Pie, No Coffee

    "I've never had pie."  "You've never tasted pie?" "No."   That's what started it.  It didn't seem right to finish our year of reading books together without introducing Cody to pie.  We've been busy. Together we read eight books; Gathering Blue, Children of the River, Jonah, The Whale,  Flipped, Crow, The BFG, Witches, and Summer on Wheels.
     All of  these books have their own merit but two where particularly significant.  Children of the River is a novel that explores the challenges of Cambodian refugees fleeting the Pol Pot reign of terror in Cambodia (think Killing Fields) who settle in Oregon.  The protagonist is Cambodian refugee navigating an American High School while trying to remain loyal to her family who want to cling to their Asian heritage.
    Crow is an historical novel set in South Carolina just as Reconstruction is ending and Jim Crow is taking a hold. Many of the incidents reported in the book are based on historical events.  It was a great opportunity to teach about, racism, white supremacy, civil rights movement and other pieces of American history.
    So........what about the pie?   The adventures with these scholars couldn't conclude without introducing Cody to pie.  This being our final time together, I brought an apple pie so Cody could sample and of course we all had to have a piece!

Left to right: Kyle, Pryn, Mr. Al, Cody and Alexis.

Recommended Reading...The Last Speakers

   "As the last speakers converse, they spin out individual strands of a vast web of knowledge, a noosphere of possibilities that encircles all of us.  They tell how their ancestors calculated accurately the passing of the seasons without clocks and calendars, how humans adapted to hostile environments from the Arctic to Amazonia.
   "We imagine eureka moments taking place in modern laboratories or in classical civilizations.  But key insights of biology, pharmacology, genetics, and navigation arose and persisted solely by word of mouth, in small, unwritten tongues.  This web of knowledge contains feats of human ingenuity--epics, myths, rituals--that celebrate and interpret our existence."
    So writes K David Harrison in The Last Speakers:  The Quest to Save the world's Most Endangered Languages, a book given to me at Christmas.  I had never thought about the valuable, complex web of wisdom and lore that is lost when a language dies.  It is so much more than a collection of words and phrases it is a whole system of thought and understanding of the world which we inhabit.
   One of the reviewers on the dust jacket said "This wonderful book is really three books wrapped into one--a world travelogue of languages, a moving personal account of the last speakers of vanishing languages, and a revelation of the knowledge tied to each language."  Jared Diamond (who wrote Guns, Germs and Steel.)
    It made me think of the terrible injustice done to Native Americans which included the insane pressure on them to give up their languages.

"When It Rains It Pours"

    Supporting four persons on $300. a month, with one person having and appendectomy and another hospitalized with esophageal problems, is difficult even in Thailand.  Gai struggle to support her family after her husband abandoned the family taking the Tuk-Tuk taxi with him.  Thailand has no parental child support laws so it's all up to Gai.

   Seventeen year old Mai, for whom we've provided financial support to keep her in school, recently had an appendectomy.  If there were any silver lining in that experience it is that it happened during seasonal school recess. 

   Then there is Poy who is also seventeen.  Gai's family took her in as an unofficial foster child a few years ago when Poy;s family of origin disintegrated through methamphetamine addiction.  Poy is not related to Gai and it's very unusual in Thailand for non-relatives to provide foster care.  Poy lived with Gai's family for a couple of years.

   Poy's immaturity surfaced when she refused to productively assist Gai in any way.  She then decided to make it on her own and moved out but stayed in contact with Gai.  When I met Poy earlier this year she was camping with relatives and reported that she hadn't eaten for three days.  Obviously her attempt to live on her own was not going well.

    Gai later agreed to let her move in again as Poy promised to be a cooperative participant in the family's life.  True to her word Poy found a job and was working when she began having difficulties eating.  This was a flare up of esophageal problems stemming from a suicide attempt, while living with her family of origin, where she drank  drain cleaner.  She had a previous hospitalization and surgery in Bangkok for thisproblem, an hour by mini-bus from Gai's home in Ayuthhaya, while she was living with Gai the first time.

    So, about the time Mai was having an appendectomy Poy was again unable to eat and was again hospitalized in Bangkok.  Gai works seven days a week to earn her $300. a month.  Time taken from work to attend to Poy hospitalized in Bangkok.not only reduces her income but jeopardizes her job. Poy will now be released from the hospital but it's doubtful that her job will be waiting for her.

    Living the privileged life that I do it's hard to imagine the stress under which Gai lives as she tries to maintain life for the four of them. One bit of hope is that Mai will finish her studies next year and then can begin contributing to the family finances. Hopefully Poy will also recover and again find a job.   Let us all be grateful for the life we lead!

      

From left: Gai, Perwaa, Al and Mai.

Gai and  Poy.