Another old poem that carries me to the present…

This was written about 8 years ago.  I visited my old website tonite, and thought I’d share this one:

And the Rain

I smile at darkness,

at flickers of light

stabbing me through

my tears.

I fade with each

fading line,

going back in swirls

of memories,

     memories I

would rather give

life to later,

     much later

at a time when ashes

can be thrown at the passing

of new wind.

    and rain …

         and rain …
it always rained

outside my windowpane

when I crept onto corners

        of my double-decked bed.

it always rained

     when I cringed with

              unlabeled pain.

it always rained

     and I would let the

blurred raindrops

        be my tears.


I smile at your darkness,

at invisible smiles

you never could show

in your hidden rhymes.

I let my past fade

with every fading

     of your past

and I dream of ashes

I can throw with the wind.

    and the rain …

         and the rain.


it rained too

when my own child

stood by his bedroom window

to shed tears at my own pain

he stood there

staring out at droplets

on green brown leaves

seeking meaning within

the distance

            I

                 held between us.

not understanding

why I had to have my own tears

when his were enough

to shatter the night.


I smile at this darkness,

this familiar black

of knowing and yet not.

holding,

grasping my own

soul and stripping it

naked

to the warmth of night.

I let my fears fade,

as darkness

fades,

into lightness of

knowing.

and I dream of ashes

I can offer to the passing wind.

    and rain …

        and rain.

Sunday morning

There are mornings when you feel like everything is smiling back at you. Even the overcast skies and the bare breeze that makes the leaves of trees quiver just so. And then there’s the sudden touch of your warm palm on your shoulder as you hug yourself, and the crooning music that finds its way out of your iPod, and the soothing massage of nepalese black tea sliding down your parched throat…

Life is not always like this, but it’s about appreciating moments of grace and being present enough to make every part of your being remember what it’s like to feel good. And creating opportunities for recreating more of that feeling as the days go by.

Do I sound like I have just stepped out of a rut? 

I was looking at my old writings and stumbled upon this one…

Gentle Wish

21 December 1997
 At  Sunset
 Boracay Island, Philippines

(For Corina)

The sunset is just about
 to fade into darkness.

Alone, I see
 the colours of the
 sea horizon
 smile back
 at my hidden smile.

Peace
 is being here
 in my solitude
 with feelings comfortably
 unexplained,
 unlabeled.
 It is only I
 who seek to understand
 or not understand.

Not even the sunset
 needs words
 or descriptions
 as it sits there
 all mine to cherish.

Strange yet sweet …

This newness
 of not having to
 make snapshot
 memories
 of every passing moment,

No scooping palms
 gathering sand
 to bring back home.

As the first star
 comes out
 I wish
 gently
 for happiness.

And how does one
 wish “gently”?
 I too ask,
 and find quick answers:
 like a passing breeze
 no jolts,
 no piercing pain,
 no pleading desperation
 for a wish to come
 true.

Almost like
 a prayer :
 for peace in this heart
 of pure white sand,
 in this life
 of open palms;
 for happiness
 in this solitude
 of a fading twilight,
 for joy to give out
 in the arms of night.

Rachel’s Wedding Song

 

 

 

A very dear friend got married earlier this month. It was a beautiful late afternoon ceremony, at a hilltop chapel overlooking a volcano that is surrounded by a lake. Beautiful music from a double string quartet, a wonderful chorus of voices, one of the country’s top opera divas (Andion Fernandez), and an equally brilliant singer-friend (Ivy Violan) who sang a very soulful rendition of the wedding song (which I am featuring in this post) — love and music go hand in hand, always.

Hymne à L’Amour (Hymn to Love fr.) is a popular French song originally performed by Édith Piaf. The lyrics were written by Piaf and the music by Marguerite Monnot. It was recorded on 2 May 1950. It has been redone in English as “If You Love Me (Really Love Me)”. Piaf apparently wrote the song as a tribute to the man she considered the love of her life; French boxer Marcel Cerdan, who died in a plane crash in 1949. - from Wikipedia

Hymne à L’Amour

Le ciel bleu sur nous peut s’effondrer
Et la terre peut bien s’écrouler
Peu m’importe si tu m’aimes
Je me fous du monde entier
Tant qu’l'amour inond’ra mes matins
Tant que mon corps frémira sous tes mains
Peu m’importe les problèmes
Mon amour puisque tu m’aimes

J’irais jusqu’au bout du monde
Je me ferais teindre en blonde
Si tu me le demandais
J’irais décrocher la lune
J’irais voler la fortune
Si tu me le demandais
Je renierais ma patrie
Je renierais mes amis
Si tu me le demandais
On peut bien rire de moi
Je ferais n’importe quoi
Si tu me le demandais

Si un jour la vie t’arrache à moi
Si tu meurs que tu sois loin de moi
Peu m’importe si tu m’aimes
Car moi je mourrais aussi
Nous aurons pour nous l’éternité
Dans le bleu de toute l’immensité
Dans le ciel plus de problèmes
Mon amour crois-tu qu’on s’aime
Dieu réunit ceux qui s’aiment

English Translation by Pristine Ong:

Hymn To Love

The blue sky may fall on us
And the Earth may collapse
As long as you love me, little matters
I couldn’t care less for the world

As long as love fills my mornings
As long as my body quivers under your touch
These problems matter little,
My love, as love as you love me

I would go the ends of the world
I would dye my hair blond
If you asked it of me
I would take the moon from the sky
I would steal a fortune
If you asked me to
I would desert my country
I would leave my friends
If you asked that of me
One could well laugh at me
I wouldn’t mind what you asked me to do
I would do anything
If you asked me to

If life takes you away from me one day
If you die, if you are far away from me
It does not matter, as long as you love me
For I will also die

We would have eternity
In heaven
Where we will have no cares or worries
My love, do you believe in our love?…
…God reunites all lovers!

Grief

How does one write about this?

I started to write this blog two weeks ago. I can’t seem to go further. But I must.

We worked closely with him. All three long weekends, on two trips to China since June of this year. On my last night, he was happily hosting friends at the bar that his group had set up and managed… providing a “safe space” for gay men that side of Yunnan province and launching HIV prevention programs from there. I sang onstage for him and his friends, at his request. He was so happy and proud. They all danced as I sang. And he kept snapping pictures with his fancy camera, just as he had been doing in the workshop sessions. I said goodbye later in the night and we pledged to see each other in a couple of months, when I would return to China.

That was the last image I would have of him… waving back at me as I rode the taxi…

I traveled back to Kunming on that Monday morning. And he was also somewhere on a road out, in another car. And he met a fatal accident.

Li Gang. Leader, brother, doctor, colleague, friend. He will be missed but his inspiration will linger. May he find eternal peace.

Work Talk

(Yunnan Province, China)

Sharing some work pics from this ongoing trip in China … narrative may come later… if I get in the mood! CLICK HERE!

Keywords:

• HIV/AIDS
• participatory community assessments
• MSM = men who have sex with men
• sex workers
• people living with HIV and AIDS
• capacity building
• community mobilization
• focused mapping
• participatory tools
• peer education
• prevention, care, treatment and impact mitigation
• program development
• behaviour change
• condom use and negotiation
• safer sexual practice
• organizational development
• empowerment

Sichuan’s panda bears

Flashback: Sichuan Province, China, 2005

It was a cold winter day but the opportunity to visit the Sichuan Panda reserve was too tempting to resist.

More pictures HERE. (<—click on that! please? )

Room service and “teenjeewberrymuds”

I dial 07 for 24-hour Room Service. A woman answers, greets me in Chinese.

“Good afternoon. Can you speak English?”

Giggles on other end. Phone is passed to a male person. “Good afternoon!”

“Yes, good afternoon. Can I order for room service please?”

More nervous giggles from other end. Phone is passed to another woman. I hear an exchange of Chinese words, and can imagine the phone receiver being tossed about like a hot potato.

“Yes, may I help you?” She speaks with heavy accent but I understand it.

“Yes I would like to order Yangzhou fried rice, please.”

“Yes.”

“And can you send me some soy sauce please?”

“Uhhh… sui sous?”

“Soy sauce.” I say it slow and clear this time.

“Yes… sui sous.”

“Thank you.” I cross my fingers and hope for the best.

“Yes. Thank you.” Click.

Twenty minutes later, I get my Yangzhou fried rice (which comes with a bowl of soup, nice touch!) and … a bowl of dried chilli in oil — that was my sauce on the side. No “sui sous.” Oh well, not too much of a tragedy. I had been through worse. I am split about this language thing, I swing between admiration and irritated awe as a visitor in a foreign land… particularly for front-line workers in the tourism/service industry.

Which reminded me of this forwarded email re: “Teenjeewberrymuds.” I paste the email here:

To get the full effect, this should be read aloud. You will understand what ‘tenjewberrymuds’ means by the end of the conversation. The following is a telephone exchange between a hotel guest and room-service, at a hotel in Asia, which was recorded and published in the Far East Economic Review:

Room Service (RS): “Morrin. Roon sirbees.”

Guest (G): “Sorry, I thought I dialed room-service.”

RS: “Rye..Roon sirbees..morrin! Jewish to oddor sunteen??”

G: “Uh..yes..I’d like some bacon and eggs.”

RS: “Ow July den?”

G: “What??”

RS: “Ow July den?…pryed, boyud, poochd?”

G: “Oh, the eggs! How do I like them? Sorry, scrambled please.”

RS: “Ow July dee baykem? Crease?”

G: “Crisp will be fine.”

RS : “Hokay. An Sahn toes?”

G: “What?”

RS:”An toes. July Sahn toes?”

G: “I don’t think so.”

RS: “No? Judo wan sahn toes??”

G: “I feel really bad about this, but I don’t know what ‘judo wan sahn toes’ means.”

RS: “Toes! toes!…Why jew don juan toes? Ow bow Anglish moppin we bodder?”

G: “English muffin!! I’ve got it! You were saying ‘Toast.’ Fine. Yes, an English muffin will be fine.”

RS: “We bodder?”

G: “No…just put the bodder on the side.”

RS: “Wad?”

G: “I mean butter…just put it on the side.”

RS: “Copy?”

G: “Excuse me?”

RS: “Copy…tea…meel?”

G: “Yes. Coffee, please, and that’s all.”

RS: “One Minnie. Scramah egg, crease baykem, Anglish moppin we bodder on sigh and copy….rye??”

G: “Whatever you say.”

RS: “Tenjewberrymuds.”

G : “You’re very welcome.”

(P.S. Thanks to Upeng for forwarding this email… and to whoever originally wrote this!)

Resting on a Cloudy Day

Finally got some rest today. I am back in Kunming City and woke up this morning to cloudy skies. Above is a picture of what I saw from my hotel room window. Highlights of my day:

• slept in … comforter feels good, pillows all soft and everything smells nice and clean
• had brunch on the 28th floor and watched the waitresses getting harassed by waiters, grrrrr!
• couldn’t get back into my room because the hotel key card wouldn’t work; found housekeeping staff at the other end of the corridor and used hand signals to explain my predicament; they were very helpful and proceeded to clean my room
• got my laughs for the day when CNN news featured the whole American media fuss about Hillary Clinton’s cleavage. I was so curious that I checked out this article on Washington Post
• got email from my friend who is getting married in August. I have been assigned to read the Second Reading during the wedding mass… oh my! Haven’t done that since I was 9 years old!
• added 698 songs to my iTunes library, current total = 11,043 songs
• sorted through the My Pictures folder of my laptop and discovered that I just might have another talent … photography! Here’s a slideshow of some pictures from Cambodia (go on, click it click it click it! ) : Angkor Wat, Bayon, Banteay Srei and Ta Phrom Temples

Embracing moments

(Scribbles from Guangzhou airport, June 2007)

 

Life is about embracing moments:

 

Seeing…

rainbows reflected on wet eyelashes

clueless beauty framed by rain-dampened hair

grimy puddles sparkling mirrors of neon lights

silhouette of tangled passions at dawn

Feeling…

warmth of a tea cup between one’s sleepy palms

mountain wind from opened car windows

furry smoothness vibrating on a purr

skipping of a heartbeat at the brushing of skin

 

 

Tasting…

chocolate icing from a serving spoon at midnight

burning sweetness of a bailey’s shot

juicy readiness of a ripened peach

trickles of passion on a velvet tongue

 

 

Hearing…

silence of a lonesome moment at dusk

street side chatter in alien tongues

humming of awakened forest streams

rustling of soft sheets and rested breath

 

 

Life.

Jazz in July

(drafted in Phnom Penh, Cambodia/finished in Yunnan, China)

Saxophone sex plays in

my mind. Half naked, I stroke

my skin - fresh and smooth

from a long soak. Perfumed bath

on a perfect night. Alone.

Mirrors reflect back

beauty beyond blurs

of memories. And jazz plays

right into July rains, fading

out with the early morning

silence. This moment is mine

Alone.