alison shapiro

Tattoonesia 2006

On most weekends, the Sheraton Hotel in Tahiti embodies the predictable paradigm of island luxury: immaculate white sand, crystalline blue sea, sun-bronzed, pearl-bedecked honeymooners happily tranquilized at the poolside bar. But the sun wasn’t the only thing responsible for putting color in the skin of the Sheraton’s clientele during the long weekend of November 9 - 12, when the hotel hosted the 2nd annual Tattoonesia Tattoo Festival.

Tattoonesia, organized by the International Tattoo Festival Association and the Tahitian Ministry of Culture, drew forty artists from fourteen different countries and more than 3000 guests. The festival sprawled over the ground level of the Sheraton, a parade of local arts and crafts tables leading up to an air-conditioned epicenter, where tattoo artists labored over their needles from 10 AM until sunset. A steady stream of clients, press members, documentary filmmakers, wide eyed onlookers and the occasional errant honeymooner circulated through the labyrinth of artists’ booths, accompanied by the standard buzzing soundtrack of modern tattoo machines. But since Tattoonesia isn’t your average tattoo festival, this soundtrack was punctuated by the tap-tap-tapping of traditional mallet and bone-comb.

Responsible for the tapping was the Samoan-born New Zealander Pete Sulu’ape, nephew of the late NZ tattooist Paulo Sulu’ape. Pete’s booth attracted the more process-minded festival goers, those for whom the ritual of getting tattooed was as meaningful, if not more so, than the resulting tattoo itself. Two of Pete’s clients, Tevru Tahiarii o Maeva of Tahiti and Tupuna Teriinarana of Bora Bora, invoked the ancient concept of mana to describe the intensity of their tattooing experience, explaining further: “We are not brothers by blood, but we feel that we are connected that way. So getting tattooed together is the closest we can come to being brothers by blood.”

The use of traditional handtools wasn’t the only element that distiguished Tattoonesia from other tattoo festivals. The weekend opened with a kava ceremony, during which the tattoo artists joined together in a large circle and served the traditional bitter root drink in coconut shell cups. Artists and guests alike were impressed by the atmosphere of unity created by this extraordinary opening ceremony: “I had tears in my eyes,” said Khani Zulu, whose partner, Zulu, traveled from Los Angeles to tattoo at the festival.

Each day of the festival culminated in a “competition du jour,” where human canvases displayed fresh ink to a panel of judges who awarded a “best of the day” prize. This daily prizegiving was followed by a “dinner spectacle,” featuring a local troop of “tatau dancers” and a runway fashion show of “tattooed beauties” - who sported, strangely enough, fake tattoos that had been drawn on for the occasion! Grand prizes were awarded on the final day of the festival; among the winners were Simeon Huuti of Tahiti and the Japanese artist Shige, who won the International Prize.

As predicated, however, by the move to the Sheraton from last year’s mellower Moorea venue, Tattoonesia is an increasingly commercialized celebration of culture, and an increasingly modernized interpretation of “tradition.” For every artist who remained faithful to a certain traditional style, there were two who departed from “pure” tradition, either modernizing the customary motifs with their own stylistic flair or blending motifs from various different traditions into one big multicultural design. Though some objected to to this blurring of customs, most seemed thrilled to participate in a festival of diverse, enthusiastic, and undeniably talented tattooists.

Blood, Sweat and Tape: A Post Office Epic

The tiffen container is a cylindrical lunch box, varying somewhat in height and diameter but always the same essential design: a series of stackable metal bowls, clamped between a top and a bottom lid, and topped off with a convenient carry-handle. This bowl system makes a lot of sense in India. Most thali meals are bowl-based, consisting of roti, rice, pickles, and an assortment of little metal dishes into which are ladled various delicious, mysterious curries. It’s a little bit of everything – the well-balanced thali will have a sweet bowl, a savory bowl, an incredibly spicy bowl and the corresponding bowl of yogurty antidote.

There’s an urban legend about the tiffen container – so-called not because I assume it to be less-than-true, but because it is as incredible and jaw-dropping as a legend and takes place in Mumbai, which epitomizes “urban” and then some. The legend is as follows.

Indian wives prepare tiffen-contained lunches for their husbands, and then outsource the job of delivery to men who push platform rickshaws, loaded with hundreds of these lunch-filled tiffen containers, through Mumbai’s spectacularly hectic pedestrian/vehicular/bovine traffic jams. These deliverymen are often almost totally illiterate. And these tiffen containers are often almost totally identical. And yet the system they’ve devised is so efficient and accurate that every day, in spite of the various factors working against them, the right lunch gets delivered, at lunchtime, to the right hungry husband.

It was of this marvelous model of efficient, against-all-odds delivery that I was thinking when I first strode confidently in to the main post office in Udaipur, Rajesthan. In each hand I held a tiffen container, one for my old roommate and one for my little brother, both of whom had the sort of uniquely picky eating habits that I thought would benefit from the sectionalization the tiffen container had to offer.

Inside the post office was the now-familiar melee of Indian bureaucracy. I waited on the “line” (which more closely resembled a mosh pit) for about 10 minutes before I finally elbowed my way to the service window. The woman behind the window looked at me like I was brain damaged, because I had not yet packed the tiffen containers I wished to mail.

“You don’t have boxes?” I asked.

“No,” she replied.

“This is…the post office, right?” I double-checked.

“Yes, is post office,” the woman told me petulantly.

“Well, where do I pack this stuff?” I asked.

“Outside of post office,” she answered.

“WHERE outside of the post office?” I pressed.

“OUTSIDE!” she practically yelled. So, I elbowed my way back out of the “line,” and set off to find some boxes.

This was not difficult, because lining the road leading up to the post office were about twenty or so hole-in-the-wall storefronts advertising PACKING SERVICES. I wondered how I hadn’t noticed them before. Probably, it was because I wasn’t looking for them. The division of labor in India is quite, well, divided. When I go out to eat I seldom have fewer than three waiters.

I chose one of the larger stores – it was about the size of an industrial refrigerator, and had a bright yellow sign that said, WE PACK YOU. Inside, I was helped by an old woman and her husband. The woman’s ample stomach spilled out through the gaps in her pale blue sari. The man wore khakis and a heavy wool sweater, and despite the fact that it was almost March and therefore at least 105 degrees Farenheit, he seemed oblivious to the heat.

First, the husband wanted to know WHY I wanted to send tiffen containers to America. I said they were presents. He turned to his wife, and they discussed this for about 20 minutes in Hindi. The only word I could catch, over and over again, was the name of my country of origin. In my head, I imagined a translation:

Tiffen containers? She wants to send tiffen containers – to America?

Don’t they HAVE tiffen containers in America?

No, no. In America, they don’t NEED tiffen containers.

What, Americans don’t eat lunch?

In America they have servants. To eat lunch FOR them.

Well, we have obviously been visited by a defective American girl. She lacks a servant.

Poor thing. We should help her to send her tiffen containers. To America.

To America!

The husband turned to me. “Give me the items,” he said gravely, “I will package for you.”

But before he could do so, the couple had to find some boxes. Since this was essentially a box store, I assumed (naively) that they would have boxes easily accessible. Not so. They tried many, many (used) boxes before finding two that sort of fit the bill. Then the husband had to cut the boxes to different heights, and fold the excess cardboard into a sort of bizarre oragami, which was used as cushioning.

All this took about an hour and a half, because other people kept coming in, delivering tea, chatting, showing off new goats, xeroxing, etc, and because the husband kept pausing in his work to tell me about his son who was in America getting a business degree.

But at last, the gifts were boxed. “Great!” I said, making ready to walk back to the post office. “Na!” the wife reprimanded me. The boxes had to be WRAPPED.

This was done by sewing machine. Each box was stitched up inside a white piece of cloth; the final side had to be hand-stitched. The hand stitching was a team effort between the woman and her husband, who seemed to argue about it the whole time. Once the stitching was done, the seams were sealed with red wax.

Two hours.

Again I tried to leave, but no - there were still SIX FORMS, six IDENTICAL forms, that I had to fill out, SIX TIMES. Then the six forms had to be taped to the packages. All six of them. Three each. I wondered how many of these forms would still be on the packages when/if my friends received them.

Finally, the woman released me back to the post office. But: “Wait!” she called. I waited. She attached four strips of “extra tape” to the packages. I didn’t ask. I just left.

I walked into the post office at 1 pm, which, of course, was the EXACT moment every single postal worker was going on lunch break.

So I, too, went on lunch break.

I returned at 1:30 with my packages. I waited on (in? amidst?) the “line.” But when I reached the front window, the lady told me to go around the BACK of the building, and to enter her area behind the glass. I obeyed, and consequently received what I believe to be a world record for Most Simultaneous Murderous Glares from those still in “line” on the other side of the window. Petulant as ever, the lady weighed the packages, charged me for the shipping, and PHEW! I was almost -

“WAIT!” the lady called. “Where is your extra tape?”

It must have fallen off, I realized, and told her as much. She was not pleased. “Need more tape!” she demanded. So far, this package was cardboard, tape, stitching, fabric, and wax. But more tape was needed. “Isn’t this the post office?” I asked, again. “Don’t you guys HAVE tape?”

“NO TAPE!” she screamed.

“Okay, okay. I’ll go get some,” I relented.

So I walked back to the packing store. The husband and wife were appalled that I needed more tape, but they gave me some. The wife made me stick out my right arm, and lined that arm from elbow to wrist with small strips of tape. I thanked them, and left again.

Back at the post office, however, I was met with more disapproving glares. “I need one LONG piece of tape,” the woman told me.

“Like this?” I tried, demonstrating how I could tape the many small pieces of tape together to form one longer piece.

At this, at least, she laughed. But declined. “I need MORE TAPE,” she said, a little gentler this time.

So I walked BACK to the package place. Or rather, I limped - in one of my many crossings, I had managed to cut my foot, which was bleeding all over my flip flop. The husband and wife seemed furious to see me return. “Look,” I said, “Can I just buy a whole role of tape?”

This provoked another 20-minute argument:

What, they don’t tape their packages in America?

How do they ensure that their six identical forms will stay on their stitched, waxed fabric layer?

Maybe she is a tape importer! Stealing our tape to bring to America?

What, they don’t have tape in America?

Maybe they DON’T have tape in America. Remember, they apparently don’t have tiffen containers.

You’re right. Let’s just sell her the tape.

“You buy tape,” the husband delivered his verdict. I delivered 20 rupees. The tape purchased, I returned to the post office.

Finally, finally, I had enough tape. The woman seemed pleased with me. But then - THEN - she tried to KEEP the roll of tape. And though the post office obviously NEEDED tape, I had had enough (and was probably going to need to tape a band aid to my foot when I returned to my hotel). “No way!” I said, snatched up my tape, and ran.

Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy (Or Girl)

Just scanning the list of cities on Toby Keith’s tour schedule is enough to assure you that there ain’t much gay about country. It’s a genre reserved for redneck, red-state, red-blooded Americans who wear cowboy boots because they’re practical for, well, actual cowboys. But anyone who’s seen Brokeback Mountain knows that, as Willie Nelson sings, “Cowboys Are Secretly, Frequently (Fond of Each Other),” and anyone who wants to confirm that notion needs only pay a visit to Country Western Dance Night at The Cuff on Fridays from 7:15 to 10:30 pm.

I paid my first such visit last Friday, and was surprised to find that I was not the only cowgirl in attendance—in fact, the dance floor population was about 50/50, which previous visits to The Cuff tell me is not a common ratio. I approached Carl, a self-identified “regular” in a leather cowboy hat, leather dog collar and leather pants, and asked if there were always so many women at the event.

“Huh,” he said, considering the dance floor, “I guess I don’t really notice the women.”

The Cuff, despite its windowless façade and the fact that most of its happenings are clearly geared towards the Y-chromosome crowd (Beareoke, anyone?), is a welcoming place. The attendees of the Country-Western Dance Night were a testament to this; they ranged from bearded bears in Wranglers and suspenders, to gray-mulletted lezzies also in Wranglers and suspenders, to Ryan, a tight-bunned two-stepper in leather short shorts, a leather vest, a leather hat, and a black tie. Ryan was two-stepping with the one woman Carl was able to point out—“That’s Miss Ruby,” he told me, “She’s kind of…in charge.”

Miss Ruby, a diminutive, quick-hipped Asian woman in a leather bodice, mini skirt, and oversized rhinestone vest, stood out among the others on the dance floor. I caught up with her and Ryan by the bar a few songs later.

“Oh, we know each other well,” they told me, laughing. They became friends through their involvement in the Rain Country Dancers, the group responsible for the Friday night dance at The Cuff and other similar events in the Seattle area. Miss Ruby is an instructor and board member.

“So is this like, a gay country thing? Or just…a country thing that happens to be in a gay bar?” I asked.

Ryan and Miss Ruby laughed again. “I dance with anyone,” Miss Ruby said, “Man, woman, I don’t care. I dance with everyone because it makes me a better dancer.”

Moments later, Miss Ruby and Ryan were whisked into formation for a line dance (the masses knew the moves courtesy of the dance lesson that goes from 7:15 – 8:15 pm). And then it was time for another run of up-tempo two-steps, including Toby Keith’s “As Good As I Once Was” and Lonestar’s “Mr Mom.”

Next up was a slow dance, to Heidi Newfield’s hit single “Johnny and June.” Carl leaned his head on his partner’s shoulder, swaying sweetly as the spotlight combed the dance floor. Ryan was spun and dipped. An enormous bald man in a striped polo shirt mouthed the words along with Heidi. Above them, a montage of hunky cowboys—one posed naked on a bale of hay; another in some sort of Edenic farmscape, sporting a cowboy hat in place of a fig leaf—flickered on the projection screen.

The whole scene epitomized what I love about country: or rather, what I love about country and me, or country and any Friday night Cuff patron. In the hands (and hips) of the homos, listening to country, whether with hipster irony or down-South seriousness, becomes an act of laying claim to a version of the American Dream from which we are often excluded. Country music is so mired in its stereotypes and clichés that it can at times approach self-parody; the men are generally manly and the hearts are generally achin’ and “kiss you” inevitably rhymes with “miss you.” But it is also powerful in its ability to appeal to the Everyman, to depict slices of “real life” that many Americans find truly relatable.

When it’s a pair of bears locked in a two-step singing along to a Top 40 Country song, though, they are at once included in that vision of the Everyman and deliciously transgressing it. And if Jack Twist and Ennis del Mar had traded their Carhartts for some leather chaps, I like to imagine they would’ve enjoyed Friday night at The Cuff, too.

The crowd started to thin out after another energetic line dance, this one to a extra-peppy remix of “Shake Your Groove Thing.” Miss Ruby danced front and center, her movements perfectly stylized, rhinestones flashing with every thrust of her tiny hips. I watched as a shirtless guy in torn up Levi’s circulated through the crowd, smiling flirtatiously and chatting up the boys. Then, when he reached me where I stood by the bar, he smiled knowingly and asked, “Would you like to buy some raffle tickets? Or should I send the slutty woman around?”

___

Originally published on Meefers.com

Crazy On Stage

Moore Theatre, Seattle, WA—On his recordings, Antony Hegarty’s voice can sound almost affected, an intentionally stylized falsetto with each warble strategically placed. This is not to belittle the quality of his studio albums, but rather to highlight the contrast with his live performance last Saturday at the Moore Theater. From the moment he opened his mouth, it became clear that Hegarty’s voice is not an affect at all, but the nuanced, rich and genuinely unique driving force behind the bizarre intensity of his music.

Also driving the show were the symphonic arrangements of Hegarty’s backing band, a distinguished quintet of musicians—presumably the eponymous Johnsons—who switched between instruments with such virtuosity that it was nearly impossible to keep track of who played what. Saturday’s show was comprised mostly of song from the band’s new album, The Crying Light (Secretly Canadian, 2009). “Epilepsy is Dancing” (above video) was a clear standout in this new material, showcasing both Hegarty’s poignantly quirky lyricism and the power of that unmistakable warbly wail as he sang, “Cut me in quadrants / leave me in the corner…”

Imagery along these lines—the body disassembled, constantly metamorphosing—is central to Hegarty’s music, and to his persona. To simply call Hegarty a “gender-bender” does not do justice to the power of his transgender-themed masterpieces like “For Today I Am a Boy” (from I Am A Bird Now, Secretly Canadian 2005), which opens: “Someday I’ll grow up / and be a beautiful woman / someday I’ll grow up / and be a beautiful girl…but for today I am a child / but for today I am a boy…”

This fluid conception of gender is embodied in Hegarty himself, whose physical presentation falls somewhere in the gray area between male and female. On Saturday, he wore a flowing brown kaftan draped over his 6’4” frame, a delicate purse slung across his broad chest, and left his long black hair loose around his face. Like Bowie and Boy George before him (the latter has collaborated with Antony and the Johnsons on previous projects), part of Hegarty’s power derives from his ambiguity, his genderlessness. And of course, there’s that voice—that transcendent, beautiful voice.

The highlight of the show was an ethereally creepy cover of Beyoncé’s “Crazy in Love,” stripped to just a spare, insistent drumbeat and a mournful string and piano melody. In Hegarty’s hands—or rather, in his vocal cords—the peppy pop song took on a haunted, obsessive quality. When Beyoncé hopes that the object of her affection will “page [her] right now,” she does so without dropping her confidence or her sass; we see her in a dance club, boogieing down with her ladyfriends despite being “crazy in love” with an absent gentleman. Hegarty, on the other hand, is crouched in the bushes outside his would-be paramour’s house, whispering those same hopes—to be paged, to be saved—into the shadowy night air. We get the feeling that he has been driven quite literally crazy by the love he’s in, and that he quite literally needs saving from himself.

“F*ck Beyoncé!” called one heckler after the applause for the cover had died down.

“Hey, man,” Hegarty responded, mock-reproachful, “She’s, like, sacred to me.”

The audience laughed appreciatively, but the laughter quickly deteriorated into a nervous murmur when Hegarty’s stage patter took a turn for the weird. Over a tinkling, improvised piano line, he asked in a stilted monotone, “Why is an American girl…a sacred girl? Why is an African American star…a sacred star?”

When it became clear that this line of rhetorical questioning wasn’t going to get any funnier, he concluded lamely, “Maybe we should just play the next song.”

Fortunately, a second heckler saved the moment, shouting out for more Beyoncé: “Put a ring on it!”

Despite his moments of awkwardness–or perhaps even because of them–Hegarty managed to endear himself to his audience. After all, no one ever said he wasn’t weird. But his particular brand of weirdness, coupled with his formidable musical talents, makes for a divinely unsettling concert experience that, like Hegarty himself, is impossible to file under the usual binary labels.

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Originally published on Meefers.com

Sit! Stay!

Ten Days of Silent Meditation

The Dhamma Bodhi Vipassana Meditation Center is about 4 km outside of Bodh Gaya, the town where Buddha became Enlightened sitting under the infamous Bodhi tree. I arrive at the Center around 3 PM on Day Zero, which leaves me just enough time to dump my valuables into a locker, unpack the not-much that I brought into my cell-like but breezy room, and chat briefly with a cute Swiss girl, a garrulous older woman (also Swiss) and a girl from the Faroe Islands before heading into the first hour-long chunk of meditation. I squirm and squirm.

Another word about what I brought: really, I brought nothing. Two pairs of pants. Three tee shirts. Underwear. A toothbrush and toothpaste. Some soap. Bug spray. And, it’s such a relief to be liberated from schlepping my passport/camera/iPods/wallet/lenses etc everywhere, to sleep with out a lock on my door.

Which brings me to: another word about the room. It’s cell-like, yes, but I love it. It’s about 3 x 2 meters, so pretty small, but there’s nothing in it - just a shelf and a bed and a lightbulb - and it has two windows and an attached bathroom (with one of those sinks that’s really just the illusion of a sink - a porcelain bowl with a hole in the bottom where the water dumps out onto the floor). The walls are light blue. The “bed” is a wooden platform with a mattress that is about the thickness of your average down comforter. There’s a ceiling fan, but the power is rarely on.

After that first introductory hour, Noble Silence begins. Not only are you not allowed to speak, you’re also instructed not to make eye contact with anyone. So I, the Swiss/Faroe contingent, and the twenty-odd Indian women retire to the women’s half of the Dhamma Bodhi compound, silently and with bowed heads…

DAY ONE

This course is officially “taught” by S.N. Goenka, a Burmese/Indian guy who is like, Mr. Vipassana. But, since Goenka can’t be in multiple meditaiton centers at once, he has Assistant Teachers who are there to field questions and comments and press “play” and “pause” on the stereo, which plays tapes of Goenka chanting and instructing his devotees. Goenka’s chanting is hard to take seriously at first. It’s really gutteral and funny and kind of sounds like moaning. This combined with the various bodily noises coming from the male half of the meditation hall makes for quite a comic soundtrack. There’s one guy who just keeps burping - actually, “burping” is really too mild a word to describe what this guy does. His burps are incredibly resonant, like the lowest string on a amplified double bass plucked by the Incredible Hulk.

As far as meditation instruction, this first day is devoted to just observing our breath. No verbalization (ie, no saying “in, out, in, out” in your head), no visualization: “Just observe reality as it is,” Goenka says.

The Swiss girl is sporting a severly uncool ankle-length navy blue skirt, but somehow manages to look more like a foxy librarian than an Amish fashion reject.

DAY TWO

I sleep through the 4 AM wake up bell for the second day in a row. Listening for wake up bells, lunch bells, snack bells - it’s like being at camp again! Except instead of first period activity, you meditate. And instead of second period, you meditate. And instead of free time, you meditate. And for evening activity, you play freeze tag on the lawn! No, no, just kidding. You meditate. And before bed? I’ll give you a clue - it begins in “m” and ends in “editate…”

We’re still observing our breath, but with slightly more specific instructions: we’re supposed to observe the sensations of breathing, the air coming in through our nostrils, brushing past our upper lips, etc.

If we find our minds wandering, Goenka says, we shouldn’t freak out - “Just observe, just observe,” he says, “And think: My mind has wandered away. Then it should come back on its own.”

When my mind wanders, it goes like this. First I have a thought. Then, immediately, my mind starts experimenting with different ways of composing the thought, phrasing it, telling the story of the thought. A related tendency: I often drift into thinking of myself from the outside, in the third person, as a character in my thoughts. I suppose I could try to pass these mental habits off as “writerly,” but really they’re just self-conscious. It’s hard to turn off The Composer, but I’m getting a little better at it.

In the evenings we watch a video of Goenka giving his “Dhamma Discourses.” The basic gist of Vipassana theory is beginning to come clear. In a nutshell: to come out of our misery, we must remain equanimous and balanced in all situations; we must show no craving towards pleasent sensations, nor any aversion towards unpleasant ones. Since all situations - emotional or physical - generate sensations, we must train our minds to notice these sensations as they arise, and practice just observing them, remaining totally objective, and recognising their true nature of annica, or impermanence. We can attain Enlightenment only when we are free of all cravings and aversions…

Well, it’s not as easy to put in a nutshell as I thought. But that’s pretty much my grasp of it on Day Two.

The problem, as it occurs to me at the end of the day, is: I’m not really all that interested in becoming “Enlightened.” I just want to become Someone Who Meditates.

Then again, maybe this isn’t such a problem: after all, if you’re craving Enlightenment, you’re running in the opposite direction from it.

And speaking of developing new cravings, Swiss Miss regularly parks her shoes next to mine at the door to the dining hall.

DAY THREE

Gradually, Goenka instructs us to narrow down our field of focus: today we’re supposed to be feeling sensations only on the small triangle below our nostrils and above our upper lip.

I’m at the point where, when my mind is wandering, I can get it to fade into a sort of static - a no-thought-ness. But this is hard to maintain.

I had worried, pre-course, that my mind would wander back to all the emotional stress in my recent past - that I would freak out, that all the bad stuff would come up, etc. This is not the case. Instead, I can’t stop fantasizing about writing a letter to Amy Hempel in which I invite her to come with me to the ASPCA to adopt my new puppy.

There’s one Nepalese monk in the English-speaking Dhamma Discourse. He’s always late. And always, by about five minutes into the discourse, he’s fallen asleep.

That night, it takes me until I’m about 40 minutes into brushing my teeth to realize that I’m drooling all over my tank top, which I’ve put on backwards. Three solid days of meditation have left me feeling, in other words, totally stoned: equal parts enlightened and retarded.

DAY FOUR

Today the actual technique of Vipassana is taught. This means no more focusing on our breath - that technique was called annapana, and its purpose was to sharpen the sensation-observation capacities of our minds. Now, we move our attention through various parts of our bodies in turn, trying to observe the sensations, both “gross and subtle,” that we encounter there.

Right off the bat, I have a totally scary experience with this. My whole body starts tingling, but I feel totally separate from it - like I’ve stepped behind myself, kind of, except with out any sort of visualization or anything. Goenka tells us that we’re observing the impermanence of our sensations in order to understand, on an experiential level, the “scientific truth” of our own beings: that the “self” we see as so concrete and immutable is actually just a mass of subatomic particles arising and passing away so rapidly as to give the impression of whole-ness. And it occurs to me, in the grips of this bodily weirdness, that we’re essentially supposed to sit here meditating until we can feel ourselves like, dying…

Swiss Miss sits next to me at lunch. I tell her silently that even if we were in the kind of relationship where we were allowed to talk, there would still be some times when I just wouldn’t feel like talking.

By the end of the day, though, I’m feeling better (perhaps due in part to an entirely distracted afternoon of meditation, in which Amy Hempel and I brainstorm some possible names for the puppy).

Speaking of Amy Hempel, I’ve started “reading” before bed. “Reading,” since we’re not actually allowed to have books and the label on my can of bug repellent is a bit lacking in poetry, consists of me closing my eyes and recalling fragments of things I’ve read in the past, sometimes connected with some sort of logical flow, sometimes disparate: The art of losing isn’t hard to master. Look at this tangle of thorns. I was the shadow of the waxwing slain by the false azure in the windowpane. Howard Roark laughed. Desire is a moment with no way out. Which way I fly am hell, myself am hell. “The woman,” Dillard whispered, “They say he missed that whore.”

DAY FIVE

Today’s challenge: we’re supposed to sit for the full hour-long group sitting sessions with out moving. No scratching itches. No changing posture. This is quite painful, especially in my hips and back. I succeed 2 out of 3 times, but I don’t feel like I’m doing it right. My mind rebels: This isn’t good for me, I think. The nature of these sensations isn’t annica; they’ve arisen because I’m cutting off the bloodflow to to my legs and they’ll last until I stand up!

Then, on the final sitting of the day, I have a moment of breakthrough: I manage to step back again, to observe the pain, to notice the pulse of it, and the blank, painless spaces between the beats of pain.

Buddha’s first words after he attained Enlightenment, Goenka tells us, were: “Seeking but not finding the house builder, I traveled through the round of countless births. Oh, painful is birth ever and again! House builder, you have now been seen. You shall not build the house again. Your rafters have been broken down; your ridge-pole is demolished too. My mind has now attained the unformed nibbana and reached the end of every kind of craving.”

I guess it just wouldn’t have been Enlightenment if he had stood up and said, “Oooommmmigod I can’t feel my legs…”

DAY SIX

When I cave - when I swich postures, or scratch itches - I say to myself, “What are you, a neanderthal?”

“What are you talking about?” I retort (to myself).

“You’re like, a CAVE-MAN!” I say (to myself).

This joke is so stupid that it helps me to derail the aversion and frustration that arises when I can’t sit for the full hour, or concentrate, or stop wondering if Swiss Miss’ eyes are open or closed.

I haven’t yet mentioned the food. This is due in part to the fact that I never know the name for what I’m eating. For breakfast, it’s some mush. Then, for lunch, we have mush with rice. Dinner is some sort of yellowish crunchy cereal and tea. It’s all equally decent food: not spicy, not particularly interesting…just fuel. I think that not knowing the name of what you’re eating, not having any say in it, not getting excited about eating one thing or another - it’s like, the culinary equivalent of how monks and nuns shave their heads. Everything is the same. Food is just food.

I think it would be a deliciously clever half-serious joke to get a tattoo of the word “annica” (in Hindi or Pali script). An impermanent marker, if you will. A memento mori with a tattoo-comic twist.

DAY SEVEN

A breakthrough in the morning - I sit through the pain until it dissolves, just observing it equanimously. I realize that this is a mental test, not a physical one: the point is not that it’s hard to sit crosslegged for an hour; if you wanted, you could sit on a chair. It’s about staying with the meditaiton, staying in it. Which is harder, I think, that just gritting your teeth and bearing the pain.

I also realize: I’ve done this before. Sat and breathed and observed intense pain with out reacting to it. As has anyone who’s gotten tattooed.

This imaginary thing with Swiss Miss is getting out of control. She’s constantly on my radar. On the one hand, it’s encouraging to prove to myself that I’m capable of being attracted to someone with out first knowing their opinions on Louise Gluck. But on the other hand, I’m missing out on a rare opportunity to be totally unaware of the people around me, to be totally inside myself. Goenka says it’s not actually the things that we crave that we’re addicted to - that we’re actually addicted to craving itself. I think of Anne Carson. The idea that getting cancels wanting. By definition. I don’t even know this girl. And she wears really terrible skirts. It’s just my mind, needing a break, taking respite in the familiar, easy-focus feeling of a crush.

There are a lot of mosquitos. But I think I understand now the idea behind not killing them. It’s not so much some touchy-feely idea about “bad karma” if you kill something - it’s more specific. In order to kill something, you have to generate negative thoughts. Even if it’s just a mosquito. And it’s true - if I wasn’t resigned to just be at peace with the fact that not even my nightly bapism in bug repellent will keep me from being eaten alive, I’d be getting really, really frustrated and sore-palmed from constantly hunting bugs.

DAY EIGHT

The afternoon sitting is from 2:30 - 3:30 pm, and it’s hellishly hot. Today, though, I detach from how much sweat is pouring down my body and find myself plunged into a very pleasurable freeflow of sensations. Goenka has warned us about this: that if we find ourself not just free from pain and distraction, but also feeling downright good, we must be careful not to become attached to this good feeling, not to crave it, not to crash when it goes away (because pleasure, like pain, is also characterized by annica).

But it feels so good! And then it starts feeling like, too good - like an overload of I don’t know what, like either someone slipped some Ecstasy into the morning chai, or I have Japanese Encephelitus, or this Vipassana stuff is more potant than I thought.

I’m starting to find everything incredibly erotic. know this technique is supposed to detach you from your body in a way, but sometimes - in this thick heat, with Swiss Miss on the cushion behind me, and all day nothing to do but focus on my sensations - I feel like it’s putting me back in my body. And not only in an erotic way; also in a way that’s just plain sensual. I step outside and I can feel every interaction between my skin and the atmosphere, between my eyes and the insane sunlight.

The evening discourses, however, are going downhill. It’s like Goenka has run out of things to say. His anecdotes, which used to have actual pertinant metaphorical import, have degenerated into just: “There was this woman, and she was miserable for this incredibly complicated and morbid reason that has nothing to do with anything, and then she found Vipassana, and lived happily ever after.”

Sure, he talks a lot about “science” - and sure, a lot of what he says is pretty rational, logical, non-sectarian - but when you get down to it, Goenka is still a preacher. And by day eight he’s starting to feel a little preachy.

The monk is asleep again. I like to watch him. His age is entirely ambigous. He could be anywhere from 20 to 70. Asleep, he is like a baby. I want to tickle him.

DAY NINE

The final goal: to attune your mind to even the subtlest of sensations so that you feel the subatomic particles of your body blending into the atmostphere, so that the edges dissolve. “Total dissolution,” Goenka calls it.

But I’m still feeling disillusioned. Not totally, though - I’ve learned a lot, and I feel, overall, well-rested and happy and engaged. I just have some questions that I can’t answer, and the Assistant Teacher’s English just isn’t quite good enough.

On the plus side: in the afternoon we’re given our “cells” inside the pagoda. The cells are small, blank rooms with just a cushion and a tiny circular portal-window near the cieling. I love my cell. I wish I had a cell for everything I had to do - a writing cell, a reading cell, an eating cell, a meditation cell. It would be so much easier to focus.

Then again, maybe it’s not the lack of cell that plagues my attention span. After all, if someone projected “Mean Girls” onto a billboard in Times Square, I could probably stand in the middle of traffic and still focus on the movie.

In my cell, I have a final helpful realization: that I can feel, under the actual muscles of my face, a sort of Inner Facial expression that helps me to gauge my level of calmness/balance. This relates to something I’ve been doing on my own all throughout India, actually. I noticed some time ago that whenever I started to get stressed out, my brow/the space between my eyes would get really clenched and furrowed. When I simply remind myself to relax this area, I feel instantly calm.

This is especially useful when trying to navigate a sleeper car in which you have to push through the throng of cross-dressed prostitutes begging for money and food in order to get to your seat. Did I forget to mention my trainride from Varanasi to Bodh Gaya?

DAY TEN

In the morning we learn a new technique called “metta bhavana.” “Metta” translates loosely to “lovingkindness;” for this techinque, you’re supposed to get comfortable, and focus on sending out waves of compassion to all beings. Goenka chants hypnotically: “May aaaaalllll beeeeings beeee peeeeeacefuuul. Maaay aaalll beeeings beee haaaapppy.” Etc.

Then, Noble Silence ends!

“God, I want a cigarette,” says Swiss Miss (whose name is actually Caroline).

Yuck.

“And a Sprite,” she adds.

Double yuck.

“And to see my boyfriend.”

Ah, well. Lucky I didn’t get attached.

The two older white guys turn out to be devotees of Sai Baba, a guru famous for his “manifestations.” One of the guys describes: “He vomits up the golden egg of Krishna!”

Again, yuck.

But otherwise, it’s a really lovely day. Everyone is smiley and happy to be speaking again. It’s the first time I’ve actually looked some of these people in the face. I feel close to them. It’s been a while since I spent 10 consecutive days with anyone, silent or speaking.

In the evening, I get my iPod out of my locker. I sit outside under the stars. I hit play. And - when I say that the next few hours, during which I just listen, move a little, but mostly just listen, to music, are some of the absolute happiest of my whole year - I’m not exaggerating. This is a whole new experience of listening to music. It’s not just the sweetness of getting back something of which I’ve been deprived - it’s that I’m good at this now, at closing my eyes and zeroing in - and now it’s the music I’m zeroing in on. And it’s fucking amazing.

You may notice, however, my rather conspicuous omission of what songs I listen to.

Suffice it to say, Jo Dee Messina is involved.

Resume

Alison Shapiro
permanentmarkers@gmail.com • (917) 375-3906
4725 Shilshole Avenue NW
Seattle, WA 98107
_______


EDUCATION
Middlebury College (Middlebury, VT, 2002-06)
Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, English/Creative Writing major
GPA: 3.6

NYU In Prague (Prague, Czech Republic, fall 2004)
Cultural immersion program, liberal arts courses taught by Czech professors

AWARDS
Thomas J. Watson Fellowship (2006-07)
Winner of $25,000 grant to travel to Samoa, Fiji, French Polynesia, India, and Morocco pursuing an independent study project entitled, “Painted Ladies: A Cultural Exploration of Women and Tattooing”

Best College Admissions Essay (2004)
Winner, college admissions essay published in SparkNotes anthology of Best Admissions Essays and online

Bertelsmann World of Expression Contest (2002)
2nd Place, Fiction Writing ($5000 scholarship)

The Southeast Review World’s Best Short Short Story Contest (2003)
Runner up, published in The Southeast Review (Volume 22.2)

The Cornelia Street Cafe Poetry Contest (2002)
Winner, gave a public reading at The Cornelia Street Cafe in New York City

EXPERIENCE
Ashford University (Clinton, IA, Adjunct Teaching Assistant, 2009-present)
Assist instructors in English-based online courses, provide one-on-one guidance to nontraditional entry-level undergraduates in accelerated curricula, provide informed written feedback on student writing assignments in general education courses

Meefers (Seattle, WA, Contributing Writer, 2009-present)
Write feature articles, review local concerts, films, and other cultural events for Meefers website, which connects gay-friendly communities through e-commerce, content, social networking, job postings, music and film

Seattle Central Community College (Seattle, WA, tutor, 2008-present)
Tutor adult East African refugees in English as a Second Language

College Essay Tutor (Seattle, WA/New York, NY, 2007-present)
Help high school seniors to prepare and edit college admissions essays

Fine Arts Work Center (Provincetown, MA, intern, summer 2005)
Assisted with the running of the summer workshop series by staffing readings, slide talks, and gallery openings, tending the bookshop, contacting faculty and students, and running student orientations and special events; participated (as a student) in intensive week-long creative writing workshops with renowned authors

Windsor Mountain International Summer Camp (Hillsboro, NH)
Program Director (Summer 2004): Organized and formulated activity offerings, assigned campers to activities using Microsoft ACCESS, coordinated enrichment staff visits and special events, ran staff meetings, supervised staff, ran orientation workshops for new staff
Biking/Arts Staff (Summers 2002/03): taught writing workshops, guitar and songwriting classes to kids aged 7-16, led mountain biking excursions, supervised girls aged 7-8
Office Manager (Summer 2001): ran the main office, supervised girls aged 10-11, taught music classes to kids aged 7-16

Sweatervest Literary Magazine (Middlebury, VT, founder and editor, 2005-06)
Solicited submissions and edited literary magazine featuring the contemporary writings of Middlebury students, laid out magazine using Adobe InDesign, hired reading board members and facilitated reading board meetings

FMPhasis Magazine (Middlebury, VT, editor, spring 2004)
Solicited submissions, edited, and laid out magazine for WRMC, the Middlebury College radio station

Gamut Room Cafe and Performance Space (Middlebury, VT, 2005-06)
Hosted musical performances and readings, cooked and served food to students

OTHER SKILLS
Conversational Spanish
Basic American Sign Language
Proficient in Adobe InDesign; basic knowledge of Photoshop
SCUBA Certified (PADI Advanced)

REFERENCES
Available upon request