Techno-Peasant Takes a Bow

Books do furnish a room.

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I’m so excited! As Vlanny would say (and did say every time a meal was set before us), “It’s the happiest day of my life!” My computer has a built-in photo card reader!

How could I not have known? you ask. Well, when it comes to strolls through the forest of technology, I’m just a babe in the woods.

Piglet purchased my digital camera in August 2002, just before we left for China. It’s a bit large by modern standards but I know how to use it and it takes good pictures. It came with a triangular reader-thing into which you insert the photo card. Then there’s a two-pronged cable – one end attaches to the reader and the other plugs into the back of the computer. Voila! Instant download.

I haven’t been able to find the cable, though, so – in my dedication to producing up-to-date photos for this blog – I’ve combined my visits to Finn with prevailing on Nym to download pictures for me. The reader will plug straight into the back of a computer, minus the cable, but its shape precludes it from fitting between the many cords already plugged into the back of my tower.

I was amazed when Nym slipped the photo card directly into a slot on the front of his computer.
“Wow!” I said, feeling a tinge of the awe I experienced on first entering Chartres Cathedral. “I didn’t know that was possible! Sliding the card straight into the machine, I mean.”

“Sure,” said Nym. “Most computers have them. Yours probably does, too.”

“Oh, I don’t think so.”

“That’s a bit odd but you could always buy one. They’re incredibly easy to install...er...it would be really easy for me to install it for you.”

“I’ll check it out,” I said, a world of possibilities opening before me. Imagine! I can take a walk amidst the city’s spring blossoms, blog about it and include pictures. Right away! Without crawling under my desk and fiddling with a swarm of cords. Without driving all the way to Sooke and asking yet another favour of Nym!

Before heading to the electronics store, I checked the front of my tower carefully. Eureka! Two slots for a card reader! Triumph filled me and I set up my Magrudy’s bag for a photo shoot.
Alas! The card wouldn’t fit into the reader. It went in at a funny angle and there seemed to be nothing inside for it to connect to.

When I explained this to Nym, he said, “That’s strange. If you don’t have a card reader, there shouldn’t be an opening.”

Even Creature managed to remove her attention from Finn long enough to say, “That’s just weird, Mom. If you don’t have a component, like a DVD burner for example, there should be a plastic front over the space.”

“Let me show you,” said Nym. I followed him into the tiny room where their computers live. He pointed out a plastic front covering a second CD-ROM port. “The card readers are here at the top. Newer cameras have tiny cards, so one slot is for older cards like yours, the other for newer ones like Creature’s. You can also see there’s a double row of them which is fairly standard. The top row is the active one.”

I gazed in silence. “Maybe I have a top row, too.”

“Quite likely. I’d check it out before you race off to buy a new reader.”

Nym didn’t laugh, mock or jeer. At least not while I was still there. He really is a Nice Young Man.

The picture you see above was both down and uploaded by me. Maybe I qualify for a promotion on the technology scale. What comes above peasant but well below Queen, Princess or Lady?

I bought a book yesterday and that’s another thing making me happy this morning. The acquisition is the result of a rather embarrassing episode at work.

The Powers That Be decided efficiency has to be our byword during the current recession (Wumbles tells me it’s now being referred to as the Global Economic Crisis but you know what I mean). Phone calls must be cut to a maximum of six minutes from beginning to end. Many employees complained. How can problems be articulated and solved in such a short time?

I, too, wondered. I’d been labouring under the assumption that customer service was our byword. If not, who am I to whine and fret? It’s not my company. If we were talking about teaching and time spent with students, I’d fight tooth and nail. But people who don’t know what an odometer is? Sure I can turf the friendly banter, be brusque and to the point.

When January ended and the tallies had been taken, it turned out I’d cut my call time more drastically than anyone else. I was given a trophy with ‘Most Improved’ engraved on it.
I told my Dad the story – it’s hard sometimes to find interesting, non-taxing topics.

“Does it serve any practical purpose?” asked Dad.

“Not really. Although it does prove that I can actually talk less as well as more.”

Dad chuckled.

“Other than that, no. It sits on my desk in a sort of garish glory and the other members of the “team” feel they have to be enthusiastic about it. I’ll be glad when it’s gone.”

I was wrong, though. A week later my supervisor handed me a $25 gift card for Chapters. They’ve known me for less than a year. How did they figure out I love books?

Yesterday, I at last had time to roam through Chapters at leisure. It’s a bittersweet experience as I can never purchase all the books that take my fancy, nor do I have room to house them even if I could afford them. The Bibliomaniac’s Eternal Calvary.

After much delightful consideration, I bought The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Marakami. They didn’t have his Dance Dance Dance, the work Vlanny recommended most highly. Since all his novels were the same price, I chose Wind-Up Bird because it had more pages than the others.

Blessings upon Cadmus, the Phoenicians, or whoever it was that invented books.

Thomas Carlyle

In the Twilight

Book Lover's Paradise, Cleaner's Nightmare; at least there's a beautiful view.

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My Dad seems to be in conflict about his decision to refuse measures that would prolong his life. He wants to hang onto some of them while rejecting others.

He takes about 200 pills daily. On Tuesday, he started throwing up the after-lunch ones as soon as he’d swallowed them, meaning my Mom had to clean up the mess. Four days went by before he agreed to call a halt.

When I dropped in for my usual after-work visit on Wednesday, Dad was in bed, reclining more comfortably than he has in weeks. He’s got open bedsores and a nurse had brought a special mattress on Tuesday evening. As I kissed Dad goodbye, he clung to my hand as if he’d never let go. “It’s good to see you, as always,” he said.

Just as I was going out the door, he summoned Mom and told her he thought he was going into renal failure and didn’t want an ambulance called as he wouldn’t consider entering the hospital. Mom looked pale and disoriented as she relayed the message and I have to admit I was panic-stricken.

Disturbing images and thick, chest-constricting emotions flooded through me. Although I didn’t know it, Piglet was in renal failure when I took him to the Third People’s Hospital in Guangzhou. Once the kidneys (or, in my Dad’s case, kidney) no longer process body fluids, the lungs fill with liquid, ultimately causing congestive heart failure. Which is neither a pretty picture nor a gentle death.

I had no idea how to handle this alone with Mom.

Needless to say, I took off my coat and abandoned departure plans. Mom, however, said I might as well go. She’d call me if she needed me. Since staying meant Mom would feel obliged to make an elaborate dinner – which even with my help would be exhausting – I went, but ate risotto at a nearby restaurant and phoned her when I’d finished.

Fortunately, it turned out to be a false alarm.

Yesterday there was supposed to be a meeting of caregivers, starting at 1:00. I showed up at 11:30, thinking I’d make lunch before the onslaught. To my dismay, cars littered the driveway. As I walked through the door, Mom handed me the phone. “Someone wants to talk to you.”

“Hello?” I said, bemused.

It was the woman from the Health Region, cancelling the meeting because her first grandchild had just been born ahead of schedule. Obviously, I had to forgive her. The meeting will now take place Monday afternoon.

After nearly – accidentally – knocking over the cleaning lady on my way to hang up the phone, I discovered a Hospice Nurse in the kitchen. She had a binder full of information and was trying not to overwhelm Mom with details.

I decided to cut to the chase.

“One of the most likely things we’ll face,” I said, “Is renal failure, which I gather is not pleasant.”

“No,” she replied, “It’s not. But hospice teams are available night and day to come out and alleviate the symptoms. They can be quite extreme. The good news is that they’re rarely painful.”

Something that has crouched coiled and hidden inside me for nearly six years relaxed, like an unclenching of muscles I hadn’t realized were taut. I felt almost light-headed with relief. I’ve never quite forgiven myself for not being present when Piglet died and I’ve imagined him alone and in pain, surrounded by people who didn’t speak English. To learn there probably wasn’t a lot of pain – and knowing the hospital staff, despite their failure to diagnose and treat him correctly, certainly alleviated his symptoms – brought me some ‘closure’, as the jargon has it. It also explains why Piglet looked peaceful afterwards. (Reading about rigor mortis taught me a person’s face retains the expression it wore when death occurred.)

I made a green onion frittata for lunch and Dad managed to get to the table. He’s got an appointment for a blood transfusion on Sunday and, right after complimenting my cooking, said, “When we go to the ‘horsp,’ we should be able to manage the trip ourselves, don’t you agree, Bean?”

My Mom murmured non-committally.

“The seats in the car are really low, Dad,” I said, horrified. “You’ll have trouble sitting down. Not to mention having to swivel your legs around after you sit.”

“We have a cushion the nurse brought,” Mom piped in. “We can easily put it in the car and arrange to have a wheelchair waiting for us at Emergency.”

Great! I thought. Nightmare on Elm Street move over! One crisis has just been averted. Make way for the next.

Once the dishes were cleared and stowed, Dad suddenly realized he was out of one of the few medications that don’t make him vomit. He wanted me to proceed directly to the pharmacy and bring him the pills. I’d planned on spending the rest of the afternoon with Creature and Finn. If I delayed any longer, I’d hit rush hour and there’d be no point going. I said I’d pick up the prescription on my way back and drop it off just after dinner.

I drove out to the Fir-Draped Cabin creating dialogues in my mind.

“You know, Dad, it really isn’t fair to ask Mom and me to...”

No – the suggestion of injustice might make him angry.

“It’s a lot to ask of yourself, Dad, getting in and out of the car twice with only me and Mom to help.”

No – that will just bring out his Scotch stubbornness and he’ll be more determined than ever to go through with it. After all, it’s partly his Scotch thrift – his desire to avoid the ambulance bill – that made him come up with this idea in the first place.

“No, Dad, it’s a bad plan.”

Short, to the point, but could I count on Mom backing me up?

For two blissful hours I was able to forget my worries as I sat holding Finn. I fed him – Creature has had to temporarily give up nursing due to severe mastitis and the antibiotics she’s taking to cure it – burped him and cuddled him. He is so tiny and defenseless, so beautiful with his long fingers and black feathery hair. He makes sweet little gurgles and coos and gazes up at me with big dark eyes full of absolute trust. At two weeks old, he’s becoming more alert and I’ve seen him often enough that I think he recognizes me. He knows I’m not Mom or Dad, but I’m a trusted presence in his emerging universe.

Holding him nestled in his soft blankets, in all his fragile vulnerability, made me incredibly grateful he was born in Canada. I’ve seen the condition of children in China, in Cambodia, in Laos and in Jordan and it’s broken my heart. What ‘fearful hand or eye,’ what unearned bounty, decreed that I and my children and my children’s children would be born here, where we can live amidst peace and plenty while so many of the world’s children suffer. It is a mystery and, truly, there but for the grace of God goes Finn.

Moments after I reluctantly handed him back to his mother, the phone rang; my mother letting me know the pharmacy had delivered the prescription. That spared me a two-hour adventure but meant I couldn’t tackle my Dad face to face bout his insane “I can do it” plan.

On the drive home from Sooke I decided I’d simply phone Mom and tell her we couldn’t begin to consider trying to manoeuvre Dad through a road trip. Just say no and all that.

Before I’d said more than, “Hi, it’s me,” Mom said, “Well, I’ve organized the Medi-Van people. The transfusion’s at 3:30 so they’ll get here at 2:30, leaving lots of time for them to carry Dad out if they have to.”

“What??”

“The Medi-Van. You know, the same outfit that brought him home. Maybe we’ll get the boy with the hilarious hair again.”

“And Dad agreed to this?”

“I didn’t ask him,” Mom said airily.

“Won’t he be upset? I mean, he wanted to go in the car.”

“What makes you think that?”

“He said so at lunch.”

“Did he really? I don’t remember anything like that being discussed.”

Maybe Mom’s way is best. Don’t register what you don’t want to hear and then arrange, turmoil-free, what you think is fitting.

Meanwhile, my apartment’s a pigsty. Housework isn’t my favourite occupation at the best of times and, given everything that’s going on, I have to choose between blogging and cleaning. Blogging wins, hands down.

I do feel a bit sorry for my bright yellow vacuum cleaner, though. A birthday gift from my dear friend, Kathleen, it sits forlornly in the living room awaiting installation of a seat and steering wheel.

Booking Muhammad

Book Bag from Magrudy's

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Muhammad’s attire never changed. He wore a grey tunic, loose grey trousers and a white crocheted prayer cap. Dark-rimmed glasses emphasized his large, moist eyes, eyes that are among the most expressive and compassionate I’ve ever seen. Riding in his taxi was peaceful as he was one of the very few calm, measured drivers in a sea of vehicular madness. After living in China, the fact that his cruising speed was 110 kilometres per hour didn’t trouble me. If we had nothing to talk about, he turned on his radio to an Abu Dhabi station that played readings from the Quran 24 hours a day. To be authentic, the Quran must be written and read in Arabic. It’s read in a kind of chanting singsong – exquisitely lovely when done properly.

There’s no public transportation in the UAE so Muhammad was my lifeline, my means of exit from the remote sandy suburb of Sharjah where I lived. I was a challenge for him, I think, because routine grocery runs were the least of my needs.

I crave books the way a mouse craves cheese or the sea seeks the shore. I’d arrived with only two – Reading Lolita in Tehran and Islam for Dummies – so I was in desperate straits by the time a week or two had gone by.

That last paragraph contains a shocking falsehood. And, like little George Washington and Canadians everywhere, I cannot tell a lie. I’m going to make a confession. I’m an addict. A bibliomaniac. A book-snorter of the lowest order. I cannot pass a bookstore and have been known to rise from my bed in the dead of night to sneak in a paragraph or two. There. It’s out. I can continue to hold my head up when we sing, “The true north strong and free.”

On my way to the UAE, I deplaned in Hong Kong, put my suitcase in Left Luggage and proceeded to Guangzhou by bus. I picked up some dishes and other household items I’d entrusted to my friend Ken. I also had to make an agonizing choice. Which books to take with me and which to leave behind? I could only carry one additional suitcase. After hours of wavering, I settled on my Iris Murdoch collection – about 15 volumes – and a few tomes of poetry.

Nevertheless, as the weeks passed I left increasingly anxious and unsettled. There always have to be books in reserve, you understand, enough unread treasures to stave off nightmares and panic attacks.

“I hear there’s a bookstore at Jumeira Beach,” I said to Muhammad.

“Oh my God, Mem!” Worry lines creased Muhammad’s brow. “Jumeira Beach is very long way. It take maybe an hour to get there. Cost a lot.”

“That’s okay,” I told him. “Books are very important to me. When I lived in China, I used to go all the way to Hong Kong to buy books. I must find a good bookstore here.”

“You have address, Mem?” Muhammad had clearly resigned himself to dealing with a lunatic. And no matter how many times I asked him to call me ‘Annie’ or how well we got to know each other, he continued to call me ‘Mem.’

Muhammad chuckled and shook his head, engaging the gear as he did so. Off we whirled and spent two hours searching for the bookstore. Once we’d arrived at Jumeira Beach Road, Muhammad got out of the taxi every now and then to pound the pavement in quest of the address scribbled on an increasingly damp scrap of paper. As the sun began to set over the Persian Gulf, even I had to admit that the bookstore, if it ever existed, existed no more. I felt weak and shivery, a headache hovering just above me – the onset of withdrawal symptoms. Muhammad was upset because he’d disappointed me.

A week or so later, I found Magrudy’s Bookstore in Deira City Centre in Dubai and it became my most frequent destination. The mall also included a movie theatre, an Arabian Treasures section with a stunning display of Persian carpets, and a wonderful French restaurant where, every few weeks, I treated myself to dinner.

Now a new problem confronted me. Where to put all my books? How to house them in a dignified and fitting way?

“I need a bookcase,” I told Muhammad.

“What is bookcase?” The widening of his eyes indicated I’d been upgraded to dangerous lunatic.

“A place to put books.”

“But you have apartment, Mem.”

“I know.” My brain twisted its coils with the effort to explain. “It is a shelf to put the books on.”

“Shelf, Mem? I do not know this word.”

“A kind of furniture.”

“Oh! Furniture I know."

A peculiarity of the UAE is the placement of similar stores and services on the same streets. Banks, for example, all stand in a splendid row on Constitution Avenue. Travel agents, bless them, crowd along a street whose name I mercifully forget. And so we swiftly came to a road lined with furniture shops. I plodded through the appalling heat, closely followed by Muhammad who’d offered to serve as both translator and bargainer. Nary a bookshelf did I see. Didn’t they exist in this part of the world?

As perspiration dripped from my fingertips and trickled down my back, I remembered a remedial English class I once taught in an isolated Vancouver Island village. Getting the students to write – anything at all, even their names – was an ongoing struggle. One day I noticed that several of them had purchased sports’ lottery tickets from the basketball team. The prize was a return flight to any city in continental North America and 1500 dollars cash. Once we’d established that Amsterdam is not a city in continental North America, I asked them to write about that they’d do if they won. Silence and no scratch of busy pens.

“Let me give you an example,” I said. “If I won, I’d go to New York. I love to cook and eat and I’ve heard New York has amazing restaurants, so I’d go out for dinner as often as I could. My brother lived there for two years and he tells me there are dozens of utterly fabulous bookstores. He says that in New York you can find any book you’ve ever wanted. So I’d buy a lot of books, too, and maybe an extra suitcase to bring them home in.”

Still silence and no movement. One girl, her face pale with shock, cleared her throat. In hushed tones she said, “You mean you have books in your house?”

Back in Furniture Land, both of us drenched in sweat and our tempers fraying – and after Muhammad tried to interest me in a series of coffee tables and TV stands – I turned to him impatiently. “A bookshelf is tall,” I said, indicating the height of his forehead. “And there are shelves, like so.” I sketched the air. “And you place the books on the shelves.” I mimed sliding a book onto one of the airy shelves.

Light dawned. Muhammad chattered to the proprietor in Urdu and we headed for a back room, where, at long last, I saw a piece of furniture that would make a creditable home for my books. It had sliding glass doors over three shelves and cupboard doors hiding two ore shelves at the bottom. Its light blue colour would blend in well with the couch and chair provided by the school.
Rapid-fire bargaining ensued. I shelled out a small wad of dirham. Peace and bliss pervaded my soul.

“I learn a new word, Mem,” said Muhammad proudly.

Soon a team of Pakistanis would arrive at my apartment to assemble the bookshelf while their supervisor sat watching Buffy on my TV. But for now I leaned happily against the plastic-covered back seat, not even wishing for a seat belt as we sped homewards under the blazing desert stars.

Muhammad the Taxi Driver

The desert from Jebel Ali; example of a wrought-iron fence decorated with gilt; the Oman border with lovely minarets in the background

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As I struggled to adjust to life in a new environment – and a bewildering culture – all kinds of thoughts and impressions percolated inside me, trying to find places to perch in my brain – places that could become part of a continuity rather than a series of random flickerings. I’m still having epiphanies about things that happened during that year. It’s taken a long time for my experiences to coalesce in any sort of meaningful way. Memories recur and shift, like glass pieces in a kaleidoscope. Abruptly, I see from a distance, as if observing the length of a tree whose top was out of sight in the clouds but that now lies on the forest floor.

What I’m trying to say, I think, is that life flows in a more or less purposeful way. Explanations and reasons always exist if you look for them. Events don’t suddenly explode in a vacuum. Most of the time, however, our lives feel as if we live them in a succession of sealed boxes – which is a dangerous illusion.

The school was a bit disorganized at the beginning because the principal, Drew, did not arrive for start up. He’d been diagnosed with cancer over the summer and had to stay in Canada for treatment. The boys’ remarks about being ‘terrorists’ made me remember my interview with him. It took place at Ricky’s Restaurant in South Surrey, a suburb of Vancouver. The sheer unlikeliness of this can only be expressed in a joke shared by residents of another Vancouver suburb, “Richmond means never having to say you’re Surrey.”

Drew’s first question shocked me. “Are you Jewish?” he asked. “I know in Canada that can’t be asked but the owners of the school in the UAE oblige me to ask it.”

I hadn’t been formally asked about religious affiliation since I was ten years old. I think my mouth fell open. “No,” I replied.

“I didn’t think so,” Drew continued, “But I had to ask because Jews are not allowed in the UAE. Are you gay?”

My native wit made a feeble comeback. “If you’re asking whether or not I’m a Jewish lesbian, the answer is no.”

“Just another thing I had to ask you,” said Drew. “Homosexuality is illegal in the UAE. I believe what you’re telling me but I have to make it really clear that if you’re either Jewish or gay, and anyone finds out, you’ll be immediately deported. Which wouldn’t be good for the school. Or you.”

When I was figuring out which countries to visit in the three-week January holiday, my students told me to go to Jordan. “You’ll love it, Miss,” they said.

Yes! And wouldn’t it be wonderful to go to Jerusalem as well, since it’s so close. I was raised in a Christian home but can’t imagine anyone with even the slightest knowledge of Christianity not thrilling at the thought of walking the streets of Jerusalem. I babbled on about the wonder of it and received a lot of strange looks.

Eventually, someone said, “Annie, listen. If you go to Israel you’ll end up with an Israeli visa in your passport and you won’t be allowed back into the UAE. They won’t let you out of Dubai airport.”

I felt another distinct shock but didn’t yet have any inner framework on which to register it. Except for my year in China and a few months’ travel in Europe, I’d lived my life in Canada. When Chinese students asked me to describe the first thing they’d notice if they came to Canada, the first really different thing, I told them, “You would be surprised because in Canada there are no foreigners. Here in China, everyone knows I’m not Chinese. They look at me and think, ‘There goes a foreigner.’ The people in Canada come from everywhere, from every country you could name, and we have no way of singling out a foreigner. Also, my part of Canada is very new. It has just over a hundred years of history, and from the very beginning there were people from many countries so we’ve made that history together. It hasn’t always been good, but we haven’t stopped trying to make every single person feel it’s their home.”

Adjusting to a place where your religion denies you access to entire countries, where it can actually put you in danger, was more than I could absorb. So the knowledge went to a sort of inner holding pen. I was at the starting point of a voyage of discovery and a lot of experiences would end up in that holding pen until I’d learned what to do with them.

In the meantime, I had the practicalities of everyday life to deal with. Despite the occasional harrowing experience with rogue travel agents, most men I dealt with didn’t treat me like a Wayward Western Whore. I really hate generalizations, but educated men and men who frequently worked with foreign women understood that the majority of us didn’t deserve the “loose” label.

Muhammad the Taxi Driver, a wonderfully kind and generous man, is a prime example. Without him, my life in the UAE would have been considerably diminished. He came from a remote mountain village in Pakistan and had a wife and three children at home, to whom he sent a good deal of his money. I saw a picture of the older two, a boy and a girl, and they both looked healthy and well-fed.

When he first came to the UAE, he worked on a camel farm. After a year or two, he was able to get his own taxi and become an independent operator. He shared an apartment with several other men from Pakistan and they all took turns sleeping so the rent they paid was minimal and the money they could send home maximal.

Speaking of camels, shortly before my sojourn in the UAE, camels were a real problem on the Emirates highway that runs from Abu Dhabi to the Oman border. A few people still live in the old nomadic, Bedouin way and camels are their most prized possessions. Occasionally a camel would wander onto the highway causing a horrendous accident as well as financial hardship for the camel’s owner. When the accidents first occurred, the Bedouins tended to be ignored. At certain times of year, people (mostly men, I think) can seek an audience at the palace of the local sheikh in order to air their grievances. If the fancy strikes him, the sheikh graciously remedies the situation. So it came to pass that Bedouins began receiving fabulous sums for their dead or handicapped camels.

Recognizing a boon when it dropped in their laps, the Bedouins began purposely shooing their camels onto the highway. The human death toll mounted, as did the incidence of camel dishes on restaurant menus, while sums equivalent to the entire annual budget of countries like Laos were paid out to camel owners. Finally the government realized Something Had To Be Done. A row of greenery had already been planted along the edges of the highway to prevent sand from obliterating the road, so it was a fairly simple matter to install discreet screen fences amongst the trees. Problem solved. No more wandering camels. Fewer accidents.

Since I’m talking about highways anyway, I’ll mention that little drive-in mosques were also dotted along the length of the highway so no one could say a mosque wasn’t handy when the call to prayer came. And – for those really difficult moments – car trouble, perhaps, or a sharp blow to the head from a cantankerous camel – you could buy prayer mats with tiny compasses embedded in them so you’d always know in which direction Mecca lay no matter where you found yourself when the time for prayer rolled round.

These were some of the stories Muhammad told me during our first journeys together. Soon, though, I would start making his life difficult.

Next Up: Booking Muhammad

I Digress

Finn at 4 days and, in a hat knitted by Auntie Wumbles, at 10 days.

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What a weekend! Wumbles and Stockwell came up from the good old U-S of A to meet Finn. Lest anyone think we don’t have our priorities straight, I need to tell you that they proceeded directly to Don Mee Restaurant for Dim Sum. I was already there – to make sure we got a table, you understand – munching my way through a second order of har gao – delicious little shrimp dumplings folded in glistening, semi-transparent rice pasta – when they arrived. We ate our way through an astonishing array of mostly shrimp-based delicacies. Stockwell has an excellent appetite.

Victoria’s Chinatown goes back to the earliest days of the city’s foreign settlement. Until the late 1850s there wasn’t much here except a few long-established encampments of indigenous people and a Hudson’s Bay fur trading fort. Then, one sunny Sunday afternoon in April of 1858, a ship from San Francisco, packed to the gunwales with prospective gold miners, floated into the harbour. Seventy-five of the 400 passengers were Chinese so their community has played an important role in local history from the beginning.

Whether you’re returning to the City of Gardens after a long absence or dropping in for a short stay, going to Don Mee for the stellar dim sum the moment you get here is, quite simply, the only sensible thing to do. Goldie Hawn and Michael J. Fox agree, as their signed photos on the wall attest.

Certain cities make certain demands on you. Beijing, to provide another example – especially if you arrive by long-distance train as my friend Pam and I did – compels you to head for the closest Wal-Mart in search of heavy-duty cold medication. Let me advise right up front that you’ll be disappointed and find yourself, instead, at the mercy of Chinese Traditional Medicine. For the duration of your stay, you’ll trail around pulling a cartload of apothecary supplies behind you. The wonders of the Forbidden City and the Great Wall pale beside the challenge of sorting out bat wings from snake skin.

The Beijing Duck, though, is extraordinarily good.

Stuffed dangerously full and overdosing slightly on soya sauce, we made our way to the Fir-Draped Cabin where Stockwell immediately established himself as a Baby Hog. Creature, Wumbles and I were reduced to standing around watching Stockwell hold Finn. Nym vacuumed. Let me digress once more and say there’s something enormously satisfying about a man who vacuums. I am of the Gloria Steinem, “I’ll vacuum when they make one I can ride,” school of thought so it’s doubly satisfying to me. Forget Playgirl pinups, forget People Magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive, even forget – reluctantly – Johnny Depp – give me a man with a firm grip on a vacuum cleaner and I’ll be content.

“Okay, buddy,” said Stockwell to Finn. “Us men are outnumbered here at the moment so I need you to listen up. The most important word – the one to learn and to remember – is toys. T-O-Y-S. Toys.”

Finn snuffled.

“That’s right, buddy. Toys.”

I had a sudden mental image of Piglet sitting on the living room floor surrounded by a Big Loader and all its components. It was Wumbles’ fourth Christmas and Piglet, fed up with ‘girl toys’, insisted on the purchase of a Big Loader. All his friends and two of his brothers came over to play. It was Wumbles’ favourite present. And, in fact, it’s the first Christmas she remembers.

Later, at my parents’, a rather bad time began for Creature. She’s got mastitis in both breasts and feeling pretty miserable, every slightest movement painful. My mother patting her belly and saying, “I see you haven’t delivered the other twin yet,” didn’t help. As Creature fought back tears, we attempted levity by teaching Stockwell some new Canadian vocabulary.

Stockwell: What the heck is a parkade?

Wumbles: You call it a parking garage.

My Mom: Careful you don’t spill that tea on the chesterfield.

Stockwell: The what?

Wumbles: The couch.

My Dad: Did you know they’ve instituted a transit tax? Our hydro bill is scandalously high this winter!

Stockwell: Your what?

Wumbles: Their electric bill.

Then, to my shock and horror, I learned they don’t have Shreddies in the United States. Or Smarties! Or Yorkshire Pudding mix! How do they survive? I don’t even eat breakfast but the neat rows of Shreddies’ boxes at the grocery store soothe me, reassuring me that all is well with the nation’s digestion.

Since I’m digressing left, right and centre, I’ll remark that the vocab lesson reminded me of my friend Pam again, on a cold January morning in Beijing. Hacking, sneezing and running low temperatures, we sat in Mandarin class trying to embed bus schedule words in our fevered brains.

Our Lao Shi (Teacher) wrote ‘route’ on the board and asked, “How do you pronounce this word in English? I’ve heard it said different ways.”

“Rowt,” said American Pam.

“No!” said I. “A rowt is an ignominious defeat. It’s pronounced ‘root’.”

A bit of heated discussion ensued but I’m happy to report that henceforth our very clever Lao Shi said ‘root’.

Sadly, a family dinner was more than Dad could handle, so the younger six of us rounded off an Asian Food Day at Futaba, a fabulous Japanese restaurant. Age Tofu. Spider Roll. Dragon Roll. Kushitori Chicken. So fresh and clean tasting. So beautifully presented. So easily sliding down the gullet in vast quantities.

The waitress endeared herself by admiring Finn, who slept peacefully while we gorged ourselves.

“What a beautiful baby!” she cooed, her tip doubling as the words tripped off her tongue. She glanced at Wumbles.

“You, too, are expecting? When?”

“In 74 days,” said Wumbles.

“But who’s counting?” added Stockwell.

The waitress looked at Finn again. “A boy?"

We nodded.

“How old?”

“Ten days.”

“He has a lot of hair.”

“Yes,” I said. “His mother had a lot of hair when she was born, too.”

“And it was all in her armpits,” volunteered Stockwell, thus, amongst the explosion of laughter, setting the final seal of happiness on Creature’s day.

His and Hers

As a female in the UAE, I didn’t have to wear a head scarf or abbaya, just make sure I covered my knees and shoulders at school and on the street. The malls were pretty much neutral ground where almost anything went, including the spray-on outfits worn by the young, international shopping crowd.

The attitude towards women – which you might not even notice on a fleeting tourist visit – was hard to get used to but once I began to understand it, I could accept it more easily.

No matter where I went, it seemed, I was asked, “Where are you from? Where is your husband? Do you have sons?” I got so fed up with these questions that I wanted to have a little picket sign made up reading, “Canada. Dead. No.”

In Arab society, family – what the western world would probably call extended family – is the foundation, the very cornerstone of existence. It’s impossible to exaggerate its importance. Women have a specific, protected – and, again by western standards – formalized place within the family. As a lone female, I represented an anomaly. Many men were never going to understand how my family could have allowed me – a widow – to wander off, vulnerable and unchaperoned, to the other side of the world. Either something must be wrong with me or with my family. While this wasn’t true amongst my colleagues at the school, it was more or less true everywhere else.

As with most things in my life, I learned this the hard way – and had to keep on learning it.

We had a three-week holiday in January and I planned to visit Egypt, Istanbul and Jordan, making arrangements well in advance through the Sharjah Tourist Authority. After an obligatory wait, I thought nothing of ending up with a male travel agent, a man in his thirties named Bashir, from Bombay. I also thought nothing of how long it was taking to finalize my arrangements or how often I had to visit the travel office. After all, I was in a foreign country and not familiar with the routines. In China, the simplest transactions had to be produced in octuplicate and then stamped with 15 different-shaped seals. Who knew? Canadians don’t tend to argue or pontificate – they follow the rules as politely as possible. (“Quietly taking over the world all the while,” as my friend Pam would say).

On my third or fourth visit, Bashir asked me if I had many friends in the UAE.

“Not really,” I replied. “Other than the people I work with.”

“It’s hard to get to know people in a strange land,” he said. “Maybe we could go for coffee sometime.”

Now, at this point, I thought I had things all figured out. Honesty was the key. Even though this man was at least ten years my junior, I proceeded cautiously.

“As long as we’re clear that only friendship is possible. I lost my husband recently and have no interest in anything but friendship. As long as we’re very clear on that, I would be happy to have coffee with you.”

Bashir look ecstatic. “Yes!” he said. “Friends. Friendship is a very good thing. I, too, cannot get involved in anything more than friendship. I have seven brothers in India who rely on me because I have done well for myself here.”

Accordingly, a week or so later, I went down to the travel office at closing time, about 9:00 p.m. I followed Bashir to a tea room in Rollah, the vibrant Indian neighbourhood of the city. He ordered chai – milky and deliciously, subtly spicy – and, to my surprise, almost no discussion ensued. Men at nearby tables watched us curiously. After 15 minutes, Bashir got to his feet, indicating the outing was over. As I climbed into a taxi, he gave me a peculiar, possessive stare, undressing me with his eyes. I felt exposed and uncomfortable.

A few days later, he called me at home.

“Why have you not phoned?” he asked. “Do you not miss me?”

“Why would I miss you?” I responded, irritated. “I hardly know you.”

“Ah, but you are my friend. Friends miss each other. You must come to my apartment and take off your clothes. I will give you full body massage. Very relaxing.”

Shocked, I almost dropped the phone before hanging it up with a decisive clack. He continued to call, however – I didn’t have call display – and his suggestions became more and more explicit. He even figured out which school I worked at and started leaving messages with the secretary.

Thoroughly alarmed, I related the whole story to my neighbours, a young Australian couple.

Mark laughed at me. He laughed so hard I thought he might lose his lunch. “Annie,” he sputtered when he could finally speak, “Don’t you know that ‘friendship’ means casual sex? You told the guy you wanted to be friends with him. He just wants the sex you promised him. He even bought you a cup of tea. And now you’re playing impossibly hard to get. You minx, you!”

I made a strangled gargling sound and felt my face turn purple. “NO, I didn’t know that friendship meant casual sex!” I shouted. “How was I supposed to know that?”

“Calm down. I’ll help you out. Here’s the plan. I’ll escort you to the travel place, we’ll ask for the manager, I’ll explain there’s been a misunderstanding and we’ll request a female agent. Which, by the way, is what you should have done in the first place.”

“Aaargh! Thank you...I guess.”

“You’re really sure you don’t want to be his friend? He sounds kind of cute.” Mark started laughing again.

“He’s portly!” I bellowed, sorry there wasn’t a sturdy rolling pin ready to hand.

The next day, as promised, Mark escorted me to the Sharjah Tourist Office. The manager turned pale when he heard Mark’s tale (I remained dutifully silent) and I was immediately assigned a female agent. I have to add I was further mortified to learn that Bashir had given me all kinds of unauthorized discounts and special concessions. The agency honoured them but I’m afraid Bashir must have gotten into a lot of trouble. I felt terrible about it because it was my fault – I didn’t understand the culture. Since the only way I could extract him from the trouble was to leap into his friendly bed, however, it was a classic Catch 22 and I had to abandon him to his fate.

You’d think I would have learned. No – certain postures of mind require a series of shocks to dislodge them. Several months later, I found myself stranded in a sand storm in Aswan. My cruise up the Nile was supposed to end with a flight to Cairo but I was confined to my – thanks to Bashir – luxurious stateroom, waiting for the storm to abate.

A knock came at the door. I opened it to behold an uncomfortable-looking steward standing in the passageway.

“I am Mahmoud,” he said. “Can I come in?”

Without thinking – radiating gormless Canadian trust – I opened the door wider and gestured him inside. Did he have bad news about the flight?

“Do you mind if I smoke?” he asked.

Native politeness overwhelmed me. The poor guy! Probably not allowed to smoke on the job and desperate for his nicotine fix!

“Not at all,” I said, scrambling for an ashtray.

He seated himself on the small sofa and lit up, replete in his dapper glory. Suddenly he leaned forward. “Actually,” he announced, a bit breathlessly, “I’m interested in friendship. I am married but I can’t talk to my wife.”

“Sorry,” I said. “I’m not interested in friendship at all.”

“That’s okay,” he said, a huge grin spreading across his face. “I’m not really interested in friendship either. I’m interested in love....and SEX!”

Already on my feet, I strode to the door and opened it. “Out,” I said. “Now.”

“In Egypt,” he pleaded, “We like to hug each other. It’s an important custom. Maybe I can hug you?”

“OUT!” I repeated.

He went. Unbelievably, he called me on the stateroom phone two hours later to see if I’d changed my mind. Maybe he thought the grey monotony of the sand storm would whittle me down into a mass as pliant and moveable as the Sahara. I hung up on him, reflecting that it’s more than hope which springs eternal.

Should I have learned my lesson by now? Definitely. Had I? Not thoroughly enough.

Three weeks before I left the UAE, I went as usual to buy groceries at the Carrefour in Ajman’s City Centre Mall. My beloved Muhammad the Taxi Driver had taken me there but, due to licensing regulations between the Emirates couldn’t pick me up and take me home again. I was at the mercy of whichever driver whose cab was at the front of the line when I emerged.

“Where are you from?” the driver asked as we pulled out of the parking lot.

“Canada.”

“Where is your husband?”

What I should have said at this juncture was, “He is at home in our apartment. He’s six feet ten inches tall and he eats Pakistani taxi drivers for breakfast then uses their bones to pick his teeth.”

What I actually said – feeling the typical Canadian concern that my answer might cause him distress so I had to make sure I didn’t sound upset – was, “Umm...he’s dead.”

“Very sad,” said the driver, trying to make eye contact through the rear view mirror. “But do not worry; I will be your friend. I will give you my phone number and whenever you need a ride, you can call me.”

“That’s not necessary. I already have the number of a driver. I just can’t call him from Ajman.”

I literally heard the sound of his face dropping. Disappointment and chagrin weighed down his words as well. “Oh. You already have a Pakistani friend.”

Panic welled up in my stomach. “No! He is not my friend,” I babbled, horrified to realize we were talking about sex. Then I was horrified to realize I’d indicated that Muhammad was not my friend and was aghast at my disloyalty. Guilt and shame percolated through my veins. My daughters tell me I live too much in my head and this episode probably proves they’re right.

Since I had five bags of groceries and the temperature stood at 115 degrees, I couldn’t order Lover Boy to stop the cab and let me out. When we arrived at the gate to my apartment building, he insisted on giving me a card with his phone number on it.

At least he didn’t ask me if I have sons.

Coming Soon: Muhammad the Taxi Driver

Lifestyle UAE

Pictures (from top): Yes, they really ARE everywhere; Landscape in upheaval; Private palace occupied by sheikhling only two days a year; Oasis at al Ain; Beach at Khor Fakkan

************************************************

Life in the UAE posed many cultural challenges but they weren’t the ones I expected as I sat on the long flight with my nose buried in Reading Lolita in Tehran. Just in passing, this is not a title I recommend for in-flight entertainment on your first trip to the Middle East, especially as passengers begin disappearing more and more often into the washroom to change into traditional dress and you find yourself more and more surrounded by shrouded women and gowned men.

I’d like to give some historical and factual background but please note that it’s from my own personal point of view. You can get the real facts and figures from Google.

The area, which lies along the bottom of the Persian Gulf and shares a border with Saudi Arabia, was part of the British Trucial States – and sometimes known as the Pirate Coast – until 1971 when the British withdrew. Sheikh Zayed of Abu Dhabi put together a conglomerate of emirates that originally included Oman and Bahrain but the leaders of those states chose, in the end, to remain independent. Today there are seven emirates.

Sheikh Zayed proceeded to do a very unusual thing. He decided to share the oil wealth amongst all the Emiratis, about a million of them. He didn’t share it equally but even the poorest citizens are millionaires. The other three million inhabitants of the country come in to work since the locals don’t have to lift a finger unless they feel like it. These foreign workers can never become citizens but most enjoy good salaries and a very comfortable lifestyle. The poorest among them are the Pakistani labourers but even they earn much more than they could at home.

Sharing the wealth has resulted in a land of no poverty and virtually no crime. It’s the only place I’ve ever been where there are no homeless people and no beggars on the streets. This is partly explained, of course, by the fact that all the citizens are wealthy and anyone without a job isn’t allowed to remain. I’ve heard it said that the reason Saudi is a breeding ground for “terrorists” is the terrible poverty. The Royal Family there doesn’t share their fabulous riches and poverty fosters anger and despair, a “what have I got to lose?” atmosphere.

While I was in residence, I heard about only two crimes. One I read about on a poster in the lobby of a Khor Fakkan hotel:

The First Annual Conference
of the Anti-Money Laundering Committee
in the UAE
Organized by the Central Bank of the UAE
Under the Title
Detection of Suspicious Transactions

The second was reported in the English language newspaper. A thief fell through the bedroom roof of a couple’s home and landed on their bed while they were engaging in an “intimate act.” The woman screamed and ran into the closet. The man captured the thief, a labourer who’d lost his job and needed food while searching for another job which he hoped to find before getting deported. Rather sadly, the episode resulted in an immediate ride to the airport and a free seat on a plane back to his country of origin.

Sheikh Zayed, the Supreme Ruler, had foresight. He realized the oil wouldn’t last forever and encouraged development of malls, luxury resorts and hotels. He believed tourism would maintain the Emiratis’ wealth when the oil vanished – thus the lavish – sometimes garish and Vegas-like – blossoming of Dubai.

Technically speaking, a form of Sharia law governs all. Alcohol, homosexuality, extra-marital sex and Buffy the Vampire Slayer are all forbidden. Since I had no need to consume vast quantities of alcohol and no desire for a torrid affair with a man I wasn’t married to, none of this slowed me down very much. I had two seasons of Buffy in my suitcase but didn’t realize she was outlawed until five months later. Creature sent an e-mail about the release of Season Three. I went to the HMV store to inquire. A young clerk looked at me coldly and said, “That series is BANNED in the UAE.” Suitably cowed, I scuttled away.

Later, knowing my students watched the show, I asked how they managed. Satellite TV. Naturally.

As for alcohol, it’s served in bars, restaurants and hotels in every Emirate except Sharjah, where I lived. The story goes that Sharjah’s ruling family were pirates and Sheikh Zayed wasn’t too keen on having them join his new country. The Saudis went to bat for the al Qassimis of Sharjah but, in return, made them promise to enact laws more in keeping with Saudi values than Emirates’ ones.

I could have bought a liquor license from the Dubai government. Apparently someone looks you over and, based on your gender and weight, allots you a monthly liquor allowance card you can use at the take-out section of hotels not located in Sharjah. I didn’t ever both with this because of Hole in the Wall, a rough and ready booze distribution centre with technically illegal outlets dotted liberally across the desert. All you need is a taxi driver willing to take you to one (everyone’s rich – there’s no public transportation) and, if you’re female, escort you through the swarms of Arab men queuing up for cases of expensive Scotch. Simple, really.

Coming Soon: Life as a Lone Woman.

Finn's First Poop

I thought grannyhood was supposed to be a Nirvana free of all fatigue and undue stress. You know – breeze in, play with the kid, work it into a nervous frenzy, then hand it blithely back to Mom and Pop and toddle off on your merry way.

Instead, I spent all day worrying about whether or not Finn would poop. Thoughts of a satisfyingly soiled diaper crowded my brain and prevented me paying proper attention to clients who’d misplaced their pay stubs and needed a quick course of Pen and the Art of Checkbook Maintenance.

I recalled Creature’s tears yesterday. “What if he never poops, Mom? He’s five days old. What if something’s wrong with him?”

I dispensed reassurance with a trowel. “Just because the book says he should have pooped by the fourth day doesn’t mean anything. Babies move along at their own pace. After all, Finn took his time about being born; he’s probably dawdling over his first poop as well.”

Creature didn’t buy it. “That doesn’t make any sense, Mom.”

Underneath my feigned calm, I worried. What if Creature was right? I envisioned operating rooms with huge mirrors brooding over them, filled with masked doctors wielding foot-long steel instruments, Finn lying tiny and defenceless on a vast snow-white table. I imagined trying to comfort Creature if something happened to Finn and realized I wouldn’t be able to manage it, not in a million years.

My blood pressure spiked. I couldn’t concentrate. I lost my appetite.

When the phone rang a few minutes ago, I grabbed it as one might grab a rope ladder dangling from a helicopter over a hurricane-struck sea.

“Did he poop” I asked.

“Yes!” said Creature. “Hugely. He filled two diapers.”

I barely had time to enjoy my relief before the worry returned. What if he develops chronic diarrhoea? What hazing will he have to endure from classmates when he hits grade one and is still going through five diapers an hour?

Who said grannyhood was bliss?

Auto Thoughts

In every way it’s been a week of contrasts. Moments of blue sky and sunshine, smelling faintly of spring, have vanished as if wiped from a slate to be followed by angry grey clouds boiling over into little chips of snow flying erratically about, never landing, whirling as if suspended in a mini-tornado.

It’s a long drive out to the Fir-Draped Cabin, located on Nym’s parents’ property. Note how the abode just gained capital letters, maybe because Dad always refers to the home he and Mom lived in when I was born as the Rose Covered Cottage, a place made even more legendary by an abundant strawberry patch in the back yard. Apparently I refused to eat anything but strawberries for months at a time.

In reality, the cottage was of pre-World War I vintage, one of its rooms was sealed off – reputedly containing the effects of the landlady’s son who did not ever return from that war – and the only heat came from an antique furnace in the basement. To get into the dirt-floored basement, you had to go outside and climb through a sort of hatchway. The furnace ate vast quantities of wood and Dad would brave the morning chill – or frost, as the case may be – to light a blazing fire before Mom got up with me. Calling what amounted to a shack – the only available housing in post-World War II Nanaimo – the Rose Covered Cottage was to smother its inadequacies with semantic charm – a trait that’s been handed down to me and for which I’m grateful.

I’ve made the scenic drive to the Fir-Draped Cabin three times in the last four days. The road winds ever on through coniferous forest and around rocky outcrops patched with moss, providing plenty of time for thought. Those intense moments Virginia Woolf calls “moments of being” flash through my mind as I drive.

I remember Wumbles’ first night at home. Women were pliant as sheep or cows or some other slow-brained, commonly herded animal back then. We didn’t question the rules, just meekly shuffled into the hospital, got wheeled into delivery rooms blazing with harsh light, and allowed our newborns to be carted away shortly after their birth. You didn’t feel the baby was really yours until you got it home.

So, on that long ago first night, I fed Wumbles and popped her into the regulation crib – which Piglet and I had painted pastel green and adorned with lamb decals – about 11:00 p.m. Babes in the woods ourselves at 20, Piglet and I fell immediately into bed, exhausted, assuming we’d waken at the tiniest sound from Wumbles. Instead, we awoke simultaneously to see sunlight sifting through the curtains and the clock proclaiming 7:00 a.m. Without a word we looked at each other, aghast, our feet hit the deck in unison – thump! – and we dashed to Wumbles’ side. She was just waking up, her eyes slitting open cautiously, letting in only glimpses of her strange new surroundings. Piglet and I were relieved to the depths of our souls. Wumbles didn’t sleep through the night again for many a moon.

I remember Creature’s rapid arrival. 11:40 p.m. saw me trudging up the hospital corridor towards the delivery room, royally irritated that none of the medical personnel had believed me when I told them her birth was imminent. Six minutes after midnight – voila – enter Creature, stage centre – looking remarkably like wee Finn does today.

Nym’s mother had a family dinner on Sunday and I took a pile of Creature’s baby pictures with me. We all marvelled at how much Finn looks like a little Creature. At first, Grandma Nym thought I’d managed to snap him in an assortment of outfits and race the photos to a developer. She was so breath taken at my presumed efficiency it was almost painful to disillusion her.

“I did wonder why he was wearing a pink blanket bag,” she said.

Telltale puffy redness rimmed Creature’s eyes. I quickly learned she’s upset because nursing Finn isn’t going as well as she thinks it should. She’s sore and frustrated. Fortunately, although I could offer little more than a neck massage, I do know one of the world’ leading authorities on the subject, the Queen of Too Much. I owed her a phone call anyway and she graciously agreed to give Creature some tips. The Queen also ordered me to race right out and buy a copy of The Womanly Art of Breast Feeding, a command I obeyed instantly. Never let it be said I had to be pushed into a bookstore.

Calling from Vancouver to check in, Tickles reported glumly that he had a piano gig with a singer no one’s ever heard of. Instead of a drummer or bass player, the logical choice for turning the duo into a trio, she’d hired a guy who plays ‘cardboard box.’ I’m intrigued. How does he coax sound from his instrument? With a drum stick? A soup ladle? A well-tempered fingernail?

On Monday, I stayed with Dad so Mom could get her hair cut and see the family doctor for advice. Dad slept most of the afternoon, his breath coming in a laboured, hoarse-sounding rale, sending an icy splinter through my heart. Mom returned with the doctor’s recommendation.

“He says we should organize hospice care,” she told me. “They’ll come to the house. Dad won’t ever have to into the hospital again.”

An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered cloak upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress.

And Dad is still so very afraid of death.

I am pulled between opposites, distracted to absurdity. The other day at work I sent an instant message to one of my colleagues, a rather repugnant man about my age. “Give me a sex,” I typed in response to a question. All I can do is point out that the ‘c’ and ‘x’ keys are right beside each other on the keyboard.

Contrasts indeed.

To the Golblimey

Tickles and my parents in happier times - although Tickles may be feeling a little self-conscious about weight gain.

Even when extraordinary events, like the birth of your first grandchild, hoist their bright flags above the mundane, ordinary existence continues to plod along from dawn to dusk.

My Dad gets frailer by the day and can’t be left alone. There’s supposed to be a Homecare Team who show up to give my Mom respite for a few hours now and then; so far, however, their performance has been less than stellar. One day, after an absence of less than 45 minutes, Mom returned to find the ‘worker’ pulling out of the driveway, apparently not caring a whit that she’d just left my Dad alone and helpless in the house. It’s always possible that Dad started quoting gloomy poetry, but that’s no excuse. The Tickles half of my team has been exchanging indignant e-mails with the Homecare Programme Director. So far, resolution escapes us.

My parents live about an hour’s drive from Creature and Nym and it’s starting to feel as if I spend all my time hurtling between the two locations. Saturday, yesterday, I picked up and delivered some ointment – Dad has festering bed sores – then went to visit Finn, proudly bearing a Toys R Us sale flyer with some scribbles about carrots scrawled in its margins. Mom always likes people to leave with “a little something” tucked under their arms. Since she can’t get out, the flyer was the only gift she could send.

You may be wondering why the home birth went so suddenly awry. Well, the midwife’s potion started working with a figurative bang! about three o’clock Thursday morning. Creature decided she needed painkillers NOW, so she and Nym set off to the hospital, a 45-minute drive. Upon arrival, she agreed to a quick physical examination. Mild panic descended. Cries of “This lady’s about to give birth!” bounced off the sterile walls and the cold, tiled floors. Almost before Creature could catch her breath, out popped Finn at 5:35. And so his public history begins.

Inside the cosy, fir-draped cabin yesterday afternoon, I sat and cuddled him. He is so tiny and peaceful and perfect, I could have held him, gazing with rapture at his little face, forever. Like falling off the edge of the world.

“I’m glad you’re not in China, Mom,” said Creature.

Meanwhile, Nym found many exciting items in the Toys R Us flyer – a swing that plays music when it moves, a baby seat that vibrates, all kinds of toys that pop, squeal and bleat. He can’t wait until Finn is old enough to help him take them apart and figure out what makes them work.

Fanfare for Finn

Less than two hours old...

Creature sounded gloomy when I talked to her on Wednesday evening. An ultrasound earlier in the day revealed a “peaceful” Finn, but not one eager to begin his journey into the here and now. In the event he remained “peaceful” – a euphemism for “stubborn” I’m guessing – an induction was scheduled for Friday the 13th, not the auspicious beginning one might hope for in a first grandchild – or a first child. In desperation, Creature had swallowed a potion provided by the midwife – a mixture of castor oil, ginseng and various herbs – but it didn’t seem to be having any effect.

When my phone rang on Thursday at 5:55 a.m. – I’d just stepped out of the shower – I thought it must have spurred Finn into sluggish action at last.

Instead, Creature, with a tremble at the edge of her voice, said, “Mom! The baby’s here!”

I gabbled some stringy nonsense and finally managed, “Can I come and see him?”

“Of course. That’s why I phoned. But Nym will have to explain how to get to where we are.”

Visions of I don’t know what catapulted through my brain. “Where are you?”

“Nym will explain.”

Nym did. It turned out they were at the hospital I can see on the other side of the Inlet when I look out my apartment windows. What happened to the home birth? No time to worry yet. I flung on some clothes, called my office to say I wouldn’t be in and set off through the frosty darkness.

When I reached the dimly-lit private delivery room – so different from the spot-lit arenas the terminally pregnant were trundled to in my day - Creature lay with Finn nuzzling at her breast, the exhaustion and glory of new motherhood circling them like feathers of faint golden smoke. Nym sat in a chair nearby, looking pale and rather shocked.

I started stroking strands of damp hair off Creature’s forehead. “I didn’t know it would be such hard work,” she said, not taking her eyes off Finn. “Did I, little man?” She kissed the soft masses of his dark hair.

“That’s why they call it labour,” I said, trying to slot strands of her own dark hair behind her ear.

Later, when the midwife had swaddled him, I held him close. Words fail me. I simply can’t describe the depth of feeling that awoke, that stirred in the profoundest parts of me, as I embraced his warmth, his tiny solidity, his fresh baby scent. A new part of me has been born along with Finn and belongs to me, inextricably. My heart has expanded its quarters.

Palestine Mon Amour

I woke up abruptly at 7:00 a.m., at the end of a dream discussion, I didn’t know with whom. An unknown male – the same one who woke me a month ago by calling my name? – was quizzing me about the Israeli election.

“The talking and the violence will drag on forever,” the voice said. “Something must be done.”

“I think a whole lot of people should go to Egypt and Jordan and just stand at the border crossings,” I said. “Stand the whole length of the border if they can. Stand in patient protest until the bombing and the occupation end. Until the Palestinians have a country. Forty thousand people, maybe – that’s not so many if they come from all over the world. The Israelis wouldn’t bomb 40,000 foreign nationals.”

“No,” the voice sounded anxious, like a family member a bit aghast at what might happen to me.

“And if they do – well, I’m willing to have a bomb dropped on me, to die even, if it focuses international attention on the problem, on the murderous disgrace of it, and achieves nationhood for Palestine. Or citizenhood. I feel that strongly.”

“I know you do. It’s a good idea,” the voice still had that tender note of concern, of someone who knew me well, with a hint of apprehension underlying it.

“Maybe 50,000 people,” I went on, trying to allay the fear. “The Israelis wouldn’t kill 50,000 foreigners standing along their border.”

“No.” I sensed a fleeting smile as the presence faded, an echo of enveloping love that was achingly and suddenly familiar.

As I sat up in bed with the crisp edges of the dream already dissolving and a raucous chorus of Canada geese squawking outside the window, I realized I’d been talking to Piglet. That it was his voice I’d awakened to several weeks ago, just before my father fell. I don’t recognize the voice as his anymore because of the distance he’s travelled since March of 2003. Apart from me and far from me. But not away from me.

In what windy land
Wanders now my little dear
Dragonfly hunter?
(Chiyo-Ni)

I’m no mystic and I have no explanation for the certainty of a dream like this, but I believe it at the deepest level of my being. I don’t know how such encounters happen, only that they do, like Sylvia Plath’s “rare random descent” of the poetry angel. A blurring of the divide between this world and whatever lies beyond it. Through a glass darkly. Many have sought words to capture the intangible but it remains the province of poets. “There are more things in heaven and earth...”

The real question is whether or not my idea has any merit – an idea that did NOT come to me in this dream. It’s been playing at the edges of my mind for several days. The more news articles I read, the more I learned of protests in various countries, the more opinions I absorbed, the more I concluded that a positive, constructive solution for Palestine is as far off as it’s ever been. What can break the deadlock? I wondered.

This morning’s dream simply brought the idea out into the open and allowed me to articulate it. Could it work? It would require massive planning and organization, as well as massive commitment. And where to start?

Is it a workable plan or a flimsy pipe dream?

Welcome to the World

At 5:35 this morning, I officially became a grandmother. Wee Finn arrived scant hours before Creature was scheduled to have labour induced. He has masses of black hair, just as Creature did, and big hands that may grow to be as big as Piglet's. I don't need to add that he is beautiful.

I can't write any more now - but didn't want to let Finn's borning day go by without a message to the blogosphere.

What did my fingers do before they held him?
What did my heart do, with its love?
I have never seen a thing so clear.
His lids are like the lilac-flower
And soft as a moth, his breath.
I shall not let go.
There is no guile or warp in him. May he keep so.
Sylvia Plath

Sugar and Spice

As I said, the girls at the school in Sharjah were another kettle of fish entirely. Just for starters, their uniforms made a statement. While the boys wore grey trousers and white shirts that would have fit in anywhere, the girls wore ankle-length grey skirts and long-sleeved white blouses.

The first thing they wanted to know about me was my religion. People in Muslim countries can conceive of many, many things they’ve never seen, but a person without a religious affiliation is inconceivable, probably because, for most, faith is the cornerstone of existence.

Since I’m a person of strong belief but not a follower of any specific Christian religion, I floundered a bit, knowing it was paramount to give an honest answer. Before I’d done more than open and close my mouth a couple of times, they decided I was a Christian, on what basis I’m not sure. It was a label I could live with, though. Raised in the United Church of Canada, I could comfortably fall back on its tenets without feeling like a fraud. I kept my more unconventional beliefs to myself.

Unlike the boys, the girls were eager to talk about themselves. The diversity in Islam became immediately apparent. Some girls wore headscarves (hijab) because their families required it. Others were permitted to choose. Still others, while devoutly Muslim, didn’t wear them at all. I don’t want to – and can’t – generalize but, among the girls I taught, the ones who didn’t wear hijab were mainly from Iran, which they referred to as Persia, and Afghanistan; the lack of head covering was a political statement – a protest against the current regimes and a claiming of their right to go bareheaded, a right they can no longer claim at “home.”

I moderated lively discussions between the girls who didn’t wear hijab, by choice or family tradition, and those who did. The ones who didn’t said prescribed clothing, headscarves in particular, limited their freedom and marked them as different. The insisted behaviour was more important than what a person wears. The girls who chose hijab tended to be passionate about it. You should be proud of your faith! Covering your hair, wearing loose-fitting, unrevealing attire means no one will ever look at you as a simple sex object. You’ll be a person in your own right. Flaunting your body sends the wrong message to the world! Reserving a closer view of your body deepens the special bond that should exist between husband and wife. Failing to be modest means you’re rejecting one of the major aspects of Islam for women and jeopardizing your right to be treated with respect by all men.

The girls from more conservative families and the sheikh’s daughters (who wore black abbayas instead of the school uniform) didn’t often contribute to these discussions. In their writing they indicated that, other than coming to school, they didn’t have any activities because their fathers were “very strict with girls.”

One day – I forget what we were reading – it may have been Wuthering Heights – the subject of suicide came up. I mentioned that, in Christianity, suicide is a mortal sin.

“It is in Islam, too, Miss,” came the immediate response. “The Quran says killing another person can sometimes be okay – maybe in certain wars or special circumstances, but killing yourself is never alright. It’s throwing away Allah’s gift of life.”

I paused for a moment, wondering if I could ask the question that sprang naturally to my mind.

“In the West,” I said carefully, “We’re told – we read – that suicide bombers believe they’re going directly to paradise. Part of the reason for their actions, in fact, is this belief. Is there an exception somewhere in the Quran? A different interpretation?”

A short silence ensued. Complete silence – and this was a giggly, chatty group of 32 girls. At last Basma spoke up. “No, Miss, there’s no exception. Suicide is forbidden. And those bombers are wrong if they think Allah will reward them for killing all those people and themselves.”

No one disagreed. Several heads nodded reluctantly. From this class of articulate and opinionated young women came not one word of dissent. I stored away what I’d learned, along with a lot of new questions.

The girls’ homework paragraphs, too, revealed a world I’d never considered from the safety of my Canadian fastness. Noor’s first memory was of being airlifted out of Kuwait by the UN during Desert Storm. Within the space of a mere four hours, Amna’s grandfather, a prominent Iraqi businessman, was tried and hanged by Saddam Hussein. Sana worried there would be nothing left of Afghanistan for her to go home to when the holidays rolled around. Aisha wrote about going to Jordan and hiring a taxi to take her family through the “back door” to her ancestral village in Iraq. She described cowering in a ditch with her sisters while soldiers passed by. My eyes were being opened wider and wider.

In the senior girls’ class we studied Tess of the D’Urbervilles. I pointed out that, in its day, the book was remarkable for making Tess a sympathetic character despite the fact that she’s a “fallen woman” who engaged in sex outside marriage. It also subtly addresses the 19th century idea that woman who “fell” were doubly bad because of the possibility they might actually like sex. In the Victorian Age, good women most emphatically did NOT like sex. It was an unpleasant duty of marriage.

A silence fell – one of the sort I was beginning to recognize.

“Women have needs, too, Miss.” Rula spoke into the silence.

“We acknowledge that now,” I said, “But not during Tess’s lifetime.”

“In Islam,” Mehak remarked, “Husband and wife have a duty to please each other. This can be found in the Quran.”

“Queen Victoria,” I said, “Famously told married women they should ‘close their eyes and think of England.’”

Howls of laughter erupted. Apparently I’d said the funniest thing ever.

I found the girls’ attitudes and pronouncements about sexuality and their roles as woman both refreshing and revealing. I appreciated the window they opened on mainstream Muslim culture and belief. I’m not trying to say ‘ta DAH – behold Islam in all its wisdom and purity.’ Islam is as varied and complex as Christianity – or Judaism for that matter. I’m aware that the persona a student presents in the classroom is sometimes a facade. I know teenagers can be experts at covering inner despair. I’m not saying that the statements and conclusions expressed during our discussions should be taken at absolute face value or used to make sweeping generalizations about the Muslim world. I know there’s always a dark side.

I do say, however, that they represent a point of view that couldn’t – and wouldn’t – be taken seriously in a Western high school classroom – perhaps in a private Christian school, but certainly not in any school where I ever worked. They demonstrate the importance young people place on Islam and on morality. They show Islam as a living and vibrant faith, a very positive aspect of everyday life.

Then there were my colleagues. Like the students, they came from a wide variety of disadvantaged and war torn countries, adding to the school’s truly international flavour: Afghanistan, Pakistan, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Iran, Kuwait, Palestine, India, Egypt, Algeria, Greece, Turkey, Nigeria, Bangladesh, Russia – the list of nations rolls on like the pages of a gazetteer riffling in a bitter wind.

I may introduce others later, but I want to round off this post with a portrait of Nadia. I met her one morning while I was crossing the lobby, an atrium-like space full of sunlight and the twitter of caged birds. Lines from the Quran, etched in elegant Arabic script, shimmered golden from the shadowy corners.

We smiled at each other. “Hi, I’m Annie from Canada. Where are you from? How’s the start of your year going?” I asked.

“Iraq.” Her face crumpled, tears spilled over and words poured from her like lava. “I got out last March, just before the war started. I arrived at the border with my children – all we had was the clothes on our backs. Alhamdalillah we made it. You see, I lost a baby during Desert Storm and I just couldn’t go through that again. I couldn’t let my children go through the bombing and the shooting. But I had to leave my husband behind. I don’t know where he is now. I haven’t heard from him for two weeks.”

The only way I could respond to her pain was to meet it and join it. “I know what it’s like to miss your husband,” I said, my own tears rising to thicken my voice. “Mine died very suddenly, in China, on the day the war in Iraq started.”

It was one of those moments of sudden, intense intimacy that are hard to describe. We fell into each others’ arms and shed hot tears that trickled down our necks as I moved deeper into the landscape of loss.

Live on, survive, for the earth gives forth wonders. It may swallow your heart, but the wonders keep on coming. You stand before them bareheaded, shriven. What is expected of you is attention.

Salman Rushdie

Sixth Sense

Perched on a stool in the jazz club, I looked around the crowded room and absorbed the excitement and anticipation running like an electrical charge through high wires. I thought how long it had been since I attended a live jazz performance and how much I was looking forward to hearing Tickles play again. I remembered my search for live jazz in Guangzhou, China.

Once we heard about a newly opened venue, Freedom Cafe, that specialized in jazz and martinis. A group of us jumped into a cab and ventured forth. The interior of Freedom Cafe had an aggressively 70s decor – lots of hanging plants in wicker baskets, empty bottles turned candle holder by melting multi-coloured crayons down the sides – and some distinctly Chinese characteristics – huge posters of Mao, Marx, Lenin and Stalin marching across the walls. A pile of equipment – inverted music stands, a dismembered drum kit and a tangle of cords and microphones – lay heaped in a corner.

Our martinis arrived in a dubious rainbow of colours. We sipped cautiously, slowly, and waited. A canned version of Puff the Magic Dragon played over and over, either stuck in a sound loop or the only song on the tape.

Finally we asked one of the waiters what time the jazz started. A beatific smile flooded his face.
“No jazz,” he said. “We not find any jazz players. But we have house music.” He pointed at the speakers from whence Puff’s sad story continued to pour, “Very good.”

I finished the last drops of my blue martini and we left.

On New Year’s Eve, the first I spent in the People’s Republic, a larger group of us made our way to a jazz bar on the fifteenth floor of an expensive hotel. We’d heard the jazz was worth the trek. Here we didn’t see any musical equipment at all except for a shiny black grand piano. It was surrounded by space, though, enough space to hold several musicians, so we sat in hope, nursing over-priced bottles of beer.

Time passed. Eleven thirty rolled around with no sign of a band. A rather inebriated man from another table wove his way up to the piano and began to crash his way through an unrecognizable song. A woman from the same table joined him and started to sing. To say her voice was scratchy, off key and off what little beat the man provided would be a vast understatement. When they at last stumbled back to their seats a mercifully short time later, the audience applauded vigorously. I have never heard relief so loudly expressed.

At 11:45, we asked our waiter when the music would start.

“No music tonight,” he said. “Is a holiday.”

On Saturday evening, Tickles (on tenor sax) was playing with a well-know pianist, trombonist, drummer, bass player and electric guitarist. The anticipation mounted as they adjusted charts on their stands and coaxed test sounds from their instruments.

The first bars of Crazy Rhythm flowed out and sent sizzling bubbles through my veins. Good jazz does that – it enters your bloodstream, it charges the neighbour air, it weaves its way through the tunnels of your brain leaving a trail of impressions and feelings. You’re drawn into the music as into the swift current of a racing stream. You arrive in a country you’ve visited before and realize you’re home again and how much you’ve missed that home.

My thoughts flitted over the last twenty odd years and the roll call of musicians I’d heard, both here at this club in Victoria and at a variety of locales in Vancouver. I thought, with a touch of timor mortis, about how we were all growing old. Even Tickles, my baby brother who is closer in age to Wumbles than to me, has passed the 40 mark.

By and large, jazz musicians are wonderful, generous people. Perhaps to relieve the euphoria that overtakes them at the end of a performance, they also tend to engage in an ongoing series of pranks and practical jokes that run between them like a sub-current.

I remembered being caught up in that current from time to time. At 2:00 one morning I called Cam (who’d never heard my voice) to offer him a gig and quizzed him about whether or not he was prejudiced before asking him to play – for a handsome sum – at the bar mitzvah of my hamster. On another occasion, Tickles (who’d had plastic wrap placed over his mouthpiece, which creates an instant mumps-like effect when the victim starts to play) dropped the mouthpiece of Cam’s alto sax into my purse and told me to make off with it. The next morning, Cam – looking distinctly ill at ease – had to meet me in a back alley in East Vancouver to retrieve it.

From all these memories, my thoughts strayed somehow to money. Baseball players, just for example, earn obscene sums while wages for jazz musicians haven’t gone up in 20 years. There’s a joke, one of the Pearly Gates variety, that has a ring of truth to it.

Peter stands by the fabled entrance to heaven, sorting out the saints from the sinners.

A lawyer appears. Saint Peter asks, “What was your annual income during your time on earth?”

The lawyer replies, “Oh, about $200,000.”

“Sorry,” says Peter and a band of little devils arrive to cart the lawyer away.

A doctor shows up.

“And what was your annual income?” asks Peter.

Having observed the fate of the lawyer, the doctor answers anxiously, “About $150,000; but I made a point of treating patients even if they couldn’t pay and I donated a year of my life to working free of charge with children in Cambodia.”

“Very well then,” says Peter, “In you go.”

Next in line is a rather ratty looking guy with holes in his jeans.

“Annual income?” asks Peter.

“Oh,” the guy ponders. “In a good year it might have been $30,000.”

Saint Peter’s face lights up. “What instrument did you play?”

And so Saturday night swept on through It Always Happens to Me, Sixth Sense and B’s Blues, pulling my thoughts and emotions through magical terrain until, too soon, came the finale, one of my favourites, Take the A Train.

Afterwards, in the alley behind the club, feeling a little giddy from the effects of two glasses of wine, I looked up at the sky. A full moon rode high in the black sea, shedding silver over the city, surrounded by a cloudy nimbus, as if some giant had blown a smoke ring that circled it perfectly. A lovely and most unusual seal upon a precious evening.