sad. Sometimes I tell myself (since there’s no one else to talk to in English!!!) that this is an opportunity to unpack what I think “a relationship” is - my needs and expectations of relationship have certainly changed radically, so maybe this is a chance to rewrite the book.… at other times, tho’, this seems like a weak and convenient capitulation, a “settling for less”. i don’t know that there’s a ‘right’ answer. I’m working with it all, doing (usually) my best, trying my darnedest. god help us all :) sometimes you know you are making one of your favorite lifetime memories as you are making it. click on photo for slideshow play button to appear :)  Exquisite place, exquisite day. After playing in the ocean for hours, the mamas and kids and I walked up to the bare bones cinderblock shrine, gave flower offerings and prayers, then back down for bonfire and delicious (if i do say so myself) bbq. at night, too many stars to fit the sky, like someone had poured a gallon rock salt on a black table, including a large nebula streaking across the whole sky. magical magical place. I love this family so much. “So this is It…? … THIS is how i’m gonna die? Naked in a Sri Lankan squatter toilet stall at the hospital, drenched in sweat, slumped up against the back wall while some kind of vaporous trash compactor works my abdomen and lower back on overdrive, like being crushed by a mirage. The whole of my back and neck an Ant’s Manifesto is written in a Braille of hives, a hole or a bucket at either end of me… Wracked with pain, palms scarlet red and feel like they’ve been boiled in chili oil, whole body crawling with itch and hyperventilating so badly that I am pins and needles up to my elbows and knees… Could there be a less dignified way to go?”
Yeah, so it turns out I am QUITE allergic to one of the 7 Sri Lankan ant varieties, at least when they attack en masse (I counted 27 bites on my feet alone, but not all are from ants…just the ones that are blistering…). Apparently the toxin from these little suckers goes straight to the kidneys, thus, I presume the crushing back and womb-ish pain. So… my first experience with anaphylactic shock… Check that off the list as the closest I ever want to get to Hell. Eventually the hydrocortisone injection and the tramadol and the topical pain killer worked enough that I could hobble out of the clinic draped over Dinesh’s brother-in-law and friend, into the back of the jeep with D’s mom stroking my hand, and home into bed with a paw full of pills to take for several days. Wow. I honestly can’t remember a time in my life when I’ve been more scared (my family’s history of medical treatment in developing countries ringing like an alarm in the back of my mind). If I weren’t a practiced meditator who can focus their breathing, I really don’t know what would’ve happened…I guess maybe one just passes out or something? Anyway, it’s certainly Interesting to observe one’s mind in such a panicked fear state… yes, well, godspeed boring, thank you very much!!!  … the rock’s gonna fall. I find this phenomenon so deeply poetic, so moving, every time I come across it. These massive cave temple boulders and the collections of tiny spindly sticks that children place underneath to prop them up… as if… ! It is at once a beautifully naive act of faith, trust, and caring, and an evocative image pointing to the inherent foolishness, and perhaps futility, of our attempts to control things, to keep things from falling. will the sensitivity that makes me care ultimately be my undoing? cow with hind hoof severed just above the ankle and hanging by a few tendons…the mama dog with 8 pups and a teat torn half off… i am useless for tears these days and for comfort have one memory of the dog in handy who was clean and healthy and well-loved and well-fed - i bring her to mind in these moments like a beacon and life buoy for my drowning heart. this memory, and these puppies…  Full Moon Poya day began as all moon-centric days should begin…with lunacy. Tension with D, hormonal cascade of relentless teariness over the dogs and Life, followed by migraine. Nice. Fortunately, Sri Lanka has a way over turning such days on their head, and loosening the grip of even the most tenacious funk… First, a visit to the gorgeous jungle temple Situlpuwa, famous for having had the world’s largest ordination of Buddhist monks back in the day - 12,000 monks took their vows here, and then took to the caves, spawning 1,000 cave temples from here to Arugam Bay. There are still monks who live in some of these caves, supported (fed) by a special cadre of temple monks, and living out their days with the elephants, leopards, monkeys, wild boars, and snakes. Here, atop this towering rock and its fresh white stupa, sun sets over one shoulder while the full moon rises over the other, through the spare branches of a scrappy tree and its faded and tattered prayer flags. heart opens, softens, and drops. We clamber down in the dark as the horns and drums begin to wail and thump and bounce off the rocks all over the temple site. There is one-tusked elephant making his way through the parking area. We have “special medicine tea” at the little canteen and then head off back down the red jungle road that winds through this corner of Yala National Park. The park officially closes for safari during this month due to the crippling dryness and danger of fire, and wildlife within the park must range further and further afield in search of water. If you happen to be on the right side of the gods, and driving in the relative cool of night, this can radically increase your chances of some very up-close-&-personal encounters with wild creatures…like, say, TWO (F’ING) LEOPARDS, maybe… right on the road…like 20ft away…like stop-your-heart-from-beating INCREDIBLE…one was a yearling, who crossed the road in front of us and then took a yawning, paw-licking little siesta under a bush not 30 ft from where we stopped and silenced ourselves. The second was a big male who was just sitting in the ditch at the side of the road - I could almost have touched him!!! He jumped into the bush but then exited further down the road and we rolled in silence and darkness along behind him, watching the spare perfection of his rippling movement by moon and torch light. Almost as exciting were the 2, very rare, mouse deer, again crazily closeup encounters, the Shiv Cat, a massive porcupine (now and forever in my mind, thx to Sad & Useless Humor post, known as a Stab Rabbit, porcupines are on the verge of extinction here in Sri Lanka), and a gorgeous closeup brush with a Samba deer, whose color resembles the gorgeous hues of pewter and dun and almost-black of the wild water buffalo. So yeah, I’d say the day turned around some, nehe? :)))))) “The best way to get to know a city and make interesting discoveries about it is to go Get Lost”.
The longer I am here the more everything I think and feel and do comes under (my own) scrutiny and is up for questioning. The simplest seeming impulse or “need” or choice I make now shrieks out as if under a blinding light and I am forced to look at “where did this come from and what does it mean to me/ what does it say to others?”. A friend recently said “you seem free”, and I thought “free? or LOST!!!”… maybe they are one and the same… I dunno - things are intensifying here for me, tho, and it seems I bounce more frequently and violently between the extremes of hopeful anticipation about the possibilities and deep panic and the desire to RUN & get the hell out of here asap! One major clarity that is emerging is that I have nowhere to run to “anymore”… I have wondered why even though I default to thinking of SF as my home, the place I could briefly return to and dip into, the home of many many dear and beautiful friends, the impulse bounces back on me, as if in recoil… and now I’m realizing that the one refuge I felt I had in the world was not actually a place, but a person… Andrew. That relationship was, in fact, my “home”, my no-matter-what-i’ve-got-your-back “place”… not saying that’s ideal or healthy or romantic or anything, just realizing that when I have these fleeting bouts of low-grade panic that compel me to escape, I am now coming up hard & fast against this realization - nowhere to escape to because the “where” was actually a “who” and that “who” is no longer in my life. It’s the same realization over and over again, of course - the No Ground, No Escape (no security, no family, no home, no job)… just interesting to understand, on what feels like a deeper layer, the true nature of what/who I have tried to anchor myself with… I can’t say it has occurred to me quite like this before. This groping for the EJECT button actually surfaces pretty rarely, but it seems pain/illness is the one thing that elicits this primal cry for mama-safety-home-protection. It’s a visceral/ brainstem thing, quite bypassing the higher brain altogether, and it “thinks” in pictures - image-sensations of having been held & healed, cared for & comforted, seen and loved. Now my comfort comes from a cool and reasoned appraisal of the situation; “you’re here. you're not dying. breathe.” …it’s not as cozy, but not without its merits!!! …interesting talk with Dinesh this afternoon, about money and friendship Sri Lanka. I’ve been thinking about it lately in relationship to my “friendship’ with CC here at Blue Paradise. It feels like we have really good rapport - we joke a lot, he shows me surf breaks, I make him fruit juice, the 3 of us have tea and meals together… it feels like he really likes me, and I certainly like him, his impish humor, his batshit craziness… but there are things taken for granted here in Sri Lanka, expectations that lie below the surface of every interaction between Sri Lankan and Foreigner, and I find this makes things murky for me. I cannot trust that what feels like a good human-to-human connection is really, and just, that. Talking about it with D this afternoon, though, I realize the cultural bias that underlies my unease - the value system (BOURGEOIS!!!) that says “this is Real friendship, this is not”, or the kind of chafing I feel when it is just assumed that I will pay for a meal when we are out with CC or one of D’s friends elsewhere. It certainly isn’t the money - in certain places I can feed 3 people breakfast for the price of a chai latte back home!!! It’s just the assumption that ruffles me ever so slightly, that makes giving something feel “unspecial” (perhaps exacerbated by the fact that saying “thank you” is totally not part of Sri Lankan custom) or gives me the feeling I will never be sure of anyone’s friendship in this country. There are 2 counterpoints here that give some perspective; one is that, to some degree, Sri Lankans are the same way with one another - if one of The Boys has a bit of money, then it is he who pays for the bottle, for smokes, for food, whatever - next week, someone else’s ship will come in (“money comes, money goes” is a heartfelt and popular refrain, I have noticed), and also, as Dinesh explained today, I am mostly meeting people whose livelihood is entirely dependent on the ever-changing winds of the Tourist Industry. From this, 2 further points emerge - one, there is NO security for these people; one bomb blast somewhere, one mudslide or tsunami, and it’s game over for every person and family who depends on the tourist dollar to buy their rice and pay their electric bill. Two, the only way anyone gets the least bit ahead in this industry is when some tourist gives them a little leg up - none of the people who now have their own jeep or hotel or restaurant or tuk-tuk or whatever have gotten there by any other means, unless they come from money already. So yes, everybody harbors the hope that one of these tourist “friends’” will be the one who says “hey, let me help you “, who will value the service they have bent over backwards to provide and demonstrate it by giving a little extra, within their individual means and as dictated by their own conscience and sense of propriety. It was so good to talk openly about this with him…much to think about still, but a very interesting vein to explore, in my opinion… I also have to examine my choices around how and when I spend money, the effect and appearance of the impulse toward “generosity”. That I feel I “need” a few nights in a hotel with A/C to spare myself death by organ failure, and so do not stay at the Harsha home - am I flaunting my options, my freedom to choose a level of comfort beyond their reach? How does that feel to D’s mom? I cringed when Dinesh presented his mom with the blender that I bought in Arugam Bay as a gift, because it felt excessive,ostentatious, embarrassing, and again like a potential judgement of her kitchen, her life. I wanted her to have it if she had a use for it, but it was not meant to be another conspicuous display of my relative Wealth and Benevolence. |
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