How important is money for life? … Can anyone answer how money changes life? … Changes everything? … Can we do anything about that? …. We live in a world where we come up with answers and clarifications for every single matter but I don’t think it’s possible for anyone to give an exact answer for this question…
I am so very grateful for the person who pinched my mind to write this… since we live in a world where we do not bother to think of how others feel… there is no wonder that most of us fail to notice this freaky part of life… This is a story of people who hunt happiness among coins and notes…. Story of young men and women who scarifice the best time of their lives to earn wealth for their loved ones… story of youth who lost their emotions and ultimately their own selves.
I met him after a long time…. With a blurred scrawled face of emotions… well-built good looking guy with an unreadable face (trying hard, putting an extra effort to ensure that he is not being read).
We are all waging our own battles to live. Some do it on their own lands on which they were born and grew up, but some find themselves at other corners of the world, where they have never smelt the joy of that soil. So this story is about the professionals who work,struggle, live on a strange land,building the futures of their loved ones.
Bangladesh is a country surrounded by two giants: one commercial, another historical. The country is vast in land and rich in water; it’s a country with a mixed hybrid culture.It's highly populated cities,various health issues,child labor, under age marriages and prostitution have created a unique cultural experience that you will hardly experience in any other country in the eastern world.
The backbone of the economy is apparel. They do all types of manufacturing, assembling, packing etc making the foreign labor involvement very popular and strong. Majority of these expats are from Sri Lanka. There are around 13,000 Sri Lankans who work in Dhaka &Chittagong. Most of them are young adults of age roughly between 25 to 40. Even though most of them are paid in Dollars this is not the USA or some blossoming country in Europe. Even though they walk around in Tommy Hilfiger and Old Navy these aren't roads of Milan or Barcelona. Despite their regular morning routines of 3 puffs of Bleu De Chanel or Paco Rabanne there's no one to take a wiff let alone a long deep breathe and fill their hearts with the fragrance inviting that sweet sweet coma. These roads are dusty, noisy and busy. People are innocent poor and uneducated. The air is humid, thick and empty. It is in this unknown land that they spend the golden times of their lives, looking for laughter and joy for their dear ones.
Most of the Asian countries still suffer from poverty. It’s the same for us Sri Lankans as well. After 30 years of civil war the economic conditions are still not stable. Simillar to all other developing nations we too suffer from all sorts of life struggles.
Fortunately our knowledge and skills are highly recognized all over the world. So we have big demand for employment. So we come here to hide among buttons, needles and “jippers” (Zippers).
They smell the scent of cotton but forget to inhale the life. They taste the sweetness of coins but never the taste of self-love. They become the victims of circumstance…Suffering from loneliness, sadness fear, hopelessness and anxiety. Life is different and difficult here but fortunately we are not bothered to accept it. As he words it “we get sold every day for the highest price”. Question is “is it worth it?” most of them fear to struggle for happiness and brave themselves to fight against life matters. They have convinced themselves that it is safer to scarifice their today for their tomorrow.
Sometimes being able to get lost in a large unfamiliar city can be the best thing to happen to an individual. It will give him a chance to discover who he is and what he really needs in his life. But it doesn't exactly happen that way all the time. In the world where we live, thinking of ourselves as the center of the universe can make us question the efforts we put into keeping other people happy, the worth of the many things we believe as essential to lead commendable lives . The environment and the circumstances create a situation where we think that we can buy anything….annnnnny thing if we have enough money. Finally, money becomes the ultimate goal and everything else turn into words without meaning.
It is sad to see how the individual identities of these young professionals are being consumed by the external forces and they have lost the consciousness of self-worth. As far as I believe career should be something that helps someone make their own choices and not something that robs one of his personality. These young people lose their bearings in the middle and lose their own selves forever. In a way they are selfless people who do lifesaving work and expect nothing other than the happiness of their dear ones. So how come I find him selfish or how come I be judgmental? Life is not fair. That’s all I can say. How come we expect them to cry, laugh or love for someone unknown or for something lifeless when all their human interactions have been limited to WhatsApp, Viber and Facebook? Knowingly or unknowingly we recognize the emoji’s but fail to read the lines on the face of the person seated next to us. We listen to soulful music but go deaf to the long sighs of our loved ones. We ask people to be polite, be committed, be honest but never bother to think why people feel to be so sometimes.
Amidst all this, they are still great humans. Who may have gotten lost. but not for their sake. According to Willibald Ruch, a psychology professor at the University of Zurich who conducts research on the effects of character strengths such as gratitude and humor, “gratitude does have a good impact on happiness, that it increases life satisfaction”. So be true to them. Be grateful to them.For them your gratitude is how you connect yourself to them, and their gratitude is seeing themselves in connection with things larger than themselves.
Arundathi
No comments:
Post a Comment