Aidagara (2017)

This is one of my favourite performances, and probably the one with the longest gestation period before it would finally take shape, come to life. 

During the initial phases of my doctoral studies, was attending numerous Truth and Reconciliation Commission gatherings on Indian Residential Schools (TRC-IRS). Having witnessed national, regional, and local sharing circles, took close notice of how different each experience was: those in attendance, those who chose to speak, the air in the rooms, the location. 

The national event in Vancouver took place at the Pacific National Exhibitions (PNE) grounds between September 18-21, 2013. This choice of location was rather peculiar to me, actually, it was downright shitty. The PNE had been used as corralling grounds for Japanese-Canadians, who were then shipped off to internment camps during World War II. As an amusement park with this disturbing history, I thought how fucking inconsiderate it was to hold reconciliation sharing circles there where survivor stories could be treated as mere entertainment and/or with attendees under the tacit threat of being incarcerated. Who of the JC community would dare show up? And for those who did, in what psychological and emotional condition would they be able to listen, given the personal traumatic memories linked with that location? Seriously, what the hell?!?

I attended every day of the Vancouver TRC gathering. But this particular occasion was remarkably different. A dear friend had requested my presence on the third day of event. For the previous three years, had been volunteering as an art facilitator at a women’s centre in the heart of the city. There, became friends with Vera*, who eventually approached me and asked if i might consider accompanying her as she gave her testimony of surviving Indian residential schools. She wished to have a familiar support by her side, yet did not want to emotionally burden her family as she disclosed her personal childhood experiences. 

At TRC events, survivors were given the option of providing a public or private testimony. Public testimonies took place in large rooms or tents, with survivors often seated apart from and surrounded by the witnessing audience. Elevated on a stage, the speakers were placed in a sharing circle configuration, facing one another. There was a time limit to these disclosures, with survivors being told that they had between 10-15 minutes to speak their truth. The private testimonies were vastly different. In Vancouver, small, white tent huts – uncannily reminiscent of JC internment camp housing – were set up in a separate auditorium, serving as tiny receptacles of trauma disclosures. In each mini tent, an interviewer, videographer/audio recorder, and counsellor were present. Within this private setting, survivors could take as long as they wished to speak about their lives in and after residential schools. Vera spoke for five hours, and she was truly powerful in her testimony. In that period, Vera’s voice moved from a barely audible, hesitant whisper to the volume of everyday speech to a strident flow of urgency. Ultimately, Vera, who stared unwaveringly into the video camera, clearly articulated her objectives for building better relations between local, provincial, and national governments and Indigenous people. I was in awe of her authority.

But…right next to us in the neighbouring booth was a man. I will never forget his voice for it is permanently etched into every bone in my body. For three hours straight, he wailed and screamed until his throat ran coarse. Yet he continued to rasp and gulp for air in his emotional turmoil. All of the surrounding occupants and the building itself absorbed all the pain hemorrhaging from his exhausted body. I don’t know how he could survive his testimony, do not think that he did. If he did not pass immediately following, then it would have been a slow strangulating death. Ever since that day, he is never far from my mind, my heart.

The TRC-IRS was deeply troubling for so many reasons, perhaps too much to recount here, but i just have to say this: Dear TRC people around the world, jesus fucking christ, DO NOT create a payment calculus based on the tabulation of people’s traumatic experiences. It fucks people up if their memories are duly noted, and it fucks them up maybe even more if their applications are rejected, when the “official documents” do not match with the individual’s memories. Personal organic memories and historical documents rarely coincide. Thousands of people have written their masters and phd dissertations on this very topic. Holocaust survivor and renown psychiatrist, Dr. Dori Laub has provided a very sensitive analysis of the gap between memory and historical accounts of living in and surviving concentration camps. In the early 1970s, Dr. Laub created the Holocaust Survivors Film Project, over time carefully documenting hundreds of survivor stories. Dr. Otoniya J. Okot-Bitek’s poetic masterpiece on the Rwandan genocide, 100 Days, also comes to mind immediately. So for the love of all that is delicate and cherished in this world, dear TRC scholars and architects, do the goddamn research. And please, please never ever price out trauma memories for financial benefit in the way the TRC-IRS did. So much irreparable damage. The intergenerational spiritual cost has far outweighed the temporary individual material gains. 

After Vera was satisfied with the closure of her testimony, and ensuring that she had eaten and was ready to head home, saw her off, then… i freaked the hell out, no longer capable of containing this man’s pain, Vera’s, all of their suffering. How do people do this day in and day out? How do the counsellors absorb and digest these stories and survive? How? How?! How?!! How?!!! How?!!!! Sobbing, i began running at top speed in the unrelenting rain, completely inconsolable and having no sense of direction. In clunky heels and overpacked computer bag in tow, i tore down Hastings, tears flooding down my face, until my legs buckled at the knees and found myself wandering aimlessly in Stanley Park along the seawall. Without thinking, stopped suddenly and planted my hands onto a rock face, which was awash with a thick layer of rainwater. It felt like the stone itself was weeping from the testimonies heard from afar, travelled through the most sorrowful of birdsongs. I remained there, crying and crying until tears refused to excrete any further. Cannot recall how long i clung onto that rock, but that day, it rescued me.

For years after, whenever passing by, would stop, touch the wall in deepest gratitude and wonder: how does one repay such steadfast care? How to reciprocate in kind to a rock its extraordinary generosities to a lowly human?

I come from a cultural background where gift-giving is complex. There are gifts to introduce oneself, to declare one’s presence and to promise not to be too much of a burden to the host. Gifts for ‘oops, sorry, may need to stay a tiny bit longer…’. Gifts for general dispersal of items collected during vacations and business trips, and gifts for every national holiday. There are gifts to show that the recipient has reached their relational limit, that they are not welcome any closer than where they currently stand. Contrarily, there are gifts to compel further intimacy, enough to be on a first/personal name basis! And gifts offered as a way to say goodbye. 

But how do you gift a rock wall in honour of its indomitable abidance?

…

Back in 2006, i was working as a disability support care worker, moving between private residences, drop-in centres, and group homes in the lower mainland. My client-bosses were living with a range of diagnosed disabilities, most were either non-verbal or verbally diverse. One of my bosses was living in a group home with two other roommates. Gareth’s* medical records were extensive. He was diagnosed with multiple, complex congenital conditions, which manifested in him being nonverbal, nearly 100% blind (5% capacity to see light through one eye), requiring heaps of medication, and hands-on assistance in every aspect of daily living. When the group home would go out on excursions, he would lead from behind. He would place his hands on my hips and we’d walk together based on the speed of his shuffle. Although Gareth grudgingly participated in these day trips, he was a true home-body. His favourite place in the whole world was his bedroom. He would sit cross-legged for hours on his bed, sometimes humming to himself, breaking only for meals or to go to his ensuite bathroom. He loved listening to country western music.

I was often scheduled to work at the home twice a week, logging between 10- and 12-hour shifts. The 12h shifts included doing an overnight, where as the sole staff member, i would check in on the sleeping residents on an hourly basis. During my work hours, Gareth would move independently from his bed to the ensuite sometimes more than 20 times a day. As his employee, i would wait to assist him after he finished, aid him in flushing the toilet, and wash his hands. He would then return to his bed at his pace, his leisure.

The first time i witnessed Gareth travelling from his bed to the bathroom, my brain had difficulty processing the scene before me. His movements were so refined as he carefully unfolded his legs and arms, edged to the side of the bed, reached downwards to touch the ground with both hands, pivot his body, then glide his palms along the vinyl flooring until they met up with the wall. From there, he would slowly rise to his feet, pause ever so slightly so that he could plant his left hand at face-level to the wall and create a path to the toilet. The first time i witnessed Gareth moving in this way, tears spontaneously and copiously streamed down my face. In all of the performances and dance recitals that i’ve attended in my life, never have i had the privilege to be in proximity to such ethereal beauty. Told Gareth this to which he responded by giggling. Thereafter, would announce every time that i was watching. On occasion, if he wished for more privacy, he would grunt brusquely at my over-attentive presence, and i would divert my eyes, turn my body away. But most of the time, he would giggle and continue on with this ritual. 

In this one repetitive act, Gareth’s life proved to be uncontainable. None of the labels, medical conditions, physical and mental health diagnoses piled upon and categorizing him could capture the scope of his existence, the elegance of his movements. He knew that wall, that route, every bump along the brick, every crevice with such practiced intimacy, such respect for the encounter. A careful and caring collaboration between human and home. 

…

How does one move between different worlds, suturing them in the hopes of creating politically and relationally beautiful meaning? Aidagara (間柄) means ‘inbetweenness’. In his seminal book on relational ethics, 風土 (Fūdo), moral philosopher and political historian Watsuji, Tetsuro (和辻 鉄路) presents a comprehensive analysis of the interrelationship between climate, humans, land, temperature, humidity, soil, and movement. Emphasising spatial over temporal considerations, Watsuji argues that we are social beings, immersed in this sociality from birth to death. He breaks down the categorical barriers between cultural, historical, and physical existence. Written in 1935, Fūdo carries the hangups of pro-Westphalian and Japanese Imperialist nationalism, and consequently, it has been rightly criticised for the racism that emerges as a result of the socio-political context in which it was penned. Yet, this book continues to compel, because despite its many shortcomings, Watsuji’s enfoldment of human and nonhuman relations was arguably visionary, a much needed contribution for the environmental and political challenges that we currently face.

In mid-spring 2017, on one of my runs circumnavigating the sea wall, the air and humidity were eerily familiar. Rainfall at times torrential and persistent, easing only temporarily to renew the swelling of cloud cover. Is this what one refers to as the proust effect? Didn’t realise that i’d been sprinting so hard until i started gasping for breath, bent over to ease my cramping body. When i stood up, was smack right in front of the very same rock face, and Gareth flew into the forefront of my mind. Suddenly, finally knew how best to repay the rock the care it had provided so many years prior. Seeking permission, and remembering the intimacy and importance of touch in Gareth’s actions, decided to honour the rock with the gift of Gareth’s movements, trying to run my fingers across the surface of the rock as conscientiously as he had along his bedroom wall. Not sure what prompted me to approach my dear friend and artist, Navarana Tretina to film the performance later in the fall. Most of my works before and after Aidagara are deliberately ephemeral, only meant to exist in a particular place, time, context for a short while, recordings scant and accidental. But in this case, guess i wanted to share as widely as possible a significant part of Gareth’s life. Publicly honour how he had changed my life, expanded my understanding of gift-giving across cultural habits, in the inbetweenesses of being, and for him, all as a matter of course, refinement through the everyday.

As a care worker who as a child had been the one cared for – having experienced significant linguistic and developmental delays due to epilepsy and over-medication during the most formative years (aged 2-13) – i intimately remember containment. First childhood memory: my arms tethered to the crib in the paediatric ward of the hospital. 

Over the years of receiving and providing care, this is what i have learned so far (＃研究): in every single person, in the most minuscule of encounters, in the aidagara of human and human, human and nonhuman, nonhuman and nonhuman, we are given the chance to come into contact with infinity, to be witness to the uncontainable. Fingers to wrist, the pulse of one’s heartbeat neverending, the home-body employer who puts principal ballerinas to shame, the rock that heals otherwise spiritually mortal wounds. Across space and time, Vera, the neighbouring man, internment survivors, and Gareth’s lives converge at the rock, sutured through different states of care and loving regard. Yet, each always already exists beyond measure, beyond narratives constructed by others, beyond our selves.

And the land absorbs so much (almost all of?) human life, movement, vibrations, struggle, suffering. Will never forget visiting the memorial museum in Hiroshima back in 1991. Inside, they had set up a maquette of where the atomic bomb had been dropped. Was struck by this model, in particular by the gentle, rolling hill that bisected the city. On the side that the bomb was set off, the citizens were killed immediately. But on the other side, those whose houses were built in the shadow of the hill survived. Yes, many would go on to develop cancer over the years, but in that moment, that humble, unassuming hill absorbed the initial cataclysmic impact of a radiation tsunami, the mushroom cloud stopped in its tracks. Humans had been given a chance. What did the hill itself experience? How did it heal in the aftermath of this chemical felling? In Rwanda, after attending a conference on trauma and memory in 2012, spent some time to familiarize myself with the country. There, met so many people who said similar things, that during the genocide in 1994, humans had been overcome by a wild fever, but that the land had taken care of them, nurtured them back to health, back to the presence of mind to care for one another.

So how do we respectfully reciprocate the generosities bestowed upon us by the land, which has cradled the most mundane and extraordinary moments of human existence without prejudice?

Here is a link to Aidagara (間柄), 2017. Filmed and produced by gifted filmmaker and multi-media artist, Navarana Tretina: https://vimeo.com/259222617/783cbd7d7b 

I hope you enjoy. 

Love, 

歩美

*Names changed for privacy protection.

[Photo: Rusororo, 2012, just east of Kigali. Rwanda is a beautiful country, the land is lush, the air scented with the spray of tropical blooms, butterflies swirl in multi-pastels. I hope you have a chance to visit.]