the ugly earring

Several months ago, someone told me the North Hollywood Thai Temple offered Thai language classes on the weekend. On this rainy day Sunday, I attended my first ‘”Thai for Beginners” class.Much of my ambition to excel in school and master the English language came from watching my mother struggle. My mother cannot read or write. Simple things such as writing checks, reading labels on food products and subtitles on films, or filling out job applications are difficult for her. Growing up, my brother and I taught her many lessons we had learned in grade school.

Having come from a family where money was always tight, the possibility of attending college or even a university served as a fantasy. I worked hard through high school, and was determined to continue my education even though my parents were suggesting that after high school a job as a secretary or a bank teller would be most ideal.

However, I wanted to attend a college where students wore backpacks on both shoulders, rode bicycles and read textbooks on a grassy knoll. That was the life I imagined and not the one that my parents had suggested. So, while many in my age group were contending with hormone overload, I competed with the science nerds for an A in physics and that 4.0. The dedication paid off when I was awarded a four-year scholarship to Arizona State University, one of the top-rated party schools in the country.

Initially the role of a photojournalist for National Geographic was swimming in my head. It sounded like a good plan since I enjoyed taking pictures and writing poetry. But, when a journalism professor suggested that I remove “the fluff” from my writing I changed my major to English and began obsessing over the idea of joining the Peace Corps. It wasn’t until after fulfilling the necessary paperwork and attending the consultations when someone pulled me aside and suggested that I do additional research on what “really” happens when one joins the Peace Corps. What was uncovered was a rather dark reality of vulnerable situations and that the motives I had for traveling to a foreign country to teach were completely different from the ones on their agenda. That daydream was sacked, but the desire to give back never died.

The first time I went to Thailand, I was around 24 and had never known my mother’s family except in photo albums and the photos my father had taken before they were married. After a sleep-deprived, 12-hour flight and a long line at customs, my uncles, aunts and cousins met my mother and me in the waiting room. My mother had not seen her family for nearly 10 years and the reunion was joyful, tear-stained and awkward since I so desperately wanted to communicate but didn’t speak the language.

As the trip progressed, shame formed a knot in my gut. I felt responsible that I didn’t know the Thai language, and as a result, I couldn’t laugh at their jokes, listen to their stories or share secrets without confessing them to my mother for translation. Though several basic phrases were taught to me, we spent most of the time communicating in other ways. We pointed out things, which would incite laughed or introspection. We relied on body language. My uncle’s poverty appeared in the hard lines on his face and hands, and his ability to leave a crowd and return with a caterpillar wrapped in a banana leaf or a rice bug for the little nephews to eat. My moody disposition revealed itself in my aunt’s temper, and she even had the same, slightly crooked eye as mine. At night, I shared a concrete floor with my cousins. In fact, together we owned the buzz of mosquitoes, the humid summer and the loneliness of the jungle. Other family members taught me how to cook and how to avoid the water snakes lurking in the rice patties during our walks. And though the communication was an obstacle, I still managed to fall in love with a family I had never known and a culture that was so unlike the one I was raised in.

Upon returning to the US, my old self returned. Walls, Barriers, Fear. Though my mother’s family had nothing—barely running water or electricity—they had so much more of the very things that have dwindled from American culture. Compassion, Family, Community. Having to rely on the land for food or a neighbor’s charity when there was no money, my family displayed the very essence of the human condition. Instead of striving for selfish motives and gain, they simply lived in harmony with the land and their community. In many ways, they are richer even though they live in an impoverished, third world country.

And so begins this new blogging journey. I braved the rain on the 101 to learn Thai. I figure, if I want to move to Thailand I have to take the steps to make it happen, or it never will. This Thai language class is a first step. And, I’m not alone. A handful of characters in the class, mainly 40-something year old men, also posses a similar ambition to return to Thailand either to marry a Thai woman or to trade this material existence for something more organic. But, first we must work. On this Sunday morning, we sat in a classroom with children’s drawings and the Thai alphabet taped to the wall and struggled as we recited our consonants and vowels.