2008 Essay Contest Winners

1st: Oaxaca

by Lizzie Martinez

Cobblestone name from ages past,
you call me back to your streets:
the memory of the sun and the moon.
Remind me why I left?

The days when we all met on the corner,
Casa Chata guarding our secrets,
and walked for miles in the dusty heat
to the tianguis, Café Arabia
or Santo Domingo on the tourist walkway.

Ducking past the hospital wall,
sweet tamales surrounding your books,
on to coffee in flowered teacups
and wicker chairs.

The day we heard trumpets outside the walls
and thought the circus had come to town
or maybe a parade of Mexican clowns,
and when we burst out the iron gate at lunch,
the protest flickered up and down the street.
Poor farmers fighting back with bullhorns and blockades.
Nothing funny about that.

dear Oaxaca,
you call me back to walk with you
down the streets of time.
You take my tears to water your gardens,
democracy will bloom with weeds swept free.

I give you my laugh at ink stained newspaper hands
and imported Australian trees from Mexico City;
you last-born forgotten child, love thyself.

You steal my heart to hide it in the zocalo
where it always smells like the day after a holiday.
Fresh fish at market from far away seas
and simmering broths bubble chicharron.
Where balloons always fly in the shade of company.

Tears, cheers, and then it's gone – my soul.
Wa, ha, ka.
dear oaxaca

I never liked watermelon till your pink fruit met my red tongue.
I never knew hot till your habañero engulfed my white nose.

When I think of you
I miss
the scent of thirty cents
of powdered sugar delights
rising in a pale cloud.

Jamaica mango mandarin,
to taste your sweetness again.

I laugh at the
crooked disappearing sidewalks,
meteoroid cars racing the lights,
heavy pesos in my pocket.

Where did you hide my soul Oaxaca?


- Lizzie Martinez

1st: Letter to My Mother

by Ansley Clark

Standing at a stone wall today in Scotland,
looking out over the endless sheet of bright sea, made me feel more deeply
than before how far away I am. I looked
out at an ocean thousands of miles beyond which
lies my own little pocket of the world,
a thirteen hour plane ride from here. That is very, very far.
Everywhere in the UK are fields – ribbony folds of bright green –
woven with woolen fog,
and crooked wooden fences winding,
wandering, limping, roaming
through tangled, heedless woods
and sheep, placid and plump, and late one drizzly afternoon,
we spotted tucked into the puffy swells of hills a house
with little buttery patches of yellow glow through the windows
like a harbor of candles,
and I thought of dinnertime back home.
You see, traveling this month has made me feel
with some surprise that the UK, Europe, foreign countries in general
are not merely some far-off exotic romance, nor some unattainable dream
– Gatsby’s green light at the end of the dock –
but instead are all living, breathing places with daily rhythms that are,
though unique, strangely familiar.
I stood at the crumbling wall in St. Andrews for quite some time,
trying to take in the soft-swinging blue sea.
The distance is vast and far, and sometimes here I feel lonely and yet,
I think of candle-like windows at dinnertime,
and I’ve realized that I cannot escape
the things I wanted to by traveling away, because
I am constantly reminded of them.
The world to me now
seems smaller somehow.

3rd: January Term 2008 Health Care in China

by Barbara Tanner

My memories of China are splashed with the color red; they are decorated with festive lanterns, surrounded by honking horns, and jam-packed with limitless construction. They are interspersed with flashing neon lights, blanketed with hazy pollution, and punctuated by a sea of faces wrapped in scarves and puffy down jackets. How can I reflect on but one singly important recollection, when I am awash with a multitude of different cultural and societal observations? From learning the theories and healing modalities of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) to tasting an assortment of Chinese cuisine with the aid (and sometimes hindrance) of chopsticks, I was completely saturated by the unique experience of being abroad. Nothing allows you to feel more alive than immersing yourself into an unfamiliar place and setting your rhythm to the pace of a culture far from home.
China is a country marked by contradictions; at once hungry with capitalism and conversely regulated with communism. With one eye on her long, often arduous history and the other on her aspiring financial future, China looks somewhat lost in the transitory present. Torn between cultural preservation and “Western” modernization, China seems to struggle along the path to self-realization. China’s glaring affinity for all things “Americanized” reminds one of a turbulent teenager trying to figure herself out by emulating everyone around her. At once a proud country celebrating its unique heritage and alternatively a nation longing to identify with the fiscal powers of the world, China creates an atmosphere challenged by merging ideas. China’s avid “economic tiger” is apparent in the gleaming multitude of Shanghai’s skyscrapers while its mighty roar falls distant in the impoverished side streets of Xian and can’t be heard among the destitute children begging outside of Suzhou’s train station. Just as in so many developing countries there is insidious growth in the disparity between the poor and the rich.
All of these contradictions have enabled China to become a master at the art of cultural and societal fusion. From embracing such modernized novelties as KFC, white wedding gowns, and luxury sedans, to entitling themselves with “English” names along with their given Chinese names, the people of China seem, at first glance, practically camouflaged in contemporary ways of life. However, if your gaze is held long enough, the essence of Chinese customs and traditions still breaks through. Experiencing China and gaining awareness of their distinctive festivals and celebrations, their many superstitions, their tumultuous dynastic history, their past and current struggles with poverty, starvation, and a huge population, their collectivist ideals under a communist regime, and their profuse, unwavering intentions for long, healthy, and prosperous lives, begins to shed light on the pieces of the ever-changing picture of China and her people.
The most harmonious union of Chinese and Western thought is found throughout their healthcare system. Blending TCM modalities such as acupuncture and herbal treatments with the latest technologies of modern medicine brings a whole new approach and wisdom to disease prevention and healing. With so many of China’s eyes on our American society, perhaps it is time we looked eastward to understand and initiate the holism that TCM integration could bring to our health care.
In regards to her ancient past, China is old with wisdom. Yet, according to her sudden capital growth she is impressionably young. How will these contradictions play out in China’s future evolution? As modernization wages war with sustainability, where will this leave China and her multitudes of people? I can only hope that in the midst of relentless growth and foreign investment, China can retain her dignity and national worth and not be exploited or diminished in the name of financial gain. Only time can reveal China’s fervent transformation to the world.