Two young people

One recent Saturday Miriam and I took a drive up to Ruston in the late spring sunshine for a mid-afternoon meal at her favorite hideout. On a spring day in a college town, the comfortably air-conditioned, dark paneled and dimly lit diner was virtually empty except for a wait person or two who were under no strain. Big-screen TVs droned from the four corners of the dining room, playing off-season sports to the interest of no one in particular. A fine afternoon to become invisible and melt into the gathering dusk.

A person materialized out of the dusky atmosphere. It took a moment for our eyes to focus, and the view became clearer as the person crouched at the end of the booth where we sat facing each other, putting himself at eye level with us. We exchanged some chit-chat as we considered the options, and it became obvious that this young person was not from Pea Ridge.

“You ain’t from around here, are you?” is a question which arises when Southern folks hear an accent not garnished with moonlight and magnolias; Miriam fields it regularly herself, even after more than fifty years on the American side of the Straits of Florida. Now it was her turn. She asked, “And where are you from?” after it became obvious that the young man was willing to visit a moment. With a twinkle in his eye, he grinned, and stood up straight, every bit of five-foot two. “Guess!” he challenged.

“Viet Nam?” I offered. No. “India?” Miriam asked. No. Well, where, then? He threw out his chest and said with a flourish, “Nepal!” Well, we’re at least on the correct side of the globe. Of course, he returned the favor. “And where are you from?” he challenged Miriam. Cuba, of course. (Shoot, everyone knows I’m from Gaar’s Mill; Who cares?) The conversation continued with the serving of the meal.

Nepal. Mount Everest. Kathmandu. Oh, yeah—Indiana Jones and the search for the Lost Ark. Language? Nepali, written in a looping script like no other. Religion? Mostly Buddhist, some Hindu. And are you yourself Buddhist? Yes. And what is the basic belief. Here, he becomes animated, waving his arms rapidly, which if you blinked in the right rhythm would almost visualize that six-armed Goddess seen in illustrations of Oriental religions. He is a civil engineering student at Louisiana Tech, doing very well, and may go back to Nepal later.

A few days later, as I sat in the otherwise empty Piney Woods Journal office in Winnfield, the front door opened, and in walked a young woman, with something in her arm. As she came up to the counter, I could see she had a box displaying some sort of craft jewelry—pins, necklaces. Approaching the counter, she said she was selling the jewelry for a project for world peace. Well, I said, I don’t need the jewelry. Let me just give you a little donation. I filched a couple of dollars from my pocket, which she accepted. She said she was traveling with a group of foreign students, promoting world peace. Some from France, India. She herself was from Mongolia. Then, looking straight at me with a serious look on her face, she said earnestly, “What about the peegs?” She was well dressed, young, nice looking, short, and had an undistinguishable accent. “The peegs?” I asked, puzzled. She waved an arm over her shoulder, and glanced back toward the street. “The peegs,” she said urgently.

“Ah,” I said. “The pigs.” Of course—those strange concrete porkers decorated with outlandish costumes, up and down Main Street. “That’s for the Uncle Earl’s Hog Dog Trials.”
“Hogdog?” she said suspiciously, as if I had mentioned a unicorn or a minotaur. I started to explain, and quickly realized she had no frame of reference whatever to comprehend a “hog dog trial.”

“Come on, sit down and let me tell you about it,” I finally said. Many years ago, people had hogs—pigs—in the forest, which they hunted with dogs, to provide meat. Etc. etc. And now, they have a gathering to let the dogs practice their old skills. Etc. etc.

Slowly a light came on in her eyes. “It’s a festival? she asked. Of course! A festival! Like a rodeo. The cowboys, etc. etc. Oh, she said, relieved, grasping a common cultural denominator. “We have camel polo.” Now we could talk.

Mongolia. Capital, Ulan Bator. Religion: Buddhist, and others. Language, Mongolian, written in the Russian Cyrillic. A very large country, with a small population, squeezed between China and Russia. Was part of the Soviet Union, now independent. I suggested that at her age as a twenty-something university student, she probably recalled the days of Soviet life. She stiffened visibly. “Yes, I remember many things,” she said, eyes widening. A regimented lifestyle, drab clothing, all wearing the same shoe styles. But now, she said, relaxing happily, now, we do what we want to.

She rose to leave, and thanked me for the information. As she walked out the door, I suddenly wished I had made a better gift to her cause, and gotten a piece of the jewelry as a memento. I went to the door, walked out and looked up and down the sidewalk. Poof! She was gone. Her name is Sheena.

In the faces of two young people from the other side of the world, bathed in the sweet innocence of hope, I saw the future. One a builder, one a peacemaker.

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