Try Try Try 10,000 Years Nonstop

Life is often mundane no matter where you are or what you are doing. For me it is a struggle to not let myself get taken over by the ease and banality of routine. So many parts of the day become a series of habitual actions. I recently read that habits, once formed, are incredibly difficult to break because once they have been established they require very little brain activity. This doesn’t just apply to “bad” habits but to anything that is done consistently on a regular basis. If, like me, you’ve ever had that moment, upon reaching school or work, where you somehow don’t even remember the process of getting there, perhaps this science on habits can help explain why that is. At least I hope so. You know you drove, walked, or rode your bike, but where you turned or stopped have become such second nature that your brain has decided that it doesn’t really need to pay much attention. And there is something comforting, reassuring even, about having a particular cadence to your day. To your life. A steady rhythm to exist by. It is nice to not have to think all the time. Your brain clearly agrees with this, as it has apparently figured out how to half-ass its way through its central function. But daily, or perhaps even lifelong habituation can have its drawbacks. Being a cog in the machine of your own body has its limitations. It prevents you from seeing. It prevents you from doing. Then again, sometimes it can make things easier. Just go through the motions. Sometimes what you see sucks. Sometimes you lose a lot through the act of doing. In which case maybe life as a series of habits, whatever they may be, allows people to be, to exist, even if not to live in the fullest sense of the word. But who does that anyway? What does that even mean?

I was trying not to take you all down my own slightly solipsistic, overtly self-indulgent processing but I’m just going to tell you now that I can’t seem to change directions. I’m just going to go ahead and let my internal monologue escape through my fingers. There is a story in here somewhere though, I promise. But first, forgive me as I work through a few things. For me right now this involves my struggle with trying to understand the injustice, sorrow, hardship, and downright unfairness of what goes on in this world and how people manage to continue to keep on keeping on. Life, under an endless number of incomprehensible conditions, continues to be lived, even when I want to stick my fingers in my ears, scrunch my eyes tightly shut and hide under the covers and pretend that it doesn’t. But for whatever reason I can’t seem to do that. To return to the idea of habits, maybe it is this habitual nature of existence that allows people to endure lifetimes filled with hardships. A life of hardships. In which case maybe our brains are doing us a favor.

In working on an expression of interest in the hopes of securing funding to implement an HIV/AIDS program I found myself reading about the Badi community in the western Tarai (plains) region of Nepal. The Badi are a Hindu Dalit (untouchable) sub-caste. They are untouchable except in one incredibly disconcerting way; Badi women are essentially hereditary prostitutes. Sadly, over the years this practice has only become more entrenched, particularly since the 1950s due to various social, political, and economic changes. What I ended up writing about did not relate to this community. But now I know about it. I will always know about it.

The situation for women is but one of many areas that I find myself thinking about frequently these days. Last week, after being accused of being a witch, a woman was burned alive. The tradition of women not being allowed into the house when they are menstruating continues in pockets throughout the country. For that week they must live without adequate provisions in a tiny hut, often barely big enough to lie down in. During a cold spell this winter one teenage girl stuffed her blanket under the bottom of the door to keep the wind out. There were no windows. She died of suffocation. These are just a few of the stories that show up in the paper regularly. And for whatever horrific tale of injustice makes it into the national media, the injustice filled realities of daily life for so many people are just that. Life. Nothing newsworthy. These things are sad. I’m okay with being sad. And I don’t want to belie the fact that much is being done in this country, and that there are many people who dedicate their lives to end these archaic practices and work towards social justice and giving people agency in their lives. I also don’t want to give the impression that Nepal is particularly backwards or barbaric. It’s just got its issues, as do we all. I suppose for some reason I’ve just been compelled to seek these issues out here instead of at home or somewhere else. Maybe part of me thought it would be easier to keep myself at a distance because it is foreign to me. And to some extent that may be true. But in the end people are people. Suffering is suffering.

I came here with the intent to work on issues of education, but I find myself pulled in so many directions. In a country facing so many problems it becomes increasingly difficult to maintain focus and not become overwhelmed by the sheer vastness and depth of the palpable suffering, struggles, and discrimination that define so many people’s lives here. It is thick and dense and suffocating at times. But their weight is not my weight. Their story is not my story. Their life is not my life. I can only soldier on and help fight the battles that I am asked to help fight. Help share the stories I am asked to share. My own personal burdens are of the privileged kind. They are born out of a good education, the encouragement to question and think critically, and the knowledge that has been instilled in me of my own value. I of course have my limits. I belong to a short, neurotic, over thinking, anxiety-ridden clan. But unlike the situation for many people here, with proper therapy, obsessive self-analysis, and the option of medication I can cast off my dental floss shackles. So, in what is certainly not a purely altruistic way, I feel like I have to at least try to work towards some sort of positive change and do what I can to not make too many mistakes along the way. I will always try to be culturally sensitive, but I can’t buy into blind cultural relativism. There are some things that I refuse to say are okay, no matter the context.

I have recently found myself regularly thinking of the First Noble Truth in Buddhism that life is suffering. It most certainly is. But I have also been thinking about a saying that I happened upon by Zen master Seung Sahn Sunim. “Try try try 10,000 years nonstop.” So I guess I will keep trying. Maybe I can make a habit out of it. Try for myself. Try for others. Try for 10,000 years. It often feels like trying to sweep a dirt floor. But if you’ve ever seen a dirt floor that has not been swept you realize that it is not futile.

Okay, let me now return to where I started. So, as mentioned, breaking habits is hard. Taking yourself out of your comfort zone is hard. Made harder still by the fact that your comfort zone eventually modifies to your new surroundings, and your mind seems hardwired to gravitate towards forming new habits. But if you don’t let yourself get too comfortable, don’t let yourself be lured in, to relax into new habits, you may stumble into some interesting situations you would never have before. Maybe even start thinking in new ways. (Sorry brain.)

Even in Nepal – where entire villages could be built with the cast off stones that failed plans had been set in – I have still managed to establish a set of habits and routines that I mindlessly go through. But, as the only way to survive here is to go with the flow and allow for changes in one’s routines, I sometimes find myself in completely unexpected situations. Such was the case last Saturday.

After agreeing to come in to work on our day off to finish up the expressions of interest, we showed up at the office at 7:30am. We were then informed that a field trip had been arranged and we were going to go to Nepalgunj, a border town 3-5 hours (depending on the driver and road taken) southwest of Tulsipur. I would not describe my initial reaction as being one of excitement. More of a mild irritation that I often get when I have not done the appropriate mental preparation required to handle the different cultural idiosyncrasies I will inevitably face throughout my days here. Once I had a moment to accept the altered plan I was fine with it. In fact, the idea of getting out of Tulsipur for a day was actually kind of nice. And I very much appreciated the effort made by BASE’s executive director on our behalf. The whole trip was planned for the sole purpose of helping us gather more information and contextualize our research.

And so we were off. Over the hills out of the Dang valley, and down to Nepalgunj where the air is so dry that the earth seems to suck the moisture from your every part of your body - from your eyeballs down to your toes - in order to replenish itself.

There were two objectives to our trip. The first was to go to a Community Care Center (CCC) for people living with HIV/AIDS and the other, much less assured (but way cooler) objective, was to visit a prison. We arrived in Nepalgunj around 12:30 and parked on the side of the main road while we waited for further instruction on how to get to the CCC. We sat on a bench trying to shade ourselves from the hot southern sun. The dust on the road was kicked up in flurries that never had time to settle back to the ground as cars, rickshaws, and horse drawn carts weighted down with people constantly streamed past on their way to and from the India Nepal border.

It wasn’t long before we were back in the jeep for the two minute ride down a small side street to the CCC. Inside the center we learned about the work they did and the services they provided. With so few options, the work they do is incredibly important. I had already read about the lack of treatment and testing facilities for people with HIV/AIDS in Nepal, and this was only made clearer during our visit. Overall, the experience was interesting, heartbreaking, educational, and frustrating. About what I was expecting.

As we got back into the jeep it was looking less and less likely that we were going to make it to a prison. As networks were being mobilized and favors called in we drove around town a little bit before stopping again on the side of a road to wait for a final decision. Waiting is an activity in and of itself in Nepal. Probably the most popular one. It spans all ages, genders, and classes. It is also a skill. I’m not good at it. It’s as if I don’t know where to put my hands. But I am practicing. And so we waited. We stood under an awning. We were the entertainment for some local children. They were waiting too. We aren’t very entertaining. Before leaving a girl ran up and gave us each a piece of gum. That gesture was just what I needed at that moment.

To my amazement we were eventually told that we had been given permission to go to the prison, and the prison was awesome. Upon arrival we were led through the front gate to a little open air waiting area where we were told to wait. We waited. A bubbly woman wearing white capri pants and a t-shirt came in and sat down. She spoke with our companions in Nepali for a minute and then said something in English. Wonderfully understandable English. It turned out that she was a prisoner there. Had been for the past five years. She has one more to go. Only had a three year sentence, but four more were added on because she couldn’t pay the fine. She told us about prison life. Mostly how it was for the women. How she was allowed to go to the market and shop for herself and the other women using the 45 rupees per day that the government provided for them. How they cooked together. How she had taught them to bake. How much they liked Chinese food and soy sauce. How when her back was hurting she managed to get a chiropractor to come to the prison every Wednesday and give them all massages. How some inmates saved the money they got from the government so they could send it to their families on the outside. At some point she excused herself for a moment so she could answer her cell phone, her mom was calling.

I had imagined that the prison was going to be fascinating. I hadn’t anticipated that I would have left happier than I had come in. This isn’t to say that the prison conditions are great, or even good for that matter, especially for the men. Only that you never know what are going to be the experiences that will stick with you forever, but so far it seems that many of them happen when you allow yourself to be taken in unanticipated directions. When you break your habits or let them be broken for you.