don't hit your friend, don't steal from your friend, be nice and the whole world will smile
I write this email from an underground hotel in
I love the story and myth behind Starwars and it is surreal to come to the desert that Luke and Annakin grew up in and wanted to escape. So far I don’t want to escape but we shall see. There are lots of pictures stuck in Chanda's camera and I look forward to posting them at www.timcampionbrown.com what a convenient web address!
Chanda and I are quite the traveling team: negotiating with taxis, louages (minibuses), and salespeople (almost exclusively men). I return to
So I am almost finished law school at the U of O just one last paper. It is about corporate social responsibility and the roles that corporations play in the human rights standard setting and regulation process. If that sounds vague, it is because I am still working on the focus. Hopefully, by the time I send this email the focus will be clear in my head.
We had a good time by the coast and drank lots more “café directs” (espresso with milky foam). I have had enough of beaches at least until I can find an English book.
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Hamam:
And of course the question on everyone’s mind is “how was the Hamam?” Hamam, you ask? A hamam is apparently like a Turkish bath although I didn’t find that description helpful either. Basically, it is heated steam room, where you scrape skin off of your self as you sweat and then you throw water buckets on top of your head. It is a little frightening seeing how much skin comes off. Chanda says that the amount of skin coming off shows how dirty we are. I personally think that the skin belongs on my body.
But the piece de resistance is the massage. I love massages and I indulged in them in
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Who knows who arrived first? Was it the man who took a bench seat and ordered a meal and then a beer? Did the woman come in after, and seek out a seat - with a view of, but a distance from, the front door? Did she notice him on the way to the table or was she just relieved to get off of the street into a relaxed setting?
Or did the woman take up her strategic position in the back corner of the restaurant first? Maybe the man came in and brazenly took up a seat with only a table - a chair - a small divider -another bench seat - and her table - to divide them?
Maybe it will help if I describe them. He: 40ish, Asian, eyes that could smile easily and the lines to prove it, perched on a chair, full of action but relaxed in repose. She: late 30s, blonde-brown hair, smiley but fatigued from the calls of the street and the stress of work, travelling to meet with the local affiliate, now in a space of respite from the street.
They each drank from green bottles of beer. Maybe he had already eaten or else he would eat later. She ordered a plate of some sort: rice, maybe with some meat.
But of course this is all background to the topic at hand: relationship?
His eyes as already described looked quick to laugh as he peered around the restaurant. His glance brushing against a poster (of the Asahi Beer woman, strangely incongruous in this Tunisian Chinese restaurant) must have met her gaze once. At least once. Did it linger? Who can know? Perhaps, she was the one who caught him in her vision and transformed him from stranger to potential comforter.
There is something about this transformation, when one of the other millions of people sharing the earth with us, steps out of the line and smiles or frowns or shares an emotion. An emotion that comforts or challenges. Tells us of an inner depth, a possibility.
I should say the restaurant was completely empty except for me and two other expats, and the servers and presumably some sort of cook in the back. I know little more, but I imagine that in an effort to connect they would have shared a smile and perhaps commented on the food or the weather, perhaps asked about the day.
I imagine that he joins her at her table. She clears a space for him to place down his beer. He interjects with a claim that her kindness is unnecessary. They smile again and pause. What next? The pause lingers.
Then both speak at once. Another moment of pause and then she begins to talk. She talks of her day or life or perhaps the challenge of travelling alone in a strange country. He listens intently without hearing a word but with hearing a tone. Her voice soothes. He feels the hairs at the back of his head perk and goose bumps running down his spine. She pauses at his silence and he smiles to encourage her to go on.
She continues with more confidence and faster speech to tell her stories - to connect to another human being - in a way that has been impossible since her trip began. He is nodding but she realizes he is not following. She slows again and asks a question. He smiles broadly and gestures her to continue.
She asks if he speaks English.
He responds with "English"
She tries, "francais, espanol, arabic?"
"Francais, oui, je parle francais..." he says clearly and rapidly, far to rapidly for her school french.
She remember just a few phrases and a bit of Spanish, "un petit peu lentement".
He nods and continues at a slower pace to introduce himself and to tell her of his day. Now his voice speaks of a rythm that connects to her in an unexpected way. She attempts to catch as many words as she can. The story of his day relates to his work and travel that is certain but he is speaking of something familiar to her.
He slows down and stops. She realizes that there is another awkward pause and she fills it with
"oui, oui."
Silence continues. He drinks. She picks at her food. They smile again.
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I imagine that they had a night of passionate love. I imagine that they had a night of sharing and stayed up late talking. I hope at least that they were able to connect. That is why we live and that is why I noticed that man and that woman in a Chinese restaurant in Tunis, Tunisia.
OTTAWA — As many as half of the aboriginal children who attended the early years of residential schools died of tuberculosis, despite repeated warnings to the federal government that overcrowding, poor sanitation and a lack of medical care were creating a toxic breeding ground for the rapid spread of the disease, documents show.
A Globe and Mail examination of documents in the National Archives reveals that children continued to die from tuberculosis at alarming rates for at least four decades after a senior official at the Department of Indian Affairs initially warned in 1907 that schools were making no effort to separate healthy children from those sick with the highly contagious disease.
Peter Bryce, the department's chief medical officer, visited 15 Western Canadian residential schools and found at least 24 per cent of students had died from tuberculosis over a 14-year period. The report suggested the numbers could be higher, noting that in one school alone, the death toll reached 69 per cent.
With less than four months to go before Ottawa officially settles out of court with most former students, a group calling itself the Friends and Relatives of the Disappeared Residential School Children is urging the government to acknowledge this period in the tragic residential-schools saga – and not just the better-known cases of physical and sexual abuse.
Last week, Liberal MP Gary Merasty wrote to Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice asking the government to look into the concerns. Mr. Prentice's spokesman, Bill Rogers, told The Globe that departmental officials have been asked to meet with native groups.
Some of their stories, including tales of children buried in unmarked graves beside the schools, are told in a new documentary by Kevin Annett, a former United Church minister, titled Unrepentant: Kevin Annett and Canada's Genocide.
Mr. Annett, as well as some academics, argue that the government's handling, combined with Canada's official policy of removing children from their homes for 10 months each year to attend distant schools, does indeed fit the United Nations definition of genocide.
The UN definition, adopted after the Second World War, lists five possible acts that qualify as genocide, of which killing is only one. The fifth act is described as “forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”
...RAISING CONCERN
January, 1919
Duncan Campbell Scott, a senior Indian Affairs official, talks about the inadequacy of the school buildings in a memorandum to Arthur Meighen, then Superintendent General of Indian Affairs. “They were unsanitary and they were undoubtedly chargeable with a very high death rate among the pupils.”
December, 1920
A report to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs says 33 students at the Sarcee school near Calgary are afflicted with tuberculosis.
February, 1925
W.M. Graham, Indian Commissioner for Saskatchewan, says in a letter to Mr. Scott: “We will have to do something to stop this indiscriminate admission of children without first passing a medical exam. ... I quite often hear from the Indians that they do not want to send their children to school as it is a place where they are sent to die.”
February, 1925
Russell T. Ferrier, Superintendent of Indian Education, writes to Indian commissioners and agents, saying each child should be pronounced fit by a medical officer before being admitted to a school. “When a pupil's health becomes a matter of concern soon after admission, the consequent parental alarm and distrust militates against successful recruiting.”
March, 1932
The Department of Indian Affairs announces that as a result of spending cutbacks, it cannot authorize admitting children with tuberculosis to a sanatorium or hospital unless the patient requires “care for relief of actual suffering.” Karen Howlett
