this 20 year old girl is coming around our house to give the boys extra help with their homework. before meeting her bibek simply asked, "is she dangerous, didi?"

i looked at him and said, "yes, she's dangerous. very dangerous."

he said, "you don't know didi, some girls are SOOO dangerous."

yes, boy, yes they are.

teenagers. ah, they are really difficult.

san soraj has been all moody all the time.

today arjun said to me, "didi, i'm not a kid - i'm only a kid in your mind, but i'm not really a kid" to which i actually responded, "if you are not a kid, then stop acting like one!!!"

i feel really old! it's funny that during their adolescence i feel a wider gap in our communication than when they were in fact, just kids.

bibek n kaley

me n my boy - gotta love that he's wearing my headband!

the other day my kids were talking about people who care versus people who pretend to care. the list of people who actually cared totaled three - puja, sewa, and emma didi. then dorje actually said, "but i think some of ur friends in america care about us, don't they didi?" i said, 'yes, yes they do... and a few of them even named every one of you kids to me when i was home - which, i actually found very, very touching.... but they were definitely right that puja and sewa really do.... and evidence there of... my lovely friend just sent me this picture.. her interpretation of bibek, me and the 200 rps. bird! :) i especially like that bibek and i look so classy ;-). if only....... :) ahh! i love you!!! please come back from "austria".

bibek and his bahini, ashmita

Dorje: Didi, when i get big, I think I want your job.

Emma: And what's my job?

Dorje: I don't know but it must be a good one because you just lie in your bed all day and play on your computer!

I love him.

but just for clarification - i'm working, not playing! and we don't have heat or insulation in the walls - it's cold! and i've been sick!

but it was still really funny :)

the other night soraj, my oldest came home a little bit intoxicated.

this is the first time i've seen the kid on anything, and i must say, if i have to choose - i'd take soraj with a few drinks in him than any of my other kids on any other substance. just saying...

i don't know why, but intoxicated nepalis all want to speak in english. it's true no matter where in the country you go - if they know a little english, that's all you'll hear after a few glasses of raksi or chang. soraj is no different, and the funny kid kept saying to me, 'didi, i am english talking so perfect when ali kati jap (a little drunk). me never speaking so good english, but drinking time... so nice and champion english speaker. isn't it didi?"

uhm.

basically, he talked at me in a monologue for two hours about his woes in life, his concerns for the other kids and his concerns for me. and he said "thank you for everything, didi" about 48 times. when he wasn't saying thanks or worrying about the other kids he was sweetly saying "sorry for i'm drinking didi. so sorry for that. you give me sorry, okay? i'm working so much every day and looking these boys going bad way... my head is sooo.... oh my gosh... so hurting, didi."

yes, i get it. me too.

i honestly don't know what to say about my "feelings" about him being drunk. it's not the best of choices, but not the worst of either. the next morning he got up and went to work on time and lived up to all of his responsibilities. drinking is not setting the best of examples for the other kids who like to justify every action, but at the same time, my oldest has lived a lifetime of being the best example. sometimes he probably just wants a break.

during his slightly intoxicated state i asked, "WHEN is san soraj coming home?"

the story the kids gave me a few days ago was that san soraj was off in pamey village; a place about 40 minutes away from our house, visiting this auntie and uncle we knew when i first met the kids. they even went so far as to say, "yeah, even auntie and uncle are calling you there.... they want to see you too, didi."

but a few drinks in and the truth came out.

"oh didi! i did not like to tell you because you are so tension and san soraj is such a bad boy! always doing something bad! i don't know, didi where is that boy's mind?"

usko deemag arko sansar ma.

his mind is in another world. clearly.

"out with it - where is the boy?"

"didi, you know some days back, he went hunting...."

let me stop. hunting is a term probably not employed by the nepali community at large, but used regularly by my kids who also say things like "jacking" for stealing. it's a term they say when they mean someone's gone to look for free growing marijuana; which occurs in mass quantities in nepal, hence the reason getting my kids to quit full stop is an almost impossible task.

"....and?"

"...and....." soraj was reluctant, "he is in jail didi! him and five boys together going to jail. i thinks one day before you are coming."

brilliant.

"but didi, i thinks we leave him in jail, he's not smoking marijuana and becoming a good boy."

"sor - get real man! you don't think he can get drugs in jail??"

"no didi... when i was in jail there were no drugs."

i know the jail sagas of all my other kids; i've been there during all of those sagas... but soraj? this was news to me.

"when were you in jail??"

"didi, i thinks i was 8 years old. maybe. i don't know why. i'm sleeping in road and then they are putting me in jail. me thinks, there was no drugs there didi. but you know didi? first time i am smoking ganja? i am just 5 years old!" he got a scorn on his face, "now i think that time and i am so angry.... why i am smoking so young??? this choice is making my whole life going to bad, didi."

regrets, we all have them.

i did a little research on my current jailbird and came to find out san soraj was in the district jail; a bit more serious than the other locations.... trial pending. instead of rushing out there the very next day, i decided to think through my plan of action. according to my go-to guy when it comes to street kid dilemmas, x told me san soraj could be facing a long, long sentence because of stricter laws these days.

fast forward to last night.

san soraj with a very short haircut walked into the house and told me his sob story of why and how he got arrested.

"and they just let you out?"

"yeah, didi."

"well, at least you got a free haircut out of the whole thing," i joked after our long heart to heart.

"no didi, this haircut cost 5,000 rupees ($80). my friend's mother came and she is paying for all guys to go out. when i become a rich man, i will pay her back."

"so, basically, you are never paying her back?"

"ha ha. didi!"

5,000 rupees is a monthly salary for a nurse in nepal. it's a lot of money. multiplied times how many ever kids this woman bailed out of jail...she did something i don't think i would have done.

i don't really know if my san soraj will ever learn. i truly have very little faith he will. the offspring of an alcoholic mother, he's genetically predisposed to a lot of problems, he is very slow at grasping any concepts, all probably aggrevated by his own early drug/alcohol use.

sometimes i wonder, is it christ-like to love someone without actually expecting God to change their lives? is there real love in that? is it possible to have love without hope?

i've had certain sentiments about returning to nepal that i can only equate to what it must be like for an educated nepali living abroad for a number of years to come back.

there is a level and type of frustration distinct to this scenario. it's different than a normal westerner who just can't adapt to the surroundings. it's birthed more out of love than disgust or lack of understanding. it's not a patronising kind of frustration, it's a "why? why?! why are you still toiling away in your same old habits and same old ways and not growing and changing and becoming more refined?? i want to see you prosper,... i want to see you be the best you can be...because i love you.." okay, that's not fair to say exactly, because in some ways nepal has grown and changed before my very eyes in the last 7 years, but still... that's how one may feel. frustration out of love is something i have both for this land and for my kids.

frustration out of love. i kind of like this concept.

on one side, you don't want to leave the thing you love. you think you can pour everything you have into it and make it better - because you love it (or in the kid situation, love them) and you want it to get better. you want to nurture it in the state that it's in because, after all, it did give you life. nepal and my kids did that for me.

sometimes i ponder how or who i would've been had nepal or these boys come into my life. it's so unreal and in all of their craziness, i am forever in debt to both this country and my kids. when i talk about nepal i say things like "we do this..." or "we do that..." and i'm not talking about america or in the west... i'm talking about us; the nepali people and me. :) i am pretty sure my subconscious thinks i am part nepali. after seeing the changes that occured within me after working in a ghetto in the US, i used to tell people i was born in suburban america but grew up in the ghetto.. i guess now i could say, i was born in the suburbs, grew up in the ghetto but matured in nepal. or something like that.

so coming back to the present, the initial thoughts have been nothing more than wanting to leave this country and all of its shortcomings. to leave my kids to the devices they so love to . to abandon it all. at least for some time...and just a warning, i'm not saying i won't. anything is possible and if there is one thing i know about myself, it's that even i don't know my next move. ever.

there is a six hour overcrowded van ride on windy mountain roads between kathmandu and pokhara. i cried a little leaving kathmandu because i just wasn't ready to deal with my life as a surrogate mother of crazy teenage boys. let's just say there is a part of me that is just very tired of it all. i love them, but it's been a good number of years that whether far or near they've been the centre of my world, and nearly every decision i've made has involved their well-being. i guess that's what mothers do, but there is always a little part of me that doesn't want that role. i love them, but i don't want to be in charge of their lives. this is just me being honest.

so back to the van ride. the driver left without getting a full tank and thus we ran out on the side of the road, and waited for one hour to get petrol delivered so we could continue the journey. this would be okay if about 1/3 of the time i take this ride something didn't happen. political problems, buses breaking down, etc etc etc... it never ends and the six hour ride is often more like 10.

when i got off my plane a nepali man from a simple background began talking to me on the shuttle from the runway to the airport. unsolicited, he informed me, "madam, nepal is an underdeveloped country, but i blame it only on ourselves. we are mismanaging."

i think that's why overseas returnee nepalis become so frustrated with the Way Things Are. because we know the problems, we know how things should be, yet we can't seem to figure out how to fix them... and instead we continue to drum on in our same ways as if there is some kind of universal force compelling us to do so in The Same Old Way. nepal does it in its political endeavors and its development plans, my kids do it in their still street style choices, and i do it in my personal life.

the petrol running out mid trip scenario was a small catastrophe but one large enough to send me headfirst into stream of thoughts of How Do I Escape. Plotting and planning... this was the frame of mind in which i arrived at home.... but then... ah... i saw my kids... and remembered how much they mean to me... and how although it's nothing big, the taste of my everyday life with them is so rich, so full of love...

dorje is my most self-conscious, insecure kid of the bunch. he hardly even knows how to talk to me, never looks anyone in the eye and is always worried about talking for the fear of being misunderstood. he doesn't know how to express him self in the least. so the boy lingered around my room last night telling me some random information about his life from the last few months. basically he was complaining about how my absence made his life rather difficult, and of course i felt bad about that.

then he said, "didi, when you left nepal, our lives are so not good. don't leave nepal again! don't leave us!!!"

what can a girl say to that?