Category Archives: Kabuli Home

Mister BBC

I was walking around with my film camera .

Afghan boy: Hello! Hello! Mister BBC, How are you, I’m fine thank you (testing his English). Mister BBC! Mister BBC

Natasha: Mister? I’m not a man. I’m a woman (as though that was more important repudiating than the fact that I was not working for BBC!)

Afghan Teacher walks up to me, wrongly believing I was offended. Afghan teacher: I’m sorry miss. But you know these children they cannot speak English so they did not know.

Natasha: Oh yes of course! I was just joking with them. Afghan teacher does not understand me.

Afghan teachers asks: So who are you reporting for? BBC or AL-Jazeera? Natasha laughs.

Natasha replies: No none! I am filming for Aschiana.

Afghan teacher: For Our Aschiana?

Natasha: Yes! Your Aschiana!

English under the candle-light

Back in village Afghanistan, I had about 10 students. I used to teach 3 times a week at night time, after work. Some nights we had absolutely no electricity. So we would learn English under the candle light. My little girls – their eyes would twinkle, or squint when they cannot remember a word. We used to act out everything – as a way of learning – I told jokes situated with English grammar so they would pick up words easy. For example I would ask one of my students what is the name of a boy she hates most in school. Then we would construct sentences like “Farhat is an ugly boy” or “I dislike Farhat.” More complicated sentences using conjunctions would sound like ‘”I dislike Farhat because he is an ugly boy.” They would be so tickled by some of the sentences! Imagine all the secrets exchanged in an English lesson! For us, it was an opportunity to share and also to bond, trust developed. They learnt so quickly. And of course they were my teachers too.

We designed the living room as a theatrical space. All of us dressed up. Each had a character and had certain roles. We used props from the kitchen – stove, pans, utensil, wash basin – and the living area – pillow, books, even a gun! – . Part of the room was designed as a house, a school, a market and a hospital. All of us acted and the narrations and script were all in English.

“Mother is cooking in the kitchen. She is cooking bon jon rumi. She is angry because Yama is not doing his homework. Sunbol is going to school now. She is sad because father is in hospital. Mursal is washing clothes in the wash basin.”

These were sentences constructed using the theatrical space and props. Characters came alive. One boy, Shoiab confused the word watching with sleeping. So instead of saying “I am watching Tulsi (character from an Indian serial)”, he said “I am sleeping Tulsi” and goodness gracious me, not only was he later very embarrassed but the lesson had to end because nobody could stop laughing.

13th September Weekly Favourites

I am introducing a new feature on my blog. I shall be pasting some of my weekly favourites of blog entries, spiritual wisdom, book reviews and pretty things too.

1. Something I learnt about sadness, pain, or fear. Often, if you feel ‘I need to detach from my feelings of xx and yy’, you are creating a sort of attachment. That is an attachment to detachment, or non-feeling. My brother and I were talking about feelings of disconnect, separation, and sadness and how to deal with it. I know they are illusions. But they are actually guiding posts. When you feel low, you know you are not in synchrony with your higher purpose/self, your true nature. But instead of ‘detaching’ (attaching, in actuality), the better practice is Notice, Feel and then Keep silent. Acknowledge and let go.

2. Book Review: Heaven on Earth

3. Nipun Charity Focus: http://nipun.charityfocus.org/

4. Beautiful Pictures I took a few days ago in Cymru Wales:

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5. Live simply is important. And Give Fearlessly. If you hold upset or anger, send love and light to yourself, and to the person you feel disconnected with. Stay silent.

6. Tagore speaks: Then comes the conflict of our lesser man with our greater man, of our wishes with our will, of the desire for things affecting our sense with the purpose that is within our heart.  Then we begin to distinguish between what we immediately desire and what is good.  For good is that which is desirable for our greater self.  Thus, the sense of goodness comes out of a truer view of our life, which is connected view of the wholeness of the field of life, and which takes into account not only what is present before us but what is not, and perhaps never humanly can be.

–Rabindranath Tagore, in Sadhana

Gypsy hair and a back pack

I want to leave Singapore for a few days to go anywhere….I think the mountains on the back of an elephant. Or somewhere further, it doesn’t matter so long as it is nourishes me, darken or lighten my skin. My colours must change.

Two tasks and then I shall load my bag and get ready to go. I will leave end of February, early March. The destination will come to me. Actually it may be in my good fate that I have left already, I don’t know but someone sure does.

Salute,

Sahara xx

Reading: The Weary Traveller

Pet,

Where will I sway my skirt next? My feet are restless; these pazebs speak to me even before I have taken a step. Truly I feel like flying. I miss our conversations.

A few days ago it poured. So I rolled my jeans up, took off my slippers and walked to the station barefoot, wet in the rain. I remember in Europe after swimming in a cold waterfall, I walked back as it was halfway barefoot allowing the sun to dry me. Is this a way of existing with the what is?

My friend asked me ‘In dance, how do you get into character?’ So I said, ‘By first wearing the right skirt.’