 |
From paradise, the following dive into reality showed the
difficulties of life beyond the rose-coloured view a few hours before. A
revelation of how life in the man-eat-man world would be like, with people
passing off poison as fresh seafood, and everyone desperately scrounging for a
piece of the marketplace until there are no buyers, only sellers.
Then there was the wait. And more waiting.
The waiting which would not finish so quickly, as an evening of waiting turned
into a night of quiet pensiveness. An assortment of characters played into the
spotlight, including a family with young child, an impatient driver and the
car's owner, as well as a mirror. The migrant worker, her aunt, a nurse, and an
ambulance complete with driver and morphine completes the picture, though
thankfully the morphine was never used.
A wild goose chase ensued through the streets
and highways out of Jakarta and into the bright night, always filled with
engines, lights, and bodies going from here to there and there on. Along the
way, beggars were mistaken for gangsters, and guides for policemen, as being
lost was the norm, and everywhere was just nearby to the mosque, including our
destination.
Finally, along a straight road seemingly
leading to the sea and the dark beyond, we turn left unto a sand bricked road
at the sign for an Islamic boarding school. Strangely, what followed was a sign
of disparity between those lucky and those not so, as gleaming houses with
transplanted flowers and shrubs stood out among plain houses with sand gardens,
and cheap bamboo replacing wood where necessary.
It was a cool night, a clear, bright night
where a young mother returned to her mother's house, and was greeted by her 70
year old grandmother, along with her brothers and sisters, as well as her
relatives and neighbours. It was close to midnight, and her mother and aunt,
who could not read or write, expressed their thanks and hopes that the migrant
worker would get healthier.
Around midnight, the family and villages were
left to enjoy the rest of an evening in paradise broken by the sound of
vehicles and the arrival of one of their own. What remains of their days ahead,
will be accompanied by a former migrant worker, who has now seen exactly what
paradise was lost for this fellow migrant worker, and who perhaps could help
ease the days ahead to a slightly less but altogether uneasy end.
On the mirror was etched a picture of a “pieta”
unlike that of the original sculpture. A picture where there was hope, there
were friends and relatives around, there was not death but life. A picture like
paradise, except like paradise there, it too was already lost, lost in
translation, lost in the wake of riches going elsewhere, lost at the fringes of
the land and society to the uncertain sea and the gathering dark.
It came upon a midnight clear, that what was
seen was altogether too often seen, and perhaps where people talk about
righteousness and laws and rights, it might be better to feel for one's heart,
be kind, and be good instead. The better option might seem to be so to the
learned and the ideal, but is it so for those who have to scrounge for money
from the blood and dignity of their children, and who cannot read or write? Who
knows best - the one in “power” and has the time to take a vacation, or the one
in need who looks to their grown-up child and grandchild, and sees only loss,
and further loss?
