Issue 5: The Editors Speak
The editors of Mahogany Journal, Jaryl George Solomon and Prasanthi Ram, share their thoughts about the fifth issue, Rojak.
Teacherly Things
As of late, I’ve been thinking a lot about my teachers. I’ve reached the age where I am constantly negotiating (and let’s be real, reconciling) the realities of my current self with the aspirations my teachers had of me.
My lower secondary Science teacher told me I would make a good lawyer because I was “so brilliant at bullshitting” when I defended my group mates from his unfairly harsh criticisms of our papier-mâché puffer fish (a horrible idea in hindsight but I used to think I was an Art Attack king since Neil Buchanan made it look so easy). My Math teacher, on the other hand, straight up told me I was destined to be a karung guni man because I had “no discipline”. Eventually, I was told to get out of his sight when I started crying from all the insults he hurled at me. I remember rushing up the flight of stairs to the fourth floor of my school with my vision clouded and heart thumping because I was tremendously late for band practice. It was especially scary because the teacher-in-charge was a horrifyingly daunting woman with the bluntest of bangs and spectacles with edges so sharp, I swear I could prick a finger on them. When I finally reached the music room, the neatly arranged blanco-ed school shoes told me that I was the last to reach. After clumsily scrambling with the door, I meekly apologised and headed straight towards the instrument rack but was halted by my teacher. “Jaryl, out!” Everything felt immensely apocalyptic at that age. I was truly destined for drama.
Naturally, I had expected to receive another round of scolding, this time for being tardy but instead, my teacher-in-charge, Ms Lee, asked me to breathe and look out at the magnificent emptiness that we had access to from that vantage point. That was the first time in my life that I experienced kindness from a teacher. But it wasn’t the last. I’ve had a teacher fight for me to take up O level literature in a relatively new school. I’ve had a teacher write me a little note in Malay reminding me not to give up so easily on a subject I constantly struggled with. I’ve had a teacher bake me a cheesecake for my birthday and tell me that being a junior college retainee wasn’t the end of the world. I’ve even had a teacher tell me I would become a TV star since I was always making her laugh. Surprisingly, none of them told me I would become a teacher myself or maybe, deep down they already knew that.
But why tell you this? What do all these stories about my teachers have to do with my role as the poetry editor of this journal? Well, I rarely approach this gig as an editor because most of the time, I don’t think nor feel that I am. Oddly enough, I edit as a teacher, I encourage as a teacher, I coax and prod and commend as – you’ve guessed it – a teacher.
Just as my teachers once gave me the space to explore the possibilities that awaited me, I’ve adopted that mindset to guide the eight selected poets for this issue towards their own polished versions of the pieces they submitted during the open call. From a comedic declaration of love for the not-so-humble pappad to an incredibly hopeful battle against the emptiness that sits like a heavy pit within us, each poet and their piece have an important place at the table. Each a necessary ingredient, without which would make for a very bland plate of rojak.
So, enjoy this lineup because I’m very proud of the pieces that we have curated for you, be it poetry, fiction or creative non-fiction. And even though I never became anything my teachers expected of me, I hope they are still proud of the work that I do.
Went on to cry at every educational institution attended,
Jaryl
New Connections, New Love
With every issue, the act of crafting an editor’s note becomes more difficult. What else can I say that our writers have not already? But on their behalf, let me just tell you: we have quite the lineup this round. Over the past couple of months, I have found it incredibly nourishing to work closely with our five prose writers – Akash, Anusha, Aradhna, Gayathrii, and Noonherd. Together, their works are akin to a rojak. Their narratives are made of different linguistic textures, genre flavours, and approaches to storytelling entirely.
Each time I moved from one world to another, I grappled with new questions about what it means to be human, and what it takes to make human connections. Is it in the alcoholic haze of a bar that connections are made? Is it instead in your grandmother’s food that comforts your soul and echoes through generations? Or is it unassumingly at a random waxing parlour with a stranger whom you allow to be intimate with your body? What happens when one party betrays the connection for just or unjust reasons? Worse, what about when a connection is unceremoniously cut off, left untethered upon the loss of memory or inevitable encounter with death? Do we have what it takes to hold on? Or should we instead move on?
While I will not give away the poignant answers I found in these works, let me digress to tell you, dear reader, about a new connection I made this year. In May, I became an aunt to a little Cavapoo named Boomi. His name in Tamil – and Malay – means “earth”, beautifully picked by my sister and brother-in-law. Even before his arrival, I predictably found myself ready to spoil him rotten, having wanted a dog my whole life. My Shopee cart soon became filled with puzzle feeders, squeaky chew toys and talking buttons. And I was glued to my WhatsApp, waiting for updates, which I sometimes pleaded for.
As anyone with a family pet might know, you start seeing the world differently with them around. Daily, Boomi picks at his kibble, rolls gleefully in the earth, and gets mad zoomies while playing fetch. I marvel at the fact that life can be that simple – if you’re a dog. Sometimes, I also wonder what connection means to him. Some days, it feels like a strategic means to an end, when he performs a couple of tricks just to earn his favourite treats or sits on command and wags his tail sweetly while waiting for his grandmother to feed him yoghurt. Other days, I am convinced that Boomi does love us unconditionally, especially when he loses his mind from joy as soon as we step into the house. I can’t remember the last time a human reacted to me that way, if ever. Can you?
What is remarkable about Boomi – all three point seven kilograms of him – is the way he has irrevocably changed our family. On several evenings, we sit around Boomi in the living room and laugh at his antics. When we talk to each other over text, we discuss him more than ourselves; we are gentler too, in our language as a family. We even go out of our way to see Boomi, and each other. Most of all, we give ourselves the license to forget the elephant in the room – that my father is gone. Sometimes, we joke that maybe he is Boomi, though my mother really loathes the idea of her husband having to reincarnate at all, let alone as a dog. Still, I would suggest that another way to make human connection and mend old wounds is perhaps to collectively love a pet. Because life after such love is truly special.
I hope you enjoy our fifth issue as much as I enjoyed editing it with Jaryl. And I hope the rojak of feelings that it inspires in you compels you to seek more connections in the world, human or otherwise.
With love and a paw-five from Boomi,
Prasanthi