Writing with Raksi

Raksi is pronounced 'Roxy'. The sounds of 'a' and 'o' are difficult here, we try and squash the words into our cumbersome alphabet, just like the Volkswagen Beetle, lime green, in which I learned to drive. It was so small that my knees would keep my ears warm, and it was so rusty that I didn't need a speedometer, I could judge the speed by looking at the road through the holes in the floor.

Raksi. It is Nepali moonshine, typically made by Newari people (the traditional inhabitants of the Kathmandu valley) from rice rather than wheat. Unfortunately, at my house we have a limitless supply, because the landlady makes it, the best Raksi in town, as many will attest. The Newari language came down from Tibet, and is therefore very different to Nepali, which came up from India. My landlady whom, for some reason, we all call Baoju (brother's wife), speaks a kind of language which mixes Nepali and Newari with a kind of Raksi-fuelled life force which makes her much easier to understand than the average well-spoken person, merely through its desire to be understood. Did I mention that she's amazing? I watched her making the Raksi one day, mesmerizing. A cauldron over a wood fire, kept burning with whatever pieces of wood were salvageable. Inside the cauldron, the frothiest slop you can imagine, over which sits a little bowl, over all of which is finally placed lid with a pointy-down part, which collects the condensation and makes the drips slide down to the point, where they can land, drip drip, into the little bowl. All the while, Baoju was tending to the fire, opening up the lid and adding bits of water and whatever else, letting the steam rise up and invade her, causing her to sweat, back into the cauldron, putting herself unmistakably inside the whole distillation process.


I just tried to backspace a full-stop that was without doubt a punctuation error. It took me a moment to realise, after I had resumed typing, that it was still there. So I backspaced over it again, like the truck driver of the apocalypse, but it did not go. Is this really happening? I thought, is punctuation rebelling? Is my writing now taking control, having been neglected for so long, is it deciding to take the laws of grammar and syntax into its Own Hands? Imagine! I was at the peak of my speculative incredulity, when I suddenly realised: that was not a full-stop, but a speck of grit on my screen, placed perfectly. I brushed it away, a little disappointed at the prospect of returning to the mundane world. At least I still have the squiggly red lines that underline everything that is not in American spelling. I've changed so many settings over to UK English, so many times, now I just resign myself, and I think of the squiggly-red-line not as an indication of error, but rather a tribute, perhaps a portal. Although, of course, I must admit, it's a funny shape for a portal.

Down in the Hole

Malaise is the colour of whole-egg mayonnaise,

Last night I made toad in the hole for dinner,

It took me two tries, because I was without a spatula, 

Or anything like it,

And I was working by head-torch, like a miner,

This morning I also made toad in the hole for breakfast,

It is true sometimes that you are what you eat.

They say that the egg is a whole food, they say it contains a vast array of nutrients, everything a baby chicken needs to survive and develop. At the time that they told me this, I found it to be a very strong argument in favour of the egg's nutritional clout. Now, many years later, I wonder if a baby chicken is perhaps not the best candidate to represent my nutritional needs. Sometimes I wonder how much the quality of the lighting affects your susceptibility to arguments. Like those 'before and after' shots where they show overweight people in terrible lighting, and then show them, in nice lighting, sucking in their tummies. It looks convincing the first 30 times you see it. The nice thing about the 'before and after' shot of course, what gives it power, is the narrative. Each photo contains a little 'Once upon a time..... and they lived happily ever after' story, distilled like hard liquor, so that it fits into a single picture frame. 

Now, thanks to the advents/misfortunes of free time, social networking, and a complete saturation in advertising, tactics such as 'before and after' photos are somewhat overwrought, somewhat pathetic.To me, at least, and I have body-image issues too, although they are only very faint voices. And yet these images are still used so much, I see such a mind-boggling amount of these 'before and after' shots, not just tummy-sucking, but more and more of abs, biceps, triceps, made oily and shiny. Is this really successful? I suppose I still know a lot of people who think that the spoon-bending trick is real, what a waste of a great illusion.

Of course, I also have a marching band inside my head. This sometimes makes it very hard to pay attention to anyone at all, but it occurs to me now that if there are voices in your head telling you that you're crap, it helps to have a marching band to drown them out.

Kurt Vonnegut just told me that his number one rule for writing short stories is that you should 'Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time is wasted'. At first, I thought he was talking about the characters, that for instance, you should not write in detail about the 4 hours they spent on facebook. Then I realised that he probably means the reader, that you should not waste the reader's time. Well, if you're reading this because you followed a link on facebook, then you were quite possibly already wasting your time in the first place. So let's continue, I wanted to clarify something.

Different people have different ideas of what 'toad in the hole' is. When I refer to it, I mean, getting a slice of bread, cutting a hole out of its centre, frying it, and cracking an egg into the bread-cavity. The result is pan-fried bread with egg filling. It is difficult to flip the new hybrid slice without a spatula, but the flipping is absolutely imperative. The small leftover pieces of bread can also be fried alongside, and either be used as croutons to dip into the yolk, or if you're a cooked-yolk kind of person, you can just eat them whilst you're waiting for everything to cook.

dogs and bells and drills and yells

For the duration of my stay in Kathmandu, the night-times have been marked by the barking of dogs. They bark and bark, and in each of the 7 or 8 places I've lived here, the barking has had a different tone, a different nature. Here, in this place, it is the worst kind of barking, feverish, maddened, distressing. And loud, sometimes the dogs fight literally outside my door. I have no love for these dogs, but I am a short-term guest in this place, their house, so I try and at least remain civil. They, on the other hand, adore me. In spite of my cat-like aloofness, they always try to lick me, jump up on me, follow me around.

I must pull the lock on my bedroom door or else one of the dogs comes into my room and takes things off my floor. She is a spoiled jerk, I caught her in here the other day, and she refused to leave. When I tried to gently push her out of the door, she lay down like an activist at a forest blockade. And when I tried to drag her out by the feet, she started biting me. What a jerk, get out of my goddamned room. I pray that the next house will have a better kind of dog-noise at night time.

Now, one month on, I am in a house which is indeed better for dog-noise. As I type, there is a dog in the distance, barking out a long soliloquy, rich in timbre and rhythm, sweeping up and down its familiar canine tonality. This may have bothered me some time ago, but not these days.

My heart stopped two days ago when I heard that they have begun killing the street dogs in my old neighbourhood, by feeding them poison. Kanchi, Dorje and Punx were always escaping and causing mischief on the streets, the idea of their accidental murder was unbearable, those same three dogs I had so viciously slated in this very blog post. Such a relief when I saw their healthy, noisy faces. Jerks they may be, but lovable all the same.

Here, in my new house, there are other kinds of noise. In the daytime, the construction site next door provides hammering, angle-grinding, etc. Between 5 and 6 in the morning, it's the temple bells, which get rung for a length of time which seems to be increasing each day. It sounds like Shiva and Pravati are screening their calls.

writing with eyes closed.

So I was hoping I would be tired enough to write without really caring, without self-censoring, as they say in theatre. But now I'm not sure if that's really such a good. Idea. Punctuation is beginning to . Disobey my flow.I let my eyes close, , my knees sag together, my spine curve up from bed to pillow-against-wall, how is this position so comfortable? How good is it to type with closed eyes? I have a plan to get out of here, it is too much for me, this place, its demands. I must wake up at six tomorrow, as I did today, pray for water to come out of the tap when I turn the handle. Ride into the English teaching job, then prepare for the private lesson, then go and teach juggling at the British school, then do the private lesson with the gardener, where perhaps we shall revisit rope-climbing techniques, then to circus training in the evening, then to catch my friend before she splits back to the Tarai, then sleep, then up again before the sun.

The only thing that makes it sustainable is the constant newness. In the last month or so, the circus classes have increased from 3 evening sessions per week, to 5 days full time, now 6 days, all at the behest of the refuge manager, and we're racking our brains to find ways to use this time so that we don't destroy the poor students. Digging up old pilates routines and researching this or that thing. Frustrating, then exciting, then frustrating again, it ebbs and flows. Then there's the English teaching, which always threatens to become too much, but still I get just little enough that I can manage to be heavily involved with circus training, just enough to pay my expenses, I will not save money but as long as nothing too dire happens then I will be able to afford to come back to Australia, and rest. Just two months to go.

Here in Kathmandu anything is possible, so long as it's not the thing you're aiming for.  A few months back I had to learn Illustrator in a night, because that's how long I had to draw up a plan for a potential circus school. This week I will teach school kids how to juggle, the gardener how to do a Russian climb, the nanny how to sing English lullabys. Today I did a particularly bad juggling show, completely unrehearsed, for some German flipping tour-group, I did it because one of the Sapana performers told me I had to, and how could I say no to them, they who jump through so many hoops, with so little warning, so that EBT can show the world what a great job they are doing at helping these poor kids. And we the trainers are always the unfortunate messengers. Never mind that you might have had plans for your weekend, for any of your weekends, ever.

Oh, oops, too tired to delete that. I never allow myself to write about how frustrating I find EBT, because I really don't want to put off any potential circus/performing arts teachers from coming and helping out. Especially right now with our super-extended training hours, with a good team of trainers we could make so much progress. Really, it's an amazing project. The opportunity to do a social circus project with kids who are at such a high skill level, who are so eager to learn, and who are above all, just such a great crew, is too good to pass up. Suffering the impulses of those who are in control, but actually have no fucking clue, is just one of those things that one must do from time to time

Good night, dear reader. My eyes snuck open back there somewhere, but now they will close again, until my unruly alarm once more wrenches them open, 8 hours from now.

Holi

A rooftop barbecue for Holi, a haven from streets where at any moment coloured powder, balloons or buckets full of water, could fly in your direction. Over there, all of the young Nepali cool kids were sitting and talking. I sat in my little group of Western foreigners, watching them longingly, just as I watched the cool kids 12 years ago in high school, when I was restricted to that small group of nerds concerned principally with science, role-playing and hacky sack. Eventually I summoned the courage to go and sit with them, try and cross that difficult bridge. They weren't unfriendly, but they also weren't about to drop everything and involve me in their conversation. My grasp of Nepali is restricted to the kinds of conversations you don't have when you're kicking back with friends at a party, so I mostly couldn't understand. Someone came with a tray full of what looked like iced coffees, just enough for all of them. I asked one of them what it was.
"It's called bhang, it's what we drink on Holi. Would you like to try some?"

"Sure, thanks!"

"Careful though, it gets you a bit high"

I assumed that this was just a simple mistake, and she meant that it was a bit alcoholic. I've heard people say 'high' to mean 'drunk' before. I didn't think much of it. It was tasty, a little spicy, later, in the kitchen, someone offered me one, and I saw them mixing a thick dark syrup into some yoghurt, adding sugar. I can be pretty slow at times -precisely the reason I don't like weed - and still didn't think much of it, until it was far too late. This is not like being drunk at all, I realised. And what had they called it, 'bhang'? The travellers in Pokhara had talked about drinking 'Bang Lassi' in Varanassi, and getting stoned out of their brains. Of course the pronunciation was different. But this was intense, much too much. I went to find the guy who made it, a lovely Nepali guy who likes to reminisce about his college days in New York, being a typical American college boy.

His eyes widened, "I made it way too strong, I didn't really know what I was doing!"

Holi is a Hindu festival, celebrated in India and Nepal, which is renowned for its epic colour-and-water fights. It's tempting to do a quick Wikipedia search and find out a bit of background information on this festival, but for the sake of ambiguity, I won't. What is Holi actually for? It came up in my conversational English class, and all of those important, respectable hindus had a little discussion and after some disagreement came up with some kind of dubious explanation. Dubious enough that I didn't bother to remember it, something about someone's sacrifice of someone's son. And what is a religious festival without a bit of ambiguity? After all, the pre-Christian god Mithras (along with a bunch of others) was also born of a virgin mother on the 25th of December, and also died and was resurrected, before it was cool. What is certain is that we give each other presents on Christmas, and we throw colour at each other on Holi. Good.

It was 3p.m. and I absolutely had to leave, to seek sanctuary in my own room. I made the bare minimum of obligatory-farewell-conversations, made a cursory attempt to wash the colour from my face, hair, arms, and left. In my state of overwhelming wibbly-ness, it really didn't help that the world had been turned into a Pollock-apocalypse. The aftermath, colour strewn, speckled, spewed over ground, walls and people. People moved around and behaved like real people, but they looked completely out of control. On the way, I encountered all kinds of trials. First there were the European girls in fairy costumes, who thought that I was unfairly clean, and unwilling to listen to my protests and pleadings, forced me to dance around them, under them, twisting and turning in my stoned and ungraceful way to avoid their attacks. I somehow managing to avoid each of their advances, and ran off down the street, fleeing from the fairy girls, it must have been a sight to behold. For the rest of the way I shadowed the older Brahmin-looking types, seeking refuge under their aura of respectability, so long had it taken me to wash the colours off. And then, so close to home, a strange man with wooden movements approached me. He explained to me with no small effort that I would have to buy a ticket to visit historical Patan.

"But I live here,"
"This is....... um....... counter" He ventured, pointing to the ticket booth,
"मा यहाँ बस्छु. पतनमा," I attempted.
He launched into the spiel from the beginning, clearly he had practiced it. Clearly this was going nowhere, but I also had no money on me, and getting home was absolutely top priority. I felt like I had to keep a lid on it, by doing as little interaction as possible, maybe no-one would realised how horribly mashed-up I was. This was a difficult situation, it would be impossible to avoid dangerous amounts of social interaction. Of course it wouldn't have mattered if he'd realised how stoned I was, it probably would have helped, but at the time it was absolutely out of the question that anyone find me out. This was, after all, an accidental bhang lassi situation, I couldn't have them all thinking that I was one of those debauched Western tourists who give us all a bad name, who make it even harder for me to fit in to the strict culture here, who make Nepali men think that it's ok to shamelessly grope Western women on dance floors, and in the street (so my line of thinking proceeded). I was at a loss how to proceed with the ticket-man, when finally, a third person stepped in, and, understanding what I'd been trying to say, put a sticker on my t-shirt. With this, the wooden-man let me pass, and finally I made it, to my room, to shut my door, draw my curtains, and stay in bed for the rest of the day. Sanctuary.

Did you know that Odysseus had gotten almost all the way back to Ithaca, when one of his crew accidentally opened his bag full of god-wind, and blew the ship all the way back to Aeolus' island? The bag itself had been a gift from Aeolus in the first place, so it was an awkward situation, to say the least. I like to remember Odysseus when I'm having a hard time getting home.

I apologise to you, my valued reader, because I don't have time to edit this just now. You'll just have to read it the way it is.

Happy Holi.