Soul Searching, Soul Food, and the Upside Down: The Moth Radio Hour

In this hour, big risks, long goodbyes, and the anatomy of a straw. This episode is hosted by Moth Senior Curatorial Producer, Suzanne Rust. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by The Moth and Jay Allison of Atlantic Public Media. Storytellers: Alzo Slade has questions. Shaw-naé builds community through her restaurant. Lekzin Tshokey says goodbye to her grandmother before leaving Bhutan. Amy Segal reflects on her mother's photo albums. Podcast # 991

• 0:13Speaker 00

  This is The Moth Radio Hour. I'm your host Suzanne Rust. Curating a Moth Radio Hour is a process. Sometimes it begins with the inspiration of a particular story or a theme, something that calls to us personally. We've had episodes inspired by shoes, letters, legends, and even the color green. From there, we'll listen through our archive to find other stories that play well together, and then start producing the hour. But other times, the process is different. There might just be a handful of stories we love that don't fit into a specific category, and the hour becomes like a quilt with different textures, colors, and patterns, like this

• 0:53Speaker 00

  hour, which I call Soul Searching, Soul Food, and the Upside Down, a title which you will figure out as we go along. First up is Alzo Slade, who told this in Austin, Texas, but we partnered with the Paramount Theater. Here's Alzo live at The Moth.

• 1:16Speaker 01

  It's Saturday morning. I'm eight years old, living right here in Austin, Texas. Now, this is back in the day when cartoons only came on on Saturdays. So I'm plopped down in front of my TV set, wearing my Green Lantern Underoos pajamas, watching Scooby Doo. I just poured a fresh bowl of Cocoa Rice Krispies with ice cold milk that we all know turns into delicious chocolate milk as you eat it. Folks, this was my time. A necessary break from the stresses of eight-year-old life.

• 1:57Speaker 01

  And it was during my time that my dad decides to tell me to take the trash out. And I'm thinking to myself, Dad, I know you just watched me pour this fresh bowl of cereal, and everyone knows Rice Krispies has a very low soggy threshold. So you can't take a break, or else you'll end up with Snap, Crackle, Slop. So I asked my dad what I thought to be a very reasonable question. Can I wait until commercial break to take the trash out? He says no. Now, this doesn't make sense to me. And even at the young age of eight, when things didn't make sense to me, I had questions.

• 2:39Speaker 01

  Like, why is it okay for adults to fight in war, but I get in trouble for fighting in school? How is it that Smurfette is the only woman in the Smurf village? And I got in an argument with my friends in the cafeteria over whether a straw has one hole or two. So my dad's demand, it didn't make sense to me. So I asked the question, Hey Dad, what's gonna happen to the trash between now and a commercial break, to where I should take it out? That was not a very good idea. I didn't make it to the end of the Scooby Doo episode, and it's a wonder that I'm still

• 3:23Speaker 01

  alive today. But I did get a glimpse into the idea that certain questions come with a risk. Now, I love my parents. I have the utmost respect for them. They raised me to be a good human being, using Christianity as the foundation. They taught me good and evil, right and wrong through example, and the Good Book, the B-I-B-L-E, Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth. And more importantly, they emphasized that Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior, and if I believe that and confess, then when I die, I go to heaven. So it's clear that I was raised in the church.

• 4:08Speaker 01

  I was also raised to be a critical thinker. So I was that kid in Sunday School, wondering, why can't I ask the preacher a question while he's preaching? Communion was always strange to me, because they're telling me I'm drinking blood and eating flesh. And I remember when I got baptized, they dunked me into the water, brought me up, the whole church was cheering. And after service, people coming up to me saying, "Congratulations, do you feel like a new man?" They were so excited, I said, "Yes," to be polite, but really, I just felt wet. You know, I was a kid, so most of these questions were just rooted in novel curiosity and, you know, childhood wonder. I was born into the church.

• 4:52Speaker 01

  I was born into Christianity. The choir singing, the tambourine playing, the deacons in their suits, the mothers with their hats and dresses. That was me. Christianity was woven into the fabric of my existence. So there was really no need to question that. Then I went to college. Prairie View A&M University. Historically, black university right here in Texas is a safe space to be young and black, to grow intellectually, culturally, emotionally, and all the other positive elites. It was there where I learned more about advanced civilizations in Africa, and how my history didn't begin with slavery and the civil rights movement.

• 5:37Speaker 01

  And another thing that happened at Prairie View was the Mr. Prairie View Pageant. It's a competition open to all male students, where you compete in categories like sportswear, talent, interview, and if you won this pageant, you got free room and board, tuition, and you were an ambassador for the university. It was a big deal. Each contestant had to come to the stage and introduce themselves with an opening quote. My quote had everything to do with what I was learning about black history. But there was this one dude who was kind of a super-Christian. Like, I was Christian, but this dude took it to another level. He's walking around campus in suits, trying to be Dr.

• 6:20Speaker 01

  Martin Luther King Jr., carrying Bibles and quoting scripture, and he got up on stage, and with dramatic flair, he said, "In order to stand up on your feet, you must first get down upon your knees and bow." I'm like, "Bro, what are you talking about? That's a little too submissive for me." Now, mind you, I'm in the middle of my revolutionary zeal, reading about black history, black power, so the idea of bowing down did not sit right with me. And I know he's talking about praying, but I'm like, "Bro, you know God can hear you when you're standing up." Next thing you know, I'm in a heated discussion about religion with the other contestants.

• 7:05Speaker 01

  And one guy asked me, he said, "Hey, Alzo, why do you believe what you believe? Why did you choose to be a Christian?" I'm like, "Whoa, bro." I got super defensive, because the only answer that I had was, because I was raised that way, and my parents were Christian. And in that moment, I knew that it wasn't good enough. And it bothered me for quite some time, and I started asking myself, like, "How are you gonna be reading all these books, thinking you're a critical thinker, but you haven't asked this important question?" So I was wondering, like, did I choose Christianity? And what about other people who were born into something else? Did they choose that? And what about black people?

• 7:47Speaker 01

  What did they believe before the Atlantic slave trade and Christianity was forced upon them? And it dawned on me that this was the first time in my life that I ever questioned why I believe what I believe, and how I was raised to believe it. And it felt wrong. It felt as if though I was being disrespectful to my parents, whom I love so much. And not too much time after that, I find myself at home for the holidays, riding in my pickup, riding in my dad's pickup truck with him, where usually we have fruitful and substantive conversations about everything. But this day, I was quiet.

• 8:31Speaker 01

  This day, I was uncomfortable, because I have all these questions swirling around in my head about the way that I was raised, and I can't, I don't feel like I can ask him. So I'm looking out the window, watching acres of pine trees and cow pastures pass by, and my dad notices my silence, and he says, "Everything okay, son?" And I'm thinking to myself, "No, everything is not okay." And he says, "Well..." I said, "Is everything okay, son?" And so I can't lie to him. And so I finally take a deep breath and muster up the courage.

• 9:16Speaker 01

  "Dad, I got some questions." "What's on your mind, son?" "Well, you know how the Bible pretty much says that if you don't believe Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior, you're basically gonna burn in hell? What about people who believe in something else just as fervently as we do in our beliefs? Are they wrong?" And I have to say, Dad, that's just one of many questions I have about the way that I was raised to believe what I believe. And to be honest, I was really afraid to bring this conversation up, out of fear that I'd be disrespecting you all in the way that you all raised me. It got quiet. I'm trying to read the silence.

• 10:01Speaker 01

  I got nothing. I'm looking out the window for some more cows, fogging up the glass. And all of a sudden, I feel a jolt in the vehicle, and I look up, and my dad is pulling into a gas station parking lot. He turns the truck off, and he turns to me, and he looks at me dead in my eyes, and he points. He says, "Son, I need you to listen to me when I tell you this. I was called to God through Jesus. Other people may be called to God in other ways. I'm not to say whether they're right or wrong. But most importantly, if you believe what you believe because we tell you to believe it, that is not true faith.

• 10:44Speaker 01

  The God that I believe in can handle any questions that you have, as long as you ask them in the interest of growth and not spite. And should you arrive at something that's different than what we taught you? At least it's your own, and you arrived at it in earnest, with the interest of being a better person. So go for it, son, and ask all the questions you want."

• 11:11Speaker 01

  The weight had been lifted, folks. Next thing you know, I'm off to the races. I'm reading psychology, theology, philosophy. I go online to the top graduate philosophy programs, download the course catalog, look at the books that they're reading, buy the books, and try to read the books along with the class schedule. I didn't understand half the shit I was reading.

• 11:33Speaker 01

  I don't know if you've ever read Heidegger or Immanuel Kant, but it's not exactly Dr. Seuss.

• 11:41Speaker 01

  I went on to get a master's degree in philosophy, to stand toe-to-toe with questions about my faith and God's existence, and also to question everything else. Because I was born into Christianity. I was born black. I was born heterosexual, Southern. And all of these groups have unwritten rules as to what it means to be a part of them and how you should be. And when I raised questions, I put all of that at risk. I risked the sense of belonging to those communities and their protection. But the reward was freedom and an understanding of who I was and why I was that,

• 12:26Speaker 01

  and having the agency to change it if I had the will and the power to do so. Since then, I've had several conversations with my parents. We don't necessarily believe the same thing, but they still serve as examples of what a Christian should be: compassionate, accepting, benevolent, and forgiving. Now, as to my question around God, I still don't exactly know what God is. But I feel closest to it when I'm learning. The more I learn about others, the more I learn about myself. And they say God is within. So the more I learn about myself, well, you get it.

• 13:09Speaker 01

  And by the way, a straw, it has one hole with two openings. Any questions? Thank you very much.

• 13:27Speaker 00

  That was Alzo Slade. Alzo is a Peabody and multi Emmy award-winning journalist, educator, and storyteller. As a former philosophy professor, his storytelling is rooted in a deep-seated curiosity about the world and the human condition. Alzo shared that he has a profound respect for his parents and acknowledges that it would have been very difficult to embark on a journey of spiritual and intellectual exploration if he felt that it would have disappointed them. Reflecting back on my upbringing, I realized that, like Alzo, I was also granted some freedom for exploration. My parents weren't really churchgoers, but that didn't stop my grandmothers from lovingly trying to win over my tiny soul. Some weekends were spent with Nana Yuna in a Catholic church

• 14:11Speaker 00

  and others with Nana Edna in a Methodist church. I was young, probably between the ages of five and eight, but I remember wriggling in the uncomfortable hard wooden pews, in itchy dresses and tight shiny shoes, admiring the stained glass windows and the fancy hats, but not fully taking in all that was said in the sermons and having lots of questions. At some point, I must have lost interest, and those Sundays stopped. At the end of it all, I didn't choose a side, sorry, grandmothers, but I wound up in a spiritual place of my own creation, a place that makes me feel grounded all the same, even if I still have lots of questions.

• 14:56Speaker 00

  I wonder what Alzo was questioning most these days. Here's what he had to say.

• 15:00Speaker 01

  I'm always questioning this a lot, and curiosity is my default disposition. But what's been on my mind lately, especially in this social-political climate, is, you know, what does happiness look like for adults who are socially conscious, self-aware, and empathetic? I think what makes it difficult to be happy is that, you know, awareness, it rarely turns off. You start, you know, you notice too much. The systems, the contradictions, the suffering, the way people hurt each other, the way people hurt themselves. You know, and there's the gap between what the world is and what it could and should be seems to be growing larger.

• 15:43Speaker 01

  And I don't know if it's, you know, as an adult, you see much more than you did as a kid, or was it always this way? Because, you know, once you see all these things, it becomes hard to, like, just fully surrender and let go to comfort or distraction, you know, like you could when you were younger. You can't just turn it off. And when it comes to empathy, it can be overwhelming. Because you see people and you kind of, you connect to their pain, but being connected to it, that ain't enough to change it.

• 16:27Speaker 01

  So you have this weight on you, you know? You end up emotionally affected by problems that are too large for any individual to hold, especially any individual nervous system, which is why happiness can kind of feel like, you know, it gets morally suspicious. It's like relaxing means that you're ignoring reality. You know, that's what it feels like sometimes. But what I'm realizing is happiness is being in community with people where, you know, I can let go a little. Like, I can, I can touch people in my immediate space and have an impact with people in my immediate space. And it's not that I'm ignoring the world's problems,

• 17:12Speaker 01

  but when, you know, folks spend a life, you know, noticing suffering, contradiction, and emotional nuance, isolation starts to distort reality. And I think community interrupts that. You know, just be around people that you can laugh, joke, jawjack, and cackle at with. And so you realize that you're not alone. You know, do the work that you can do. That's about it.

• 17:53Speaker 00

  Alzo Slade.

• 17:56Speaker 00

  In a moment, a cook takes a leap of faith when The Moth Radio Hour continues.

• 18:07Speaker 02

  The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts.

• 18:17Speaker 00

  This is The Moth Radio Hour. I'm Suzanne Rust. Our next story is about a different kind of soulful nourishment. Shawnee told this at an Only in New York themed show produced with WNYC, a media partner of The Moth. Here's Shawnee.

• 18:39Speaker 03

  I want to take you back to June 5, 2021.

• 18:47Speaker 03

  I'm standing in front of this building, and as I'm staring at this building that I just painted red because I seek attention, I am looking at a $22,000 life-after-death DIY renovation that I had done, and at this point, I want to do a DIE. I said, just kill the whole dream. I don't know why I'm standing here doing this, but I'm getting ready to have a grand opening. I'm getting ready to do a grand opening for a restaurant, a soul food restaurant at that,

• 19:30Speaker 03

  on the toughest block in Staten Island, in Stapleton, where the cars are driving by so fast and there's only three other stores. What the hell did I just do? As I'm standing there, looking at the building with the big balloon arch over the door, and I just roped every single family member that I possibly could into taking orders from me and putting this grill on and getting the DJ ready and making sure that my tiny little soul food exclusive boutique owned by a family and owned and operated by just us was going to go well.

• 20:18Speaker 03

  I wasn't sure if it was going to work, but I did honestly believe that I knew how to throw a party. So if the restaurant didn't work, I knew the grand opening would be fine. Because I just stuck my foot in my mouth by clicking on the button on my Facebook and inviting 4,000 people that I don't know.

• 20:42Speaker 03

  I was sure that nobody was really going to attend because it was June 5th, 2021, spring into summer. That was the pandemic.

• 20:55Speaker 03

  I stood out front and I tried to get some ease about it as people started to gather around. And it was like 10 people showed up and then it was 20 people showing up and then it was 40 people showing up. And then it was, I should have got a permit because there were 400.

• 21:12Speaker 03

  This whole grand opening was a success. And so I just knew that the 400 people that showed up for this grand opening would be my regulars that would keep my lights on. Everybody was gonna come back the next day and buy food. And so I was excited about going into the restaurant the next day and cooking and having my kids there because these people just left and they spent time with me and saw me at this grand opening. I had my kids sitting at the kids' table and that was the table closest to the kitchen where they could see my recipes while we did homework.

• 21:51Speaker 03

  I had no clue that this restaurant was really... I was in the belly of the beast at this point.

• 21:59Speaker 03

  What should I do to try to get people to come into the restaurant? Because one day had passed and nobody showed up. Two days had passed, nobody still showed up. And that became an entire year. I needed to get creative and I'm extremely creative when it comes to, like I said, planning a party. So I went out into the community and I started telling people, "I opened up a restaurant. Do you want to come hang out with me? I'm giving out free food." Nobody wanted free food. And even though I sat in front and put benches and plants and I taught people medicinal properties of parsley, nobody really cared.

• 22:43Speaker 03

  This little white lady, Grace, would pass by with her little cart and she'd stare at me and she'd look and with pity in her eyes, she'd hand me $5 and say, "Baby girl, just hold on." I felt like it was ministry.

• 23:01Speaker 03

  I said, "I have to figure this out." So I started letting people do all kinds of crazy things in the restaurant just to keep the lights on. I did paintings, I had book readings. And I even let Method Man shoot a music video in there.

• 23:18Speaker 03

  That began to get a little bit daunting. I couldn't plan enough parties. And so a year and a half had gone by and I still wasn't really selling any food. Someone comes into the restaurant and they said, "Hey, we want to film you while you're bringing food out to the table." And I said, "Oh, I don't really know if I want to do that because there's nobody here." They said, "No, it'll be fine. We'll just put the word out and we'll get people to come and, you know, we'll bring community together." And I said, "Oh, I'm not sure if I'm comfortable with that." They came and they did it anyway and sure enough, it shows up and it's on TikTok. I don't know what TikTok is. And then I started showing up into these Facebook groups where those 4,000 people were.

• 24:04Speaker 03

  The people started to talk. And sure enough, as they were talking, people started to also come into the restaurant.

• 24:12Speaker 03

  The community wasn't really tied together because we're kind of like separated by shores, north and south shore. And so when I say the south shore that way, I'm pretty sure you kind of understand where I'm going with all of this.

• 24:25Speaker 03

  I planted a soul food restaurant in the middle of a sea of pasta, meatballs and pizza.

• 24:34Speaker 03

  The south shore showed up and they came in in droves and they supported and they told me how much they loved me and I hugged and kissed them. And then they started to ask me lots of questions. "Well, why did you open this restaurant up and why over here?" I said, "Well, I'm the eighth generation direct descendant to the first free black man to purchase property on Staten Island in Sandy Ground."

• 25:00Speaker 03

  I figure I owe my ancestors something, so I need to be doing something here on Staten Island. And they were excited about that. And that became a part of my marketing strategy because people's faces and mouths would start to drop every time I said it. We'd hug, we'd kiss, we'd break bread, we'd enjoy each other and then there was chatter all over Facebook. There's this girl, she's in the restaurant, she shows up, she comes out, she kisses you, she hugs you, she tells you she loves you.

• 25:29Speaker 03

  My 20-seat soul food boutique was staying a little bit full. And my Google reviews on Google were showing that something was happening on Staten Island. It was nothing like my bank account where the numbers were going kind of up and the dash in the front sort of kind of like my name was like over there.

• 25:54Speaker 03

  Two and a half year mark and a gentleman walks in and we sit him at the kids' table. At this point, the kids' table is operating like the chef's table. And the guy and the two other people are sitting at the table and it's about 9:30 at night and they start to ask me all kinds of questions like, "What do you have on the menu? Can I get oxtail? Do you have ribs? Is there jerk chicken left?" And I would say, "Nope, nope, and I don't have that either." I said, "What I do got is I got scraps because you came here kind of late and you wouldn't do this to your grandmother, asking her 10 o'clock for anything exquisite. So don't ask me. I should just give you a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

• 26:37Speaker 03

  But if you trust me, I'm gonna bring you out a spread that's gonna still blow your mind. Do you trust me?" He said, "Sure, no problem. You're the chef, right?" I said, "Yeah, I'm the chef." So I go back, I get the food, I bring it out. He sits down and he sees it and he says, "Oh my God, this is the scraps?" He said, "What do I got to do to get the whole menu?" I said, "Well, you got to get here at 5 o'clock. Like I said, you don't go to your grandmother's house 10 o'clock. Get here at 5 and get everything on the menu." Two weeks later, he shows up, comes at 5 o'clock and took my advice. I knew who he was exactly when he walked in the door. I hugged him, "Hey cousin, you made it. I love you." He said, "Yeah, I made it. I'm here at 5 o'clock."

• 27:23Speaker 03

  I said, "Well, I'm so glad that you made it. I hope that you really enjoy yourself."

• 27:28Speaker 03

  Couple of weeks later, I get a phone call from my nephew's son. "Yes?" He said, "Somebody just called and said that they wanted you to call them from the paper." I said, "Okay, well, what do they want?" He says, "I don't know. They called from the New York Times. They want to talk to you." I said, "I don't want to subscribe to the New York Times. I don't have $4.40."

• 27:51Speaker 03

  He said, "Well, I think that you should try to call them and tell them you don't want to subscribe." I said, "Okay, give me the number." I give the guy the number, take the number and I call. I said, "Hey, I'm calling because I didn't know that you guys made cold calls for the subscriptions for the New York Times, but I don't want to subscribe." He starts laughing and then I kind of like am listening to him. He says, "I didn't call to get you to subscribe to the New York Times." And as I'm listening to his voice, I'm kind of recognizing. I said, "Wait a minute, did you come and sit at table three, at the kids' table? And then you sat at table two?" He said, "Yeah."

• 28:34Speaker 03

  "That's incredible. How did you do that?" I said, "Don't you recognize every voice of the person that comes into your house?"

• 28:42Speaker 03

  He said, "Yeah." He said, "That's exactly why I want to write an incredible story on you for the New York Times." I said, "Like the bear?"

• 28:57Speaker 03

  I didn't know it was real. He said, "No, it is real. I'm gonna write a story and I don't write bad stories. I write good stories. So when I write this story, it's going to change your life drastically. Are you ready?" I said, "Yeah." He does an interview, he starts asking me questions. And he says, "Well, where are you from?" I said, "I'm from Staten Island, but I'm an eighth generation direct descendant from Sandy Ground." He said, "Funny you say that. 30 years ago, I used to hang out in the Sandy Ground burial grounds. You were a kid then." I said, "Wow." He said, "Yeah, this is like a full circle moment for the both of us."

• 29:37Speaker 03

  I said, "Yeah, I guess it is. I guess I kind of like did what my ancestors wanted me to do. I actually got the opportunity to create my own legacy just by telling you that I love you. I got the only two stars that the entire Staten Island has ever seen in any restaurant in history."

• 30:07Speaker 03

  So the proudest moment was that I got the opportunity to show my ancestors that I too was the first one.

• 30:24Speaker 00

  That was Shaunee. Shaunee is a product of the sacred soil of Staten Island's historic sandy ground, and, as she mentioned, an eighth-generation descendant of freedom fighters. She says that she, quote, "cooks with purpose, feeds with love, and heals with every plate." Her restaurant, Shaunee's House, has earned a two-star New York Times review and a spot on the New York Times Top 100 three years running.

• 30:52Speaker 00

  A few years ago, The Moth had a special-only-New York-themed show with stories from each of the five boroughs. When I was looking for Staten Island storytellers, I very happily stumbled upon Shaunee and reached out immediately. I was so grateful that this busy restaurant owner found some time to share her story. And I was also grateful to get a seat at one of the six coveted tables at Shaunee's House. My friend and fellow Moth Radio Hour host Chloe Salmon and I hopped on the Staten Island ferry and are greeted by Shaunee's warm embrace. Everyone gets a hug at Shaunee's House and some killer soul food. I have every intention of returning, but in the meantime, I asked Shaunee for a soul-soothing recipe.

• 31:33Speaker 00

  To find out what she shared and to see some photos of Shaunee, go to themoth.org.

• 31:47Speaker 00

  In a moment, the people, places, and things we leave behind, and a unique photo finish when The Moth Radio Hour continues.

• 32:03Speaker 02

  The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts.

• 32:13Speaker 00

  This is The Moth Radio Hour. I'm your host, Suzanne Rust. Our next story was told by Lexin Pamashuki at a showcase featuring stories from the lost education programs. Here's Lexin live at The Moth.

• 32:33Speaker 04

  It's a Friday evening. Me and my sister, we're sitting in front of the TV, watching our favorite show as we have some leftovers from breakfast, when our mom comes in and tells us that we might be moving to the US in six months. Now, this is something that we have already been planning, but what surprised me the most was the fact that we were moving in six months and that it was already confirmed.

• 33:03Speaker 04

  Now, the 13-year-old me didn't want to leave US, and I remember telling my mom that I didn't want to go to Bhutan.

• 33:22Speaker 04

  13-year-old old me didn't want to leave Bhutan, and I didn't want to go to the US. In about a month, our mom plans this trip to our village in order to pay a visit to our grandmother, whom we haven't seen in a while. So she lets us know that we will be staying there for about a month and that villagers will be coming to visit us and to say goodbye. So we travel all the way from western part of Bhutan to the eastern part, where the roads are more like roller coasters built by goats.

• 33:55Speaker 04

  You might just rattle apart before you even get there. But, as we all know, beautiful things are hard to reach, and that's exactly what it is. The moment we get there, I get out of the car, and the cool breeze of Phnom Penh touches my face. I see the orange fluorescent bulb lit in front of this tiny shop that my grandparents own. I walk inside the house, and I see my grandmother sitting there with a wide smile on her face. I sit next to her, we have our dinner, and before I even knew, it was morning. I get up, and I enter the kitchen, where I find my grandmother standing next to the

• 34:40Speaker 04

  mud stove, stirring and frothing her signature rice porridge. I sit next to her, and as I'm looking at her stirring and frothing the porridge, I think to myself that if anybody ever asked me to describe my grandmother, I would tell them that she's this calm, put-together person who looks approachable but keeps her boundaries. And as I'm thinking, my grandmother questions me if I'm hungry or not, and I tell her that I am. So she gets up, walks towards the fridge, opens it, takes out an apple, washes it, peels

• 35:24Speaker 04

  it, cuts it, and hands it towards me. I eat the apple slices, each one of them carefully, one by one, and throughout the very moment, the only conversation that we had was when she questioned me if I was hungry or not, and when I said yes. That was one of the many moments that we share, where we just sit next to each other and talk less. Later that day, I find my grandmother and my mom working in the field, where they're plucking some of the weeds that has been growing around the chili plant. So I go and help them, but 30 minutes in helping them, I'm already sweating like a

• 36:07Speaker 04

  pig. Just like that, a month passes by with all these visitors coming in and out, saying goodbye to us, giving us advice, and, you know, chaotic mornings with all these cousins that I have, but cozy nights. And it's the day when we're about to leave that I feel this heavy cloud on top of my head, like this silent voice crying inside of me. So we have breakfast, and as I'm loading the legacies inside the car, my grandmother

• 36:50Speaker 04

  just walks up to me, and she slips her rough fingers against mine, and she gives me 100 niltrum. And that's when the polite talk of war begins. She goes "vui vui vui vui vui," which is "take it, take it, take it," in Tsengla, and I go "mabla mabla mabla," which is "no, no, I won't take it, I won't take it." This goes on for a very long time, and then I give in, and I take the money from her. I say "thank you." I hug my cousins, and I say goodbye to my grandmother, and I get inside the car. As we're slowly starting to drive away, my cousin brother, who was five at that time,

• 37:35Speaker 04

  points to the mirror, and when I look, I see my grandmother following the car slowly, with no slippers on her feet. Her feet is bare, and with her right hand that's raised up, waving goodbye to us, and with the back of her left hand, she's wiping off her tears. And at that very moment, the cloud that I've been carrying since the morning burst, tears come rolling down my cheeks, and that's when I realized that it really hit me.

• 38:17Speaker 04

  Because the whole entire month, I was surrounded by all these people, I was spending time with my grandmother, and I didn't even think about how it would feel like to leave all of these people behind and the memories that we made. We drove away. I sat there with my head against the window, my cheeks sticky and tied with the tears that had dried. And no matter how many new people I meet, I will always look for the person I was with

• 39:00Speaker 04

  the people I loved the most. Thank you so much.

• 39:10Speaker 00

  That was Lexin Pamashuki. We first met Lexin at the International High School of Health Sciences, where she was coached to help share her story at our high school Grand Slam. She lives in Elmhurst, New York, speaks four languages, and loves watching Studio Ghibli movies like Whisper of the Heart and collecting anything Ghibli-related.

• 39:36Speaker 00

  Our final story was told by Amy Segal, who participated in a New York Story Slam that we held in partnership with Union Theological Seminary. Here's Amy, live at the Moth.

• 39:47Speaker 05

  Thank you. Eight years ago, when my mom was dying, she needed morphine every four hours, and so my sister and I took shifts. And one night, after placing the drops under her tongue, because she was mostly unconscious, I pulled some old photo albums off the shelf of her study, and I was flipping through them as I sat cross-legged on her queen-size bed next to her. And I had many to choose from, because she made photo albums all the time. She was essentially doing Facebook before Mark Zuckerberg was born. And it wasn't online, but it was the same concept of, "This is my perfect life, and these are my carefully curated postings."

• 40:30Speaker 05

  Because it was a far cry from what was actually happening. My mom and dad separated on multiple occasions. My sister and I fought all the time. I would call her names, and she'd chase me down the hall. And if I made it to my room in time to slam the door and lock it, I was okay. But if I didn't, her nails would sink into my arm, leaving little crescent moon marks behind. And my mom would say, "Stop fighting." And then she'd go and get her Kodak camera, and she'd say, "Now, look lovingly at your sister." And she'd snap a photo of us looking at each other with fake smiles on our faces. And when we were on vacation, she and my dad would be screaming at each other in the

• 41:14Speaker 05

  hotel room, and 10 minutes later, we would all be on the beach, posing for the photo album. And once she had a roll of film with equally staged moments, she'd go to the drugstore and get it developed, and then she'd paste these into a photo album. And my parents eventually got divorced, and I went away to college. And my mom sent me away with a photo album titled "Amy: Zero to Sixteen." And it was my baby pictures through high school. And when I graduated from college, she gave me another photo album, which I thought was going to be "Amy: College Years." But it was "Amy: Zero to Twenty-One." And it was from the very beginning, all the way through.

• 41:56Speaker 05

  And she did this over and over again, throughout my life, and also for my sister and for herself. It was as if she was trying to reinforce this narrative that she had created. And when I was around 25, she sent me a book on the Kennedys. And it was this coffee-table-sized book with thick paper and glossy photos. And I didn't know why. I lived in a very small apartment in New York. I didn't have room for anything. And I was not into the Kennedys. But she was, and so I started flipping through the book. And a few pages in, there was a photo of JFK and Jackie in black tie and an evening

• 42:40Speaker 05

  gown, and the caption underneath described the event they were at. And next to it was pasted a photo of my mom and dad in black tie and an evening gown, with a handwritten caption underneath stating the event they were at. And a few pages later, there was a photo of JFK Jr., and the caption said, "John John at NYU Law School." And pasted next to that was a photo of me, with a handwritten caption saying, "Amy at NYU Semester Exchange."

• 43:20Speaker 05

  And a few pages later, there was John John and Caroline on a boat, and pasted next to it was a picture of me and my sister on a boat. And I called my mom, and I said, "Thanks for the book." And she said, "Aren't the similarities uncanny?" And I told my sister about it, and my friends, and we made fun of her. We laughed at her. But honestly, now, today, when I see postings of people saying, "I'm in the same dress

• 44:03Speaker 05

  as this celebrity," or "I'm at the same resort as this person," I think, maybe my mom was just ahead of her time. And so, as I sat there on her bed next to her, listening to her labored breathing, there were some photos in the album of her that I wanted to keep on my phone. And so, I was taking pictures of pictures. I snapped one that was of her at a party, and it showed up on my phone. And there was one of her by a pool, and I snapped it, and it showed up on my phone. And there was one of her wearing a holster with a pistol in it. We lived in Arizona, so these things were allowed.

• 44:45Speaker 05

  And I snapped it, and it showed up on my phone, upside down. And I stared at it, and I thought, "Why is this upside down?" And just then, I noticed that she had stopped breathing. And I said, "Mom? Mom?" And then I said, "Lisa?" And my sister ran in from the other room. And we checked for her pulse. And I rested my head against her chest, and there was nothing. And I think about that photo still, showing up upside down. And I've Googled it since, and it is something that can happen. It could be caused by a technical glitch based on the orientation of your camera, you

• 45:30Speaker 05

  know, when you're holding it. And I get that. But I also get that I was holding my camera in the exact same position as I hovered over that photo album, taking all the other photos, and they showed up right-side up. And I don't know if it means anything, that this showed up upside down in the moment that she stopped breathing. But if it did, I'm glad that it was on that photo, of her in the backyard, in shorts and a t-shirt, slinging a gun. Because I think in that moment, she was just being herself, and she didn't care about what anybody else thought.

• 46:17Speaker 00

  That was Amy Segal. Amy, a regular at storytelling shows, has appeared on The Moth main stage and has won three Moth Story Slams. And while Amy works in finance by day, by night, she's drawn to the open mics on the Lower East Side. Along the way, she's picked up some unconventional prizes, including 200 $1 bills from a comedy storytelling competition. When she came home at midnight with a stack of singles, she had a little bit of explaining to do. I asked Amy for a happy memory about her mother, and she said that she loved how her mom used to pile her and her sister into the car to chase the pershing meteor showers. It was one of her favorite memories, because her mother's Kodak camera couldn't capture

• 47:00Speaker 00

  it, meaning that they were just in the moment.

• 47:14Speaker 00

  You can share these stories or others from The Moth archive, and buy tickets to Moth storytelling events in your area through our website, themoth.org. There are Moth events year-round. You can find a show near you, and come out and tell a story. Moth can be found on all major social media platforms.

• 47:34Speaker 00

  And that's it for this episode. Thanks to Alzo, Shaune, Lexon, and Amy for sharing their stories, and to all of you for taking the time to listen. We hope you'll join us next time.

• 48:05Speaker 02

  This episode of The Moth Radio Hour was produced by me, Jay Allison, and Suzanne Rust, who also hosted the show. Co-producer is Vicky Merrick, associate producer Emily Couch. The stories were directed by Meg Bowles and Chloe Salmon, with education program instruction by Amy Blumberg, Priscilla Bustamante, and Ingrid Romero. The Moth's leadership team includes Gina Duncan, Christina Norman, Marina Kluch, Sarah Austin Jenness, Jennifer Hickson, Jordan Cardenale, Caledonia Cairns, Kate Tellers, Sarah Jane Johnson, and Patricia Urenia. Special thanks to Unlikely collaborators for their support of the Moth education program.

• 48:47Speaker 02

  Moth stories are true, as remembered and affirmed by the storytellers. Our theme music is by The Drift. Other music in this hour from Blue Dot Sessions, Andy Summers and Benjamin Verteri, and Epidemic Sound. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. Special thanks to our friends at Odyssey, including executive producer Leah Reese Dennis. For more about our podcast, for information on pitching us your own story, and to learn all about The Moth, go to our website, themoth.org.