Short Thoughts on Time

They say time heals all wounds.  I've spent countless days, hours, weeks pondering this statement and how true it is.  Time is a strange thing; it is both an enemy and a friend.  I've found myself in situations where I thought I could never forgive someone for something they did...but months or years later, I find myself in a civil, friendly conversation with them.  I find myself smiling and possibly even trusting that person again.  I've also been in situations where I thought something or someone good would be in my life forever, but after time, those feelings have gone sour.

Time heals all wounds.  But does it really?  Even in those friendly conversations where I let my guard down with someone who has hurt me, the back of my mind brings events of the past to the surface.  Not completely to the surface, but it seems to be a small memory that taints the present.  Is this wound really healed?  Or is the pain just subsided?

Perhaps it's not about a wound healing completely.  Perhaps my wounds will never grow new skin in the place of the gashes it already has.  Maybe time doesn't heal the wounds, but distances us from the pain the wound once caused.  Time allows us to forget the intense and sometimes extreme emotions that come with the wounds we have, both physically and mentally.  For example, after each tattoo, it only takes a few weeks for me to forget the immense pain I've felt before I am ready for a new one.  Time allows the pain to subside bit by bit so our ordinary lives can continue, and when we encounter the same situation or person that wounded us, we've forgotten how terrible it once was.  Time simply dulls the pain.  Because shortly after my friendly conversation, and the emotional assailant of my past has left, my wounds still hurt.  They start to pulsate, stir and singe again.  

Maybe that just means that not enough time has passed.  I'm young, and maybe not enough years have occurred for these wounds to heal.  Maybe in ten more, there will be a completely healed wound with no sharp pains when memories are revisited; maybe one day my wounds will be healed with the faint scar of the memory with no emotional strings.  Maybe time really does heal all wounds, and I just need to let more of it pass.

But I am fairly certain I just don't believe that.  Those wounds are what help us remember the lessons we've learned.  Our intense emotions and experiences are what make us human and what makes us individual.  If time heals all of the bad things that have happened to us, what have we gained?  To me, it just seems like a way to marginalize our own experiences, our thoughts in that moments, and our beliefs.  Some wounds are deep and powerful.  They are reminders to me of how I change.  Sometimes, they are reminders to me of how important my ideas and convictions are. I don't want those to heal and go away.  I want them to stay with me as reminders of who I am.

Maybe what I'm really unsure in this phrase is not time, but the concept of healing.  What does it mean for a wound to be "healed"?  Does it mean it seems like it never existed?  Does it simply  mean it doesn't hurt anymore?  Or does it mean that you remember it, but the pain has subsided just enough to deter you from being in a situation that caused the wound in the first place?  How do you heal from wounds that you couldn't avoid?

I think I have come up with more questions than ideas here, once again, but I guess that's what thinking is all about.  Coming up with questions is sometimes half of the battle.

On Change And The Pieces That Make Us Whole

I've spent a lot of time reflecting over the past few weeks.  Maybe it's because it's nearing the end of the semester.  Maybe it's because it's almost the end of the year.  Maybe it's because almost everyone is going home for Winter Break and I'm not.  Maybe it's because I'm a self-reflective and generally over analytical person.  Either way, I've spent a lot of time thinking the past few weeks: in the bus to and from school, on airplanes, when I become lost in my own mind during a meeting, standing in line at lunch, and as I drift to sleep at night.

I've been thinking a lot about changes.  I've been asking myself a lot of questions.  How does change happen?  Are the changes that have been happening in my life active choices, or have I passively been letting them happen to me?  I know that some changes are outside of our control, but through these changes, am I making the decisions, or letting everything around me just happen?  Why do things change?  Why do I seek change, but also fear it?

I have had a lot of surreal moments over the past few months where I just stop and ask myself, "How did this become my life?  How did I end up with a life that allows me to teach awesome students in a setting where I get to absorb other cultures and travel all the time?"  It happens in all different types of moments, both minute and remarkable.  It happens when I look around my classroom and see that I have students from all over the world in one room.  It happens when the support staff smiles and says says "Namaste, ma'am" to me each and every they see me.  It happens when I help chaperone 27 kids to a music festival in a different country.  It happens when I see a monkey run across the roof of the school building from my classroom window.  It happens when I get compliments from colleagues and students about what I'm doing at school.  It happens in small, kind comments from students.  It happens when I see "our school cat" (a stray cat that runs through our lunch area every day) running around campus.  It happens when students understand and share my struggle to form a cultural identity.  These moments of awe have caused me think about what has gotten me to this point, and who I have become.

One change I have been thinking about intensely, especially in regards to where my life is today and who I have become, is the people and relationships in our lives. (When I say relationships, I mean the true definition of the word: the way in which two or more people or things are connected, or the state of being connected)

I have a lot of important people who have consistently been in my life.  They have helped to shape me and my identity.  I also have people who have intensely been part of my life, but are no longer in my life, or they play an entirely different role in my life than they once did. They have also helped shape me and my identity.  But, which of these two "categories" of people have had to most important impact?  Why are the people who were once so important and present in my life not here anymore?  What makes us drift apart?  When I look back at the past year, the past 5 years, and the past 10 years, I see bits and pieces of each of these people in the person I am today.  I see my love for travel, which has been nurtured by my father and a few close friends.  I see how I've grown to challenge myself to be emotionally stronger from a friend who always encouraged me to "be strong", even when I felt I couldn't be.  I see a strong desire to follow my heart that grew more intense when someone showed me that I was stuck in a place where I was afraid to do what I felt would make me happy.  I see a girl who is afraid of being left behind because a handful of important people in her life have in a way that seemed too easy for them.  I see a girl with dreams and a sort of fearlessness to follow them, which was always supported by my parents.  I see someone who has become less afraid to fail because of the love that so many have given her.  I see a critical thinker who had college professors and fellow students who challenged her to question and explain her beliefs and the world around her.  I see the unfailing and intense love that I offer to the people and interests in my life, regardless of how hard I try to love them with reservation at times.  I see someone who is proud to be the person she's worked so hard to become because of a person who, when we first met, said they appreciated and noticed those things about me.  When I see all of these things, it makes me happy and sad; it makes me feel comfort and confusion.  What does all of this mean?  Humans are dynamic.  Our lives are dynamic.  But how much of who we are is really us and how much is just bits and pieces of the people who have been in our lives?  Am I really me? Or, am I just millions of pieces of the others that have participated in my life, morphed into the silhouette that I appear to be?  Does the answer to this question even matter?  I'm a painfully nostalgic person, and I cherish the pieces that others have left me: the memories, the laughs, the challenges, and the growth.  But, has this love for all of these people caused me to be pieces of them instead of who I truly am? Is it bad (read: inadequate, detrimental, weak, abnormal) to hold on to these pieces and let them be a part of me?  When do I let go of these pieces? Do I let go of them?  When do these pieces stop being "a piece of ____" and "a piece of ____ " and simply become pieces of me?  When do these pieces simply become me because they are who I am, and not something that so-and-so influenced (helped, colored, caused, encouraged, taught) me to be?

I don't know the answers to many of these questions, and I may never know the answers to many of these questions.  Maybe I am not supposed to know, or maybe I will eventually figure it out.  Either way, these questions are weighing heavy on my heart.  In many ways, I'm thankful for the pieces that I have of everyone who I love and have loved.  In many ways, these pieces make me miss them and wonder why things are this way.  I'm not sure if in this moment I feel mostly thankful and comforted by all of the memories that created these bits and pieces of who I am, or sad and mournful for the loss of the people who gave me these pieces.  I feel both from second to second, day to day, and year to year.

What I do know is that I am dynamic; my life is dynamic.  I don't have to continue to be anything I don't want to be.  These bits and pieces are always shifting, growing, shrinking.

I can change. 

It's Been a While...A Brief Overview of the Past 2 Months

Hello, friends!  It's been too long since my last post, and I apologize for the hiatus.  A LOT has happened since my last post two months.  It was a busy time with school and lots of breaks because it was festival season in Nepal.  Here's a brief overview:

Dshain break:  In Nepal, they celebrate a holiday called Dashain (in India the celebration is called Navratri, which means 9 nights), which celebrates the victory of good over evil.  It is a festival with many pujas, and has been explained to me that it is as important to Nepalis as Christmas is to Americans.  For Dashain holiday, we had a week off of school, and I went to India! I visited a few friends in Mumbai.  We went to some great restaurants and I finally went to the Gateway of India.  I spent a day in Vasai with a few friends and got to see some of the Navratri dancing.  Then, a few girls and I went to Goa and spent a few days laying by the beach.  Amanda got stung by a jellyfish.

Walking by the Taj Hotel on the way to the Gateway

The 3 of us at the Gateway

Panorama of the Gateway and the Taj Hotel

Mumbai Central Terminal Train Station

Nauratri Festival Dancing

Krispy Kreme in Mumbai

A cow came to visit us...and have some Ketchup

The 3 of us, by the beach. 

Leaving Goa after a few great days laying by the beach

Halloween in Kathmandu: A week after returning from Dashain break, it was time for Halloween.  It isn't celebrated in Nepal, but we are in an international community.  We have some families with small children, so David and I hosted a party on the hill so some of the kids could come trick-or-treat in our neighborhood.  I also ate the majority of a GIANT bag of fruity candy that I had ordered from the US full of Starburst, Skittles, and Lifesaver Gummy rings.

Trick-or-Treaters at Uncle Dave's house

NESA Conference in Dubai: Just over a week after returning from India, I headed to Dubai for a conference with a colleague and friend, Molly.  It was my first time traveling to the Middle East, and I'd recently become interested in visiting Dubai.  It was great.  First, the conference was awesome and it was so reassuring to spend some time with my WiDA people.  Molly and I also got a lot of time to explore the city.  We went to the mall (OKAY, we went to two) and were able to get some shopping out of our systems.  We ate a lot of amazing food.  Kabobs, pita, and Thai food.  We absorbed the atmosphere and the city that surrounded us.  Molly and I spent the majority of our time in Dubai (when we weren't at the conference learning, of course!) trying to wrap our heads around the city.  It is such an opulent city.  Everything has come up so recently, and everything is so fancy.  There are malls everywhere, designer stores, and luxury cars.  When you walk down the street, there's fine dining restaurants, high end stores, and amid all the grandeur, a Panda Express or an Applebee's.  Each time we saw something like this, we were completely in awe.  Overall, it's a place I'd like to return to and spend more time getting into some of the cultural roots and experiences.

The inside of our hotel

The American School of Dubai had an AMAZING
library; these were the stairs

A snow park inside the mall

A beautiful dinner view

Strolling down the marine area of Dubai

Sunset from our hotel roof

The night skyline from our hotel roof

Tihar: A week and a half after returning from break, we had 3 days off for Tihar, which is the festival of lights, Similar to Diwali in India.  It's a beautiful time in Kathmandu because there are lights all over the city.  Shops are covered in strings of lights and candles/diyas are lit all over the city. Diya means lamp in Hindi.  We had a 3 day vacation from school, plus the 2 days of the weekend.  David and I spent the entire 5 days cooking.  We chose some recipes and went shopping.  We'd spend a few hours prepping, then a few hours cooking.  Then, we'd eat and spend an hour or two cleaning up after the meal.  By the time we were done cleaning up, it was time to start prepping the next meal!  Cooking in Nepal really takes a lot longer than in the US.  Vegetables (and almost anything else that's not going to be boiled or fried) have to be soaked in iodine, then rinsed in purified water before they're chopped.  Plus, we have only gas stoves and it can take quite a while for water to boil (we're also at a higher altitude).  Washing dishes takes a long time here as well.  The water in my kitchen sink is cold, so if we want to soak any dishes, we have to boil water for soaking.  It was a great break, spent cooking and laughing.

My didi prepared my house for Tihar with rangoli and garlands, as well as some diyas I had purchased in India:

The large Rangoli my didi made for me

The entryway to my house: Rangoli and diyas

All lit up for Diwali

The city all lit up.  I could see everyone's lights and hear the Tihar music

Thanksgiving:  Thanksgiving in Kathmandu was awesome.  It was hard for me to be away from home on this holiday because I have a few traditions that are really important to me,  For the past several years, I've gone to my grandma's early that day or the night before to help her prepare.  I help her prepare the potatoes and make the gravy.  We make the stuffing together-I cut up all the bread and we season it and bake it.  This is one of my most treasured Thanksgiving memories.  I cherish the time that my grandma and I spend together getting the meal ready.  It's a time for us to catch up on what's been going on in each other's lives, share our thoughts with each other, and show each other how much we care.  I've always had an extremely close relationship with my Granda.  Needless to say, spending my first Thanksgiving away from family made me uneasy.  Actually, I think I was more uneasy about seeming sad and uneasy about being away.  I know my friends would have understood; as a group of expats and international teachers, we all have waves of homesickness and things that makes us miss home.  But, just because they understood, didn't mean I wanted to be the girl who spent all of Thanksgiving missing home.  And, quite honestly, it was an amazing day.  David and I woke up, had coffee, and spent the Morning in the kitchen, which is our new favorite pasttime!  We made garlic mashed potatoes, wagon wheel cookies, and green bean casserole, which we made completely from scratch (including the mushroom soup and fried onions!)  Then, we headed to our friends' house.  We had a great time getting the finishing touches of the meal ready, eating together, and making each other laugh.  Our friends had cut out a tree and we wrote things we're thankful for on the leaves, which we taped to the tree.  It was nice to see a tree full of things we're all thankful for.

Casserole Selfie in the kitchen

David and I with the Thankful Tree

Our AMAZING Thanksgiving spread...and my plate of food!

The Thanksgiving crew

I am SO thankful for these great friends in Kathmandu.  I'm luck to have great friends and talented colleagues by my side to laugh and learn with

The day after Thanksgiving, we walked into Sanepa for coffee and massages.  We walked the long way into town to avoid walking on the busy ring road.  I clicked a beautiful picture of Kirtipur, near the area where I live.

Kirtipur

Right now, I'm chaperoning a trip with some of our students to a musical performance festival where they get to play with other students from other countries.  After a nightmare of an experience getting through Indian Immigration, it's been an extremely enjoyable few days with the kids.

There's just one week of school left before Winter Break, and in just under 2 weeks, my sister will be arriving in Kathamdu.  We'll be in Kathmandu for about a week and we'll be heading to Thailand for a week as well.  I can't wait to show her around Kathmandu and head out on a new adventure.