2020, what a year you have been. You started with good promise, that I was going to follow. I had set up priorities for you. I had plans for you. But, all went in vain.
First, 2020 was the year, I would have my Graduation. I regretted not registering for earlier in December 2019. I had my reasons, there were too many pending work. My fantasy was to finish them all by May 2020 and attend graduation ceremony with a bang in my Monash University, Australia It would have been a costly affair, but worth penny. During some of the darkest and challenging moments of my PhD journey, visualizing myself graduating in a gown with my loved ones had helped me to persevere. But none of that happened. AFter making all preparations and just about to apply for a visa ahead of time. Australia closed it borders, crashing that dream. It coincided with first lockdown by government of Nepal. And I did not know what to do with my self. I remember, first few weeks of lockdown was very challenging for me. I have never been a stay at home person. I love my home, I love my family but being at home 24 hrs without venturing outside, without meeting colleagues, friends interacting in seminars, workshops and coffee meet ups. And not to forget my favourite time of working alone by myself in cafes of Patan, accomplishing small writing tasks over cups of coffee and hot bowl of Jhol Momo...................I was having an existential crisis. I realized, it was within these little moments of connections with people, food and places that I really lived. I also remember, wandering around streets of kathmandu, looking for trinkets that Soham asked for his inventions and never ending project ideas was challenging at times. But it was worth it, when I found exactly what he needed and he would thank me with sincerity. Going Shopping with teenager Shubham and discussing over " what his style is" and realizing that my fears of parenting teenagers are exaggerated. Me and Shubham despite our differences and arguments at home, valued our time outside bonding over a cup of coffee, momo and him patiently waiting on the foyer sometimes, while I indulging on my own shopping. He would wait patiently till I selected the right sweater and he would say thoughtfully " It is looking good on you Ama but I wonder whether another color would be more suitable to your profession". And in midst of all this, sometimes me and Dadhi plan to have little #metime finding that gap of a time in a day between our busy working lives. We would suddenly find ourselves talking about things that escaped us at home. We would eat and always took takeaway for the boys.
These little things, little moments of happiness were gone. What we thought would be for a month or two, lasted a whole year, and even more likely to prolong. It still feels like an eternity when we can go back to some semblance of normality. Corona Virus as an epidemic was not just about people being sick. It robbed us the sense of freedom and solace we found outside our homes. It robbed us of the happiness we sought while travelling. Things, I realize will never be the same. We won't be hugging as freely. We won't be meeting each other as freely. We won't be travelling as freely. And yet, reflecting on the journey of a year, I feel positive that we will evolve.
I am an educator, I love to teach. The best part of this profession is having face to face meetings and interactions with the students. The thrill and excitement I feel in the classroom gave me energy to do other things. When we moved to virtual classroom, I missed that. My students missed that. Patan Campus Sociology Department was one of the first to initiate online classroom. I conducted the very first session on zoom for the whole department to discuss the Term paper guideline, which I had shared with students just before the lockdown started. Over the weeks, few students emerged as leaders creating a virtual community of students and teachers in viber. We also connected each other in google group platform for easy sharing of resources. Zoom those days offered unlimited meetings for the first time users, so, student created their own account and hosted meetings, recorded them and shared in google drive platform ( which I had created to support sharing resources). Earlier, my communication with students was limited in campus only, after class. I always encouraged them to reach out to me and I offered to stay a few more minutes to answer questions. But shy ones never approached me, busy ones with work had to leave immediately after work, rushing for their work.. Creating this virtual community enabled students now to communicate with faculty members, ask questions and even discuss things among themselves. This, I believed increased access in communication and also established new norms of communicating online. The very first batch of First Semester Sociology in online classes were one of the most creative and sincere students I taught. I still remember reading their well-written term papers and giving them feedback to make it better. Gradually TU embraced the online learning and shifted classes to teams, which continues now. This sudden shift to online classes brought somewhat a digital revolution in TU. Academics, who never used a computer for their own learning and teaching, had to learn and educate themselves. However, this digital revolution have somewhat been limited to delivering the same old style face to face lectures in virtual platform, which is a disaster as it does not engages the students. We seriously need to think about pedagogy of online classrooms.
Similar shift is happening in school education. I cannot say for others but, the way Soham has embraced online classes is a sight to see. I don't know how he is within face to face classroom. But online classroom is his playing field. He asks questions to teachers, sometimes too many. He expresses his disagreement or differences. And he volunteers to make powerpoint presentations. He follows up on his teacher in whatsapp asking " where is homework" via voice bytes and messages. Shubham, I think is tolerating and coping. Recently both boys had their mid-term assessment via open book exam. Both were sincere and worked hard.
Talking about my boys, it may not have been easy for them, with just a year of returning from Australia, from different education system and culture and adjusting to this new normal was not easy. Me and Dadhi have tried to ensure that their transition has been smooth, but they have had upheavals. Only consolation is a hope that, they have become more emotionally resilent. Earlier, one way I could make things better for them was with food, specially bakery items, scavenging in kathmandu to find out the best bakeries. I discovered 12 baskets in Nakku Dobato. They loved the muffines, breads and donuts. But with pandemic, we minimized bringing cooked food from outside. Then, I started baking with limited amenities, innovating and figuring out how to bake without a oven. As a mother, cooking healthy and tasty meals for my boys is one of the ways, I express my love and care. Since then, we have made momos, pizza, bread, scones, donuts, sel roti, cakes and many other delicacies at home. During this pandemic, I have become nearly perfect at making sel roti, figuring out the perfect combination of the batter, reflecting each time on the past mistake I have made. I have made masyoura, I have even made titaura of lapsi and amala. I didn't realize I had it in me to become a home maker like this, embracing the art of cooking, pickling and preserving. As a busy working women, I mostly relied on getting these things from outside as it saved my time and effort. I also embraced these as a strategy to look forward to each day as new with a promise to make and create something.
With pandemic, most of us working from home, creating a safe, peacefully and supportive environment at home is of utmost important. As family violence is rising worldwide, we all need to reflect how we are contributing to creation of this home environment. Things are not always easy for me, with engagement in teaching, writing publications and undertaking research works for different organizations. I tend to get stressed sometimes and I have not always managed it well. One of the way I dealt with these turbulations was sharing and venting with friends over coffee, having lost that I finally have connected with an online community.
Earlier this year, I had this crazy idea of group of women writers and research together hanging out every Sunday over cup of coffee, writing and guff stuffing in between. Gradually that group translated into a online platform. We started doing weekly reading discussions. Each discussions started with weekly check-ins sharing about our challenges and accomplishments. We appeared together in online discussions and seminars. And we even zoom bombed few of the Manels with ingenious names. We supported each other and cheered each other during our presentations and seminars. We lament, discuss and support each other via our messenger group. This same year, I had a major fall out with one of the feminist writers. I don't want to go over the details. I am not perfect, I have my own biases. While I tried to reflect on that and meet halfway ( which was not necessary in first place, as I self distanced with her and simply had reached out to her in relation to one professional engagement). She took that opportunity to slam me continuously in messenger starting early morning to mid-afternoon. While I continued to say, look if I hurt you I am sorry. But, she kept on attacking me. While I respect what she writes and contributes, this has made me realize I will be more careful translating appreciation into a meaningful friendship.
Friendship for me, has always been and will always have about each other. I realize I thrive best when I can support and receive support and motivation in return. Friendship for me is not space where I incessantly hear and talk about what's wrong with other people. It is a space for me to find solace and to give same in return for the highs and lows of life. And most importantly, I connect best with people who want to grow both inwardly and also in their career.
In addition to all this, inspired by my friend Pranika and her knitting experience, I started crocheting again, picking up the needle after nearly 15 years. I prefer crochet over the knitting needles. I find crocheting less intimidating and more flexible.During college years, inspired by industrious Anjana Chalise ( who studied home science and is now business owner at Silican Valley), I started knitting. Anjana would turn her torn jeans into bag, knitting bags out of Jute thread and still managed to look fashionable. I tried that, but results were disastrous. After one or two specimen of knitting, I stopped, as life got busier. Then, while I was in fieldwork in Nepal, my boys learnt knitting with help of our neighbour Wendy, who watched over them after school while Dadhi was working in Australia. I restarted a bit, but never had much time and stamina to continue as demands of PhD and taking care of boys was challenging. Little time I had in between, I would rather take a nap, or just watch a show in Netflix without wanting to move a muscle in my body.
Things changed this year. I realized at some point, I need to find a diversion away from social media, from my never ending research and writing engagements and from demands of being a mom. One fine day I travelled to Bhotahity and bought a big bag of wool of different colors. Boys started helping turning these loops of thread into a ball of wool. Even buwa, would help out to turn into balls. Sometimes, while basking in sun, I would see all my boys ( buwa, Dadhi, Shubham and Soham) each making a balls out of the wool, it was a sight to see these men working with wool. I chuckled and smiled with pride and now I regret not capturing that moment in camera but the image is struck in my memory forever. As I knit, I reflected, our life as a journey is similar to that of a wool. You start with a shapeless thread, you add a simple single stitch and then you keep on adding and find the momentum in which it grows itself. It is about trusting the process that it will grow, it will move and turn something into better. But not always.
Mistakes happen, threads get entangled, it is your decision whether to cut them off entirely or really work on them one by one finding each entanglement and untangle them with patience. which one you choose, depends on your mood and also the time you have. with the mistakes, you sometimes rectify immediately and mend it. Sometimes, you go too far with it, and you think, do you undo it all the way to back or just bear with it and move ahead. Or do you start a fresh project, with lessons from the past mistakes. Knitting now has become a place of zen and peace. I knit while I sit in the sun talking with buwa and boys. I knit watching the Korean drama in Netflix, another discovery, another place of comfort during this pandemic. And yes, this is a prompt now for me to write about K-Drama now :)
K-drama are clean, they move slowly, in each episode you get to know the character a bit more with back story. Romance never develops in first episode, you see glimmer of that sometime in the middle like episode 5 and 6 and it builds on. And Korean drama is always about food. At one point or the another, hero or heroine will tell to each other " eat up, food is getting cold", just like we Nepalese do. By now, I have learnt almost all tropes the drama use, I just smile and continue watching. As I do not watch these to deconstruct and tear apart. K-drama is like a comforting presence while I knit, a perfect companion.
Now, seems like post has become quiet long, I initially thought, I would just write a quick FB post on what a shitty year 2020 has been. It's a cliche but I realize, it has come with a lesson. It has made all of us to set our priorities straight, focus more on our health, both physical and even more mental: not just us in individual level but our families and people around us.
2021, I do not know what you will bring. Hoping, it will be a sens of hope. I know being a citizen of Nepal, access to vaccine is far fetched. But we cannot give up hope. As, hope is the only rope that keeps us holding during turbulent times.
Happy New Year to readers who read this patiently till now. Drop a note to share that you were here and share how 2020 has been for you. Take care and stay safe
