Living on a dime

A Buddhist teaching speaks of the Eight Vicissitudes of life, also dubbed "The Eight Worldly Winds". These - joy and pain, gain and loss, praise and blame, and fame and disrepute - come and go like the winds. The trick is to remain mentally unshaken by these ever-changing winds, being equally reactive for the positive experiences and the negative experiences in life. Because only then, the negative experiences won't break you and the positive experiences won't lull you into a fall sense of permanency.

I'm currently passing my second wave of "poverty" since year one (semester one) of my undergraduate studies. Growing up, our family didn't have money to splurge on but we were fortunate to have enough to live a modest life. My father was not able to afford a good education for us with his job in Sri Lanka, so he spent most of my childhood working overseas. My mother had boarded students from time to time and she tried out a myriad of small scale businesses to contribute to our home expenses. Of all the mini-businesses she tried (which included catering, cookery classes, making envelopes, cultivating mushrooms, cultivating ginger, sewing clothes, buying and selling clothes, pasting vesak buckets, making incense sticks, and a few more which I can't even recall now!), only the production and sale of soy tofu still continues. When I was a lot younger, I occasionally felt embarrassed to let people know this is how we got by because my peers were often from better socioeconomic standing. It was only later I realised what incredible resolve my parents had (and the things they compromised) to give me a good education and a fighting chance to survive in this world. 

I started to become financially independent around the time of my O/Ls (aged 14-15) through English tuition classes for about 10 children in the village. My charges back then were Rs 100 (USD 0.63) for a 1 hour (sometimes 2 hour) class. With the money earned, I was able to contribute a little for the house expenses and buy small things that fancied me as a teenager. Just after I left school, our principal employed us as teaching assistants in primary school (for about Rs 3500 or USD 22 a month, if I recall correctly) till it was time to leave to university. With this and the money earned from tuition, I was able to contribute to my share of rent and food. While studying in university, I worked all my permissible work hours (I think it was 14 hours a week back then) as a Student Assistant in various university administration offices earning between SGD 6.50 - 8 (USD 4.85 - 6) per hour, which gave me enough money for my general expenses, air tickets for the holidays and a bit extra cash every month to send home for the parents. In Dubai, I managed to drive 3-4 other people to work and back (I was also making up for the environmental sin of using a 3.7 liter fuel-drinking monster engine with a bit of car pooling!), which helped me cover my Jeep's fuel costs with ease. After I returned to Singapore, I didn't need to do an extra job and that fortunately gave me more time to volunteer at the Singapore Zoo. 

My story isn't unique and I know many who went through similar (or worse) times of hardship at some point in their lives. Also, there are many others who are in much more dire straits, not having the opportunities or the ability to crawl out of their current conditions. The point of reminiscing in this post was to probably to remind myself that I have the coping mechanisms to be resilient. Taking more than a 90% pay cut to return to Sri Lanka was a rather risky move (the struggle is real now), but if we played safe all the time, we may never recognise our hidden potential or even get close to achieving those near-impossible things we dream of! Life really is like being at a casino. 

My latest favourite comic strip by Stephan Pastis! (Source: https://www.facebook.com/PearlsComic/)

The following are some of the ways I've tried and mastered in keeping my costs down:

1. Walking, taking public transport and hired tuk tuks, instead of hired cars or owning a car (on lease). Trains with a reserved seat, as I have discovered, are the most comfortable transport means for long distances. For shorter distances, public buses are good too. Although everyone seems to be in a rush, I usually wait till I see a bus with free seats or adjust my time to beat the peak hours. Tuk tuks are also cheap here, and sometimes the amount of time they can save is far more valuable than the few hundred rupees I would save by taking a bus. 

2. We don't need as many clothes or shoes as we think we do. Over the last 2 years, I have bought less than 10 items of clothing and no shoes. They were all bought out of necessity rather than desire. Also, the clothes I spent on when I was faring better, mostly from good quality brands, have proven their value and durability. As an added incentive, I no longer feel compelled to keep up with the latest beauty or fashion trends or worry about the reality than I am aging. Unlike my younger years, I also don't feel embarrassed to live within my means or be open about it. Having said that, I did receive clothes, shoes, bags and such as gifts (more than I need) from friends and family in the past two years, which have kept my own expenses down. 

3. Food is something you have to be careful about. You can't eat less or poorly without risking bad health issues later. For my mornings, I mostly eat oatmeal or a local nutritious cereal (called Samaposha), both of which are very cheap and keeps me fit. My lunches are usually home-cooked and this has helped me to save cash, minimise the generation of waste packaging and eat healthier. I do spend a little extra on buying organic vegetables and multivitamins, which I hope will be a good health investment. As for the rest, my own home garden is like a mini-market so when I return from the weekend, I bring fruits, greens and some vegetables to last me the work week. Plus, my mother sends me with a lot of frozen food which saves my cooking time and costs. Occasional food treats are no longer a method of rewarding myself!

4. Monthly trips to the salons are also completely out now, except when I have to go to a wedding (see point 5). Earlier, I used to make a monthly trip to the salon to get services like eyebrow threading, waxing, pedicures and haircuts done. Now, I have resorted to doing what I can at home and my hair has grown rather long (and wavy) from a lack of haircuts.

5. I'm not very social and I am very content with my current list of friends so I don't feel the urge to socialise in order to make new friends (I am aware this also reduces my chances of meeting a potential mate, but this is not a deal breaker). I save a lot by just simply not taking part in social events because they entail transport costs, dressing up, bills for food and drinks, gifts, etc. I only participate in the social events that matter and those that aren't too costly. 

No, thank you!...but urgh, fine if I really must (Image source: http://introvert-inspiration.com/)

6. Sanitary pads can be a significant expense on a girl's budget. I shipped a stock of them with my cargo when I returned to Sri Lanka and besides that, I got a supply from a friend and several loads from my sister after she had to get a hysterectomy. I am covered with sanitary pads for some time.

7. Gym memberships are really a thing of the past. Owning to my lack of discipline for exercise, in the past, I resorted to paid gym memberships. Knowing that I've paid a big amount was the only motivation that made me go for regular yoga and Zumba classes. Now though, without that luxury, fitness and stamina are really lacking in my life. 

8. I can no longer spend on entertainment like new books, movies at the cinema, renting movies online, buying gifts for friends (I've asked some friends not to send me any gifts since I can't reciprocate), buying new gadgets and even travelling (the biggest deal breaker so far but it helps that my work involves some travelling). However, having a good internet connection is enough to satisfy one's basic entertainment needs. 

Fat and lazy sounds perfect to me too (Source: https://www.facebook.com/PearlsComic/)

These times of adversity have forced me to value the joys of simple pleasures and be grateful for what I have (which is everything I need plus a lot of love). I've found it has made me a little more grounded and conscious to the needs of others. It has also made me waste less resources. 

When I had a fat wallet, I knew it wasn't going to be forever that way. Likewise, this too shall pass. 

The nun from hell

I shuttle between two offices during the week. Lately, I’ve been spending more time at my new office than the one at the UN compound.

This office is an old-fashioned, large, single-floor house that has been converted to a multi-purpose office. I learnt that this place has a lot of history. Even now, the building has remnants of various publications stacked up in shelves, novels written by a famous local author (deceased) and lots of artwork on the walls that depict womanhood through the eyes of various artists (they tell me there used to be many art workshops then). The place is owned by three NGOs that work on women’s rights. Things have quietened down now for women’s rights activists. Most of those young activists who started out many decades ago are old now, some have passed away and some have moved to other sectors like the environment (and that’s how I got to know some of them). Parts of the office have now been leased to other NGOs like ours.

Work of an unknown artist which is hung right opposite my desk. Pretty depressing sight, if you ask me. Shows a bride looking at a reflection of herself with two kids in tow, bent over a large pot of food while also doing other house chores. I'm going to request for a change of scenery! 

One lady remembers those glory days of theirs when they marched in the streets for women’s rights. She tells me that young people these days don’t like to do that. That’s true, I prefer to voice out from behind a laptop screen than shout out in the streets (even for environmental causes). My generation has it a little easier, I suppose. Back then, times were worse for women; there was more oppression, less opportunities in education and work, early marriages, female child labour, basically many things to fight for. Now there are little or no barriers in education for women in Sri Lanka. Career-wise, the gender ratios are healthier. Under-aged children working as "servants" (that's what they call them in Sri Lanka) are rare because laws are tough on people who try to exploit children. Under-aged marriages have reduced with better literacy rates. What remains are mostly the age-old issues like rape, domestic violence, power imbalance in marriages with a dominating male partner, unfair division of labour in marriages and objectification of women. These are the ongoing struggles of most women in vulnerable communities and some women in not-so-vulnerable communities.

This lady, who I assume is in her sixties tells me she worked hard and mostly voluntarily (to the dismay of her family sometimes) with NGOs when she was young to push for equal opportunities for women and bring about social reform. She’s quite the remarkable character and what strikes me the most is her skill in dealing with people from all social strata with ease; all the way from the top (politicians, high profile people, academics) to colleagues and down to the level of people who work for her (like her helpers and drivers) and people from low income backgrounds. Although she’s moved to the environment sector now, I could tell her passion lies in fighting injustice for women in marginalised and oppressed communities. She’s great (and hilarious) when it comes to conversations on open-minded topics, marriage, women’s reproductive rights, male chauvinists, religious leaders who take a keen interest on women’s genitals, injustice to the environment, etc. On field visits, she’s the best travel buddy anyone could wish for because she’s so curious to explore new areas, try new food from roadside places specially the home-cooked types, buy fruits and vegetables from small roadside vendors (and distribute to her friends later) and strike conversations with random people to learn about interesting facts. She still has so much fire and a thirst for adventure for her age that when I am with her, I feel it’s contagious. But this post was not meant to be about her!

This post is about another lady who used to work in one of the NGOs, again on women’s rights. I’ve been told she was quite the fire cracker back then. Now she’s become ordained as a Buddhist nun, lives forcibly in this office and emotionally blackmails anyone who tries to evict her, saying that they would go to hell. Normally, monks and nuns take up a life of simplicity, living on charity after having given up their material possessions, in order to focus on selfless service to the community and the pursuit of spiritual goals. On the other hand, this nun has become very possessive and has forcibly acquired furniture, appliances and even a scythe-like tool for cutting grass, claiming it’s hers now. There’s a box with a padlock in the kitchen, which I am told contains her kitchen utensils. She’s paranoid when vehicles comes to the office and goes, and she relies on a few neighbours to spy on “suspicious” activities in the office while she's not around. As I’ve also been told, she’s too curious and goes through our office belongings after we leave, so we have to lock up everything and leave nothing open on the tables. She acquires things like soap that has been put in the toilet for common use. She rarely speaks good of anyone, too, I hear. She’s basically impossible to communicate with, irrational, hasn’t developed the skills to respectfully co-exist with other people (which is why she can’t survive in a nunnery with other nuns) and uses the excuse of religion to establish some kind of authority over others through fear. Well, those fear tactics could work for someone who believes they can go to hell for offending anyone claiming to be a holy person or is wearing a uniform of a holy person.

Now everything I’ve heard so far are one-sided (yet similar) accounts from about three people. Being here only a few days, I am yet to meet this personality who sounds like a character from a tele-drama plot! On the other hand, it’s good to be informed. Given my hopeless level of assertiveness (as a close friend recently pointed out, I apparently have the assertiveness of a water flea), I fear I might be caught in the cross fire of these estrogen-powered politics and be expected to take sides. At times like these, I remember the ease with which I worked in an all-male team in my previous job. If there is no threat of harassment from male colleagues, things are much simpler and straightforward with men.

I'm no psychologist and my predictions of people have failed many a time. From what I’ve gathered about her behaviour, she appears mentally imbalanced and suffers from a variety of mental complexes like paranoia. She's most probably deeply unhappy, frightened and is probably a lonely soul inside. Also the relationship my colleagues have with her might be one full of misunderstandings and unaddressed emotions build over a long course of history working together, and therefore biased. 

Feeling compassionate for people exhibiting unnatural behaviour and trying to be nice to them or help them have almost always back fired on me, so I’m going to remain super cautious on this one. Also, this situation made me realise how much (good) relationships matter in life. You have to be ready to give as much as you are willing to take from the people around you.

On a positive note, I suppose we have to feel thankful to the women (and feminist men) before us, who fought for equal opportunities and created waves of change in society. The battles are not over, but it is because of their courage, defiance to conform, their struggles and their vision that we have the level of comfort we have today. So is it also not our duty to speak up for injustice (of any kind) when we see it around us?

E.T. settles in

Two years ago, after I made the somewhat unsettling decision to move to Sri Lanka, I felt like I was an alien that had unknowingly arrived at the correct planet. Many years prior to that, I felt that my interests in wildlife conservation were a little strange and highly idealised, even. Having spent a good part of my early life stuck in the obsession of being a veterinarian and eventually having to concede that it was not practically possible, I thought it was too late in life to ever find satisfaction in a closely related job and that I'd die with regrets. It was my stint at the Singapore Zoo that gave me a renewed sense of hope. I still work with more people (i.e. lesser animals) than I would like to, but I feel strangely at home in these circumstances I have fallen into. For the first time, I've found many more people like me (or better even), so much so that I am no longer an outlier in contrast. For once, I feel that talking about saving animals and having those conversations at work is not something that would raise eyebrows or sound silly enough for others to make jokes about it.

Yesterday at work, we completed a 2-day workshop for 18 NGOs (consisting of about 60 individuals) who will be working with the UNDP GEF Small Grants Programme for the next two years. Sure, there were small hiccups here and there, but our efforts in organising the event mostly paid off. Even though I was on the event management side of things, I learnt quite a lot of things on formulating projects according to the Logical Framework Approach (LFA) method, applications of Geographic Information System (GIS) tools in projects and the importance of using good communications.

On Day 1 of the workshop, I was put on the spot with a request to be the compère. Despite the great lengths I go to avoid standing behind a podium, I get cornered sometimes. And being an adult and realising I was one, I had to play it cool. First, I was given the simple task to welcome the participants, do a quick run through of the agenda and introduce the first speaker. Being me, I messed up, of course. I accidentally introduced the second speaker first. After that blunder, I fared better. Thankfully, I realise that with age, I am getting more humiliation-proof. Those small things that used to embarrass me and make me very anxious are becoming fewer in number. Even the really embarrassing things that happen, I realise, are but a moment that will be soon forgotten, or would end up a good lesson or become fodder for a good laugh in future. And these are all equally good outcomes.

On the morning of Day 2, just as I woke up, in a state of semi-sleep, I mentally drafted the best opening lines for the workshop. I come up with the best imaginary speeches at that time of the day and some of those speeches really blow me away. As usual, I remembered none of that when I stood behind the microphone. The segments where I had to use the microphone for bossing people around to remind them to hurry up, submit forms, etc, were easy. Someone I knew from my childhood once pointed out (to my surprise at the time, I admit), that I am bossy. This small talent of mine for pushing people around, especially if they are lazy, incompetent, uncooperative or ridiculous and reverses the "forward-flowing" energy of life can be good sometimes. It's no wonder that I took a liking to the quality assurance and regulatory compliance (i.e. policing) aspects of my previous profession, which involved setting things "right" (to accepted standards), despite the unpopularity. This is making so much sense now. But Shuri, you are lazy too!! Shhh, this isn't about me. 

The workshop left a profound impression on me. The participants were people from different walks of life who bid and won grants (through a tough selection process) for environment-based projects involving communities to improve things in Sri Lanka. To see the vision and ideas of how different people proposed to do things, including the introduction of innovative solutions, were very interesting. They spoke with passion. Sure, these were only at a conceptual level for now, sounding great on paper, and implementation on the ground would be a challenge. Still, it was nice to play with the thought that if done right and all these projects achieve a high success rate, it would be a great accomplishment. Given the little experience I have gained from this job, I know that there will be plenty of obstacles, for example, failures, mismanagement of funds, disputes, unforeseen circumstances, show-stoppers or even grantees losing interest, after the project kicks off.

The projects to be implemented touched on various areas like eco-tourism, agriculture, community livelihood development, increasing biodiversity and environment conservation. I have already taken a special liking to a few projects that focus more on wildlife.

One of the participants was a young lady (possibly under 30 years of age) who's made herself a name in the wildlife conservation circles here for being a passionate and driven individual. She's made it her life's mission to protect the Fishing Cat population living in the highly urbanised city of Sri Lanka's capital, Colombo. During the applications process, she wooed the panel with her charisma and youthful optimism in wanting to fight the odds to carry out her mission. Fishing Cats are nocturnal, so many city-dwelling people don't know about their existence or the decline of populations, unless they become roadkill or are caught and killed by people for attacking poultry. In her project, she's used the Fishing Cat as an indicator species to assess the health of Colombo's urban (inland) wetlands, which are its natural habitat range. This is a project I am looking forward to since it is going to involve the building of an animal rescue and rehabilitation center (* gets distracted thinking of Fishing Cat kittens * SHURI, focus on finishing this post with a serious tone!)

The Fishing Cat is found in various parts of Asia, including Sri Lanka (Image Source: http://www.fishingcatcambodia.org)

One project is going to increase nesting areas and habitats for the wildlife in urban Colombo, such as for the endangered Purple-face Leaf Langur, insectivorous bats, wetland birds and the Fishing Cat. With an increasing human population in the cities, animals are rapidly losing their homes. While we can't do anything about an increasing human population, there's hope in trying to help humans and wildlife co-exist. The project will also carry out various activities to remove invasive plants that are wiping out indigenous species of plants and slowly destroying the balance of wetland ecosystems. The person leading this project is also a passionate zoologist who volunteers his weekends to educate members of the Young Zoologists Association. He has experience in working with the National zoo and he led a project which was instrumental in establishing the only official wildlife rescue and rehabilitation centre in Colombo through a previous grant.

Another noteworthy project will be implemented by a university in the north of Sri Lanka. The project is led by a young gentleman (also under 30 years) who is a passionate zoologist and a probationary lecturer. He also wooed the panel with his subject knowledge, humility and his determination to improve the lives of the people in the area who were for decades affected by Sri Lanka's 30-year old civil war. Their project will involve the establishment of an outdoor laboratory for university students in the midst of a coastal wetland and will include boardwalks, etc. The site will also be promoted as an eco-tourism destination for activities like guided nature tours, boating and bird-watching for generation of income to the impoverished and isolated communities living in the area.

Another one of the projects is led by a leading herpetologist/ photographer. In November last year, he was part of a team that discovered the newest species of snake in Sri Lanka. In addition to that, his research findings have led to discoveries of over 20 (and counting) other new species which include snakes, amphibians, geckos and skinks in Sri Lanka. He didn't have a pompous air about him, despite his impressive career background. With my liking for reptiles, it was hard not to want to strike reptile-related conversations with him (nothing even remotely intelligent-sounding came to my mind, to be honest) or make him talk about his subject to satisfy my inner fan. I just stuck to small verbal exchanges relating to the workshop. I am happy and shameless to say I was able to manipulate the course of events and get a (group) photo with him in it. Seriously, Shuri!

It takes the coordinated effort of many individuals in various capacities to make a project a success. The grant that we (the organisation I work for) received was to oversee the knowledge management and capacity building aspect of several of these individual community projects located in the Colombo urban wetlands landscape. We are one of the mid-way links between the ground level and the funding agency. It will be our job to monitor progress, to facilitate project activities, to intervene when things are not going well, to link the ground level project persons with higher level authorities, to help communities to link their enterprises to larger market chains and finally, to use communication tools to showcase and document what the projects are up to and have ultimately achieved. Because ultimately, grant-based development work is part of a cycle where good work (as showcased by good publicity) will attract more sponsors and grants, which will in turn bring more opportunities to people and community level organisations to carry out good development work (mostly for the environment, in our case). That's the theory, at least.

On the downside, working with NGOs entails some effort to be optimistic and trust that people will maintain their good intentions and not become too corrupt in the face of extra money, and if they do, to be as vigilant as possible to close any loopholes that would allow it, without letting emotions run you over and make you form a too negative outlook in life. On the upside, there are several capable and driven people working in these projects, including young people who give the conservation field much hope, and there will certainly be a few successful projects that will leave a lasting impact. I don't know where life would take me in the next two years, but the end results of this phase of projects are something I'd really like to see.