Thanksgiving

Today is Thanksgiving in the United States, and yet another Eid here in the UAE.  Eid-ul-Adha marks the traditional Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca, where millions of Muslims circle the temple in Saudi Arabia ,

as well as when goats are sacrificed to remember the prophet Ibrahim's willingness to sacrifice his son at the command of Allah.  The goats are sacrificed to symbolize the willingness of Ibrahim to do Allah's bidding, but the sacrifice is also an act of thanksgiving as well, because Allah did not require Ibrahim's son and replaced the boy with a goat at the penultimate moment.
Quite a similar story to Thanksgiving, a time when turkeys are sacrificed (all right, outright inhumanely slaughtered) to celebrate the bounty as a reminder of everything we have to be thankful for.  This entire week I have been remembering Thanksgivings past.  Perhaps the better phrase is "haunted by" Thanksgivings past, like a mashed-potato loving Ebenezer Scrooge.

Here's a quick recap of some of my bad Thanksgivings:  last year, my dad couldn't see how easy it would be to push Mom's recliner (she was post-operative) to the Thanksgiving table, even though we all knew (or at least thought) it would be Mom's last Thanksgiving; I told my family I was an atheist at the Thanksgiving table; I wished Jay McCoy (absolutely ruined by Alzheimer's) a happy Thanksgiving, then I agreed with him that buckwheat pancakes couldn't be beat; I joined my dad in a Convict Thanksgiving (we were searched for any type of metal); I watched the brother of my new found friend Shannon slip into a coma (he had brain cancer) on a Thanksgiving night.  I know that I can't always see the bright side of things, but the Thanksgiving holiday hasn't been good to me for 17 years...until last year. (Yes, the same last year as the chair dust-up with my father.)

Last year, my sister and I went shopping with her two kids, Kobe and Destiny.  They were confronted with a choice:  run around the store with me or drive the shopping cart.  Destiny chose to go with me, Kobe chose the shopping cart.  Kobe lost.  Because I wasn't pushing the shopping cart.  Destiny and I roamed the store (which was a big one), with the only rule being that she couldn't turn down an aisle unless I was right behind her.  I taught her that she shouldn't take the first thing she picked in  the produce section, that she had to open egg cartons before buying them. I lifted her up to so she could grab a can of pineapple from the top shelf, and I demonstrated the subtle difference between cranberry sauce and jellied cranberries (ok...so my sister Jennie did that, for both of us.  Don't ruin the moment.).

Days like today, all I think about is that difference: how we are slightly different from each other, and how much that doesn't matter.  Gelid, slightly cooked, solid: we are all cranberries.  Soft and sour, we naturally lack sugar.  That sugar, that grace, comes from others:  the sweetness of relationships overrides our innate bitterness.  And though I am more bitter than most, I thank all of you for being my sugar.  Enjoy Thanksgiving.  Eid Mubarak! 

Losing my Mother, Finding the Dubai Museum, Random Thoughts

I haven't written anything because I have been so annoyed with the fact that uploading a picture takes so long, and I am such a visual person.  But, it really is time that I do write something, even if it's only for me.

Last Thursday morning, I found out my mother died after a year long battle with cancer. 

This is my mother with her grandkids.  Along with a home of her own, all she has ever said was that she wanted grandchildren.  I wasn't going to give them to her (c.f. Kathy), so it was up to my sister.  And here they are with her.  My mother and I were very similar in that we hate to have our picture taken, but you can't fake that smile.  She is happy, and she is gray, and she is cancer ridden.

I found out about her death after having a really good time with one of my GMAT classes:  we went to Jumeirah beach, had a few cocktails, and they all talked about what they wanted in life.  I could only think about what I wish I hadn't done in life.  But that's just me. 

This is what one of the hotels looks like there.

Anyway, after Security kicked us off the beach, we all went back to Sumurti's house for a final cocktail.  After some vague "I'll call you"s and "what's your email"s, I left with a light heart and an eye towards...alright, I can't actually finish that with a straight face.  I mean, I was in a staring contest with being 35 years old, and 35 was winning.  When I got home (don't ask me what time...don't ever ask me what time), I checked my email, and there it was.  The death announcement.  The "sorry" and the "tell you this" and everything seemed so clinical and cold even thought I know it wasn't meant that way.  It was clinical and cold because I have been clinical and cold throughout my mother's death.  (And yes, this last year has been her death.)

I didn't go to work on Thursday (obviously), and on Friday, my birthday (hooray 35), I decided that I would find the Dubai museum, regardless of the cost, time, and/or effort.

I found it.

Dubai's Museum is built on the ruins of a fort raised on a creek.  This is the only watchtower that is left.  In the 60's, Dubai's central government razed all of the pre-existing buildings to pave the way for progress.  This tower is the only one left.  Anything else in Dubai that looks/feels old is a replicate, a doppelganger, a fake.

 

The museum was entirely representative...meaning that there were very few artifacts, but a lot of creepy mannequins.  This particular couple was intended to show how tools were forged.  I was more concerned with the fact that they were knee deep in sand:  who put them there, how would they get out, and forget the sweatshops of Nike et. al., this just seems cruel.

After leaving the museum, I went walking around the area and found this mosque.  I found it right as evening ablutions began, and I'm pretty sure I lost an eardrum when they started.  Prayers are broadcast over loudspeakers (I'm assuming Bose, because they are that good) and because of where I was standing, I got the initial soundwave, as well as the reverberation coming off the buildings behind me.

Ears bleeding, eyes watering, and the taste of being 35 years old burning my mouth, I went home.  This is what I saw there:

 

That's chinese:  Wo Ai Ni means "I love you."  The cryptographs below the letters are the numbers 1-10.  I have a foreign language written on my walls.  

Sometimes, I think I have a foreign language written on my heart.  Sometimes I think my failure is I can't touch people because they are foreign to me.  Sometimes I think sunsets are finite and I should watch more of them.  Sometimes I think reading saves me.  Sometimes I feel so foreign in my own skin.  Sometimes I wish I could dance.  Sometimes I think I don't matter.  But then I have a night like tonight:  greeted by such a variety of people, people of all walks of life who relate to me, who know me, who enjoy me.  So I tell myself Wo Ai Ni.  And I tell you:  Wo Ai Ni.