Yesterday, a stranger landed on our beach. I was on the beach because Pa won’t let me go out on the boats fishing. I saw the sail first, then the man balanced on the prow of a wooden boat, skinny knees protruding from under cut-off fatigues. He was real dark. Even in the distance I could make out that he was darker than me or Andre or Paul. He waded ashore and heaved his boat a little ways up onto the sand. The stranger looked at me out from under a floppy, canvas, army-patterned hat. There was burnt skin peeling on his nose and cheeks. He looked young, in his mid-twenties at most. I spoke first. “My name is Mattieu. I am fourteen. Welcome to the Seychelles.” When he answered, his voice was deep and lilting, filled with music. “I’m Kizza,” he said. “Is your village nearby?” I smiled. “It’s quite close, but all our men and boys are fishing and the women are at the market selling yesterday’s catch.” I hoped he wouldn’t ask me why I wasn’t fishing too. “I’m Kizza,” he said “Is your village nearby?” Kizza’s brown eyes danced. He stretched his arms wide, then slapped his hands on his knees and laughed deep, booming, and bell-like. “Then, I’ll pull my boat up on the beach out of reach of the fingering tide and sit in the sail-shade to wait.” Kizza leaned down to the bow rope neatly coiled on deck. He looked up. “Mattieu,” he said, “maybe you could stay around for a while and we could swap stories if you have no work.” “Cool,” I said, using one of the words I had picked up during the tourist season. Kizza swung the rope over his shoulder and dug his feet into the sand. I watched his boat slide up the beach. I saw how as it ceased to bob with the tide, it became a lifeless thing, made of wood and canvas. I could see the name now, painted on the stern, Rosa Maria, in white on the red wood. “Did you know her?” I asked quietly. Kizza followed my finger with his eyes. Then a change came across his face, almost as if a shutter had been pulled down behind his eyes. “Yeah, I knew her,” he said softly. Then the shutter flicked up. “Is that far enough?” he said, his eyes shining. * * * We sat in the shade of the Maria’s sail, while Kizza told me his story Kizza’s teeth and dirty T-shirt gleamed white on his black body as he spoke of his country Angola; of the rivers and the seas and the people. I listened, hands clasped around my knees, as he described the brutal civil war and the scourge of HIV/AIDS, which had devastated Angola. I was entranced as he told me how he had fought two years for freedom, and how it was won. Then he told me how his thoughts turned to love, and how just weeks before his marriage to a beautiful woman with a Portuguese name, she had drowned in the monsoon rains. I listened, raptured. His words were no longer just words; they blended together into blurred images that danced before my eyes like mirages on the sand. I felt his pain as he told me how he knew he could no longer remain in Angola so he was pursuing his dream to circum-navigate Africa in a twenty-two foot sailboat he named after his fiancée. “Now,” he said, “this is my purpose. Everything I have, I am giving to this quest. I do not know what I will do once I reach Angola again, but I know I cannot stay there.” He let out a ringing laugh and hit the sand beside him with his open palm. That broke the spell. My head snapped up to look at the sea. I saw how the tide had risen and then the shadows of fishermen on white sailcloth guiding their boats in to the beaches. One lone boat followed them, a figure hunched over at the tiller. I knew it was my pa’s boat, the Samuel. I ran down to meet the men, sand swishing on my dry feet. The yellow, blue, and red skiffs blurred in my mind with the black faces of the villagers. I talked with and laughed with them. They jested back, my friend, Andre, hovering on the outside of the group, a strange mixture of pity and compassion in his eyes. I thought about Kizza’s eyes, how they sparkled with life as he spoke, and I realized that he treated me as a man, while the villagers acted like I was a child. The fishermen departed, talking loudly about the day’s catch. Kizza looked back at me, about to say something, then old Dominque touched his arm and he turned to go. I gazed down the beach at the boats drawn haphazardly onto the sand, drinking in the sounds of the sea. The memory came unbidden, rising from the depths of a dark sea in my mind. I saw Samuel, as real as the images in Kizza’s tale. I was jealous and he was laughing, standing in a brightly painted boat, a salt-stained orange life vest slung over his shoulder. He was fourteen then. “Sam, please,” I said. He smiled at me, the smile he reserved for his only brother. “I’ll take you fishing tomorrow,” he said. Samuel’s words lingered for a moment on the air, then left me, the waves sighing around my ankles. When I returned to the village alone, the women had come back from the market and were dancing in time to a drum and a deep tenor voice. Kizza stood in the middle of them, eyes laughing, singing: By the moonlight, By ebbing tide, Look for me on the silver rocks, By ebbing tide, By the daylight, By rising tide, Look for me in the clear waters, By rising tide. By any day,
Diversity
Muslim Girl
CHAPTER ONE: LEYLA “Wake up, Skylar!” hissed my older sister, Robin. “It’s already eight-fifteen!” My groggy eyes adjusted to the early morning light streaming through the window and I glanced at the clock. She was right. I had twenty minutes to get dressed, have breakfast, and brush my teeth and hair. I dragged myself out of bed. I was exhausted. I had stayed up till two o’clock reading a great book about the fall of the Romanov empire. And now I would have to pay the price. I sighed. Today was the first day of seventh grade. I wasn’t nervous. I’m never nervous on the first day of school. It’s always the same. The work’s easy, and I never make any friends. I don’t have any friends outside of school either. Unlike Robin. Robin is popular, and has more friends than you can count. Actually, she has fans. That’s all she wants really. Fans. The morning was a rush, and I just managed to catch the bus, but only by running as fast as I could to the bus stop. I was panting as the bus doors opened to admit me. I stepped inside and found a seat by the window in the second row I sleepily stared at the head in front of me. It took me a minute to realize what was different. The head in front of me was wearing a headscarf. It shocked me, but that wasn’t the only thing wrong. She was sitting in the first row. Kids here will tease you mercilessly if you sit in the front row. Don’t ask me why. I’ve never been able to quite understand the kids that go to Newberry Middle School. But I’ve got a basic idea. They aren’t motivated, and because of that, don’t try to live up to their full potential. Because I was different, I got teased a whole lot. But it didn’t faze me. Part of it was the fact that they may tease me, but I know that it is not bad to be a nerd or globally aware. I’m proud that I’m not like them. The girl turned around to look at me. Her eyes were big and brown, with long, dark lashes. The brown was almost black. Like a doe’s eyes, or coffee without cream. Her eyes were big and brown, with long dark lashes “Hi,” she said. It was almost a whisper. “Hi,” I squeaked back, but she had already turned around. A new girl. And she had promise. CHAPTER TWO Newberry Middle School had seven rooms: the sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-grade classrooms, the multipurpose room, the office, and the girls’ and boys’ bathrooms. I know it seems a little sad, but Newberry is a small town. A very small town. If you live here, your great-great-grandparents probably did too. It’s so small, the town sign says Newberry, Population: 514. So the seven rooms accommodate the ninety students just fine. Today, I trudged into Mrs. Park’s seventh-grade classroom. So did the Muslim girl. I looked around the room. I was sitting at a table in the back, next to Darcy. That was OK. The Muslim girl was sitting at a table across the room. Mrs. Park walked in, her purple heels tapping the floor as she closed her door and walked to her desk. “Welcome back, to another hopefully great year at Newberry Middle School.” Silence followed her words. “Now before we start, let me introduce you to Leyla Aghdashloo, who will be joining our class this year. Leyla, how about you come up and introduce yourself?” Leyla walked up to the front of the room and stared awkwardly at all of us. “Hi,” she said sheepishly. She took a deep breath and started over, this time sounding more confident. “Hi, I just moved here from San Francisco; I live with my mom and dad and three sisters who are fourteen, ten, and seven. I like to read, write, and act. I also love being out in nature.” She walked quickly back to her seat. “Thank you, Leyla, we are fabulously lucky to have you in our class this year,” said Mrs. Park, her smile wide and fake. “Now what did you all do this summer?” Hands shot up, including Leyla’s. “Let me introduce you to Leyla Aghdashloo, who will be joining our class this year” I put my head down on my desk and listened to the other kids talk. All I had done all summer was read. And sing in the bathroom when no one was home. I love to sing. I could spend my whole summer just singing. But I’m too scared to let anyone know I do. It means so much to me, I would die if just one person gave me the least bit of criticism. This is a big problem for me as my mom is a trained singer. She doesn’t sing professionally, but she knows a lot about it. She says her criticism is her way of saying I’m good, and she just wants to make me better. That if I wasn’t, she wouldn’t even bother. But I know this is not true because of Robin. Robin is tone deaf. She has no range. Her voice wavers when she sings. But she gets criticism. Lots and lots of it. So me, I resort to singing in the bathroom, until I have enough courage to come out of my shell. The teacher’s voice jerked me out of my thoughts. “Leyla, I’m sorry, but headscarves are not allowed in school.” Leyla didn’t move. “Leyla, please take off your headscarf.” Leyla sat as still as a stone, her eyes on Mrs. Park. “Leyla, if you do not take off your headscarf, then I will have to send you to the office.” Mrs. Park looked angry now. “Very well then,” and Leyla got up and walked right out. No one that I have ever seen has been sent to the office on the first
Traveling Light in the Andes
“Will you look at that?” I said, tugging on Mom’s sleeve and pointing down from the balcony at the lady walking in through the gate, being helped by Jose Luiz and his siblings. “If ever there was a typical American tourist! She must have at least eight suitcases. Jose Luiz is too kind. She should have to carry her own things if she’s going to bring all of that stuff. That is just ridiculous!” “Oh my gosh! She doesn’t belong in a hostel, she needs a three-room hotel suite!” agreed my thirteen-year-old sister, Summer. We watched the lady walk towards her room, with her bags preceding her. Just the other day my own family had made the long train ride to Ollantaytambo, Peru, in the sacred valley of the Incas. The mountains of the Andes towered high around us, the ancient city of Machu Picchu lying far to the east. Also tumbling through the valley was the wild Urabamba River, its raging waters swelled by recent rains. We considered ourselves fortunate to run across this warm and friendly hostel run by Jose Luiz and his family. I was also excited that we might visit a Quechua village higher in the Andes and see the beautiful weavings we had heard so much about. * * * Janet, tired from her long trip, greeted Jose Luiz and his little sister Pamela with a happy heart, thinking of the last time she had seen them. It had been at least a year. Pamela was only four then, and Eva had just given birth to their third son, Core. Jose Luiz and his sister helped Janet to unload her suitcases as the rest of the Pinado Bara family showed up. She was delighted as all of them but the very youngest came up to hug her and help with the luggage. Walking up the familiar cobblestone street towards the hostel, Janet smiled to herself. Janet, tired from her long trip, greeted Jose Luiz and his little sister Pamela with a happy heart As she carried two of her suitcases across the grassy courtyard towards the stairway, Janet couldn’t help but notice an American family on the balcony outside their room. That must be a wealthy family, she thought to herself. You’ve got to have a lot of money to travel with five people outside the U.S. Their only girl was running around in shorts. She probably goes into town like that too, Janet thought. This is definitely their first time in this kind of place. They should know how offensive it is for a girl to have her legs completely exposed like that. Then she climbed up the steps and disappeared into her room not too far away, leaving her suitcases just outside the door. * * * “Do you mind?” Dad said, trying to step over the suitcases that were lying right in the way, blocking the stairs. He tripped over one and tumbled to the deck. “Could you move your bags?” he snapped, throwing a dark look into her room, then spun around and marched down the stairs with my brother, Nick, trailing after him. As we were getting ready to go to the village of Huilloc, I saw Jose Luiz pick up Janet’s bags and carry them into his house. Our hike up to the small Quechua village turned out to be a lot longer than we had bargained for. Mudslides loosed by the torrential rains had blocked the narrow cliff-hanging road high up in the Andes. Otherwise we could have gotten within a mile of the village in a van that the hostel owvned. After an exhausting uphill climb we finally entered the village with Jose Luiz as our guide. The first thing we saw was six weavers dressed in the colors of their village, working away in their yards, children running, playing and shouting all around them. “This is Huilloc,” said Jose Luiz in his nearly perfect English. “I think you will all have fun exploring around here. The people are very friendly. I’m going to go down to the river and get some water. I’ll come find you in a couple of hours. Good?” “Yeah, that’ll be great, thanks so much,” answered my mom as Jose Luiz lifted Nick off of his shoulders. “We really want to see the women working on the weavings, so you’ll probably find us wherever anybody is doing that.” My mom smiled, looking around. Then we all turned back towards the village. As I sat in front of one of the looms, my gaze strayed to the weaver’s hands “Adios!” I said in my limited Spanish as we departed. As we neared one of the huts I noticed several roosters walking on the thatched roof, pecking away for a meal of delicious bugs. “I’d like to go for a little hike further up the mountain,” said Summer, to my utter dismay. “That’s fine, just as long as you don’t force us to go with you,” I said, not wanting to walk any longer on my aching legs. The kids in the village were very friendly, but a little bit shy when it came to having their pictures taken. The rest of the afternoon was spent exploring Huilloc. We met a lot of very kind families, but what fascinated me the most were their wooden looms. One end of the loom had been driven into the ground, while the other end of the loom rested in the weaver’s lap. The weavings produced were more beautiful than I ever could have imagined. They contained a rich array of colors from deep purple all the way to bright yellow, each one as appealing as the next. As I sat in front of one of the looms, my gaze strayed to the weaver’s hands. They moved with what seemed impossible speed over the fabric, but without losing the precision of decades of practice. Before we left we bought two small weavings, one that had been made
