Immersing in the Global South

One of the reasons I love being in India, which is also why I love being in Hawai`i, is because these are regions of the Global South.

Hawai`i is an anomaly because geographically and culturally it has always been part of Oceania, Polynesia, and the Global South. But because it was assimilated into USA statehood, it is increasingly and economically associated with the Global North.

What does all of this mean? At this minute I am settled into a waiting area at the Mumbai airport.  It’s 3am. I’m surrounded by dark-skinned People of the Global Majority (PGM) in various stages of sleep or wake. They’re taking up 2-3+ seats each, with legs stretched out on baggage carts. They’re draped in dupatti and pashmina. They’ve taken their sandals off and they’re barefoot. There are entire families, as well as individuals and pairs. They speak many languages and dialects. People talk loudly, and laugh loudly, even at this hour. I am so thrilled and so comfortable in this mix of humanity.

What a contrast from the Tokyo airport, where they actively discourage this type of lounging by eliminating most places to sit. Unless you’re ticketed, security-checked, and waiting at the gate of your plane, or unless you’re monetized and paying for a spot in a restaurant, or a frequent flier lounge, forget it. Keep moving.

Even though Japan is populated by PGM, it identifies largely with the Global North, especially economically, and that’s what counts. I’m sure there are still places in Japan that are rough around the edges, gritty, and shaped by indigenous cultures, like Okinawa, but I was not exposed to any of it in my 24-hour layover.

The transition from GN to GS happened when I flew from Tokyo to Bangkok, then Bangkok to Mumbai. During the flight, like a caterpillar in a cocoon, you gotta shed your expectations and your colonial mindset to be suited for the Global South. You see the problems all over Hawai`i when settlers fail to do this. That’s when you get labeled as one haole. But haole is a mindset that can be adoped by anyone of any race

Perhaps GN/GS offers a helpful framework beyond race, class, caste, creed, East and West, and indigeneity. For instance, Zionist Europeans came from the GN into Western Asia with the goal of recreating their former lives in Palestine. From the 1948 Nakba onward, they destroyed historic Palestinian villages, with ageless stone architecture, and replaced them with cookie cutter subdivisions like ones we see in suburbs in Turtle Island and beyond—actually almost anywhere the GN has colonized the GS.

The GS does not prioritize speed or convenience or productivity. These values are proponents of capitalist extraction and white hegemony. Neither does the GS prioritize individuality over the collective. The GS accepts what the colonized mind may consider chaos, inefficiency, messiness, and circularity over linearity. Instead of quick fixes, PGM in the GS operate through a multigenerational lens which includes both the past and the future.

On our way from Mumbai to Pune, I noticed less garbage, less poverty than the last time I was here, 7 years ago. But then it occurred to me that maybe I was the one that had changed. That is, I didn’t notice the trash because I myself live in a pile of rubble!

I have increasingly identified with the Global South over the years, and now live on a farm in Waimānalo. This is a real farm, not a picture-perfect hobby farm. We have small scale, mostly organic agriculture. The house I live in was built on the footprint of a smaller house, by family and friends, which is to say…. it’s quirky. The hot water comes out of the cold spigot, lots of repurposed materials were used, and some stuff is still unfinished. The farm community is almost all Southeast Asian, mostly immigrants, Thai, Laotian, Filipino, Hawaiian, and Korean. Our motley crew does its best, and things don’t always go according to plan.

The rubble from the old house has not fully been cleared. Several of us have taken load after load after load to the dump, but there’s still a lot to go. The rubble bothered me like crazy at first, and I was determined to clean it all up, but the human mind and our senses are designed to prioritize. My mind soon put the rubble on the back burner until I barely noticed it. Upon closer examination, there are still piles of trash on sidewalks in India, and watch out for the dogshit, but it doesn’t bother me as much as it did when I first started coming here 20 years ago.

Trash reflects the capacity of governments to meet the consequences of capitalism, consumerism, overcrowding, and coloniality. Living in Detroit was also like living in the Global South within the US empire, and another place where people frequently complained about the trash and rubble, especially in Black neighborhoods. People in Palestine comment that settlements and Jewish districts are well lighted and clean, whereas Arab zones are neglected and dirty. Are Black folks and Palestinians “dirtier” than white folks? Are high caste Indians “cleaner” than non-caste Indians? Of course not. In fact, I would say PGM and working class/lower income people tend to be more fastidious and germ-phobic, out of necessity, culture, and pride.

The reason I live in a pile of rubble (I’m exaggerating to make a point—actually my home is wonderful and so is the farm!) is because our farm community is making a way out of no way, skills I learned in Detroit. My friend who owns the farm does not have deep pockets to draw from. She has managed to build a community and run a business, imperfect, messy, but we all do our best to make it work. The construction rubble would take thousands of dollars to professionally clean up, so we are doing our best to do it ourselves.

One American Iyengar Yoga teacher, here for the first time, commented that she questioned if she was ready to study at RIMYI, the homebase. I told her that āsana-wise, there’s no problem, but to be culturally ready is the bigger challenge. I know from talking to international students here that some struggle with the Indian ways of doing things, so different from Global North priority on efficiency, delusions of equality, and individualism.

In my community, we emphasize yoga as a practice of embodied ethics for the purpose of sovereignty and collective liberation. In order to do this, I must shed my colonial conditioning. If anything, nearly 30 years of Iyengar Yoga practice has taught me how to feel, observe, see patterns, and make connections. I remain unable and insensitive in so many ways, but pray that I continue to feel and see more and more, with humility, love, and courage.