indiaharrisdotcom
From maple leaves to mango trees. I'm a Canadian woman living on a tropical island in the Philippines. Welcome to my world...
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“Ma’am, you need to come over here now. Edward has died”, said my husband’s live-in housekeeper over the phone, almost exactly two years ago today. Edward and I had not lived together for several years, but we were still legally married. I had planned to visit him in two days’ time. Now he was dead? My knees buckled and I had to sit down. “What happened?”, I asked. “I don’t know, Ma’am,… Read More
I’m not sure how I have come to be so deeply connected to Asia. Yesterday, as I sat in the back of a taxi on my way to Manila airport, I saw the taxi’s reflection on the side of a mirrored building. In the background were a Bank of the Philippine Islands and a couple of scrawny palm trees. Wow, that’s ME in that car, I thought. How on earth did I… Read More
And now, for something a little different from my usual posts… Last night I was in Hong Kong, reading an excerpt from my published story, “The Rainiest Season”, at a book launch party (that’s me in the photo, signing books). I thought I would share the same piece with all of you. It’s a very personal, true account of the breakdown of my marriage in the Philippines ten years ago. This excerpt… Read More
“You’re a racist”, an anonymous blogger recently wrote to me. “You should go back home”, the blogger said. Am I a racist, I wondered? And if I went back home, where would that be? I haven’t lived in Canada for twenty-four years. When I created this blog two months ago, I had no expectation of it becoming anything more than a link for that rare person who might possibly read my story,… Read More
I recently read a blog post announcing that I should accept the fact that no one is going to pay me to write, so I might as well give up my creative dreams. The writer’s disillusionment made me sad. I’ve thought a lot about that blog post and its underlying negative message — that creating art for art’s sake is a waste of our time. Should money be the artist’s sole object?… Read More
After I submitted my anthology essay, “The Rainiest Season”, to the publisher, I literally did not write a single sentence for a year-and-a-half. I thought I might never write again. Had I run out of words? I honestly didn’t know. Rather than worry about it, I picked up my camera and threw myself into photography. I traveled a lot. I spent time in Africa, Bali, India, northern Canada and New Zealand —… Read More
When you choose to write memoir you can’t be afraid to look closely at yourself in the mirror. And that’s not always pleasant. When I first began writing my anthology essay, “The Rainiest Season”, I had to come to terms with some difficult facts about myself. The essay, which describes the aftermath of my discovery that my husband has been having an affair with our housemaid in the Philippines, forced me to… Read More
As of June 10th, “How Does One Dress to Buy Dragonfruit?” will be available in paperback and all e-book formats. This is an anthology of real life stories by twenty-six expatriate women living in Asia. Each story is uniquely beautiful and I can honestly say that I am very proud to have been a part of this anthology project. I’m looking forward to meeting Shannon Young and many of the other writers… Read More
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"My life is all about travel, photography, helping animals, and writing..."
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July 2014
Camping in Washington state
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