A quote that says it all.

"'Farewell!' was the cry of my heart as I left him. Despair added, 'Farewell, for ever!'"--Jane Eyre, Vol. III.

We leave tomorrow.

We're Okay

I don't know if I have any regular readers anymore, but if I do, you probably are aware that we're in Southwest China's Yunnan province. You've also probably heard of the quake. Well, we felt it, and it woke us up, but Pu'er (a.k.a. Simao) is 200 km away from here, so we're okay. We've had folks who are worried about us, but we're okay. 3 dead though, in Pu'er, and many more injured. It tortures the mind to think about it.

Sorry!

I haven't posted in ages because I've been busy and there's really nothing to write about. Okay, I was looking up 9/11 on World Book and the most striking picture was that of the Statue of Liberty holding her torch over a couple of smokestacks that used to be skyscrapers. But that's hardly anything you want to know.

Things are winding down here. Two more weeks of school after today, then two weeks of packing and saying goodbye, then it's time to go...home.

Home? What is home? I was faced with that question while listening to a tape with my favorite songs on it. One made me think about Qi Shan so much that my heart ached, but two songs after that was the uncomparable Atwater-Donnnelly singing "Song of the Cowboys". Immediately, I was back in Seattle on a winter evening, often late on a Wednesday during Lent. Both songs brought tears to my eyes from associations. I don't have associations of a place--just an event--with a song unless there's some homelike aspect to it. Oh, I don't know! It's just surreal. And last year I was half-wishing that something would come up and we couldn't come back.

Poking with Pictures:

Honest! I didn't do nothing with this picture but add "clouds" to the background. Why is a completely different story...

Oog.

Things are winding down. I'm tempted to quit this before June. Not because I'm sick of blogging, just because...oh, I don't know. I don't really know my own mind right now. I think it's because of leaving here. I'm being pretty honest with you, here. Life's been a bit of a bummer right about now. Not too bad, of course. But...ah, who knows? I wish I could just speed over the goodbyes and rewind life back to one of the two golden ages of our time here...

Drawing to a Close

Less'n a month, now, and I'll bid you farewell. Yes, it's May already, and in June it'll be about a month before. I started this blog back in January 2006, and it's been a long way. And even that is less time than I've been here; I've been here since August, 2005.

2005! Two years! So long ago, I thought that two years was forever. And now it just seems long, for it's an age in my life...ah, phooey, why am I talking about all this now? It's a whole month, yet.

So, although it's "21:01:11" by my computer's clock, I'll "wish you a' a good morning" because who knows what time you'll read this?

"maurn"?

I spent about fifteen minutes last night hunting for a Scots word that doesn't exist. It was a typo. I finally found the word; it's "maun". Which means, I think, "must". Let me think, just how does that make sense...?

"Though poor and poorer we must be"?

Actually, I think it does make sense. Never mind.

Universal Willie

"Willie" is this universal name in folk music, it seems. Willie is everybody from this handsome guy that every lady in the whole castle loves to the fellow who kills pretty Polly. And everything in-between, though I suppose Willie O' Winsbury would fit in the first category. Anyhow, it's like the name "Johnny", only Johnny is mostly a soldier (Johnnie Cope? No exception! The guy was a general! He was also a real person). What's with it? If only the most universal name for women in folk music wasn't Mary. I don't care for that name at all, really...

I'm Back!

I'm back from vacation where it seemed I did everything from dress up in a minority costume (Mosuo) to catch the stomach flu (not too bad).

And guess where I'm writing this?

The office computer!

One of these days, I'm going to look back on this and laugh hilariously. But right now I want to scream. Oh, well, "to everything there is a season"...and right now it's time for frustration. Then I can laugh.

P.S. I will post pictures of me in the horrible sunburn and beautiful outfit, but I won't post pictures of the stomach flu...are you glad?

Cool Resource!

This is an absolutely fabulous resource for Jacobite songs. Yeah, I know, you probably are thinking When will she stop talking about this? and by "you" I mean Mum, Daddy, and Grandma (who else reads this crazy thing?). Well, it's exhaustive. In fact, there's one song that is sometimes thought of as pertaining to the Jacobites but it doesn't really have to be (seems to me kind of like "Paul is Dead", huh?) and yet it's included "for the sake of exhaustiveness". Well, the exhaustiveness hasn't exhausted me yet. When can we get home to "Loshan" where I can learn all these tunes?

I better go now. Daddy will probably want to spank me for that horrible pun...

Pleading or Accusatory?

My mother is sick of hearing this. There's this song; "Will Ye No Come Back Again?" that goes like this:

Bonnie Charlie's gone awa'
Safely o'er the bounding main
Many's the heart will break in twa
Should he ne'er come back again!

You trusted in your highland men.
They trusted thee, dear Charlie.
They kent your hiding in the glen
Death or exile braving.

English bribes were a' in vain
Though poor and poorer we maun be
Silver cannot buy the heart
That beats aye for thee and thine.

We watched thee in the gloaming hour
We watched thee in the morning gray
Though thirty thousand pound they gie
There is none who would betray!

(chorus)Will ye no come back again?
Will ye no' come back again?
Better loved ye canna be.
Will ye no' come back again?

So is this pleading (come back, Charlie, come back!)? Or is it accusatory (Charlie, get back here now we did plenty for you get back here or else!)? Hmmm...

Frustration, frustration...

Oy. I love going places, travelling (my dad tried to play the devil's advocate and said that I didn't, but he was obviously just kidding!), but I hate stress. Some might argue that stress is part of it, but I think it largely depends on how stressed you let yourself be. All of us (except maybe for Becky) let ourselves get stressed. I show it by sobbing when things aren't going exactly right; Mum shows it by getting irritable, and Daddy shows it by getting out-of-this world crabby.

So that's why I like to hang around somewhere else or do something so engaging it makes them forget about stress. Of course, that doesn't always work. I don't know. Anyhow, it gives me a headache.

Anyhow, a good way to tell if the family's stressed is if I'm lagging behind and not chattering; if Mum is one minute seemingly (and perhaps actually) having a good time and the next snapping; and if Daddy is dour (except he seems to be like that more and more these days :(...); all three of those, well...you've got it.

Thankfully for most of you...we don't tend to do it around folks we sort of know.

Cuy hi ngo mui-mui!

Ney ho ma? I am in the Guangdong province, writing on a Chinese computer, and still guessing at characters. This is my sister's birth city. She, of course, doesn't remember it. The post title in Mandarin would be "Ta shi wa mei-mei", but the guy who asked me about her was speaking Cantonese, which meant I said that. I have tons of stuff to write, but little time, so joi-geen (or zai djen) (or bye-bye) for now and I will write later, probably back in Yunnan.

Over the Sea to Skye

Well, I'm leaving, too, but it's not on a boat, not to Skye, and, most importantly, I'm NOT ESCAPING anything. Except school, maybe. Actually, if it weren't where my sister was left and spent the first almost-six months of her life (and perhaps was born), I would think myself and anyone else to be daft to go to a place where there's nothing to do. I mean it. It's a city like here, "Loshan", where there's absolutely nothing to attract tourists (so why do we have so many hotels?) (Of course, China Eastern did do this article about it, or the prefecture, the famed month we almost crashed. But it was all in Chinese, so I don't know if it said it was a good place to visit or not.) This is really a second time, but with a twist: last time was Gail's hometown, where there's nothing but a natural bridge; but Gail's grandma said the road wasn't safe so we didn't go. It was fabulously interesting, though, because it was an untouched part of China. Gail said no foreigners had been there for a long time, though I do actually know the name (knew the name)of somebody who was. But I digress. Anyway, there we had friends to visit and a guide who could show us the cool parts, here we are heading off to Guangdong to see this incredibly boring sounding city.

It's a need of my sister and my parents. They need to see it again. Sure, I think it would be nice, but I have no need. We've had some disappointments about this whole trip that have devastated my mom, irritated (yes, irritated) my dad, and that my sister has borne with incredible courage. But...I'm this outsider. I have to be strong. And sure, I want to be strong, to not want or need (or at least to put aside my want or need) any extra care or attention, but it's difficult. I only broke down once, and there's other factors influencing that, too...

I guess I'm feeling some strange feelings of being an outsider. Every year we celebrate "family day" because it was the day Mom and Dad were married and Becky was adopted. I have felt this niggling feeling for a few years now that it's not about me. That's okay. But I almost feel like an intruder. I know I'm welcome, I mean, Mom helped me come up with "it's the day I became a sister" sort of thing. And I'm not jealous. I see the specialness of adoption, yet being a birth child has its merits, too. Please don't get me wrong. But all of a sudden, I realized that this has nothing to do with me. And while I don't want everything to do with me, our trips have often been family affairs. Something for everybody. I guess it's my turn; Becky is sort of quiet and doesn't care much what we do besides rest occasionally or eat some Western food. And somehow I feel...well, not left out, but just--outside. I don't really care that much, it's just that I've got to acknowledge that, right or wrong, I'm feeling that.

I'm also feeling, interestingly enough, that we're going to the wrong province. I mean, in Seattle there are tons of Chinese people who come from Guangdong. I have yet to discover any who came from my sister's hometown, but there might be. And I've learned a little Cantonese. So before that, I would read books about and set in China or about Chinese people, and if they spoke Cantonese, or were from Guangdong, I thought it was the "right" thing. But now, having lived in Yunnan all this time, I realize that I've changed. I'm used to hearing Mandarin, I'm leaning Mandarin, and I'm really realizing what it's like to live in China. I'm also learning about local cultures and such in MY part of China. And all of a sudden, the "right" place isn't Guangdong; the "right" language isn't Cantonese, it's Yunnan and Mandarin. And usually, I found books about Guangdong and sometimes (though more often it was Mandarin) Cantonese. Now, I know I'll be reading those books that have Mandarin in them and reminiscing and perhaps I'll be combing the stacks for a picture; a word; a sentence about Yunnan.

So what I'm looking forward to is seeing Micha and Kiana again and seeing the Kunming Nationalities Villages, and, oh, yes, riding the train to Guangdong. Not the other way around; the novelty would have worn off.

And if Mum takes Daddy seriously about bowling, well, I haven't done that in years and it is something to do.

But I'll be glad to be back here surrounded by Yunnan culture...and, yes, probably researching the Jacobites again. Now I'm certain that the "right" place to go in Scotland is the Isle of Skye, or the clan that our name belongs to's castle, or--most importantly for me--Culloden Moor.

No tricks now

Hum. We've got a real Jacob-Esau dynamic going on around here, except there are a lot of exceptions. If it weren't so frustrating it would be amusing.

My sister and I are both regular kids--regular people--in that we're bad and good and all that. Well, it seems we both have a particular flaw that drives one parent crazy while the other, though not fine with it, sort of takes it in stride, disciplining, surely, but not really getting too angry, or if they do it's very short lived. Becky's is her temper, mine is my habit of speaking disrespectfully--and while it's wrong, I don't think either of us do it on purpose all the time. But it is wrong, and it ticks both of our parents off--but the temper drives Mum nuts, and don't expect civil conversation for several minutes between my father and me after I chance to say something...well, you get the idea.

Now, I'm sure my parents don't play favorites, or if they do, it's an accident that they can't help and it doesn't affect much of anything. Besides that, there's always been this dynamic of "what's a creative thing to show Daddy" and "what's a creative thing to show Mum" with me at least and they're different. Daddy has more in-jokes, Mum's stuff is generally stuff that I would post in detail here more often or something like that. Like right now...well, she might read this before Mother's Day, and then what would I do?

And my sister, the youngest, can get by with more from Daddy, whereas I, the oldest--well, they both crack down a lot, but Mum's less...how shall I put it? And there's not this serious rivalry. Change our genders, ages, and so on...I think Becky would be off hunting while I helped my mother (though sitting around typing isn't doing that). Right now, I do a lot of creative stuff, and, oh, yes, occasionally I'm "mother's little helper" (when she's stressed or doesn't get the dishes done before English Corner), while Becky is definitely "mother's little helper". But I think that at the right place and the right time she'd go off hunting, a lot. Neither of us are that hairy. Furthermore, we don't have that birthright thing, and who knows if she'd buy it from me if we did? Hmmm...

The biggest parallel, however, is that she's already a really good cook. So selling a birthright for her cooking isn't as impossible as it may seem...;)

The Bold Fenian Men

Yes, another song. I'm into Scottish songs and Irish songs that are against the English. This should make our very British neighbors aboslutely thrilled. Anyway, this one is "Down By the Glenside", and it's Irish. I've decided that I'm going to try and learn a lot of Jacobite songs and some Irish Rebellion songs. So far: the rest of "The Rising of the Moon" (Theodore Bickel tune) and "Down By the Glenside" and "The Foggy Dew". That's for the Irish. For the Jacobites: "Ye Jacobites By Name" (Robert Burns version!!!), "Johnnie Cope" (Not Robert Burns), "Will Ye No Come Back Again?" and perhaps some more. When we get home I'm really going to have to learn the guitar.

"Down By the Glenside" is a beautiful song about some rebellion (part of my project, after I've got words and tune down as easy as an Atwater-Donnelly song, is to research to death the origins and background, because there's some obscure stories out there), and its first verse deals with someone saying, "I was out walking and I saw this old granny humming this tune--'Glory O, Glory O to the bold Fenian men'." Anyhow, the tune is beautiful, and on some website I found an MP3 sample instead of a MIDI. I wish every website did that! It helps to know how the words fit in. But I like MIDIs, too and wish I could make them as good as some people out there...

Anyway, I'm writing a comic strip for my dad, the fourth in a series. The first three stories dealt with a young woman who 1.) frees her galaxy from the tyranny of the evil "Bureau" and its leader, Commander Krane; 2.) Gets Krane put in jail once and for all; 3.) Puts down another woman who wants to rule the Galaxy and is killing people to do it. But now, we turn from Sci-fi (and really bad Sci-fi at that) to folk music. This young woman's by this time aged quite a bit, and her children are grown. So her son, daughter, and son-in-law form a folk trio. Anyway, the story is about this woman's son, who is a bit of a jokester. Hence a really bad joke I made at the expense of this truly beautiful song:

Emmett (the son) is miffed at Theresa (his sister) because she said that he sang out of tune. Whether he does or not is yet to be soon. Theresa is moody and the siblings often have slight tiffs. Anyhow, Emmett has the solo for the first verse of this song, so he begins nicely:

"'Twas down by the glenside, I met an old woman
A-picking wild nettles; she scarce saw me comin',
I listened awhile to the song she was hummin':

And then he grins at his sister and bursts into "Angels We Have Heard on High"--"Glo-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-oria in excelsis--oh, sorry. Glory O, glory O to the bold Fenian men!"

Theresa's response is: "Can't he just be serious?"

But it is a beautiful song, truly!

Oy, the internet!

No, like I said before, I'm not Yiddish. My catch-phrases are Yiddish and Chinese: "Oy" and "Aiyah!" Enough said.

Anyway, the internet is up again. How long will it be this time, hmmm?

At the Office

This is all in Chinese. I have to guess at publishing buttons, and I'm just glad I know the Blogger interface so well. I'm writing on the office computer because the internet in our home is down (again!) and I don't want to wait or publish via email that much, because it adds so many weird line-breaks. But enough complaining.

For school this week I have to write a paper about some disease. I'm having a hard time choosing between diabetes, AIDS, or leukemia. I asked Mom and she said, "What a cheerful decision". But then she suggested leukemia. I'm actually kind of glad. AIDS is interesting and horrible, but it also bears a bit of an aura of "starving children in Africa". We should help starving children in Africa, but it's not a suitable threat. In my opinion.

The Rising of the Moon

This is such a lovely song--the tune I know it to is the one I'm thinking of, though the other tune is nice, to. This doesn't have that little repeating bit, "At the rising of the moon, at the rising of the moon..." etc. It's really interesting. I used to think it was a woman (Sean O'Farrell's girlfriend?) singing. I still imagine that, though now I find that "buichaill" is a lad or a young boy. Oops!

Why did I become so interested in this Irish war song? Well, I liked it when I first had to sing it out of Theodore Bikel's book for school. Then, when I was thinking of making a personal tape of this "band"--i.e. my sister playing anything percussive, my dad singing what I could teach him, and me doing the rest of the stuff because I was the only one who actually knwe the songs--I started researching songs. At this time, 2004, or thereabouts, the word "moon" was this big joke between us...never mind why; the wrong people might see it. I learned the song as a joke. Then I thought it was great. At first, I thought it was a really slow, drawn-out song (sung by a woman, no less!), but I've heard the other tune now, and it's generally done pretty fast and by people who might at one time have fit the defnition of "buichaill".

So I guess the song has two identities for me...but where on earth is that tune from the Theodore Bickel's book has??? I can't seem to find it anywhere. Anyone know?

Ye Jacobites by Name

So you don't get lost, here are the lyrics to the particular tune I'm talking about: Ye Jacobites by Name.

Now, most of the penned down stuff and folk music you get in connection with the Jacobites is all pro-Jacobite and stuff like that. Now, here's a different twist on it. As the site clearly states and shows, the original words were a scathing, specific lashing of the whole Jacobite cause. Any more and your ears would bleed. Now, along comes Robert Burns with his Jacobite sympathies (and, luckily for him, he was also not in the actual time of the Jacobites or else...) and he toned down the lyrics. Now, when sung right, it's a great song full of fire, though a bit too specific for my tastes...I like songs about fictional characters who are metaphors for everyday life--or even real characters who are metaphors, like in "There Were Roses". But this song fascinates me.

Another Jacobite song I just discovered today and am wearing out my computer playing a MIDI file of it, is "Johnnie Cope". The lyrics are in broad Scots dialect (or whatever you call it) and the story is...well...let's just say I like Jacobite songs for their tunes (and, occasionally, sentiments), but I don't really enjoy the whole history or story behind the thing. However, as no one seems to have written new words for it, I'm coming up with my own personal ones. If they're good, you can read them here. The problem? Well, the chorus begins "Hey, Johnnie Cope" and I can't discard that. Seriously, I've tried. So now I have to find a name with two syllables and then one. The closest I've come to is "Mr. Brown" for the goat that gets into the...well, we won't go there; or "Willie Lew" (short for Willie Lewis, Lewis being the last name) for the...well, it's supposed to be funny, but I can't get any farther than "He's gonna loose and it's not his fault", but who would be saying that and why? Hmmm, somehow I think starting at the beginning would be easier...

Willie Lewis is another topic entirely. No, he's not my boyfriend. It's just how I came up with him and why that you will find interesting if you find anything about this blog interesting. Except, you probably won't. In the words of John Lennon: "I'm so bored/I buried Paul."