{"id":914,"date":"2013-12-21T09:04:57","date_gmt":"2013-12-21T09:04:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.michaeltuckerauthor.com\/aquarius_falling\/?p=914"},"modified":"2013-12-21T09:04:57","modified_gmt":"2013-12-21T09:04:57","slug":"914","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/michaeltuckerauthor.com\/2013\/12\/21\/914\/","title":{"rendered":"Interview with Tiffini Johnson"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Interview with Tiffini Johnson, <\/strong><\/p>\n

Author of Dance For Me<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

When she’s not acting as a canvas for her girls to paint upon, searching for creepy crawly bugs or found playing any number of imaginative games, Tiffini can be found writing. Writing has been a part of Tiffini’s world for as long as she can remember. She is the author of over 100 books. The majority of her books focus on childhood trauma and the children who must overcome it. She is also an avid reader, horseback rider, chef. She soaks up country music like sunshine and currently resides in Nashville, Tennessee.<\/p>\n

MJT:<\/strong> Tiffini, what was your inspiration for the character Maelea?<\/p>\n

TJ: I never know exactly how to answer these questions.\u00a0 I don\u2019t \u201ccome up\u201d with a character;\u00a0 characters just pop into my head.\u00a0 One day, they won\u2019t be there;\u00a0 the next, I\u2019ll see a figure.\u00a0 Usually, she hangs around for awhile before she tells me her story.\u00a0 Maelea was the same way.\u00a0 I saw her caramel colored skin, dark hair and solemn expression for several weeks before she ever said anything at all.\u00a0 The pervading emotion was sadness, but I didn\u2019t know why.\u00a0 Maelea stands out from my other female characters, though, in that she is particularly wise.\u00a0 The book is written in her voice—but it doesn\u2019t sound like an eleven-year-old—or even a thirteen-year-old, as she is at the end of the book.\u00a0 It sounds like an adult talking.\u00a0 And yet, there\u2019s this na\u00efvity that seems to envelop her, especially where her home and family is concerned.\u00a0 She misses her mother in heartbreaking scenes, she chooses not to go back because she\u2019d rather miss them than face their rejection.\u00a0\u00a0 Maelea impacted me on a personal level very much and I think that\u2019s because I see a lot of the teenage Tiffini in her;\u00a0 in the way she refuses to give up and in the way she thinks.\u00a0 I\u2019m not sure where Maelea\u2019s character came from, but I am glad that she showed up at all.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

MJT: <\/strong>Much has been made about \u201csex tours\u201d to Thailand but I was not aware of these issues in Cambodia. Why did you select Cambodia for your novel\u2019s country?<\/p>\n

TJ: <\/strong>\u00a0This goes back to my being extremely character driven.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t have a choice.\u00a0 Maelea told me to write about her home;\u00a0 that was the first sentence she ever \u201csaid\u201d to me:\u00a0 \u201cwrite about my home.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I did not know where her home was.\u00a0 So I got online and searched for images of third-world countries.\u00a0 I had a picture of her home in my head—I knew what it looked like.\u00a0 She was walking down a dirt road barefoot, with a dog following her, and water nearby.\u00a0 When I did the search, the exact same image I had in my head appeared on the screen.\u00a0 Goosebumps traveled my arms.\u00a0 I followed links until I discovered where the picture had been taken:\u00a0 Cambodia.\u00a0 Then I started researching Cambodia and sex trafficking and was horrified to learn that they did not have any laws specifically against child sex trafficking until 2010, which is why there are still some hotels that post signs saying, \u00a0\u2018No child sex.\u2019\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I knew Maelea was from a poor village, so I looked up remote villages in Cambodia and discovered Anlong Veng. After researching the people there, and the culture, I knew that\u2019s where Maelea was from.\u00a0 Now, most of the trafficking takes place in the capital, but the most vulnerable are those facing desperation and that is usually those with little to no income or education.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

MJT:<\/strong> What research did you do to understand the life of Cambodian people and the nature of the treatment of the girls in the brothels?<\/p>\n

TJ:\u00a0 I read several books, including <\/em>Half the Sky.\u00a0 \u00a0In addition, I tracked down experts in the field, like Nicholas Kristof, and read everything they wrote on the subject.\u00a0 Then I watched videos of survivors speaking out.\u00a0 I watched their body language.\u00a0 I heard horror stories that gave me nightmares.\u00a0 I had a friend who works with an organization in my hometown that rescues girls that are being trafficked, and I was able to talk with her.\u00a0 The torture is what most upset me.\u00a0 A survivor of childhood abuse myself, I could not wrap my mind around the unnecessary torture of the victims.\u00a0 It isn\u2019t necessary—a young girl who is raped multiple times a night, every night, will not be emotionally capable of running, especially if threats against her family or her life are added to the equation. Torture via electric shocks, isolation, whips or any other form simply isn\u2019t necessary.\u00a0 It\u2019s just evil.\u00a0 And my heart quite literally hurt after reading the stories and watching the\u00a0 documentaries that showcased the survivors speaking.\u00a0 After I had a good understanding of the brothels and how the perpetrators get their victims (trickery, lies, coercion, etc),\u00a0 I started researching Cambodia.\u00a0 While the city is mostly modernized, the outlying villages still retain old traditions, superstitions and beliefs that are fascinating.\u00a0 I learned how they make a house. I learned why their houses are on stilts. I learned about the Nagas.\u00a0 I researched things as simple as traditional fairy tales and as complex as dating rituals. I looked at hundreds of pictures and videos of the region and even made the one of Maelea\u2019s home my screensaver on the desktop.\u00a0\u00a0 I even learned to speak certain phrases in their language, and listened to the audio recordings of them speaking repeatedly.\u00a0 I also looked up and watched videos of games the schoolchildren would play.\u00a0 Not because Maelea was going to play them, but because games tell about culture and values.\u00a0 It was an interesting time, researching the people, history and land of Cambodia.\u00a0 But it left me sad and hurting because of just how common this crime is there.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

MJT:<\/strong> What does Maelea\u2019s dance represent?<\/p>\n

TJ: This is a fascinating question, to which there are multiple possible answers, depending on who you are as a reader.\u00a0 For me,\u00a0 Maelea\u2019s dance represents freedom.\u00a0 When she dances at home, it isn\u2019t because she\u2019s obligated to, it is because she wants to.\u00a0 She feels an unspoken permission to act spontaneously.\u00a0 She feels the freedom to let her body move without conscious thought;\u00a0 she is happy and so she moves.\u00a0 But after she is taken to the brothel, her body is stolen from her, repeatedly stolen.\u00a0 Never again will she look at her own body in the same way.\u00a0 Now, instead of an expression of joy, dance has become sexualized; \u00a0instead of allowing her body to move based on emotion, she is taught how to manipulate her body for the pleasure of the Dancing Man.\u00a0 She doesn\u2019t see her arms the same way, or her legs, or any other part of her body because suddenly the arms that once were held above her head with abandon are now like foreign instruments whose purpose must be controlled.\u00a0 Dance is also a representation, therefore, of the innocence she loses. When she danced at home, no one was looking at her body and breathing heavily;\u00a0 instead, everyone was clapping and laughing and smiling.\u00a0 Dance wasn\u2019t symbolic of anything then—it was free.\u00a0 But the Dancing Man steals that from her.\u00a0 He takes something clean and pollutes it.\u00a0 Suddenly, Maelea feels like a stranger within her own skin;\u00a0 she can feel herself being watched and now to raise her arms above her head is to \u201cwant\u201d someone.\u00a0\u00a0 It represents the mind games that make rape so traumatizing.\u00a0 Dance can also represent the loss of innocence.\u00a0 Her life isn\u2019t carefree before being sold; \u00a0her family is poor and food is scarce.\u00a0 But within the confines of simplicity lay innocence.\u00a0 She didn\u2019t know what a \u201clollipop\u201d was—neither the candy form or the other.\u00a0 When she danced at home, she was innocent, there was no manipulation involved at all of her body.\u00a0 But after the brothel,\u00a0 she is forced to think about what her feet are doing, what her arms are doing, what her head is doing.\u00a0 She isn\u2019t innocent anymore because, like Eve upon eating the fruit, she was suddenly ashamed of her previously innocent actions. What had she done differently? Nothing. But that\u2019s the lie of rape\u2026 that, even though <\/em>you haven\u2019t changed at all,\u00a0 you are, overnight, guilty of something terrible.\u00a0 No one knows what that something terrible is, really, only that whatever it is \u201cdeserves\u201d terrible treatment.\u00a0 When the perpetrators tell you,\u00a0 \u201cYou look like a slut,\u201d\u00a0 suddenly, you remember how you held your arms above your head and danced and what they say sounds logical.\u00a0 So you believe it.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

MJT: <\/strong>In Dance for Me<\/em><\/strong> Maelea expresses a very dim view of men, and the perspective is justified based on her experience. Is it possible for women like Maelea to see that not all men are like the ones she encountered? Does trust ever return?<\/p>\n

TJ: One of the survivors I watched tell her story was asked if she thought she would ever get married and her response was immediate and fierce:\u00a0 \u201cOh no.\u00a0 No.\u00a0 I could never.\u201d\u00a0 Her reaction to the question stayed with me for a long time.\u00a0 Will she never marry because she cannot trust a man or will she never marry because she doesn\u2019t want to have sex anymore?\u00a0 Or is that really the same question?\u00a0\u00a0 <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Personally, I think yes, survivors <\/em><\/strong>can trust again, but it takes a lot of concentrated effort—not only on the part of the survivor, but also on the part of whomever it is seeking her trust.\u00a0 Abuse clearly demonstrates that words are meaningless.\u00a0 Abusers almost always promise things—school, flowers, forever\u2014but when things don\u2019t go as they planned, they turn on the ones they have sworn to love and those actions contradict flowery praise.\u00a0 So then, once the survivor is out of the abusive situation and meets a man, any man,\u00a0 she can\u2019t just believe everything he says, no matter how wonderful \u2013 or how true \u2013 it may sound.\u00a0 She is too afraid of finding herself ensnared again.\u00a0 So she has to be shown.\u00a0 Actions speak louder than words. How does this new man respond to stress?\u00a0 Does he strike her?\u00a0 Does he leave?\u00a0 Does he yell?\u00a0 Does he turn cold?\u00a0 How does he take his anger out on her, or does he?\u00a0\u00a0 How does he react when she disagrees with him over anything? Does he criticize her?\u00a0 Does he laugh at her, or make sarcastic remarks?\u00a0 Or does he give her ideas merit by seriously engaging them.\u00a0 That doesn\u2019t mean he has to agree with her, but does he at least acknowledge her thoughts are just as valid as his?\u00a0 If she is shown, over time, that he can be trusted, then it is possible for her to give it.\u00a0\u00a0 I was hurt as a child, for 11 years.\u00a0 Today,\u00a0 17 years later,\u00a0 I truly trust only 3 men;\u00a0 my pastor,\u00a0 a male teacher who cared about me when I was in the middle of the abuse and one friend.\u00a0 But, despite my caution and all the walls I have constructed, I <\/em>can learn to trust you.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

MJT: <\/strong>One of the brilliant pieces of your story is the moral dilemma given to Maelea\u2019s father. He has two daughters that he loves very much. He is confronted with a decision either let one daughter die or sell the other daughter in exchange for medical treatment. Why did he make the choice that he did? What does it say about his love for Maelea?<\/p>\n

TJ: The real question here is, <\/em>did he know?\u00a0 And\u00a0 the story simply doesn\u2019t say.\u00a0 Maelea\u2019s mother cries, she is clearly worried.\u00a0 But that doesn\u2019t mean she knew for sure where Maelea was going.\u00a0 Perhaps they really believed Madam.\u00a0 If they did really believe her, well, then, they weren\u2019t sacrificing their daughter\u2026 they were securing a better future.\u00a0 Was it wrong?\u00a0 That\u2019s a question only the parents can answer but I know that, even if my intentions were pure,\u00a0 I would not be able to live with myself if I sent a daughter away for the sake of the other.\u00a0 However,\u00a0 if they really believed Madam and trusted that Maelea would be provided for, sent to school\u2026 then I wouldn\u2019t have trouble questioning their love for her.\u00a0\u00a0 But\u2026 What if they did know?\u00a0 What if they knew what was going to happen?\u00a0 In this case, I have serious doubts that they understand what love is at all.\u00a0 As Maelea fears in one part of the book,\u00a0 what would happen if Mae got sick?\u00a0 Would Eu sell Srey then?\u00a0 See, once one does something previously thought impossible, it becomes easier to do it again.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Eu was desperate.\u00a0\u00a0 Desperate people do desperate things.\u00a0 All he could see was the immediate danger of Srey dying.\u00a0 His need for a resolution to that illness prevented him from seeing the long-term danger of Maelea dying an emotional death if not a literal one.\u00a0 I like to believe that had he been capable of seeing how severe the danger was to Maelea, he would not have sold her. I like to believe his love for Maelea was genuine and deep; that he was just blinded temporarily by desperation. But doubts about his genuine love for his daughter is evident elsewhere in the novel.\u00a0 For instance, if a parent truly loved their child, would the fact that she had been raped and deformed prevent him from welcoming her home with open arms?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

MJT:<\/strong> Some of the scenes in the book were very difficult to read. How did you manage to write those scenes where extreme pain is inflicted on Maelea?<\/p>\n

TJ: Writing this book was the most emotionally draining and difficult thing I have done\u2026 possibly ever!\u00a0 I literally could not sleep for crying.\u00a0 I would lay awake, thinking about how the things I wrote just hours before, were really happening to someone right\u00a0 now.\u00a0 Not only that, but Maelea struck very raw nerves because she reminded me a lot of myself\u00a0 as a teenager. This made it doubly hard. I honestly did not think I could finish the chapter in which she is deformed;\u00a0 it took me days to finish that chapter because I simply couldn\u2019t do it.\u00a0 But the truth is, as difficult as it was for me to write it or for you to read it,\u00a0 it is a thousand times more difficult for the victims to experience it.\u00a0 It was very hard to write this book.\u00a0 But it was just as necessary.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

MJT: <\/strong>The consistent theme in your novels involves the trauma of child abuse and the battle to heal the scars. Why is this the focal point of your work?<\/p>\n

TJ: I remember.\u00a0 The mind-numbing terror.\u00a0 The feel of ants in my skin.\u00a0\u00a0 The heaviness of someone hurting me.\u00a0 The numbness.\u00a0 I took brushes and quite deliberately made bruises on my skin because the reflection in\u00a0 mirror did not match the horror I felt I really looked like.\u00a0 The idea that children are hurting like that right this minute rips my heart out.\u00a0 The idea that those same children truly believe they are totally alone in the world, and that no one else understands, lights a fire in me that nothing can match. Quite simply,\u00a0 I cannot sit by and do nothing. \u00a0Initially,\u00a0 writing was my way of healing personally.\u00a0 I would write what I could not say.\u00a0 I still do that.\u00a0 But even after healing a great deal,\u00a0 I still write about it, because I want children who are going through\u00a0 now or adults who went through it at some point to know that someone else really does understand.\u00a0 I want them to know it does not have to be, as Maelea described , \u201ca death sentence.\u201d\u00a0 Hope.\u00a0 I write about it because I am trying to offer hope—to those whose need it and to myself.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

MJT:<\/strong> If someone suspects a child is being sexually abused what should they do?<\/p>\n

TJ: Don\u2019t talk yourself out of helping a child.\u00a0 It\u2019s easy to do.\u00a0 It is easy to tell yourself you\u2019re imagining things or that you shouldn\u2019t interfere.\u00a0 But 1 in 3 little girls and 1 in 5 little boys are sexually abused. If you don\u2019t say anything, there is a distinct possibility you are allowing horror to remain a reality. If you speak up, but are wrong, nothing bad will happen.\u00a0 No one even has to know it was you who spoke up.\u00a0 But a child\u2019s safety will be ascertained.\u00a0 Even more than that, if you speak up and your suspicions are right,\u00a0 you will have told a child:\u00a0 \u201cYou matter.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 And that simple, unspoken statement is often enough to offer her enough hope to heal.\u00a0 Call the authorities.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

MJT:<\/strong> Are you available to speak to community or church about child abuse?<\/p>\n

TJ: Absolutely, and I\u2019m not interested in speaking about child abuse for profit.\u00a0 Anyone interested in hearing my story, or having speak about child abuse in general, is welcomed to e-mail me at <\/em><\/strong>tiffini@tiffinijohnson.com<\/em><\/strong><\/a>. \u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

MJT:<\/strong> If readers want to become involved in the fight against child abuse, either financially or by volunteering their services, what do you recommend them to do?<\/p>\n

TJ: CASA —\u00a0 \u201cCourt Appointed Special Advocate\u201d \u2013 is an organization that uses volunteers to act as advocates for children who have been removed from their parents\u2019 care. Many of them have been abused.\u00a0 As a CASA volunteer,\u00a0 your job isn\u2019t to determine where the child should be placed but rather to act as a friend\/mentor\/advocate for that child.\u00a0\u00a0 It is a fantastic organization,\u00a0 one to which I have personally volunteered.\u00a0\u00a0 The website, casaadvocates.org can give more information.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

As far as financial gifts go,\u00a0 RAINN. RAINN stands for Rape, Abuse, Incest National Network.\u00a0 They provide a 24\/7 hotline and care for survivors through resources, their Speaker\u2019s Bureau and a wide range of other, community-based outreaches.\u00a0 You can locate their website at rain.org.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

MJT:<\/strong> Where can we find your novels?<\/p>\n

TJ: Local bookstores in the Tennessee area like Parnassus and Landmark Booksellers shelf them, as do select retailers like Barnes and Noble.\u00a0 All of the books are available world-wide on Amazon and my website, tiffinijohnson.com.\u00a0 My blog, which I update regularly, contains multiple excerpts from each of the books and can be found at\u00a0storiesthatmatterblog.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Interview with Tiffini Johnson, Author of Dance For Me \u00a0 When she’s not acting as a canvas for her girls to paint upon, searching for creepy crawly bugs or found playing any number of imaginative games, Tiffini can be found writing. Writing has been a part of Tiffini’s world for… Continue reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/michaeltuckerauthor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/914"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/michaeltuckerauthor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/michaeltuckerauthor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/michaeltuckerauthor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/michaeltuckerauthor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/michaeltuckerauthor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/914\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/michaeltuckerauthor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/michaeltuckerauthor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/michaeltuckerauthor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}