Thank you. It’s heartening to know there are matriarchal cultures still in existence, one’s deeply entangled with and reciprocating earth’s generosity. I look forward to learning more in your next installment.
Thank you dear friend for spending your time on this important story. I am sure the Khasi way of life and their matrilineal modus operandi holds a mirror to the world and shows us where we lost and what we lost along the way when we subjected women and nature in almost all major sectarian religions of the world. Your presence and support means more than you know. Thank you again, I deeply admire you.
Thank you for this first installment of an important and fascinating story, Swarnali. You have done such a wonderful job of setting the scene, describing the environment and the land, and the culture and worldview of its people. I can feel the emphasis on the bond, the relationship between the Khasi and the earth/waters/sky that are part of their world. And I feel the encroachment of colonization, and all the ways it has attempted to steal this sovereignty. I look forward to the next installment.
Oh Maia how can I put in words how immeasurable the beauty of Meghalaya is and how sad it is as christianization has disrupted these beautiful people and their relationship with nature and each other. It is a story of beauty, heartbreak, and the hope of finding a way out of the mess we have made. Thank you for supporting this journye my dear friends, it means the world to me.
Another beautifully written journey of which I am waiting eagerly for the next installment. A powerful frustration is felt too, a kind of petition I suppose, for peoples, cultures, ideas, hopes and dreams to be left alone by these terrible men (not only but often) on horseback or foot with swords or guns who wish to stomp their way across ancient lands crying out they've discovered virgin territory as they scythe down all in their way.
Thank you my friend. You are absolutely on point with your observations. There is so much rage and grief in this story, and also remembrance and hope. The severed bonds between man and nature is an absolute outcome of the patriarchy and white patriarchy in specific. And what is more grotesque is that the shadow cast by colonial loss still challenges the traditional wisdom within the khasis, and I can see new generation forgetting their ancestor’s songs.
As usual I just read your comment and agree with everything you say. It's very difficult to not to be despondent with all direction of travel these days. Perhaps it's just clutching at straws but it's also very difficult to predict the future and what kind of resurrections may occur. It's very difficult to re-find what's been lost, but might we learn something as a species and stop being so dreadfully stupid and destructive? It's a cold dark winters night here so I'm possibly not in the right frame of mind for optimism. But I'm grateful for your fine writing anyway :)
I understand how you feel. The world at large is in tatters, it’s hard not to despair. Yet there’s beauty in how we battle them, hope in how we work together in a new direction. Sending you warmth and sunlight in spirit from the tropics my friend.
If you are interested in mycology, here’s something I found yesterday that might cheer you up. The interconnected world of fungi has a lot to teach us on finding our way back to building a happy functional society 💜
Thanks so much Swarnali, I do love mycology! In fact I read Merlin Sheldrake's book Entangled Lives a few years back when it came out. Very interesting read. I'll definitely read your link, and thanks for the sunshine too, it's a lot warmer here now ;)
Oh wow! I discovered him only yesterday and I was completely blown away by his ideas. What a phenomenal guy. Let’s chat more about mycology someday 💜. I will give this book a read.
Absolutely! The mycelic world is such a good metaphor for healthy co-dependent mutuality in the social and political world too. Or even considering philosophical thought patterns that investigate where one entity starts and another ends which undermines mechanistic ideas of separate and individual existence (which is also ideological nonsense on the whole).
Funny the tangential conversations that can arise :)
Dear John, thank you. You are so right. We have completely lost our way. Last night I found out, last year, Yakutia has seen its worst yet wildfire ever since time immemorial. North pole being on fire is literally a nightmare. The urgency to change and find the ways that taught us harmony, is blaring. Thank you for your support and interest on this journey on discovering an alternate path.
Stunning and beautiful, Swarna. Thank you for bringing us on a journey through this land, where it sounds like land is kin rather than possession. Land of waters -- how this makes me think of Elif Shafak! -- and I am so struck by the 5 forces of chaotic nurturing and 2 to balance them. I can feel the truth of it in the ground under my feet.
Thank you dear sister. The earth she speaks to us in so many ways. And you are so right about the forces of nurture and balance, I felt it as deeply as well - in ways it works around us, its impossible to miss how Gaia is so frivolous and forgiving at the same time. But how long do we stretch her kindness before she gives up? That’s the question haunting our generation and the future ones right now. The khasis know it like many other indigenous people who are in tune with nature’s agency and rage.
Thank you. It’s heartening to know there are matriarchal cultures still in existence, one’s deeply entangled with and reciprocating earth’s generosity. I look forward to learning more in your next installment.
Thank you dear friend for spending your time on this important story. I am sure the Khasi way of life and their matrilineal modus operandi holds a mirror to the world and shows us where we lost and what we lost along the way when we subjected women and nature in almost all major sectarian religions of the world. Your presence and support means more than you know. Thank you again, I deeply admire you.
Thank you for this first installment of an important and fascinating story, Swarnali. You have done such a wonderful job of setting the scene, describing the environment and the land, and the culture and worldview of its people. I can feel the emphasis on the bond, the relationship between the Khasi and the earth/waters/sky that are part of their world. And I feel the encroachment of colonization, and all the ways it has attempted to steal this sovereignty. I look forward to the next installment.
Oh Maia how can I put in words how immeasurable the beauty of Meghalaya is and how sad it is as christianization has disrupted these beautiful people and their relationship with nature and each other. It is a story of beauty, heartbreak, and the hope of finding a way out of the mess we have made. Thank you for supporting this journye my dear friends, it means the world to me.
Another beautifully written journey of which I am waiting eagerly for the next installment. A powerful frustration is felt too, a kind of petition I suppose, for peoples, cultures, ideas, hopes and dreams to be left alone by these terrible men (not only but often) on horseback or foot with swords or guns who wish to stomp their way across ancient lands crying out they've discovered virgin territory as they scythe down all in their way.
Thank you my friend. You are absolutely on point with your observations. There is so much rage and grief in this story, and also remembrance and hope. The severed bonds between man and nature is an absolute outcome of the patriarchy and white patriarchy in specific. And what is more grotesque is that the shadow cast by colonial loss still challenges the traditional wisdom within the khasis, and I can see new generation forgetting their ancestor’s songs.
As usual I just read your comment and agree with everything you say. It's very difficult to not to be despondent with all direction of travel these days. Perhaps it's just clutching at straws but it's also very difficult to predict the future and what kind of resurrections may occur. It's very difficult to re-find what's been lost, but might we learn something as a species and stop being so dreadfully stupid and destructive? It's a cold dark winters night here so I'm possibly not in the right frame of mind for optimism. But I'm grateful for your fine writing anyway :)
I understand how you feel. The world at large is in tatters, it’s hard not to despair. Yet there’s beauty in how we battle them, hope in how we work together in a new direction. Sending you warmth and sunlight in spirit from the tropics my friend.
If you are interested in mycology, here’s something I found yesterday that might cheer you up. The interconnected world of fungi has a lot to teach us on finding our way back to building a happy functional society 💜
https://emergencemagazine.org/conversation/the-substrate-of-mystery/
Thanks so much Swarnali, I do love mycology! In fact I read Merlin Sheldrake's book Entangled Lives a few years back when it came out. Very interesting read. I'll definitely read your link, and thanks for the sunshine too, it's a lot warmer here now ;)
Oh wow! I discovered him only yesterday and I was completely blown away by his ideas. What a phenomenal guy. Let’s chat more about mycology someday 💜. I will give this book a read.
Absolutely! The mycelic world is such a good metaphor for healthy co-dependent mutuality in the social and political world too. Or even considering philosophical thought patterns that investigate where one entity starts and another ends which undermines mechanistic ideas of separate and individual existence (which is also ideological nonsense on the whole).
Funny the tangential conversations that can arise :)
This is fascinating, Swarna. I'm eagerly awaiting the next instalment. The world needs examples of a better way.
Dear John, thank you. You are so right. We have completely lost our way. Last night I found out, last year, Yakutia has seen its worst yet wildfire ever since time immemorial. North pole being on fire is literally a nightmare. The urgency to change and find the ways that taught us harmony, is blaring. Thank you for your support and interest on this journey on discovering an alternate path.
Stunning and beautiful, Swarna. Thank you for bringing us on a journey through this land, where it sounds like land is kin rather than possession. Land of waters -- how this makes me think of Elif Shafak! -- and I am so struck by the 5 forces of chaotic nurturing and 2 to balance them. I can feel the truth of it in the ground under my feet.
Thank you dear sister. The earth she speaks to us in so many ways. And you are so right about the forces of nurture and balance, I felt it as deeply as well - in ways it works around us, its impossible to miss how Gaia is so frivolous and forgiving at the same time. But how long do we stretch her kindness before she gives up? That’s the question haunting our generation and the future ones right now. The khasis know it like many other indigenous people who are in tune with nature’s agency and rage.