Where

 

W is for…Waterbirds

 

Where are the waterbirds? No seriously, wherever are they? I have seen mynahs and pigeons galore. But no gulls, no gulls! and very few waterbirds generally. Admitted, I haven’t been close to the sea except in the last three-four days. But even so.

 

The Indian or Common Mynah. Present everywhere.

Day before yesterday I spotted what I thought was a glossy ibis feeding close to the seawall at low tide, but it flew away before I could get close enough for a firm i.d. This morning there were two herons fishing in the shallows, one each on either side, not that they were a pair or anything. The tide has been out both mornings when I was walking which is actually great for bird spotting. I walked from one end of the road, which is called Marine Drive, to the other, up and down, before I came back into the hotel – in all I spent nearly an hour out walking beside the water. But no birds, apart from those two. The photos are all on the phone, not clear enough for any conclusive identification, but my guess is as good as anyone’s. I don’t think the bird I saw yesterday is either of these. The shape of the ibis beak is distinctive, though I realise now that it was against the light so any plumage would appear dark.

 

To my left. A White-faced Heron is my hypothesis.

On the grass verge there were the usual flocks of mynahs and pigeons pecking around, dozens of them whirr about in the mornings and evenings. You can hear them chirping from inside the room too. There’s no traffic noises to drown out the birdsong here.  There was a black, crested bird the other day sitting on the chain link fence, again not a close enough shot but that has to be a bulbul, which I understand was introduced to Fiji by the girmitiyas.

To my right. A heron definitely, but could be either a Reef or
a White-faced. I think it's a Reef because the colour was
uniformly dark, whichever way it turned or moved.

 

Fiji is rich in birdlife, it has to be, such a diverse and lush environment, the tropical forests, the hilly terrain and the vast ocean. There are mangroves here as well, which is another ecosystem with its own peculiar lifeforms. There are more than 160 bird species found in Fiji, around half of which are water/sea birds. Most of them are species I have never come across before – but they are all acting super elusive. Patience, as you’ll know if you’ve been reading this blog, is not among my virtues, but I guess it’s never too late to learn some.

Bulbul sitting on the fence. Introduced by the
Indian indentured labourers.

And I’ll have to get the regular camera out, bird shots are impossible on this piddly phone. I don’t know why I am putting off unpacking, there’s no way I can live out of one suitcase for three weeks. Or maybe even more – there’s no trace of the property I am to, ahem, inhabit. Waiting is an expat wife’s middle name. Patience should be too, but it isn’t, at least not this one’s. But then I’m putting my limbotime as I call it, to good use. 

A-Z Challenge 2022

Valuable

 

V is for…Vax

 

We got our booster shots a week ago at a Lautoka health centre. We went in with our Indian passports and our Bahraini vaccine certificates and drove the staff out of their minds. Who takes the first two shots in one country, goes back to their home country, does not take the booster there and then blithely relocates unboostered to a third country during a pandemic?! Insane or what?

 

We explained that the Indian system has not yet developed an option for returning NRIs to register, (story of my life, btw! the step-motherly treatment of NRIs covers entire sectors, not just vaccines)  and anyway India isn’t giving boosters to everyone yet. Boosters are only available for 60+ so we don’t qualify. Incidentally the Bahraini app on my phone keeps flashing me reminders about how I am due for a booster since November last, they are boosting adults after six months. After some more explaining and patiently waiting while our details were entered in three separate systems, we got the shots and the cards which are now more valuable than rubies.

 

Fiji health infrastructure is basic, expats get health insurance to cover emergency medical travel into Australia/NZ as a matter of course. The Lautoka primary health centre reminded me of the health centres in Northern Nigeria 40 years ago. The same unplush wooden benches in the waiting rooms, whirring pedestal fans, no token systems, long waiting times. The road in front crumbling away to a dirt track, the parking lot overgrown with weeds. The nursing staff in contrast were excellent, both courteous and efficient. Suavely professional.

 

With my first shot of Astra-Zeneca I had a pretty severe backlash - fever, chills, headache, delirium, totally wiped out for a day. Second shot was a breeze. But this booster was Moderna, so I expected my system would react the same way as the first time, and took the pills before the reaction got fully underway. But even so I felt feverish, washed out and spent the next day in bed.

 

For all its lack of sophisticated healthcare facilities, Fiji has done a pretty good job of the vaccination. Around 76% of the total population has got at least one dose, 70% have got the full protocol.  Fiji went into lockdown, twice I think, with the one in April ‘21 being prolonged for two months. It affected the tourism sector, as also the availability of goods, business slumped.

 

The quarantine restrictions have now been lifted for fully vaccinated travellers. But there are testing requirements in place, both pre-boarding and post-landing. Masks are generally not being worn, and I have somehow happily transitioned to a maskless state without much unease.  I thought after nearly two years of constant mask wearing I’ll have trouble reverting back to normalcy. But thankfully, that hasn’t been an issue.

 

Victory over the virus is still some way away – have you seen the vaccination trackers for Nigeria (11%)  or Egypt (44%)? Africa as a whole (21%)? abysmal doesn’t begin to sum it! Till the world can vaccinate a large chunk of its entire population, the pandemic will not be over. 

View from the balcony

A-Z Challenge 2022

Up

 

U is for…Underwater

 

Yesterday we checked out of the Nadi hotel and came to a Lautoka one. This reduces hubby’s two-way commute by about 40 km every day. But we’re booked here till early May only, then we move to Denarau which is farther beyond Nadi again. So I am not sure how this will help, but mine is not to argue why…the wheels of company practices grind exceedingly slow and exceedingly baffling…

 

Because of the forgotten suitcase, I repacked everything and took an unconscionable time to recheck every inch of each cabinet and drawer where things I’d unpacked might lurk. I am haunted by the fear of leaving something – test results or vaccine cards or something even more important, behind next and being stranded in a foreign country without the regulation papers.

 

Yesterday when we fetched up at Lautoka, the tide was high and the weather was fine. Today though it was a drizzle-sunny combo, which produced a rainbow first thing I saw in the morning. Unfortunately, underneath it, instead of the mandatory pot of gold or any other type eye candy was a ugly-functional no-frills warehouse type building. But still, a rainbow is always beautiful whatever it arches over - it felt like a divine omen.

 

It cleared up briefly as we went down to breakfast so I took a quick walk after. The tide had ebbed. As the water had receded the seawalls that were underwater yesterday were exposed. This too felt more significant that just rocks emerging from water - a reality check. An old frayed tyre had surfaced along with other debris. It happens with every place, every relocation, this high tide/low tide change of perspective and the seawall coming into view. Not unexpected. 

There was a whole flock of common mynahs hopping around on the low barrier and pecking at the grass verge. I saw a glossy ibis hunting off the rocks of the seawall but it flew away before I could get a shot, I am still with the phone and haven’t unpacked the big lens camera.  

It's been raining, sometimes in torrents, sometimes in drizzles, ever since I got back into the room. The weather too feels like a metaphor, the promise of the early rainbow swamped by incessant rains. Any place this green would have to have a substantial amount of rains, stands to reason. It's a good thing I'm not hung up about sunny weather, living in desert climates for decades has slow-seeded in me an uncommon appreciation for rain, but at times the most indefatigable optimism is not enough to stop the mood from ebbing out like the tide.  

The way everyone I’ve met so far has been telling me not to go walking after dark and/or alone, not to speak to strangers as they’ll make out from my Hindi I’m not local, not do this, nor do that, is rather upsetting. Being on my own doesn’t faze me, I can manage with my own company quite well. Expat wives and trailing spouses mostly have to, I’ve had long practice. But security is another matter altogether. Daunting.

Five books and very little solitary exploration – this is going to be an unprecedented challenge! But I’m up for it. Maybe the universe is telling me to complete my third manuscript of poems? We shall see...

 

A-Z Challenge 2022

Tall

 

T is for....Today

Whatever's happened yesterday, whatever tough times it might
have brought...today is another chance to calm down..

To see things in perspective...and be grounded like these
ancient trees...and refocus...

..

...bend with the winds like tall grasses but then spring back too...

Tranquillity lies in flowing like water, in rising and falling
with the tides...

Today is another chance to be thankful...that what's going well
is going well...and what isn't can be improved with time and a
touch of patience. Have a wonderful Sunday!

A-Z Challenge 2022

Scary

 

S is for...Steel

 

Steel is what my nerves are not made of. The first thing that got me rattled happened yesterday - hubby had gone on a business trip to Suva and was supposed to fly back last night after work. Rang me up to say his flight was cancelled and there was no space anywhere to be had, so he took a taxi back and was on the road at dead of night for some four hours, came back at 1:30 a.m. by which time I was beginning to freak out. 

 

Then this morning we landed up, by the kind offices of Google maps - at a single track bridge, which was just a narrow slab of concrete without any guardrails on the side, laid over a canal. Now we have been used to cars driving on the right side for 25 years, and Fiji, like India, drives on the left. So we are anyways tending to veer over on the 'wrong' side and have to consciously keep hugging the left side kerb. By the time we realised what we were up against, there was no scene of reversing and taking a different route. Cars on the opposite bank were flashing their lights at us to get a move on, so there was nothing for it but to go on.  Thankfully nothing happened, we got to the other side without any problems. But it was nerve wracking for anyone with soft serve floppy noodle nerves like mine. They were thoroughly wracked.

In the evening around 7:30, we went out in search for some slippers, hubby's have got left behind in that last, forgotten bag, and found much to our dismay that all the shops and markets were firmly shut. Maybe because it's a Saturday, or maybe because shops close early anyway out here in small town Fiji. Incidentally, I spotted a bookstore but couldn't go in obviously because it was shuttered. Then we got lost in the back roads of Nadi and I was terrified that we would somehow land up at that bridge again in the dark and this time there would be no saving us, the car would topple into that canal for sure. There were no streetlights and not much traffic, the GPS was asking us to turn off into even narrower, unsurfaced tracks, no way! So we just went on and on for miles through pitch dark sugar cane fields before we got to a proper lighted road again. From there we  managed to get back into roads which we recognised and ended up at an eatery we've been to before. My nerves by then had turned into wobbly jelly. 

So I came back and made this video from archival snaps to soothe  them a bit. Here it is :

 

 

A-Z Challenge 2022

Rice

 

R is for…Read

 

Remind me again where I am…many thousands of miles from India, many thousands of miles from Africa, a country and indeed a continent I have never visited. Yet in many ways this place feels like I've been here before, feels like a throwback to 1970’s Africa, the same narrow roads and low rise buildings, a small town feel, courteous drivers giving each other the right of way. Sudden stockouts in supermarkets, basic health infrastructure, low hills on the horizon everywhere one goes. Very similar if one discounts the presence of the sea. And of course, the internet (which is erratic, at least in the hotel).

 

I mentioned this in passing to my husband and he, who has not one single sentimental or nostalgic bone in his body, casually replied, “That’s how you feel about every place we go, everything is Africa.” It made me laugh out loud. Well, can I help it if Africa is so rich and beautiful that once you’ve lived there as a child, it becomes the benchmark for every other place you’ll ever experience? The prism through which you view and review every element of your life?

Low hills on the horizon...the Nausori Highlands...
visible everywhere in Nadi.

 

On reflection though, it’s true what he said – I felt the same way about Bahrain when I first moved there. The same hibiscus and bougainvillea splashed buildings, perfect strangers greeting me in public spaces, holding doors open for me without knowing me from Adam. The desert climate, the strong sunlight, the sandy soils, the mesquite trees, the less urbanised, laidback  yet tight-knit community lifestyle – all of that felt at once familiar and reassuring. I settled in without any problems. By that reckoning, Fiji should also be a breeze.

 

Except that in Bahrain hubby had travelled ahead of me, so I had gone from the airport to a functional home. I had sent on a small carton of books, so I had reading material sorted to some extent. Bahrain those days had few bookshops and availability of books was an issue – that too was a throwback to small town Africa of my childhood. I figured out that in time.  Subscriptions   to magazines and trips to Dubai, India, Europe – the holidays and home leave were major opportunities for book shopping, utilised to the hilt. By the time I left Bahrain 25 years later there was a Virgin Megastore.  And Amazon had meanwhile transformed the dynamics of the whole book distribution market worldwide.

 

Bahrain, despite having a population roughly double that of Fiji, is tiny geographically – all the bookshops were located within half an hour’s drive, as we lived in the capital. Also, Bahrain’s per capita GDP is nearly 5 times that of Fiji, that has a direct bearing on the shopping options available in any market.  So, Fiji is much larger and poorer (btw, still way richer than India’s per capita GDP.)  The capital, Suva, is a half an hour’s flight and half a day’s driving from where we are. And Suva, very logically, is where the large bookshops are. Religion seems to play a huge role in the Fijian lifestyle, more than half the population is Methodist, and the few bookshops nearby are dedicated to Christian spiritual books.

 

Narrow roads and a high level of road courtesy...this is the
Queens Road connecting Lautoka to Sigatoka.

Books do NOT make for travelling light, forgive me if I’ve bored you with this before, they gobble up the baggage allowance something crazy. This time, between the two of us, we’ve got exactly five books, three of them picked up as we travelled through the airports. I’ve already finished the ones I got. I’m not sure what I am going to do about fresh reading material.

 

But this too is reminiscent of my childhood relocations, learning to navigate places with meagre book supplies. In Maiduguri, parents got me children’s magazine subscriptions from India, they reached me by sea mail months after they came out. My father, whenever he went on work trips to the larger cities, would pick up books for me as well as himself.  In Bauchi, growing into my teens, we would make occasional trips to Jos, 80 miles away,  for some difficult-to-get item such as a sewing machine or music system, and that would be combined with bookstore visits. And of course, I borrowed the daylights out of whatever books my friends had and from the school library and from my parents’ friends, and in turn they borrowed from me.

 

I'd have to travel on this road...for nearly 200 kms
before I can get to a large bookstore...

I was a relentless book hunter and reader those days, my passion for reading burns lower and more selectively now. Nevertheless, books are a required staple just as Basmati rice is. I’ve figured the rice bit out already, no doubt I’ll be able to figure the others too with time. Maybe I can get them shipped over from Australia or NZ? At any rate, going bookstore spotting is one of my favourite things!

A-Z Challenge 2022

Quail

 

Q is for….Qet

 

Qet?! Yup, that is the Arabic for cat, may or may not be the origin of the Latin cattus from which English cat  is derived. It came to mind because today it is raining cats and dogs here in Nadi. The mountains have disappeared, I can only see up to the palms that border the golf course and the road just beyond it. The rest is invisible whitemisty swirls. Maybe because of the rain,  the internet today is hard to pin down too, acting snooty - like a cat often does.

 

Now Q is a super serious letter, it makes me quail every time. It demands gravitas and earnest, painstaking labour. Like the ant that hefts loads larger than itself and stashes things away for the hard, rigorous winter that descends on the A-Z from Q to Z. But my mind is playing the grasshopper today, it refuses to hold onto any subject seriously for any given length of time. It’s leaping from word to word, nibbling at one briefly, then running its forelegs through the next one and then leaping off into a giant jump for another, quite unrelated subject. Quo vadis, O Grasshopper?

 

What’s happened is this – Joanne from Word Splash, a long-time friend, had mentioned Amanda Gorman. Of course that made me go back instantly to listen to her absolutely magnificent poem. For the nth or rather qth time -  Amanda and her poem never fail to amaze. And that one line where she recites “…quiet isn’t always peace” – it’s like the words have been etched on my soul from some earlier birth in quaternary times. So I wrote a response quatrain to it - it sulked because it thought itself too grand for  just four lines. I had to write a full fourteen to quiet it down. Here are the first -

 

Quiet is rarely peace, it’s the lull before the storm

it’s often prepping for war, reaching for the guns,

it’s the split second before someone explodes the bomb,

quiet isn’t quiet - it’s studying ammunitions.

 

But then the grasshopper flew off again, it doesn’t do serious at all. And I thought yeah, all this angsty woe-is-me witnessing yet another war and floods of refugees...okay, it’s not that I’m for violence or dictatorial systems of government or general cruelty and human rights abuse, I am NOT. But it’s not going to wholly demolish the global quest for nuclear disarmament and peace and justice and gender equality, if I don’t, just for once, post another of my whingy outbursts. So that was that.

 

Then the grasshopper landed on quarantine – stands to reason in covid times, right? I got as far as saying that Fiji has lifted quarantine rules for fully vaccinated travellers from 7^th April, provided they take 1) Pre-boarding covid test 2) Post landing covid test and 3) travel insurance covering covid…but Grass H. had no patience with that also and took off in a quantum leap.

 

As a last resort, I am going to talk about the Queens Road, which is the road I find myself on, going and coming everywhere in Fiji. It is actually a highway connecting Sigatoka in the south-west to Lautoka up north via Nadi. I travelled along the road going to the Garden, to the less edifying Lautoka factory and also to McDonalds last night for dinner. Not a fan of McD’s but heavens, was I glad to see a known face!  The grasshopper has hopped off again, really I might as well quit while I am ahead. Am I, though?! Never mind…

 

 

 

 

A-Z Challenge 2022

Write... Edit... Publish... April 2022 : A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall

 

There’s nothing much in common between us.

Just the hard, fiery rain of these bullets.

Just the concentric waves of the virus.

But an unequal share of the planet.

 

We’ve nothing in common even as we flee.

Your route’s a black ribbon made of velvet.

And mine’s the pounding of an unkind sea.

A wobbly raft, a camp and a pallet.

 

We just share a word – that's hardly enough.

And we share the cruel falsehoods we are told.

We’re told our rights, a world that waits with love.

But the rights are yours, I’m shut out in the cold.

 

My home, my route, my skin define what I get -

the harder rains. And an unequal planet.

This one's for the refugees, the dispossessed, the asylum seekers fleeing conflict zones across the world. May they find a warm welcome wherever they go and may their tribe and hardships dwindle.

WC - 128

FCA

Tagline : All refugees are equal but some are more equal than others. 

This is a scheduled entry. I am relocating out of India this month and have no idea how I'll be placed for an internet connection when this goes live. But I'll be catching up with you as soon as things are sorted. 

Read the other entries here:

Phew!

 

P is for…Progress

Lautoka to Nadi. Sugarcane fields flanked part of the way.

Every relocation has a set process. The formalities before you get into the country, the formalities after you get in. The pandemic has added the covid test, vaccination protocols to that, but even without them, the wheels of the bureaucracy grind exceedingly slowly, the world over. The relocation out of India adds another layer. Fiji's has been the most elaborate process so far – the police clearance from Kolkata Police, the detailed medical tests for the job holder and spouse, the insurances -  a Pacific Ocean of paperwork, if you’ll permit me a bad pun. The paraphernalia seemed endless at the beginning but slowly and steadily it got done, bit by bit. 

These old trees, a double row of them, were planted by the
Girmitiya ancestors, I was told - indentured labourers from 
India brought in by the British in late 1800's.

Digitisation and the internet however, have made things much quicker – thank heavens! Hubby’s passport (expired most inconveniently last December!) was done in less than a week start to finish, the application and payment made online from home. The Police clearance certificate, also applied for online, came through in 24 hours. (Probably because we don’t have criminal records!) Papers were scanned and sent whizzing over the net and took no time at all. The only packet of original signed documents that had to be couriered to Fiji took more than two weeks to reach the recipient so imagine what the time requirement would be if we had had to send everything that way. Phew!

 

So are there no problems in this tropical paradise? You bet there
are! Politics is fraught and their democracy is fragile, as in many
other new nations. But this too is part of being an expat - see
and listen, but don't meddle. No taking sides, no participation. 

Now that we are here, things are moving at a fair pace. The phones were organised even before we landed, so the SIMs were just slotted in as soon as we got here. Local IDs, bank account, driver’s licence, property viewing and lease, and of course, the booster shot. India is currently giving boosters to 60+ so we were not eligible there. But here we are, more about that later. Today I had to get into Lautoka for some admin work, the second city in Fiji. The whole place is just lush green and picturesque. As the photographic proof shows. 

A-Z Challenge 2022

Over

 

O is for...Out

Finally, jetlag over, we have got our bearings back – a four day holiday for Easter helped no end – hubby had to slow down and acclimatise. Today we went out exploring. First stop, the Garden of the Sleeping Giant. I heard hubby saying 'orchid' and of course I had to get there pronto. It's located at the foothills of the Nausori highlands and houses some 40 different varieties. They were originally the private collection of actor Raymond Burr and later developed into a tourist attraction. The garden itself is plonk in the middle of a Fijian native forest and includes indigenous species as well as curated ones.

 

The road changed to dirt track-ish once we turned off from the main thoroughfare. We passed the village of Natalau. And missed the garden because Google maps urged us on and coolly led us to someone’s private residence. The road by then had all but disappeared and hubby was protesting as the car bumped along violently. The temporary transport he has been given does not have offroad capabilities, he’s already had trouble with the tyres, I understand. Anyway, I got out and knocked on the door of the aforementioned residence and a very friendly lady pointed us back on track. 

Offering these photos of the outing  for the O entry -

Getting lost is de rigueur for us - we've done it in Egypt, also in Bahrain and even in Dubai, so why should Fiji be an exception only because it is tiny? I had a very pleasant time, navigation fiasco notwithstanding. There's a picnic spot for families, a play area with swings etc for the little ones and plenty of benches alongside the pathways. And a fish pond a la Monet with lily pads and a fringe of orchids and tiny central island of vegetation. Recommend wearing sturdy walking shoes, I haven't bothered with unpacking in the hotel - while it didn't stop me from enjoying the place, I would have been more comfortable in a thicker sole with some grip. Overall, good start to getting out and about in Fiji.

A-Z Challenge 2022

Nothing

 

N is for...Notes

When you get to unpack the case, you’ll find

the folded river like a paper crane;

the courtyard, the terrace and the blind lane

have travelled with you, nothing’s left behind.

 

In some garment, in the collar or cuff -

the smell of rain. The lamppost under which

the poor sold bargains pressed hard by the rich

has come with you and can’t be shaken off.

 

You’ll find the texture of sun ripened noons

in the meshed pockets of your suitcases,

the unloved street kids with their grubby faces,

the rain splashed windows, the dissolving moons.

 

There’s nothing you can untangle, discard –

however far you go from this courtyard.

Today I found this half finished pre-pandemic poem in the notes section of my phone. I'd completed it differently at the time it was first sketched and have posted it earlier.  I tweaked the last stanza and couplet afresh and am offering it here for the N-day. 

Happy Easter to you if you are celebrating, happy A-Zing if you're participating in the challenge and happy Spring to all those who are doing neither.

A-Z Challenge 2022

Minefield

 

M is for...Mask

 

Air travel over the last two years has become dominated by masks and jabs and tests and certificates. A layer of extra, tedious health procedures shaving a major chunk off the pleasure of travel. Even within the country, different Indian states had different protocols at different times. And international travel, omg! it’s a minefield! At one point of time in 2021, one had to take a test and be covid negative to transit through Heathrow. We had to get a transit visa as well as a negative RT-PCR test to stopover at Singapore a few days ago.

Adding to the mayhem is the frequency with which the protocols change – at one time, airlines were giving free PPE kits to the passengers on the aisle seat. At another, only masks were mandatory. In 2020 and early 2021, there was a 72 hour window for the test for flying to USA, now it is 1 day. Apart from showing proof of vaccination, of course. Every country has it's own little set of rules and protocols. It’s hard to keep up. And it makes planning any travel super fraught.

 

For Fiji, we had not only to take a covid test 2 days before the flight but also prebook a test for 48 hours after landing. Relocations, much as I am used to them, have a stress quotient all their own, the covid protocols spike that off the charts. Our tests were administered yesterday and turned in a negative result. Another thing to be thankful for! Mask protocol has been changed to optional here except in closed, indoor spaces where social distancing cannot be observed. So my mask is coming off after two years and heavens, does it feel marvellous or what?! Hello, lipstick!

 

A-Z Challenge 2022

Learn

 

L is for...Let it go and Let it be

 

In the case that’s got left behind, there is a humble but rather special garment. It is a seagreen and white floral print housecoat, faded and softened, threadbare with a million washes over many years of use. Ma had it made for me when I went home to her during my pregnancy, exactly 21 years ago this April. I have worn it ever since, the fabric is a cotton blend and therefore sturdy, and though it is now thinned out, the seams have held and there is not a single tear anywhere in it, no patches, no mending required, perfectly functional, never mind its looks.

 

In the first years of my son’s toddlerhood, it saw constant use. That leveled off after a time, but I never got up enough motivation to replace it. I’m lazy with my clothes I have to confess, I tend to go on using the same things year on year unless forced otherwise, no matter how unsightly or threadbare they get. And so it went with me – from Bahrain mindlessly to Dubai to Cairo and back to Bahrain. I still wore it around the house in the mornings. A conditioned reflex almost, without the need for thinking.

 

My mother passed in April 2020, during the first lockdowns in Bahrain and in India. When it came to leaving Bahrain for good last year, I discarded huge swathes of stuff, decluttered my entire wardrobe, but I didn’t, couldn’t get rid of the housecoat. It ties together my mother and my son. Ever since she has passed, I have held onto it even more fiercely. When I was packing to come out to Fiji this time, I threw it into that small case, wanting the familiar comfort of it wrapped round me in this new, unknown journey I was undertaking.

 

This is another one of my failings. I load unnecessary meanings onto material things and cling onto them long after any useful purpose can be served. It’s exactly what all scriptures warn against – this attachment, the maya for worldly goods of whatever kind, investing them with manmade, puffed up significance and hanging on, carrying the comfort blanket of mementos everywhere. It doesn’t make for peace, it doesn’t make detachment easier and invariably it exceeds the baggage allowance. My mother’s memory doesn’t need any material props. I know this in my bones but some other stubborn body parts still refuse to accept it.

 

So. Perhaps this is the universe’s own way of telling me that it is time. Perhaps it’s for that reason the case got left behind. Maybe it’s time to free Ma’s memory from all these physical trappings and hold the essence front and centre instead. Time to learn - to let it go and let it be.

 

A-Z Challenge 2022