The other morning, I was smiling at a Facebook memory of my early days in Myanmar as a post from years ago flashed on the screen in front of me. I had apparently been preparing to travel to the field, smugly noting that Grandmother’s suitcase was lying in the corner recovering from a field trip less than ten days earlier.
“poised to pack again – grandmother’s suitcase is, as, yet, blissfully unaware” I had announced to the world.
Wondering idly when that had been, I checked the date. My heart stopped, I had written this on 4 September 2009. The irony hit me hard. Only 19 days later, life had changed dramatically.
Checking back on my diary, I could see that I had left Yangon early on the Monday morning, 7 September. Grandmother’s suitcase and I had left home before dawn, with two of my colleagues to head to the airport for our flight to Mandalay. The flight had been smooth, and I had noted that I was becoming familiar with Mandalay airport, with its cavernous arrivals area, row of empty immigration desks and the one carousel creaking as it revolved with our few bags on it. I had been there only a couple of weeks earlier but it seemed that the landscape was even dustier than it had been then, the bougainvilleas holding on to their colours with effort under undignified layers of dust.
This had been the start of an exhausting but inspiring to Upper Sagaing in the remoter north of Myanmar and where few foreigners were allowed to travel.
From Mandalay we had travelled by train, arriving not long before midnight and spent the following days visiting project areas and working with our field based colleagues. I learned such a great deal, these early days of my job in Myanmar were such a time of constant learning and growing to understand the context and our work.
We headed back down to Mandalay several days later, on an overnight train in a crowded compartment. From Mandalay we travelled onwards to another township. This time in the dry zone where we spent more days with colleagues and communities in our project areas.
We covered a great deal of ground, both in distance and our work. I had travelled by plane, train, car, bus, boat and even bullock cart to remote villages and townships gathering mosquito bites, dust and dirty laundry. Grandmother’s suitcase was clearly disgruntled at the indignity of this treatment – we were both travel weary but I was also inspired and motivated at the end of such a draining field visit. Another very early departure for the return trip to Yangon saw us driving through Nyaung U’s roads, deserted but for a long line of monks collecting alms as the sun start to throw its first light of the plains of Bagan.
I would be home in Yangon in time for lunch, with many a tale to tell, not enough photographs and a week’s worth of sleep to catch up just a couple of days before my visa would expire. The long awaited renewal had still not come through and I would not be not permitted to travel until it did.
All through that field trip I had been blissfully unaware of that I had been carrying an additional item of baggage with me. An unwelcome addition which had been growing and developing. It was just a few days later, in the shower, that I discovered the lump and life took a completely unexpected turn. I had been blissfully unaware that I had been harbouring three masses, two of them cancerous in my left breast.
It was 23 September 2009 when that blissful lack of awareness was so abruptly ended.
Ten years ago today, I entered a new universe. Ten years have passed, and I am still here. The collateral damage, be it physical, emotional or psychological has been considerable but there is an important message. I am reminded more than ever to carpe that diem. We all go about our days, unaware of what might lie ahead. There are challenges ahead, personal and global yet equally there are moments and people to cherish and treasure. We just need to pause and make sure we don’t miss what matters.
Feisty Blue Gecko - a tail of the unexpected 