Had a staff meeting today at the refugee center where I work; everyone brought different kinds of food (since I've never been much of a cook I brought wagashii, Japanese sweets). Afterwards, sitting with our tables arranged in a circle, everyone told something of themselves. Many of the westerners told about life-long interests in teaching and such, and then a beautiful young woman from Somali whose first name means "moon" told of her escape following the civil war, loaded onto a boat crammed with people packed so close you couldn't move, even to go to the toilet, and how one man was sitting on the edge of the roof and fell asleep, falling into the water in the dead of night. There was a storm so there was nothing anyone could do. Later the next day his body was found on the shore when they got to Kenya.
She said the one image that stuck in her mind was just seeing his feet sticking out from under the cloth which covered his body. And one other image, from the night before, of having caught a glimpse of his legs dangling up on the roof where he slept, just before he fell into the water . . . when they got to Kenya, they were some of the lucky Somalis who did not have to go to a refugee camp, instead, owing to connections, they were able to share a small house with 5 other families. It is only when she starts to talk of her father that her voice begins to falter. He had crossed into Kenya before her, her mother and her brothers and sisters to prepare for their accommodations. None of them expected to wind up in America; all of her uncles' relatives had managed to get European visas in Yemen. Her father left them again, intending to try and obtain one for the whole family as well. For three months they heard nothing, until word finally reached her family of her father's death in Yemen. Although he had some health issues, the details of his death were never revealed. At this stage, she is weeping, wiping the tears from her eyes. The green color of her hijab, elegantly wrapped around her head and draped over her shoulders, frames, even in grief, a beautiful young woman. Eventually her mother, destroyed by the grief of losing her husband, was able to get a visa to go to the US with 500 other Somalis. They settled in Portland, mother, grandmother and eight brothers and sisters, owing - in part - to the city having one of the most developed refugee programs in the nation. And yet, for nearly a month upon their arrival almost 10 years ago, they lived nearly 1 month in a tent. There is a noticeable silence after she finishes speaking.
While her story was very moving, I was no less moved by Yuka's story, particularly her telling everyone that the district she came from in Osaka was one in which the Burakumin lived, mentioning very briefly, their history of persecution. I don't know if anyone else caught the reference, but hearing "burakumin" come from the lips of any native-born Japanese is the equivalent of a gunshot if one knows their history and the particularly ugly forms of discrimination Japanese society has perpetrated against them. In just one word, I understood her devotion to equality and human rights in a way few in the room – if any - did. Since 16th century Japan, people employed as butchers, court executioners, and undertakers were deemed unclean. Ironically, this notion of "uncleanliness" stemmed from a misreading of Buddhist doctrine; therefore all persons engaged in these professions, and ultimately, their descendants for the next 500 years, were discriminated against. Ethnically, they are 100% Japanese, but Japanese society has treated them as non-Japanese and has discriminated against them ever since. Imagine having family ancestors in Elizabethan England that were either butchers, executioners or undertakers, and owing to population census records, you and everyone else that had family that was engaged in those activities then, has ever since been regarded as not even second-class, but a kind of under-class, comparable to India's "Dalit" or "Untouchables". To hear that before Yuka met her husband she was actually studying human rights in Europe at The Hague really affected me.
There were many stories, some short, others quite long. Damayanthi, my immediate boss from Sri Lanka, told how she is the youngest child and daughter, and the one most expected to stay close to home, and how she attended school in Boston, met her husband, and worked in South Africa for several years before settling in Portland as it is her husband's home town. She has been here for nearly 6 years, and despite a rather sanguine disposition, several times hinted at the difficulties faced in this city, both cultural and climatic. Shiva, a Bhutanese-Nepalese, told of his people being evicted from Bhutan by the Bhutanese government and how they wound up living in refugee camps in Nepal for 17 years. And Frank, an absolutely brilliantly jazz guitar player elected to the Jazz hall of fame in Iowa, described the dual life he is forced to live in the United States as an African American living in a predominately "white" society. He went on to both point out and question why, despite the staff consisting of several Africans, he is the only African American. He plays regularly in Portland, and his first CD, Quite Frankly is a masterwork of Jazz guitar.
Afterwards, I'm on the light rail bound for downtown, my mountain bike dangling by it's front wheel from one of the bicycle hangers, periodically knocking against the doors as the train sways from side to side. I sit down in the upper section near a window and catch the eye of woman wearing business attire. Chinese? Impossible to tell. I put on my headphones and pull out Patrick French's Tibet, the sounds of Tuvan throat-singing filling my ears as I've created my small space bubble. I haven't used headphones this much since I was 16. The train stops at PSU and taking down my bike, I ride to Smith Hall, get a cup of coffee, and take out my computer and start writing, needing to make some sense of this social/cultural/economic milieux I now find myself in. How did I get here? As regards teaching, am I "genuine", or does having a strong attachment to art and writing make me out to be some kind of "faker"? In truth, I'm not really an "ESL teacher", though quite probably I am a teacher. Maybe even a writer, provided I create enough physical forms inked onto paper acknowledged by others, maybe even a painter, provided an altogether different kind of form is inked onto another kind of paper, acknowledged by others. Acknowledged by others? As with everything we do, creating is rarely in a void, drawing on sources both internal and external, which in turn are themselves transmitted outward. A glance outside finds a clear sky, partially leafless trees standing as dark sentinels marking sudden spurts of rain with a bow of branches. Who knows when they start kicking out students, if my charge lasts, I may hold out another hour, two even, before I return to my rented room in The Big Red House...
S
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