Poetry Friday - The Walrus & The Carpenter

Why this one comes to mind, I don’t know. I remember reading Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass over and over when I was a kid. My sister and I had all the rhymes memorized. Every character and plot point was passionately debated. They feel like old friends. Reading it reminds me of those days …

The Walrus and The Carpenter by Lewis Carroll
(from Through the Looking-Glass)

The sun was shining on the sea,

Shining with all his might:

He did his very best to make

The billows smooth and bright--

And this was odd, because it was

The middle of the night.

The moon was shining sulkily,

Because she thought the sun

Had got no business to be there

After the day was done--

"It's very rude of him," she said,

"To come and spoil the fun!"

…..

Read the rest here – Jabberwocky.com. And head over to Adventures in Daily Living for the round up!

Snow day ...

Wednesday was a wipeout, writing wise. School was cancelled, and our SCBWI critique meeting, that I'd been looking forward to since the holidays, was cancelled as well. I'm very disappointed. I got some writing done today, but I'm so behind on the big goals I've set for myself.

I did sign up for some conferences though; the Whispering Pines retreat and the New England SCBWI Conference in April. So that's something to look forward to. I'll feel better if I get some solid writing done in the next few days ...

ALA Awards

The ALA awards were announced this week. Check them out here.

I need to add THE GRAVEYARD BOOK, THE UNDERNEATH and SAVVY to my list of books to read. They all sound great! I wish CHAINS had won something at the ALA. I’m glad it won the 2009 Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction. We all have our favorites!

The one I'm most excited to read is debut novelist Kathi Appelt's THE UNDERNEATH. Here's the book trailer ...



Read an interview with Kathi on Cynthia Leitich Smith's Cynsations.

Parades and Elephant Poop

Today is a holiday in two countries I’ve lived in, India, and Australia.

It is Australia Day, celebrating the landing of the first fleet in Sydney’s Botany Bay. Kind of like Columbus Day. But since they don’t have an Independence Day it is also a bit of 4th of July, coming as it does in the middle of summer vacation down under. I should mention that some aboriginal people mark it as a day of mourning, much like Thanksgiving Day in the US.

In India it is Republic Day, celebrating the completion of the written constitution of the Republic of India in 1950, two and a half years after independence. The constitution is the bedrock of Indian democracy, so in a way they’re celebrating democracy itself, a wonderful thing to celebrate, in my opinion!!

They celebrate with parades, the grandest of which takes place in New Delhi. When I was in 8th grade I marched (or rather danced) in the parade. It remains one of my happiest memories!

There I am, in the front, dressed as a Punjabi bride in flaming orange and gold. The dance we did had to do with “Unity in Diversity”, the Indian version of E PLURIBUS UNUM. So if you look carefully, you'll see groups of kids in costumes from many parts of India.

The worst part of the whole thing was that the elephants carrying the “brave kids” ahead of us had gone and pooped on the road. So we had to dance around the elephant poop … in our bare feet!!

Since then, my kids have been in our town 4th of July parade. The funny thing was that they’d heard my elephant poop story a few times. So they were weirdly thrilled when the horses of the Canadian Mounties before them also did their thing and they had to perform their Karate Katas around the horse doo doo.

But I think my story still trumps theirs. They were wearing shoes, and everyone knows that elephant poop is bigger than horse poop!

Happy Australia Day, Australia! And happy Republic Day, India!

And as Yat-Yee points out, it is also Chinese New Year. So -- Happy Year of the Ox too!!

* picture of the Year of the Ox by chooyutshing @ Flickr creative commons

Poetry Friday - Stillness by Tagore

I had meant to post Praise Song for the Day, by Elizabeth Alexander, but I see that The Blue Rose Girls and others have beaten me to it!

So here is a poem by the great Bengali poet, Rabindranath Tagore, on something I often strive for, but don't always achieve; Stillness. It is hard to find in our crazy world, but very necessary (for me) to be able to collect my thoughts and put them down.

Stillness - by Rabindranath Tagore

Stillness soars as a mountain peak,
Seeking its greatness in height.
Movement stops in a silent lake,
Seeking in depth its limit.
~
The fish in the water is silent,
the animals on the earth is noisy,
the bird in the air is singing.

But man has in him the silence of the sea,
the noise of the earth
and the music of the air.

Read the rest here ...

(BTW - The wierdness with the singular/plural has to do with the translation from the original Bangla, I think!)

Poetry Friday is hosted today by Laura Salas

One page at a time ...

Hurrah! I've finished my writing target for the day. I might even take the dog on the shoulder out for a walk.

Smekday on Sunday

On Sunday it snowed and snowed. The kids and I sat around in our jamies and read THE TRUE MEANING OF SMEKDAY. I read the 1st report aloud to them (it doesn’t have chapters) and we were literally rolling on the floor, it is that funny! Then I shooed them off and read the rest myself. Loved it! It is funny, and profound, with a very cool cat, my favorite kind of book!

If you haven’t read it, start now!

Bodhi-dharma, Zen, and traveling monks

I’ve been reading a lot of historic travel accounts of India for my WIP. They are all foreign accounts--by Chinese, Arab, Greek or Italian travelers who went to India for pilgrimage, or trade, or employment in its royal courts. They are fascinating!

Then I started thinking about Indian travelers who left India to see the world. I knew they had to exist, but there are hardly any surviving accounts that tell of them. Still, I decided to make a list …

The ones I found easily were Buddhist monks who went to the Far East to spread their teachings. The most famous of these was the monk Bodhidharma who went to China in the 5th century AD. He was the founder of Zen Buddhism (Sanskrit - Dhyana, Chinese – Chan, Japanese – Zen) and said to be the father of Shaolin Kung-Fu (!) as well as having discovered tea. He is known as Daruma in Japan. Those Daruma dolls they have are based on him! And look at this clip I found of a Chinese movie about his life (Master of Zen). Chinese actors playing Indian roles and talking in Cantonese! How amazing is that!!



And there are more. China, Tibet, Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia and even Japan all had visitors from India.

Sona and Uttara – Cambodia 274 BC
Malananda – Korea 384 AD
Bodhidharma – China 5th century (Founded Chan/Zen)
Kwang Yoo – Korea 7th century (Founded Golgulsa monastery)
Bodhisena – Japan 736 AD
Nagasena – 7th century AD went to China from Cambodia
Padmasambhava – Tibet 747 AD
Prajna – 804 AD China
Atisha - Tibet 10th-11th century
Vinitaruci – Vietnam

There were also the seafaring Chola Kings of Southern India, Rajaraja and Rajendra, who had a formidable Navy and colonized Java, Malacca etc. And there were traders who plied the monsoon winds of the Indian Ocean and traveled regularly to the East.

So, what about the West? Did no Indians travel to Persia, Arabia, Egypt or Greece? The evidence is they did. The Bamiayan Buddhas were a product of the Indo-Greeks that ruled Afghanistan (Gandhara/Bactria) after Alexander’s conquests. Emperor Ashoka erected stone tablets etched in Greek and sent Buddhist missionaries to the Yonas (Ions or Greeks).

The Mahavamasa (Chronicles of Lanka) says -
The wise Maharakkhita who went to the country of the Yona (Greece) delivered in the midst of the people the Kalakarama suttanta. A hundred and seventy thousand living beings attained, to the reward of the path (of salvation); ten thousand received the pabbajja.

So someone went West, but what became of them, no one knows! There had also always been trading links over sea and land. But until someone unearths an account from the Indian POV we have only Megesthanes and Marco Polo before the colonial period to shed light on these links.

* Pictures from Flickr creative commons - Bodhidharma by unforth, Daruma by KO-ROCK

Poetry Friday / Doggie playgroup

Sorry about the doggie poem. Couldn't resist! Along with my life, this blog seems to have gone to the dogs. Enough! After this I’m not posting ANYTHING more about dogs for a while.

Walking the Dog by Howard Nemerov

Two universes mosey down the street
Connected by love and a leash and nothing else.
Mostly I look at lamplight through the leaves
While he mooches along with tail up and snout down,
Getting a secret knowledge through the nose
Almost entirely hidden from my sight.

Click here for the rest...

----------------
It was 3 degrees this morning when I dropped the kids at school. Too cold to walk the dog, at least for me, so Yogi (the dog) and I went to PetSmart and signed him up for doggie playgroup. Remember that sick feeling when you first send your kids to preschool? Yeah, I had that again today. Yogi didn’t know anyone, and was very anxious. I watched him through the glass doors and he settled down after a bit. The girls there shooed me off and told me to come back around noon. When I got back he was in a separate room because he threw up from excitement or nervousness or something. Poor baby!

But apparently he did play (before he threw up) and it’s good for him to get socialized. I have to say that a daycamp/hotel/playgroup for dogs seems very odd to my third-world brain, but it serves a useful purpose. We’ll try again, but not for a while. Maybe some one-on-one playdates first … Yikes! I can barely keep up with my kids’ social life and now I have to have playdates for the dog!!

Webcam!

Hey, there's a webcam on this laptop! Hi, there!

Puppy picture

We got a picture of Yogi when he was a puppy, from Doris in Puerto Rico. Isn't he cute?

Slumdog Millionaire sweeps Golden Globes!!!!!

What a night for Mumbai!! Anil Kapoor, A.R. Rehman, and Shahrukh Khan at the Golden Globes ... winning! OK, so Shahrukh wasn't even in the movie, but he was the first Indian actor to present a Golden Globe, that's something too! I thought Danny Boyle, Simon Beaufoy, Dev Patel and Freida Pinto were awesome! Oscars, anyone?



And all you writers, before it was a Golden Globe winning movie Slumdog Millionaire was a book. That's right, the movie is based on Q & A by Vikas Swarup. Check out an excerpt on the author's site here.

Snow on the playhouse ... and two more pictures

That's the kids' playhouse this morning. Great place to write when it's warmer! The thing next to it is Kiki's toddler bed. We removed the bottom and filled it with top soil so she can grow flowers in it in summer.

And here are a couple of pictures I took at the Museum of Science over the holidays. Each has a special meaning for one of the two novels I'm working on. One is a slice of a 2000 year old Giant Sequoia showing tree rings dating back to the time of Julius Cesar (for KDD), and the second is a page from Bhaskara's Leelavati (for LS). I thought the grudging and dismissive write up (based on colonial era attitudes) about Bhaskara needs serious updating. I've been reading THE CREST OF THE PEACOCK by George Joseph, it's good to know that these biases are being re-examined.

Laid low by the common cold

This week hasn’t gone as well as I hoped. I thought with the kids back at school I would be able to get lots of writing done. HA and HA-HA! They had a snow delay on Wednesday and Kiki came down with a cold/fever on Thursday and Friday. And Ravi was grumpy because I had to cancel his Friday playdate. Oh well, it’ll be better next week (since it can’t get worse!)

I owed several people critiques and sent off a couple of queries all off which ate into the little writing time I had. This time last year I was determined to finish the 1st draft of Karmic Cat and single-mindedly pumping out a 1000+ words a day! I’m antsy to get back into a regular schedule – here’s hoping Kiki’s cold won’t get passed on to the rest of us (gulp!)

At least I managed to read a lot. My favorite holiday read was Sea of Poppies by Amitav Ghosh. I think it’s the best South Asian book I’ve read since A Suitable Boy (except Anuja’s book of course :-)), but it kind of leaves you hanging. I’m glad there are to be two sequels. Also read Speak, Shiva’s Fire, and just started A Curse Dark as Gold. Weirdly I’ve been reading a lot of the Artemis Fowl books (again) for some reason.

Note to self: Must bring laptop to Kiki’s ice-skating class, if she’s well enough to go.

Poetry Friday ...

I got a bit of writing done on my historical today, and bravely posted the very start for a critique on UA. Wonder what they'll think ... I also found an old poem I'd sent to Charlesbridge with a very sweet letter from an editor who kept it for two (!!) years. Now that my friend Martha (a poet) and I are planning on meeting up regularly, I'm thinking of expanding the poem into a collection. It would be a nice break from novels. And I've decided to do the Poetry Friday thing that a lot of my blogging friends are doing. Here's where you can sign up to host it, Kelly Herold's blog Big A, little a.

So, to start, here's an old favorite by Emerson.

Ralph Waldo Emerson - Brahma

If the red slayer think he slays,
Or if the slain think he is slain,
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep, and pass, and turn again.

Far or forgot to me is near,
Shadow and sunlight are the same,
The vanished gods to me appear,
And one to me are shame and fame.

They reckon ill who leave me out;
When me they fly, I am the wings;
I am the doubter and the doubt,
And I the hymn the Brahmin sings.

The strong gods pine for my abode,
And pine in vain the sacred Seven;
But thou, meek lover of the good!
Find me, and turn thy back on heaven.

Letter from San Juan

We got an e-mail back from our dog’s foster mum in San Juan, Puerto Rico. We knew nothing about his history except that he was brought over with the Save a Sato program. He had been adopted and returned once, and all his paperwork had been lost in the shuffle.

But now we know that:
1. He has 4 siblings, Heather, Honeybun, Herbie and Hazelnut. (His old name was Healey, we renamed him Yogi)
2. Most of them have been placed around here so we should be able to see them at the Sato reunion in August.
3. He had been found with the other puppies eating out of a trash-bin to survive. He was less than 2 months old.
4. He lived with Doris, his foster mum, for 2 months before flying to Massachusetts.

I have been looking at him with new eyes today. What a lot he’s been through! And there was no way for him to tell us. I can’t stop fussing over him. What a good, good, dog!

Winter and The Dog

I love the outdoors but, being a creature of the tropics, I usually hunker down for winter. I find all those things you have to put on to go out, hats, gloves, boots, jackets, layers of clothes etc. truly annoying. But this being the winter of The Dog I have been forced out into the open.

The Dog has to be walked. He needs to do his Business. He needs exercise and playtime. He whines to go out just when I've settled down with my laptop and a big mug of tea. And I’m thankful.

Oh, I’ve been outdoors when it couldn’t be helped. When I had to take the kids sledding, or to shovel the driveway, or put up Christmas lights, or walk to work from the train-station. But until this winter, I’ve never been out alone.

Well, not completely alone, because The Dog is there, of course. And there are other creatures. Birds of all kinds, and critters that scamper out of sight but leave tracks for The Dog to sniff. And with nothing to do but take it all in I’ve finally realized the wonder of winter. Like when it’s snowing silently and you are the only person outside to watch it come down, or when it’s crisp and bright and the snow melts around you with the sound of pop-rocks candy in your mouth. I love how it covers everything and makes it beautiful.

So, I’m thankful that The Dog dragged me out of my cozy cocoon and showed me stuff that was right there for me to see all along.

Thank you, Dog. Now, I must go and defrost my toes.

Legomania

Behold the Imperial Star Destroyer, 1366 pieces of total awesomeness! And the X-Wing Fighter, AT-AP Pod Walker and various other Star Wars legos that my son spent half the holidays building. He actually timed how long it for him to build each set. I have to admire any activity that produces such intense concentration, over multiple days, in a 10 year old. Now if I could get him to read with the same single-mindedness ...

I'm exhausted. We had an overload of playdates etc. over this final weekend. They go back to school tomorrow. At which point I can actually have my life back. Oh yeah!