Nawan Sij. A rock opera for children–the book:
THE OPERA’s heroine is a girl who wishes to know how big the Earth is (its circumference) and finds out in Zoya Science School. It tells her story of striving against the odds: facing off against those who wish to put her back several centuries, learning math and science, and proving her competence. The Opera is set to a mix of local, pop, and (Western) classical music. The singers and musicians are villagers and children.
The prologue, in the style of ancient Greek drama, (page 1) sets the stage with a chorus of villagers, vox populi, yearning for NAWAN SIJ to shine the light of education on all.
Next, is a mother’s song of lament–her response to our heroine asking how big the Earth is (pages 5-10). Following Maya Angelou’s poem Woman’s Work, it’s a cry of despair for our countless women who toil and perish in obscurity, their fates forever crucified on the cross of ignorance. She sings: How would I know how big the Earth is? I’ve children to tend, clothes to mend, cane to cut, and animals to feed….
The mother’s fate is painful, yet our heroine’s fate is to be different. In the next song she gives a clarion call to her slumbering country folk (pages 11-12): Wake up! She cries. End this despairing night; Send children to Zoya Science School.
There she goes singing I am going to Zoya Science School. I will learn how big the Earth is! (pages 13-14)
In school, she learns science, and abstract math concepts with catchy songs in her mother tongue (pages 15-19): Pythagoras theorem (pages 20-23), Circles, Pi (pages 24-29) She learns Heliocentrism (pages 30-31), all the fundaments to measure the Earth’s circumference. And How Eratosthenes and Al Beruni measured it (pages 32-37).
And so, the opera reaches its crescendo (pages 38-39): to Beethoven’s Ode to Joy, our heroine sings: I have learned how big the Earth is! It’s 40,000 kilometers (its circumference).
The village chorus returns in the finale, stirred by our heroine’s achievement. The villagers pledge to raise NAWAN SIJ, and send children to Zoya Science School (pages 40-45): Our children shall learn to shape the country’s destiny …no more tend the rich man’s animals! We are sending our children to Zoya Science Schools.