Being Appreciative

Abbas MEXICO. State of Guerrero. Village of San Augustin de Oapan. Boy wears a mask made of cardboard. 1984.

At the ‘Abbas, 45 Years in Photography’ exhibition at the National Museum last weekend, a mother was standing with her child in front of this photograph. Mother told Son to observe how poor the child in the photo was, “so poor that he has to make his mask out of discarded cardboard, unlike the store-bought mask you have at home, the one with the fancy feather, remember? That is why you must learn how to share, because there are less fortunate children like this Mexican boy.”

At first I was impressed by how she incorporated values education into their exhibition viewing outing. This is good, yes. It’s a start, certainly, but the more I thought about it, the more I realised what I was uncomfortable with. I’d like for us to aspire to more. Not to settle for mere pity and charity, which creates an unhealthy power imbalance that perpetuates the unfair social structures that created these economic disparities in the first place. Instead, I’d like for us to appreciate and celebrate. For who amongst us can look at that same photo and instead applaud this Mexican child for his creativity, ingenuity and do-it-yourself spirit to be able to fashion something of value out of something others see as trash? Perhaps, just perhaps, the child who can see this will grow up to become one who is part of the solution, not the problem.

Because We Love Her

Today we celebrate 100 years of International Women’s Day.

While it is a time to reflect on the progress made, for me, it’s also a time to remember how little has changed in some of the areas I take for granted and to make a commitment for that to stop.

Last week, I attended “A Call for Help”, a UNIFEM Singapore video screening cum talk about domestic violence, organised by a group of young ladies from Temasek Junior College.  Their aim?  To educate the public on the prevalence and seriousness of domestic violence and encourage the masses to be more proactive in taking a stand against it.

Domestic violence is appalling, yes, tell me something I don’t already know.  The big question on my mind that whole night was: so what can we do about this thing that seems so invisible and private?  As the evening unfolded however, and the clear messages never to condone, commit or keep silent about violence against women rang out, a long buried memory surfaced.

When I was 17, I had a classmate who, every now and then, would walk into our class with bruises on her arms.  We all knew she and her boyfriend had a tendency to get into heated arguments (or rather her boyfriend had a tendency to get angry while she attempted to pacify him) but did that have anything to do with her tendency to bruise?  Surely he wouldn’t be violent, or would he?  One day, she walked into class with a big, ugly bruise on her cheek and claimed she’d walked into a door handle.  That was probably the day we all realised that something really bad was going on, though we refused to admit it to ourselves, much less to each other.  Such a thing could not be happening to our friend, not from the guy she was madly in love with, and who claimed to love her back, not from the guy who could make her so happy, surely?

And it was because of this ridiculous naivety that I never did anything about it.  I rationalised to myself then that I didn’t want to jump to conclusions, nor get either of them in trouble.  As her friends, we’d give each other puzzled looks when she walked in with yet another bruise, but it was as if by not speaking about it with each other, we could magically make it true that this nightmare was not happening.

Fortunately, the two eventually broke up, the volatility of their relationship unable to survive his graduating from school a year earlier than her.  Unluckily for me though, I ended up in the same faculty as the guy in university, and had to endure the sight of him in the corridors throughout those years.  Yes, there was anger emanating from me every time I had the misfortune of bumping into him, but what use was that?  Too little, too late.

What was the anger all about?  I think it stemmed mainly from the guilt of wishing I had actually had the guts to admit to myself that all that was happening and that I needed to report the guy.  Whether my friend would choose to hate me for jumping to conclusions or for messing up their relationship was beside the point.  I know now what I didn’t know then, that when it comes to abuse, you do not keep quiet, even if you’re only operating on suspicion.  Err on the side of caution.  Trust your instincts.  Speak up.  Because violence isn’t right.  Because she needs you to break the silence, even if she doesn’t know it yet.

If you suspect someone is a victim of domestic violence, don’t hesitate.  Do something…because you love her.

The Universal Right to Education

I realise I’ve completely neglected this little space, which means I’ve probably been hibernating in the last half a year it’s taken for me to come to terms with my long journey towards recovery.  In no way, however, does my failure to blog indicate that “I NO LUV MY READERS” (and yes, this means you, you know who you are!).  Thing is, this is supposed to be a spot of cynspiration, and I’ll have to admit, I haven’t been awfully cynspired for awhile.  Until now that is…  Hullo!  We’re back!

How did this happen?  Well, sometimes a simple change of scene is all it takes for inspiration to strike.  Last week, the light flickered back to life while I was attending an educators workshop in Gurgaon, Delhi.  Soaking up stories of the good work being done by this community of idealists, I was reminded of exactly why we do what we do.

The community work undertaken by our host school, Scottish High is one such example.

Like many other cities around the world, the rapid development and construction of Gurgaon is built on the backs of a large number of Bangladeshi labourers who live illegally in Delhi and Gurgaon. With them are their children who usually have no access to education.

As a service to the community of labourers who live and work illegally in the neighbourhood surrounding Scottish High, the school offers classes to the migrant children. The programme includes free lessons, school materials and uniforms.

The migrant children go through 3 levels of classes in Scottish High. I was told they leave the third level equipped with the basic language skills necessary for them to cope in mainstream schools.

Taught by Scottish High teachers after their regular lessons, the teachers are assisted by Scottish High students taking the International Baccalaureate Diploma programme. Their contributions count towards fulfillment of the Creativity, Action, Service component of their diploma requirements, but more important hopefully, towards their belief in the universal right to education.

Mari kita…

The thing about being on a doctor’s rest order is that it forces you to stop running around like a headless chicken, doing ever more things, and instead leaves you with time to actually, wait for it…*gasp*, think.  Yes, that’s right.  Another thing about being on a no-travel rest order is that unlike so many a National Day come and gone, I spent this one in Bali (2009), Kuching (2008), Bangkok (2007, 2006, 2005), Perhentian (2004), familiar ol’ Bedok, reflecting on what will be the twentieth year of my love affair with Singapore.

Twenty years ago today, this newcomer drew a birthday cake for her newly adopted country’s birthday, and in true-blue Singapore style, won a prize for it.  And thus began our relationship.  But as with all relationships, we’ve seen our fair share of ups and downs, extremes of intense love, and intense hate.  And as it turns out, I’m slowly coming to grips with being the island girl with the blue IC whose traitorous heart, damn it, can’t help but swell to the tune of “Majulah”.  So today, at home, with space to think, my thoughts turned to the “Magic of Marikita” (kudos to the ever spot-on Colin Goh for coining the term) – what it means to me and more importantly, what I want it to mean to me.

This time thirty days ago, I was admitted to Changi General Hospital.  They didn’t have enough beds in the orthopedic ward then, and so I was initially placed in the Accident & Emergency Department’s observation ward, together with what at 1am, was about twelve other people.  After the nurses, doctors and my friends were done fussing over me, utterly exhausted from the ordeal, I managed to get some sleep despite the persistent light and noise, only to wake up and find that while I had been sleeping, the ward had so completely filled up that access to my bed was now completely blocked by other beds.  Of the three beds placed at the foot of my bed, two were occupied by migrant workers who appeared to have sustained injuries in worksite/industrial accidents.  One guy was unconscious and wearing a cervical collar.  The other guy was conscious but could only lie on his front because his back was in so much pain.  Asked if anyone had accompanied him, his heartbreaking response was, “No one.”

No one.  I shouldn’t be surprised.  It’s a scary situation to be in.  In pain, miles away from family and friends, terrified if you’ll have enough money to cover the medical fees, but most of all, scared of what will happen to you, and unable to find out the exact details of your situation because these people, they don’t speak your language, and you, you’re not all that proficient in theirs.

When I was doing the hospital admission paperwork, I momentarily fretted over the prospect of the hospital bills, but the hospital staff were quick to remind me about MediSave and MediShield, should all else fail.  Over the next few days, my supportive, understanding employers told me to concentrate on getting better, and not to worry about finances; that they’d have everything covered.  Today, a whole month after the accident, I’m still on medical leave, and a complete recovery of the use of my ankle is not guaranteed.  Whatever the eventual outcome may be, I still have an income, and the job I love to return to.  What of the two migrant workers who lay in that observation ward with me that morning though?  Will their injury have permanent repercussions, and if so, will they have a job to return to?

Lying in the same ward with injured migrant workers – the people who’ve helped build our roads, schools, hospitals, offices, homes and countless other essentials, I worried about their welfare but felt powerless to help.  The good people of The Cuff Road Project though, are doing something about it.  A project by Transient Workers Count Too (TWC2) and ONE (SINGAPORE), The Cuff Road Project provides daily meals to homeless and jobless foreign workers, workers who have had their employment terminated due to injury or whose errant employers haven’t paid them their wages.  But a sharp increase in the number of migrant workers seeking food aid from the project is threatening the survival of the project.  To continue the programme, the group launched an urgent appeal for funds from individuals and corporate bodies, stating in a press release last month, that:

“Some 450 men depend on the programme for their daily meals. But without new donations or grants, the project’s funding risks drying up within a month.”

Of course, a food aid kitchen isn’t a permanent solution to this problem, but that isn’t their aim.  As Sha Najak, TWC2’s Communications Manager puts it,

“…as a charity, we would rather create an environment where migrant workers do not need our assistance.”

While they work towards such an environment, there are daily needs today.  In the state I’m in, I can’t run over and volunteer my physical help, but I can and have donated funds for 100 warm meals with a little clicking at GIVE.sg.  It’s not much, but it’s a start.

Mari kita…  Come, let us…

Help each other do something, however much or little we can, to build the kind of community we want this to be.

Broken Girl

Broken Girl’s Broken Leg, 12 July 2010

This was not quite the way I’d intended to get back to writing.  Not lying in bed, recuperating from an ankle injury.

So it happened that after a lovely weekend climbing the natural limestone walls of Batu Caves in Kuala Lumpur, while at Camp5, a climbing gym that a friend described as “when-climbers-die-they-pray-heaven-will-be-like-this”, I slipped during a lead climb, while downclimbing into position to attempt a “controlled fall”.  The irony of having made an extremely UNcontrolled fall is not lost on me.  Anyway, I fell, probably about 3 metres, swung like a pendulum, whacked into the wall, over-dorsiflexed my right ankle (toes brought towards the shin beyond the normal range of motion) and the rest is Broken Girl history.

To cut a long story short, the impact caused multiple fractures of my right tibia, fibula and talus bones, for which I had to undergo open reduction, internal fixation surgery (moving the bone fragments back into position and stabilising them with metal plates and screws).  While the bones are doing their miraculous job of regenerating (fingers crossed), I won’t be bearing weight on my right leg.  That means Broken Girl will be living out the next six months of her life wearing a plastic leg splint and hobbling around on crutches.

As painful as it was when I first broke my ankle,
As painful as it was when I first regained consciousness following surgery,
As painful as it was the first day I was discharged from hospital, sitting in front of the sink brushing my teeth and thinking: “This is so difficult, how will I be able to get through six months of this?”, and,
As scary as it was to read about the low odds of full recovery and the long-term implications of these types of injuries,
The attitude with which we choose to face each day is a choice.  A choice.
And I choose to face them with optimism and positivity.

For as clichéd as this may sound, it is in the depths of our vulnerable moments, that emerge our greatest strengths.  It’s times like these that help me take stock, reminding me of just how very much I have to be grateful for:
Family.  To whom it never occurred to scold me for breaking my ankle in such a silly way, who’ve raised me to be resilient in the face of a challenge and who are here for me through every minor every day struggle, whose love is my strength.
Friends.  Who’ve stuck with me though the ordeal,  cheered me up, told me funny stories, stocked me up with a supply of trashy and non-trashy magazines, books, dvds, sketch pad, plied me with essences and chocs, flowers and cacti, drew me lovely get-well cards and silly-funny notes (yes, this means you, my lovely G5!),  pulled strings in the hospital, kept me pragmatic in the face of surgery and who continue to keep me company while I’m on rest order at home and keep me upbeat with their stream of heartwarming and downright hilarious messages.
For all this and more, I am truly blessed.

So perhaps this is one of those forks in the road, a reminder to slow-down and stock-take:
What are you grateful for?
Why are you doing what you’re doing?
Where are you going?

Perhaps I’ll find out some day, what the grand scheme of things for this incident is.  Perhaps.  For now at least, I’m content to be optimistic and grateful that life continues to send us little surprises, whatever guise they may come under.

You have my loyalty

19:44 at Pulau Ubin

A few weeks ago, I went on a lovely dusk nature walk at Pulau Ubin with a lively group of inquisitive, curious young folk.  Amidst the thrills of the many critters and plants we saw, was that peaceful tranquility of the moment captured above.  My photo may not do the sight justice, but to me, it symbolises my gratitude for the beauty we are blessed with, and reminds me of the spirit of an extremely inspiring quotation I read at a recent workshop on outdoor education:

“You and I…
We meet as strangers, each carrying a mystery within us.
I cannot say who you are; I may never know you completely.
But I trust that you are a person in your own right,
possessed of a beauty and value that are the Earth’s richest treasures.

So I make this promise to you:
I will impose no identities upon you, but will invite you to become yourself without shame or fear.
I will hold open a space for you in the world and defend your right to fill it with an authentic vocation.
For as long as your search takes, you have my loyalty.”

- Theodore Roszak, Person/Planet: The Creative Disintegration of Industrial Society

For I hear that some of you young lovelies have found this little space – you know who you are.  ☺
If you’re reading this, know that I am so very happy to have the privilege of crossing paths with you, and I look forward to the rest of our journey together.  This quote is my vow to you, each wonderful unique individual.  Fearlessly become yourselves – we are here for you as you walk this journey of finding and making meaning in your lives, as you are on ours, though you may not even know it.

P/S: Thank you for the cake, my dearies!  That was so sweet of you guys.  I could taste the love that went into it in every bite!

We Have Not Forgotten You

“I feel I want to fight for democracy.  But I think we had better make a longer plan.  We cannot go to the streets and get shot again.  There is no one left to die.” – Video journalist Joshua, in Burma VJ

I sat in the cinema with tears streaming down my face.  Tears, chased by quiet sobs, because the story flickering on the big screen made us relive that familiar surge of hope against all odds, the tales of optimism in the face of oppression, and the utter crushing disappointment when the bubble is burst yet again – the story, the endless story, of Burma.

But Burma VJ is not just another story.  It may be pixels on a screen, it may be chock full of controversial reenactments, but for someone who remembers her friends from Burma, this is real life.  A real life that hit far too painfully close to home when I saw a dear friend, retired photojournalist Law Eh Soe, on screen, “accidentally” caught on video as he braved it all to capture those by now famous photographs that told the world of the acts of extraordinary courage in Rangoon in 2007 – the story of the Saffron Revolution.

In 1999, I went to Yangon for a college community service project.  We were told never to talk about politics with the people we met in Myanmar.  I had only the vaguest of notions about the potential implications, and an even shallower understanding of contemporary Myanmar politics, but I heeded our teacher’s advice, and so found myself scowling at the university student from another team when he was so foolhardy as to ask our local liason, a young man barely out of his teens, on his thoughts about the junta, and got nothing but tears for an answer.  It was to be two whole years later, along the Thai-Burma border, where words flow freer, that I began to get a clearer picture of this country I had witnessed, but not understood.

A research project in a Karenni refugee camp introduced me to many friends who wanted to share their stories.  Please tell your friends about our situation, they’d say.  Anyone who will listen.  Every single soul who empathises; who cares, counts.  Tell them our story.  Do not forget us.  We are still here.  We are still suffering.  And so on it went, and we left overwhelmed and depressed, unsure of what we could possibly do to make any difference, and in our desperation, we poured our energy into a little awareness and income-generation project, and while that helped in its own tiny way, it was not enough; and it always seems like it will never be enough.

“Please use your liberty to promote ours”, the lady, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi once said.  And this rallying call was echoed in a voice shaking with emotion, by a Burmese lady during the discussion session after MARUAH‘s Burma VJ screening.

Yes, it is heartbreaking to hear; it is frustrating to care, yet feel completely powerless to do anything.  While it may not seem like much, ensuring that we know the facts on the issues surrounding Burma matters:
Because what we tell our governments about what we think of their engagement with Burma, matters.
Because what we tell the companies about what we think of their investments in Burma, matters.
Find out and speak up.

But perhaps what matters most of all, is assuring another person that they matter.  My dear friends, though none of us knows when this may end, know this – we have not forgotten you.