'Waiting for The Dust to Settle' Review by Achingliu Kamei

WAITING FOR THE DUST TO SETTLE 

REVIEW BY ACHINGLIU KAMEI

I

Will the dust ever settle in this part of the world?

Green pristine forests, blue skies, mountains that evoke inspiration.

A misnomer

When will the people get over this collective trauma?

Waiting for The Dust to Settle chronicles a terrible period.

Lives disrupted in the 1980’s and 1990’s 

A story of great pain, grief, loss, and injustice suffered by a people,

Told through the eyes of Rakovei

Traumatised memories and painful stories found a place,

In this novel well told.

A whisper that got heard 

The silences of the ones who weathered pain,

Found space in the pages of the book- the plot unfolds.

‘Voices’ muffled, snuffed out, suppressed- 

Operation code named ‘Blue Bird’

Bluebird, a harbinger of happiness

How ironic

It rained down tortures, rapes, starvation, and death.

A continuation of structural violence

Hundreds rendered homeless.

“The soles of his feet had congealed-blood blisters and marks of whipping 

all over his body. He could never walk again and died three weeks later.”

Many elderly grandfathers like Voba who had suffered-

Unimaginable cruelty meted out by the army.

Memory still fresh of such horrors

Many mothers like Shiveine, are still trying to cope with the trauma.

No wonder the camouflaged uniform is repulsive-

Hated -visually challenging- to that generation and the next

Added to the complication - ‘Kuki-Naga’ conflict.

***

Told it must be in whatever way possible the stories of a people,

By telling bluntly and not by showing; by writing like a newspaper report

If needed. In broken sentences even to show the broken pieces of the lives

Never stop telling, more importantly, to heal, if not to bring justice

“… it is so important that they be told in any way, even in ways that 

we have not thought of before… as song… reinvented, breathing 

Life in new forms 

So that they can touch lives and 

Work their transforming magic.” Kire

II

The barbed wire of the book cover, aptly used metaphor-

An antithesis to the open mountain

Controls by threatening injury.

Which side are you at?  To keep in or to keep out?

The cloud of dust. When will it settle?

“12 volumes of evidence of large-scale human rights violations

Of the people of nearly 30 villages in Senapati district”

Lost, gone, vanished into thin air. 

https://scroll.in/article/928469/manipur-killings-1987  

-charges-against-assam-rifles-disposed-

of-though-evidence-has-gone-missing 

All lost testimonials recorded in the book-

The Judgement that Never Came: Army Rule in North East India

Nandita Haksar and Sebastian M. Hongray.

Few Memory Keepers

May many more memories join hands with-

Shadow Men, The House with a Thousand Stories, These Hills called Home, 

Bitter Wormwood, Nagaland: The Night of the Guerrillas,

 Waiting for the Dust to Settle…

III

For whom is the book? 224 pages. Published by Speaking Tiger.

For some readers, a breezy read, for some, opening unresolved wounds.

This book is- 

For those who need healing

For the present generation who did not get to hear

What trauma had silenced.

For the ones who refused to see ‘others’ exists, for children of the Mainland,

For those who had never experienced living under AFSPA 

For those who look for truth, for those who love humanity.

For the ones who have interest in the literature from North East written in English

The evocative tone speaking eloquently for those who seek to know.

 

About The Author

A short story writer, poet, and an ultra-runner, Achingliu Kamei teaches Literature in the English Department of ARSD College, D.U. She loves to pen down her day-to-day life in the form of Haiku. Some of her poems and haiku are published/due for publication in anthologies and journals like ‘Caravan’, ‘Global Warming’ ‘The Looking Glass Anthology’, ‘Insulatus’ and in ‘International journal Setu’, ‘The Little Journal’, ‘Melbourne culture corner’, ‘Poetry pea journal of Haiku and Senryu’, ‘Imphal Free Press’ and other places. She believes that poetry can heal. Her keen interest in literature and art keeps her engaged in writing, despite her busy schedule as a teacher. She is currently working on her next book of folktales - ‘Morning Blush’ and a collection of poems - ‘Flower of Remembrance’. When she is not writing, she’s running marathons and ultras, having run numerous marathons and ultra-marathons. She is currently residing in Delhi, India, with her husband, two daughters, and Haru the cat.