Letters from the Edge 12 Women of the World Write Home
Illustrations inside this book: Zimbabwe Clive Offley China Peter Wingham (35), Clive Offley (39) Bolivia Alan Hughes India Miriam McCurdy (75, 82), Sarah John (88) Pakistan Miriam McCurdy Nigeria Miriam McCurdy Russia and Chechnya Miriam McCurdy (145), Sarah John (153) Colombia Sarah John Mongolia Sarah John Lebanon Sarah John Mauritius Sarah John Egypt Sarah John About the New Internationalist The New Internationalist is an independent not-for-profit publishing co-operative. Our mission is to report on issues of global justice. We publish informative current affairs and popular reference titles, complemented by world food, photography and gift books as well as calendars, diaries, maps and posters all with a global justice world view. If you like this book, you ll also enjoy the New Internationalist magazine. Each month has a main theme, such as Ethical Travel or Nuclear Weapons, as well as a Special Feature such as Guilt or How to Get Out of Iraq. In addition there are music, film and book reviews, country profiles, interviews and worldwide news. To find out more about the New Internationalist, visit our website at www.newint.org
Letters from the Edge 12 Women of the World Write Home New Internationalist
Letters from the Edge First published in 2008 by New Internationalist TM Publications Ltd 55 Rectory Road Oxford OX4 1BW, UK www.newint.org New Internationalist is a registered trade mark. Front cover image: Illustrations by Sarah John; Photograph by Dieter Telemans/Panos Back cover illustrations: Sarah John New Internationalist / The Authors 2008 Reprinted 2009 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission in writing of the Publisher. Edited by Chris Brazier Designed by Simon Loffler Printed on recycled paper by T J International Limited, Cornwall, UK who hold environmental accreditation ISO 14001. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data. A catalogue for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data. A catalogue for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN 978-1-904456-97-1
FOREWORD These letters from 12 women in different locations around the world, written over a period of two decades have a timeless quality to them. They weave together a patchwork picture of our world that is very different from the standard portrait painted in news media dominated by disasters, atrocities or political pronouncements. This is not conventional travel writing, where a visitor skims across the surface of a new location, picking out the exotic morsels that loom into view. Whether they are written from the remotest part of the Mongolian steppe in midwinter, from Beirut as it stoically faces up to the latest car bomb, or from an island in the Indian Ocean, they tell the human stories of ordinary people as fresh, insightful and, often, as moving today as they were when they were written. When the New Internationalist magazine began its popular Letter from series in 1986, there was certainly no thought that it would still be appearing more than two decades later. We had simply responded to an intriguing proposal by a young woman then working as a teacher in rural Zimbabwe. Yvonne Burgess wrote beautifully about the Shona culture around her but also very thoughtfully about the relationship between rich and poor worlds and her own compromised part in that relationship. By the time Yvonne returned to Scotland it was evident to us that there would be a gaping hole where her column had been and so the Letters became a series, and Carol Davis took up the story of how she grappled with Chinese culture a decade or so after the death of Mao. This was very much the original conception a woman from the rich world living and working in (rather than just traveling through) the Global South, acting as a thoughtful, observant representative of our mainly Western readership but also as an active bridge between cultures. No sooner had that model been established than it was refined and diversified. The next correspondent, Susanna Rance, had married and had children with an Aymara man in Bolivia and thus wrote about the indigenous culture with the extra insight and engagement that situation afforded. And the correspondent after that, Mari Marcel Thekaekara, was born and bred in India though there was an intriguing twist in that she too was in a way an outsider, often writing about the perspective
of the indigenous people or adivasi with whom she lived and worked, whose own outlook on life was as different from her own background in Kolkata (Calcutta) as it was from that of her readers. That the correspondents were always women was not planned at the outset but it soon came to seem important. One of the reasons why these Letters are still a pleasure and an education to read today is that the women writing them are trying to get us under the skin of a country and a culture, portraying the lives and thoughts of ordinary people. And while men may dominate the world of politics and wars that makes up the daily news, it is women who are the lead actors in the dramas of everyday life yet their stories are never normally told. This was something our fifth correspondent, Maria del Nevo, excelled at, homing in with both passion and insight on the plight of the women she saw around her in Pakistan. Over the years since, the Letters have ranged across the continents and cultures from urban Nigeria to rural Mongolia, from civil-wartorn Lebanon to civil-war-torn Colombia, from Russia s capital to its troubled colony Chechnya, from the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius to their current location in Cairo. Reading these Letters together, there are many common themes. There is a fascination with how people are named in other cultures, for example: from the Mongolian Son of the Cosmos to the Nigerian God is worth worshipping, from the Zimbabwean Thank you to the Chinese Colorful Clouds at Dusk. There is also a recurrent awareness of the seriousness with which magic or the paranormal is treated in other cultures as when Susanna Rance resorts to some unconventional healing when her daughter falls ill, or when Louisa Waugh encounters a female shaman. Yet paradoxically, for all that they focus on the differences between peoples, on the cultural distinctiveness of their particular locale, the Letters as a whole convey an overwhelming sense of how alike human beings are the world over with similar hopes and dreams, similar concerns for family and community, and for making ends meet. This book is dedicated to former New Internationalist co-operative member Maria del Nevo, the only one of its contributors who was not able to play an active part in approving its contents (to understand why, see Maria s biographical section on page 91).
CONTENTS Letters from Mawere (Zimbabwe) by Yvonne Burgess 1986-1987 About Yvonne Burgess 11 Changes in Zimbabwe 11 Golden eggs Calling cards Pendulum swings A fine art Upon this rock 13 14 16 17 20 The woman in green Dancing under the full moon Evening conversation Speaking truth to fear Bulawayo to Birmingham 21 23 25 27 29 Letters from the Yellow River (China) by Carol Davis 1988-1989 About Carol Davis 31 Changes in China 31 Sea slugs and monkey brains Rise and shine Minding your own business Vibrate the Universe! 33 34 36 37 Sleeping in cars Jumping the queue Children of the moon Trashing the past Reaching for the sky Little emperors revisited 39 40 42 44 45 47 Letters from La Paz (Bolivia) by Susanna Rance 1989-1990 About Susanna Rance 49 Changes in Bolivia 49 A style of death Spiritual food Bread for the living, bread for the dead Over the border Trashing lives 51 52 54 56 58 Tickets to salvation Mother tongue, fatherland Becoming a person Calling the spirit Shaking the sorrows away 60 61 63 65 67
CONTENTS Letters from Tamil Nadu (India) by Mari Marcel Thekaekara 1991-1992 About Mari Marcel Thekaekara 69 Changes in India 69 In silence and in shame People and other pests Born to shovel shit Meat matters Killer drugs 71 72 74 76 78 The time trap The wisdom of sages Restructuring the poor They re singing our song No requiem for Rajkumari 80 82 84 85 87 Letters from Lahore (Pakistan) by Maria del Nevo 1992-1993 About Maria del Nevo 91 Changes in Pakistan 91 The sari s curse Heavy shadow Caught in the web The burned bride Wretched of the earth 93 95 97 99 101 A lesson too late A suitable arrangement You can fly it! Sperm in the market Dupatta or not dupatta 103 104 106 108 110 Letters from Lagos (Nigeria) by Elizabeth Obadina 1993-1995 About Elizabeth Obadina 113 Changes in Nigeria 113 What s in a name? A way with waste No hair for Josie Siren values Vanity Fair 115 117 118 120 122 Blood money Your money or your bank Shadow boxing Phoning for democracy A gust of pure evil 124 126 128 130 132
CONTENTS Letters from Russia and Chechnya by Olivia Ward 1995-1997 About Olivia Ward 135 Changes in Russia (and Chechnya) 135 The honest colonel Walnuts and sunflower seeds Love and pies at the Usinsk Café The future is rising Mountains and miracles 137 138 140 142 144 Dzhamilla s degree Stalemate Crystal glasses and kidnapped wives Business as usual Dust and memories 146 147 149 151 153 Letters from Atlantis (Colombia) by Jenny James 1997-1998 About Jenny James 155 Changes in Colombia 155 An avalanche of love Monkey business Natural causes Going home 157 159 160 162 Killing connections Of poppies, plantations and parents Our children s blood 164 166 167 Letters from Tsengel (Mongolia) by Louisa Waugh 1998-1999 About Louisa Waugh 171 Changes in Mongolia 171 Mother Rock Tuya s tale Journey to the end of the earth The death of Kalim Tea and delight 173 175 176 178 180 A frozen world In the eye of the beholder A sheep for the Shaman A month in the country Going home 182 184 185 187 189
Letters from Beirut (Lebanon) by Reem Haddad 1999-2006 About Reem Haddad 191 Changes in Lebanon 191 CONTENTS Candles, courtesy of Israel Across the fence Neighborly love A visitor in the mountains Heart s desire The perfect wife 193 195 197 199 201 202 Taking the veil Worlds of words Fundamental flaws Life lessons Written in the stars Motherland Speaking in tongues Running out of lies 204 206 208 210 212 214 216 218 Letters from Bambous (Mauritius) by Lindsey Collen 2006-2007 About Lindsey Collen 221 Changes in Mauritius 221 A yellow flag in the sunset The slide of sugar I see a human being The breadfruit tree Empire s exiles 223 224 226 228 230 To a place of healing Tongue twisters Fetching grass Where the streets have no shame Of robbers and planners 232 234 236 237 239 Letters from Cairo (Egypt) by Maria Golia 2007-2008 About Maria Golia 241 Changes in Egypt 241 We can take it A marriage of convenience The thinness of things 243 245 247 A bag of lemons A world apart Turn, turn, turn Beyond nature 249 250 253 255