#OMMS writing credits

[daisiesonafield-blog]

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[burmajournal]

Growing up in the tropics

It’s funny how the smallest things stick to your memories as a child. A snapshot of a moment in time, a whiff of fragrance, the sounds of birds calling. It is only when you are much older that you realise that these memories are the little candles that light the path of your life as it weaves through different lands and different times.  

I had so many memories as a child growing up in the tropics. Yet so many also stayed hidden and have resurfaced as I rediscover the country of my birth, shining a light on the idyllic childhood I had even as this country was going through some of its darkest days in the eighties. For that, the credit can only go to my parents, grandparents and extended family whose cocoon of warmth and love follow me wherever I go, even to this day.

What of those memories which have come back to me now?  I shall share a few which bring a smile to my face even as I think of them now.  

Of the bumpy feel of pushing a lantern made of cane and colourful cellophane paper down the streets at Thadingyut (the festival of lights in Myanmar to mark the end of the Buddhist Lent)

Of watching the oil rig pumps nodding incessantly against the dry and dusty plains of Minbu in Central Burma which became a familiar and comforting sight

Of playing hopscotch often under the moonlight in the yard as the adults talk leisurely on the balcony, all of us silvery figures chattering and laughing in the glow of the moon

Of the sound of my grandfather saying “omm-pwa!” to make us feel better when we had small knocks or falls (a familiar sound to many Burmese children I am sure)

Of eating warm kaut mont in your hands with sticky jaggery and coconut shreds after a long day at school

Of sitting in the back of my father’s jeep and getting wet as the rains lashed against the vertical flaps which roll down to cover the back space and once, the car getting stuck in thick roads of mud that the men had to get out to push it

Of my grandmother showing us how to blow huge soap bubbles out of straws made from hollow papaya plant stems and the faint smell of fresh cut papaya plants as you blow the bubbles.

Of learning to write Burmese characters on my own small chalkboard made of clay on which my Dad drew ruled lines for me with a nail and ruler.

Of the time one of my Mum’s patients brought a “roasted rabbit” impaled on a stick (in the style of roasted suckling pigs) as a treat for my family which I refused to touch or eat

Of playing with little ohe-boat bowls, pots and pans which are miniature kitchenware made of terracotta and painted in bright colours, a favourite of Myanmar children

For being able to rediscover these memories in the past few years, I am forever thankful, for they remind me where I come from and who I am.