On Research

It was four in the afternoon, day two of the student presentations. I was slated to go last–a slot I had lamented since first learning of it–and it was hot in the Taragoan Museum. The dark room seethed, full of the nodding necks, the waning energy of bodies subjected to every presentation but mine.

My headset was on, my clicker at the ready. I stood in front of my peers, my teachers, my amala, my friends, and every ounce of community I had built in the past four months, my heart beating with the personal gravity of what I was about to present.

It was hardly even what I was about to say, but what I was about to not say. And the things I was about not to say were these:

I think I’ve realized what it means to be a writer, what it means to be a researcher.

To be a researcher in a place where you dont speak the language is an extreme exercise in self doubt, in loneliness, in constantly delving deep into your inner reserve of charisma when you least feel like being charismatic, in feeling that you’ve overstayed your welcome, that nobody understands you and that perhaps even once you leave you’ll never be understood again

To be a researcher in a place where you’re the first white person to ever stay the night means that you become the singular spokesperson for your country, your gender, your race. It means desperately trying to learn Nepali, foolishly singing and dancing in front of large groups of locals,and making every attempt at friendship you’ve ever learned how to extend. It means fearing that the relationships are disingenuous because of your research goals.

It means never knowing exactly what you should be doing, if what you’re doing is enough. A day off becomes a day spending hours looking through the photos of friends and family on your phone in your dimly lit room. It means missing home more than you ever thought possible.

It means returning back to the city, excitedly ordering a waffle, and having your body violently reject it because all you’ve eaten for an entire month is rice and lentils. It means crying with your friends on the porch of your Air BnB. It means getting up early, thinking of everything except what you should be writing about, staring too long at passersby, shaking your head and returning.

To be a writer means working, and working hard. It means sitting by the fire scribbling furiously while garnering quizzical glances from your host sister who serves you increasingly heaping portions of rice. It means writing on the roots under massive pine trees, on rocks while walking from town to town, on a laptop in a cafe, on the street, on the floor, a bed, on napkins, and your hand.

It means putting together something from nothing, trying to take an entire month’s worth of experiences and interviews, new friends and enemies, allies and dissidents, sights and sounds that you had only just begun to grasp, and then force yourself to summarize and showcase them as carefully and effectively as possible.

To be a writer means setting the scene, the mountains, women beating dried millet, children riding horses through muddy paths, massive pine trees, fluttering red and gold flags, apple trees, trash vortexes, raging rivers, festivals and fires. It means trying to explain where you were, what you saw, how you struggled, how everyone you met both struggled and thrived and what it all freaking meant.

And it means failing. Failing more than you ever thought you could. And this failure becomes your greatest accomplishment to date.

So failingly, I clicked the clicker, and proceeded to try and explain everything else to that hot room, full of sleepy people.