Gods and mothers

>> A trek through a World Bank project

by JULIET WATERS

In The Water Gods: The Inside Story of a World Bank Project in Nepal, 22-year-old student Anna Paskal is on a mission with her mother, Montreal writer and documentary-maker, Merrily Weisbord.

It's 1995 and they're in Nepal to observe and interview villagers who may be threatened by Arun III, a hydro mega-dam. Weisbord hopes to get a radio documentary out of the trip, while Paskal hopes to get an undergraduate thesis and escape an all-consuming romantic relationship with a painter named Max. "I wanted to feel full and strong on my own, without dependencies," she writes.

Early in the trip tensions develop between other traveller/activists. As Nepalese villagers wait in front of an empty movie screen, the activists debate whether they should show a documentary about the James Bay project. But the natives, so to say, are getting restless. To distract the crowd, Mehda Patkar, a legendary Indian activist who has fought the World Bank on the Sardar-Sarovar dam, attempts to lead them in a Hindi protest song. "Most know no Hindi," Paskal ruminates, "or only a few phrases from popular Indian film soundtracks. Only the educated Nepalis can fully understand. I wonder if Mehda sees the irony."

It's a good question, albeit one that is never answered. A sensitive, conscientious and often poetic writer, Paskal is a keen observer of many of the ironies on this trip.

The irony of the activists who aren't interfering in the villagers' lives as disastrously as the World Bank, but who are interfering nonetheless. In politicizing the villagers, they risk endangering them in a country where the financial stakes of this project are extremely high.

The irony of an interpreter who narrates the James Bay documentary and changes the ending so as not to upset the villagers. She decides to tell them that the Cree were able to force the government to build the dam the way they wanted, instead of the truth: that protests resulted in the second stage of the project being shelved.

The irony of impoverished villagers who don't have running water, let alone electricity and who probably still won't have those things even after the dam is built. Though if they did, they would have to pay hydro rates several times higher than North Americans pay.

And finally, the irony of the newly elected communist government that initially promises to protect the country from the punitive terms set by the World Bank, then in the end turns around and signs the very deal it opposed.

The Water Gods is a brief, interesting, readable primer on some of the main issues involved in protesting potentially damaging mega projects. It reads like an excellent undergraduate thesis. But as a personal narrative it begs the question, "I wonder if Anna sees the irony?"

Paskal frames her book as a somewhat facile tale of a strong young woman who, through a life of devoted political compassion and the aid of an incredibly wonderful mother, frees herself from dependency and returns to end things with her demanding boyfriend. But in the end, the story falls kind of flat.

It's hard to imagine a more fabulous way to recover from a painful relationship than to be brought to Nepal by your mother, who will later (according to the acknowledgments) give you her notes, edit your manuscript and drop it off at her publisher's. But it's not exactly the way of life "without dependencies."

Not that there's anything wrong with a life that has some dependencies. If we could consciously choose our own dependencies, many of us would want exactly the same ones. Still, if Paskal had grappled with this irony, even at a superficial level, and if she had presented her relationship with her mother as even slightly flawed, her book might have been a little less earnest, but a lot more fun to read.

The Water Gods, by Anna Paskal, Vehicule Press, pb, 158pp, $16.95