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| Der Himmel ueber Berlin by DpressedSoul |
A
happy smile greets us at the door. "Hey, quickly, open the door!" A
moment later, the room becomes a little stage, as a one-woman revue swings into
action, with introductions in French, followed by American evergreen songs and
English matinee favourites, Indonesian lullabies and children's songs, and a
smattering of Chinese and Japanese to keep it more in context. This bewitching
360° tour-de-force was at times threatened to be derailed by sudden drowsiness
attacks in between acts, but while in the act of literally falling, the body
lurches awake and swings upwards immediately into another song or catchy
monologue.
It's
a manic expression of all a mind has encountered, and is encountering. Such a
stark contrast to the other women in the same room, who tend to be quiet,
depressed, or even socially withdrawn. Maybe it's a reflection of the
difference of being born as they are. The show-girl wannabe had the opportunity
to get a degree and even a professional qualification. The other ladies tend
not to have more than 7 years of formal education throughout their entire
lives. It's a choice no one makes, especially not at birth. But in that same
room, these two groups share more than meets the eye.
As
much as their differences at birth lead them to have two very different types
of lives, yet the same qualities were exhibited by them. Both of them tried to
the best of their abilities to square off against the challenges of life. No
one quit on life - no one decided to exit left of their own will. But their
being in the same room indicates their fragility, their humanness. As much as
no one is perfect, there are some differences that need greater care and
understanding, greater patience and hope.
There
is no practical way to judge how great or how onerous were the challenges faced
by each of them. But the majority of the women in the room, those quiet ones
given over to crying, melancholic blank stares, or fretful, quiet questions,
most likely were taking great leaps of faith and dicing with death when they
decided to travel half the world and more to serve strangers in a strange land.
Not that it's any easier to find and keep a job in a dog-eat-everything world
today. No, both paths are, in essence, a gamble, that at the end of the day one
makes it with being and body intact.
Yet,
the stakes are more easily seen to be not in favour of those who don't really
have a choice against working abroad. Their brokenness is usually more visible,
more dramatic, more evocative of the damage inflicted on their humanity. Their
wounds, their mournful stares, their meaningless deaths, these are more poetic
than the dying of the spirit, the cracking of the facade of rationality, and
the slow transformation into something which was never intended, the stuff of
nightmares, and even abhorred.
Let's
take a moment. Everyone is precious. Everyone wants to be good. Nobody wants to
be less than perfect, or be unsuccessful. Nobody really wants to be in a race
or a competition to the death, or to be chained to anything. And if anyone
falters, if anyone doesn't come up smelling like roses, it's not the end of the
world, it's not the stamp of failure that cannot be erased; it's not a disease
that can be caught by affiliation, by friendship, by caring for them. If we
remember what we wanted, what we really wish we are, then maybe, just maybe, we
should take the time to care and to embrace them, for we are all really more
similar, and on the same path, than we could admit to ourselves.
