Freedom Noun
- The power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restrain
- The power of self-determination attributed to the will; the quality of being independent of fate or necessity.
Privilege
Noun
- A special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group of people
- Something regarded as a rare opportunity and bringing particular pleasure
The French first used “tiers monde” in the 1950s to distinguish the developing countries from the capitalist and communist blocs to separates us, human beings into three castes. First, second and third worlds form our reality of living.
We are lucky to be living reality from this part of the world and not from Billy’s. We should know so, not just think so.
India has been one of the most mind-blowing countries I have ever been to so far. Not because of Taj Mahal, I never actually made it there. It was the vision of poverty that shocked me to the core. Having lived in the third poorest country in the world, Malawi had presented a false pretence that I was prepared to see the faces of misery and eyes of despair, little did I know that there is always a little more behind the faces on the covers of National Geographic magazines.
Purgatory is on earth, and it’s known as Gujarat.
Gujarat is the only Muslim province in India and after an earthquake that destroyed its ancient city gate; it also destroyed the tourism that once somewhat helped the Gujaratis. While the cab drove through the city - or the desert should I say - I wrote down these words on my notebook: I have arrived at the end of the world.
There were no paved roads starting out from the airport. There were no villages, not even glimmering lights of slums. At night, it was pitch dark everywhere and the city sleeps on the windy dirt streets that are fumed by cow dung and other human deposits. Grandmothers nurse their grandchildren to sleep on mattresses the size of a sarong. They set up tiny tents with pieces of shabby fabric and a couple of wooden sticks to hold up one end and the spaces formed underneath are where they call home. Dromedaries driven by dark faced middle aged Indian man in red turbans carrying gigantic lumps of vegetation, heading toward destinations unknown and skinny men gathered at roundabouts, ready to be picked up to work as cheap construction workers but the fatigue looks on their faces told me, they haven’t had proper meals for days. Children scrambled through the sparse traffic, trying to catch up to my cab in hope that I’d throw something out of the car. As their voices and tiny shadows disappeared with the flying yellow dust behind me, I shut my eyes with a stern frown and felt my vehement rage take over my senses. It was as if God didn’t know they existed and they were left to worship their pagan gods and live their lives as… as they do. As I got closer and closer to the hotel, the dreadful images kept on rolling outside my window, like a black and white movie that just kept on reeling:
Not my time, not my reality.
I wished for the ability to put it all on pause like I do to Tivo but I could not shun this reality away because this was happening right up to the outside of my hotel, my safe haven, which was complete with an Olympic size pool, spa showers, room service, a private Indian Puppet show patio and private butlers at my command 24 hours a day.
I had a driver, whose name was way too long and too hard to pronounce (besides, I don’t want to call him awful by accident.) so I started calling him Billy out of my own selfish reasons. It was just much easier that way. I hired him as my local guide through a taxi company. He didn’t speak any English but he always had a smile on his face. During my 5-week visit, I prayed to Vishnu and Shiva and had sari dresses made. On the last day, I asked to see Billy’s house. I had expected him to say no but he smiled like he always did and shook his head side to side as if to say no but answered, “Yes, madam, of course. My wife and kids at home. They like see you.”
I was ecstatic, thinking that I was going to get the genuine Indian experience, as if the streets didn’t show enough desolation. I decided to do something, which I still don’t know if it was the morally correct thing to do. I bought toys and clothes that were worth Billy’s whole month’s wage as a driver and paraded into the village as if I was Santa Claus. I meant to feel proud of myself but as soon as I saw his house, I knew that I was wrong to had done so. I should have just given him the money to fit in a front door onto the house.
It was in a tiny gathering of clay huts with ladies carrying tin vases on top of their heads with water spilling out of as they walked, just like scenes out of The Jungle Book. That’s when it dawned on me that I was no longer in Kansas, as they say.
He proudly presented me his numbered house with two rooms and a tiny back garden. In total, it wasn’t much bigger than two double beds put together. The front door was never placed because his wage as a driver barely fed the needing mouths of a wife, a six-year-old daughter and a two-year-old son. After Billy introduced me to his beautiful family, I took several pictures of him staring into his wife’s loving eyes and way too many shots of the children who had eyes of angels. I promised to develop them before I left India. As I tried to wrap my head around how their daily lives went in this tiny hut, I decided to try and speak to the little girl but she didn’t speak a word of English and so, I gave her new dresses and a pink purse I had picked out for her specifically and asked for a hug. She wrapped her scrawny arms around my neck and I swear I felt the most power and strengthening flow of energy through her. It was life changing. I have no better words for it. When I finally released her from my arms, I knew that I couldn’t stay for long.
I never took my sunglasses off and had been wiping away my silent tears with my hanky, kept saying how hot it was, how I wasn’t used to the desert weather.
I stayed for fifteen minutes but it felt like a millennium.
Finally, it was time to leave India. Billy took me to the airport and as he unloaded my luggage, I took out the rest of the rupees that I had with me. It was worth around 220 US dollars. (I paid the taxi company 50 US dollars for hiring Billy for two weeks.) I put it in an envelope that I had prepared earlier with pictures that I had promised to develop and handed it to Billy. He smiled and started to shake his head side to side again and said thank you in Hindu. I smiled and started to walk away. Just as when I got to the check-in counter, he caught up to me, in tears. I didn’t know what to say but cried with him. I gave him a hug and said, please buy little Sabina books to read and send both of your children to school. I didn’t know if he understood what I said because my words were interrupted by violent expulsions of sobs that I didn’t have any control over. The people around me didn’t know what was happening and even after I boarded, the tears never stopped pouring out of me. The flight attendants even asked if I was leaving a loved one behind. I shook my head from side to side and said yes, in Hindu.
Billy. I wish I had taken the time to learn how to say his name properly.
Only occasionally do we hear of a young boy who lived in the subway station, rose above his so-called fate, got into Harvard University, and became a successful lawyer. Once in a long while, we are inspired by stories like the president of Taiwan who grew up in extreme poverty but later became one of the most influential people on this tiny island that makes two thirds of the world’s computer chips. One in a million. I hope one day Billy becomes the “1”above that dividing line.
As the dictionary explains, a right is “a moral or legal entitlement to have or obtain something or to act in a certain way”, as though there are no other limitations to life other than law. There is an invisible boundary that binds us all to a certain degree. If we are talking science; DNA restricts us from acquiring our knowledge to a certain level. I know for a fact that I will never be able to come up with an equation as decisive as E=mc2. Not that I have never tried to achievement some sort of brilliance in the field. I have and I failed, without complaining. I caved into my DNA encoding but not to my fate.
As a foreign teacher teaching at an overseas preparatory program in Taiwan, I have realized that I have had so much freedom in learning alone. I was able to choose the subjects that I was interested in and even at which hours I had wanted to take those classes. The children I teach now are all from wealthy families that drive their kids to school in the latest Gucci spring collection and/or a Porsche SUV. Somehow the kids have managed to find something to complain about unceasingly; about how they were under so much pressure to succeed in life, to choose which of the Ivy League schools to go to and how they never had the chance to interact with the opposite sex. To the latter, I say, I have had the privilege of knowing what it is like to be kissed at an early age and may I just say: I wish I had not known so much. Oh, I wish that one drunken night of my Sweet 16 birthday party never occurred. Now, that’s a story to be told at a different time.
The rest of the complaints are just …
Are we not in a privileged state already living in developing or developed countries? We have the convenience of 7-11s that are sprinkled around town like Hundreds and Thousands on a chocolate cake. We have Sony T1 to T30, iPods that are mp3 players that play movies, wireless Internet at McDonalds, and how could I forget about the PS2s and PSPs? We have come to see these items as “necessities”. Some of these items have yet to make their premiere appearance in most corners of Africa. Yes, I have been complaining about how I miss my BMW and yes, I have thought about buying that diamond ring from Tiffany. I am guilty as charged but these complaints are only whispered at hours of insanity after a hectic day at work or occasionally when the monthly cycles of raging hormones dysfunction my Thinking Machine. Most of the time, I know that I am privileged and living a life, which I am able to choose to be who I want to be without having to worry where my next meal is going to come from.
I chose to teach, I chose to be away from home, I chose to travel instead of saving up money for a down payment on a house, I chose to live alone and I chose to study creative writing as opposed to getting an MBA.
I could have saved up money and bought a house somewhere, I could have bought a BMW instead of traveling around the world, I could have made so many different choices in life but no matter what choices I made, I always remind myself to be grateful. I have the freedom to dream of exotic island getaways and so far, they didn’t take too long to become part of my reality. I have had no regrets in life because the choices that I have made must have seemed like the right ones at the time and as for the choices that didn’t seem right but still, I went ahead with my heart instead of rationality; I am only human. Who doesn’t have hindsight of 20, 20? And how many of us possess the foresights of prophets?
I am just a girl, working at a job that I love, making a moderate amount of money and driving a regular car to work. Occasionally, I get to travel and occasionally, I get to shop at Luis Vuitton. All these occasions are as sporadic as an American president fumbles over a public speech, oh wait, we have George Bush! Alright, so the metaphor isn’t there to make you go wow. It’s not how I write; it’s what I am writing about that is the point at hand. Be grateful and understand that on this part of the world (Taiwan) instead of “Purgatory” that is only 5 hours away by plane and 5 light years for my students to understand that the freedom they possess today, is not a right. It is a privilege.
Billy may have the so-called rights to own all the things that we have. Still, I have my doubts about when Billy’s going to even have the opportunity to learn how to use the computer and write me an email. The dictionary doesn’t define life like the French did. There should be several definitions under “Life” – one for each class, race, system and DNA combinations. We are civilized men and women living in the “real world” and our society and education tell us that we are all born with equality. Again, the reality is, nothing is fair and everything is biased.
For Billy to part his reality is virtually impossible. There is hope of course, but hope can only keep hearts afloat, it doesn’t fix the front door.
I am just as spoiled as the students that I teach but the difference is I know that I am spoiled. I don’t complain about how hard my life is, not anymore. Not after knowing that the freedom Martin Luther King spoke of, is a civil right, yes, but not a human right by definition, as we know it. I am not pessimistic by thinking so, rather, I am optimistic of what my future will be like because to me, I have the freedom to be who I want to be. I have the ability to break away from the ball and chain because I am privileged to live properly as a human being by any standard and not on the god forsaken streets of India where cows roam the streets freely, and dreams are nothing but just dreams.
This is our reality:
Twelve million dollars paid to movie stars for two months of their lifetime to perform their craft of art.
Sports companies spend eighteen millions US dollars to buy twenty-two seconds of airtime on TV for advertisements on Super Bowl Sundays, and another four million to come up with a slogan like “Impossible is nothing
Their reality:
Billy needs thirty-five US dollars to buy a front door.
Need I say more?
Freedom seems just about “right” for us, but if only this is all that I know.
