We spent that afternoon in KL before our flight back to Terengganu getting a little bit excited for the next two months. We bounced comforting thoughts off of each other, such as "it will go by so fast!" and "we don't have to live out of a backpack anymore!" and "we get to see our students and really give them our all!" Realizing then that we had no one to pick us up from the airport in KT at 9 o' clock at night, Ez called Acik, his Mr. Fix It, and given the kind man he is he agreed to pick us up and drive us home. We both felt comforted that at least in Malaysia, we had friends-- people who looked after us. I was further soothed when Acik really did pick us up, and he drove us all the way home, Indian music blasting from the speakers as we watched the darkened fields of palm trees fly by. Finally, after weeks of the hustle and bustle of traveling, we could finally rest and relax. This was going to be a nice last 2 months.
Unfortunately, I could not have been more wrong. The second we arrived at our house at 10:30pm, my visions of rest, relaxation and a great last 2 months were shattered into tiny shards of glass all over the floor. We walked in through the front door to find that the same leak in our ceiling that they had supposedly fixed a month ago had become 4 leaks, and the floors of the dining room and kitchen were inundated with about 2 inches of pipe water. All the papers I had left on the table were drowned in their own ink, and the bottoms of the table and chairs were starting to mold. There's no telling when the leak started, but it could have been as long as three weeks earlier. Exhausted, we cleaned up the mess and made some water-catching devices before we went to bed. After two days of telling us he'd come, the school's handyman finally came and fixed the leak. For some reason, he left the ceiling tile in the attic, so now, over a week later and after asking him to put it back every day, we still have a gaping hole in our ceiling. WELCOME HOME!
Since then, I have been struggling to stay positive. The last two months, if the last week is any indication, are going to be rough. It is always better to end on a positive note, so let me vent a little bit first, and then I'll tell you about how wonderful it all really is and how I am learning so much.
THE BAD NEWS
I arrived back at school last week excited to see everyone. Of course, it had been awhile since I saw anyone, and I was looking forward to reuniting with my teacher friends and students and finding out how they spent their vacations, etc. I should have seen it coming, but I am either slow on the uptake or just insanely optimistic. As I smiled and greeted people at my school, I was completely ignored. I asked everyone how they were, how their vacations were, like you do, and the nicest response I got was "Oh!" as if I frightened them. What was going on? By the end of the day, my closest teacher friends had come around and started to be friendly, but with everyone else, it was "Ignore Sarah day" if not "Give Sarah the Evil Eye Day." To say the least, I came home and cried into Ezra's arms.
The next day, I woke up bright and early as I always do, gave myself a pep-talk about how from now on, I was just going to engage with the people I knew were friendly as not to put myself in the situation of feeling hated and unwanted, and headed off to school. As I was walking, the kids who lived at the hostel and their Warden, Saidi, offhandedly mentioned that there was no school today. "Terengganu won the Malaysian Olympics (Sukma), isn't that great? They declared a state holiday!"
"Great." I responded, when what I really wanted to say was, "Yeah, its great when all 900 teachers and students who attend this school are informed of a day off and I am walking to school at 7am like a complete idiot. How considerate of you. Just Great!" I walked home and went back to bed, realizing that being bitter was only going to make it harder for myself, as obviously no one else seemed to care. So, the bad news is, the next two months are going to be really difficult. I figure that the least I can do is be good to myself and try not to hold any anger, bitterness or hostility in my heart.
THE GOOD NEWS
Despite the frustration, our trip made me appreciate a lot of things about this country, and helped me separate my unfortunate circumstances from the country as a whole. It's easy to blame everything that goes wrong on "Malaysia," but that is extremely unfair. Coming back to Terengganu after being in other parts of Asia showed me how beautiful the state can be. In what other place would a taxi driver take us out for coffee after driving us to our destination? Where else in Southeast Asia can you find an unpolluted river that actually looks gorgeous up against the green palm fields and rolling hills? There ARE really special things about this place.
Also, as usual, I love my students. Last week I decided it was time I really do what I think is important in my classes. I started a new unit on globalization, and have been teaching my kids to think about how technology is affecting Malay culture in both positive and negative ways. In some of my classes I had them discuss these changes, and in others I had them simply draw a picture of what their village might look like in 50 years. I think it was a good exercise for them in looking at the possibilities for change even within a system that seems so against it, and also to think about what it means that the West is "getting closer" to them. For the record, every single student had a reason why globalization was better for Malaysia, and it wasn't until I introduced the idea that there could be some negatives that they actually thought about it. They came up with some great reasons: more pollution, the replacement of traditional foods, styles and entertainment with Western ones, etc. I also taught them about the increasing gap between rich and poor in most countries, and felt pretty awesome for putting my college major to use finally. So yay!
Finally, the real good news is that despite all of the you-know-what I have to go through, I think I am capable of remaining calm, present and together in my mind and heart. I taught a yoga class last week to my yoga girls and, for the first time, I introduced them to the Omm chant that is normally done after a yoga session in order to calm the mind and body (I had been reluctant to teach it to them until now since I thought they'd think it was non-Islamic or something). As the nine of us sat facing each other after 45 minutes of stretching and balancing, we chanted together in perfect unison, "Ommmmmmmmm." They loved it, and I felt so happy to be able to share it with them.
And now, to make sure I share it more often with myself.
Ommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
1 comment:
see.. I'd take the mold from the house.. and put it somewhere else.. if the adults are going to be immature, they may as well be moldy and immature :)
Post a Comment