Our chain of thankfulness: very pastel, very happyhappyjoyjoys, very fun.

...couldn't resist

Jottings on Postcolonialism

Here is one of the compulsory weekly journal entries I wrote for my Postcolonial lit class. I don't know if you'll be able to make head or tail of it, but hopefully it might give a hint of what the course has involved (and why I've loved it!).

Wk 3 – Danticat – We are Ugly But We are Here, Guevara's The Motorcycle Diaries, Bhaba.

I danced in the rain on Monday night.

On Tuesday I ate pancakes at 8am in the morning. I took my sister breakfast in bed and she was very happy.*

On Wednesday we bought a new packet of Earl Grey tea (Nature's Cuppa, the one and only). It smelt good and the whole household was content.

On Thursday I drank some beer. I didn't get a free lunch.

But on Friday I got free sushi and sand between my toes.

On Saturday I played an epic game of 500. 22 rounds, 3 hours.

On Sunday I played soccer in the park and sang in a silly voice to Mika.

That was my week (or one impression of it at least). I also reflected on stuff I read [finally!]:

I enjoyed the Motorcycle Diaries but it wasn't as substantial as I'd imagined it might be. It seemed to be little more than just two guys rambling around South America surviving on nothing but the hospitality of locals and enjoying it where they could. I would have liked to hear more about their experience of the leper colonies and a little more of the development of their thinking regarding communism, power to the oppressed and stuff. I did like the bit where they'd managed to get first class fares on a ship, but then concluded that they connected better with – and enjoyed more – the sailors anyway.

I really liked Danticat's piece. Wished it was longer! Her pithy observation regarding Haiti “economics and politics are intrinsically related; who is in power determines to a great extent whether or not people will eat” spoke volumes about her experience, and that of the people of Haiti. I liked the strong feminist overtones, introduced and then threaded through with the story of Anacona amongst the reflections on the other women in her life. It is confronting, even devastating, but there is still a beauty in the strength and hope expressed in their catch cry “we are ugly, but we are here.” There is a real solidarity and honesty about it. Life is hard, but it is still worth celebrating the fact that they have survived another day together. The ending expresses more of the concept of the circularity of life; as her grandmother believed: “if a life is lost, then another one springs up replanted somewhere else, the next life even stronger than the last.” They exist through memory in an endless circle of power and endurance.

Bhaba [Postcolonial theorist] was pretty dense. It took me forever to get through the shorter article (Of Mimicry and Man) and I barely touched the other. I did really like that idea of the colonisers keeping the colonised in a bondage of mimicry: they would give them a dose of the Christian faith, or of 'civilisation', what it meant to be a gentleman, etc, but just a limited amount that would prevent them from being able to be fully 'civilised' (in their terms) or a free Christian. I could see some of this in King's stuff from the week before – how there was this writing and rewriting of what it meant to be Indian which ended up being a lose-lose situation for them.

When we went over it in class, I grasped more of what Bhaba was meaning by hybridity and ambivalence. The coloniser is in an alien world with an imagined picture of their old world, writing the image of the colonised. The colonised meets them in the middle of these images – it is not all on the one side but an exchange that grows into something new. Some ideas of postcolonialism rely on traditional manichaean dichotomies, but these don't honestly represent the situation. There is a blending. Also, if it is defined with regards to possessions and lacks; with this understanding it becomes evident that everyone possesses and lacks different things, and so there are no longer dichotomies.

*I made that one up. Or Skye did. Don't remember. She wishes it happened...

I might try and tell you about my favourite books from the course soon.. & bug you to read them!

the day I died and other stories

Twas the night of our housewarming, several moons ago (ok maybe two), right on 6pm (the official party-beginning time) and I was in my room preparing myself to receive guests( ie trying to find clean clothes to wear) when I hear a knock at the door. And a strange voice.

"Hi, I'm a friend of Josiah's, I was meeting up with him here". Oh ok. Didn't know Josiah was coming tonight. And inviting a friend. Random.

One of my friendly housemates invites him in. He takes a seat and they make awkward conversation.
I come out, introduce myself, sit down. The penny still hasn't dropped.
Conversation begins again, I look away, and all of a sudden I'm being poked in the arm with a plastic card by mystery man.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh!!! That means he's my assassin*. That means I'm dead. Why the heck did they let him in?!?!?!?!?!

That was my head voice.
In reality I wailed 'oh no!', laughed dolefully, and offered him a drink. He declined, and took himself off soon afterwards, the dirty deed accomplished.

Apart from the grisly start, it was a great night.

There was sushi:

And fire:

(photo courtesy of Em)

The other stories?

Well, we had a Passover celebration, with as much Jewish tradition as we could muster. Rich and thought-provoking.


And our clothesline got squashed by a giant branch:

(photo courtesy of Mandie)

I should really have a good rave about Postcolonial literature and lamb-eating and bike-riding and QUIDDITCH. especially quidditch.
Maybe another time..


*uni-wide game of Assassin. You kill your target by hunting them down and touching them with a card.