We Measure The Earth With Our Bodies by Tsering Yangzom Lama
“For those of us who cannot return home, all the world is a dream.”
This book is incredible. We Measure The Earth With Our Bodies contains gorgeous writing, a beautiful story, themes of love and land and magic, and characters that show you a real range of responses to trauma and displacement.
I was constantly highlighting passages in this book because they were so poignant.
I stayed up until 4 am to finish it because I was so invested in the story.
The novel centers around two sisters and their escape from the occupation of Tibet. Growing up in a refugee camp in Nepal, we learn about their strengths, their relationships, and the choices they make that lead into the future.
We Measure The Earth With Our Bodies contains a healthy dose of political commentary, a strong presence of decolonial education in the history of Tibet, and a really interesting balance of pain and resilience and community. I learnt a lot about Tibet through this novel and several of those same lessons overlap with all colonial contexts: such as the reverence of art and gods, the need for respecting sacred objects, and the way that land is more than just a place you live.
I attended a session once during a course on Decolonizing Education, and the topic of land was addressed by a guest speaker from Palestine. She shared stories of Elders in her community who could never return home. What they asked for from the younger generation who could travel with their Canadian, American, and otherwise second generation immigrant passports, was to bring them soil from the homeland to be buried with. The land is a part of us. The land we call home is connected to our ancestors, our deities, our foods. As a multi-generational settler in Canada, this is a complex point for me. I have such a strong and loving connection to British Columbia - the trees, the mountains, the land here. But ancestral I am from England, Ireland, and Scotland. That land relationship is complex for us settlers/settler descendants, but the point there is that we have the choice. We have never been forcibly displaced from the land we consider home. This is why it’s so important to know whose land you live on and who has called it home since long before you.
The plot weaves in and out of time as you get to know the characters better, and although I missed a pretty key plot point and had to re-read a chapter (pay close attention to the names!) I loved it. I’ve been reading quite a few novels that revolve around refugee stories lately and I find them really fascinating for learning the context of other countries beyond what we are ever taught in schools. I also really appreciate stories like this now that I am teaching language classes for Newcomers to Canada. There is so much that we need to understand about the strength and bravery that it takes to uproot your life (whether by choice or by force.)
If you’re interested in stories that challenge you to think about colonization, magic, the sacred, and human rights for *all* in the world - you will be pulled right into We Measure The Earth With Our Bodies. ❤️
Reading Journal Questions
What do you know about the occupation of Tibet? What did you learn from this book that surprised you?
How does the trauma of displacement affect each woman in the family differently?
What is your opinion of Samphel's actions in relation to family? Was he thinking of himself or of them?
Did this novel challenge you pre-existing notions of museums?
Did this novel challenge your pre-existing notions of home?
