Closing Pandora's Box

We were sitting and talking, waiting for afternoon lectures to start. The Indian girls I was with were on a roll; after bitching for about half an hour they moved onto Bollywood and began re-enacting their favourite scenes. I don’t actually know why I was there because I dislike bitching and don’t watch Bollywood. I guess I was literally killing time in the most painful way possible.

The subject of the conversation turned to one particular (absent) individual and I learnt many eye opening facts about their life story. In all that time I had been yawning profusely and making funny faces at people passing by our table at the canteen so the girls looked at me, expecting some input into the discussion at hand:

It’s amazing isn’t it? People form ideas and assumptions about others really very quickly but when you actually hear their story, you have nothing to say but “oh” and wish you could take it all back.

Our eyes see only that which they are capable of seeing or that which we want them to see. That’s also why people wear lenses and glasses. It’s not the thing being looked at that is changing, but the ability of one to see that particular thing. If you stand two individuals; one with perfect vision and another who is short-sighted together at a distance of 15 metres from a sign, they’ll see different things. The sign is the the same but the images perceived are different.

It’s the same with people. What we see of others is nothing but skin and clothes, all superficial. And when seen through our eyes, they’re even more distorted.

*****

In other news, I am extremely sorry for having not posted in over a month. Though I may not have commented on your blog posts, I have regularly been visiting and read them every morning on my phone while on the train to university. The wonders of technology aye.

Lastly, you may recall my previous post was about a series of guest posts that I would like to do in the next month or so regarding the issues women face in today’s society. I have already received some excellent, though provoking and well written articles from a number of you but there are still some slots available if you wish to join the discussion as a few people have dropped out due to one reason or another. So if you wish to get involved, just let me know.

I hope and pray you are all having an excellent weekend!

Stay smiling.

This post is dedicated to Cяystal

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Title: I need a dollar – Aloe Blacc
YouTube video: I saw on Asma Khan’s blog and as it was really pertinent to the post, decided to include it.

I read a book not too long ago and a particular scene regarding things really caught my attention and got me thinking.

“Almost everyone to whom I introduced Jennifer remarked on how self-possessed she appeared for one who had experienced so much tragedy. Indeed, she did have a remarkably assured manner, and in particular a capacity to make light of setbacks which might have brought other girls her age to tears. A good example of this was her reaction concerning her trunk.”

The girl Jennifer is a young orphaned teenager who is adopted by Christopher, the I of the story. She had been waiting a very long time for her trunk containing her valuable possessions to be delivered to the UK from Canada. Christopher received a letter informing him that the trunk had been lost at sea. On informing her, she just laughed it off.

When after two or three days she had still shown no sign of distress over her loss, I felt inclined to talk with her, and one morning after breakfast, spotting her wandering about in the garden, went out to join her.

…When I stepped down on to the lawn, Jennifer was drifting about the garden with a toy horse in her hand, dreamily walking it along the tops of the hedges and bushes. I remember being rather concerned the toy might be harmed by the dew and was on the verge of pointing this out to her. But in the end, as I came up, I said simply:

“That was rotten luck about your things. You’ve taken it awfully well, but it must have been a terrible shock.”

… “It’s all right. I’m not upset. After all, they were just things. When you’ve lost your mother and your father, you can’t care so much about things, can you?” With that, she gave her little laugh.

… “You know, Jenny, I’m not sure that’s true. You might say a thing like that to a lot of people and they’d believe you. But you see, I know it’s not true. When I came from Shanghai, the things that came in my trunk, those things, they were important to me… What I’m trying to say is that for me, my trunk was special. If it got lost, I’d have been upset.”

She shrugged and put her horse up to her cheek. “I was upset. But I’m not any more. You have to look forward in life.”

Today we live in a very materialistic society. A survey of parents reported in the BBC showed that one-third of under-10s possess their own mobile phone¹. The Guardian describes it ‘a materialistic trap’². Parents are forced to work longer hours to provide money to fulfil these materialistic desires and thus spend less time with their children. The media plays a significant role in this brain washing of children making them feel they have to own a particular thing or gadget to look cool or to improve. When I was 10, I was too busy playing watching Power Rangers and re-enacting it out with my friends in the park. In this materialistic mind-trap, many people forget the value of the things that matter in life. Things can easily be replaced. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but the day after, or the day after that.

I was discussing this with my friend the General and he said, “Yes it’s true. People give preference to materialistic things. But I think sometimes some things are worth cherishing. When a person is no longer with you, sometimes all you have to remember that person is the things they left behind.”

I have a many such things, which my mum calls junk, but they hold such sentimental value I wouldn’t get rid of them for the world. Because they remind me of what once was, but could no longer be.

Do you have any such things?

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Title: Good Riddance – Green Day
All quotes are taken from the book “When we were orphans” By Kazuo Ishiguro
¹Third of under-tens own mobiles – BBC
²UK children stuck in ‘materialistic trap’ – The Guardian

A few days ago my dad brought home a lot of cherries. He shouldn’t have bought a lot because it turns out that only mum and I eat them. Though I passed a cursory glance over each of them before sticking them into my mouth, I realised that what we see can be deceiving.

It looked succulent, a deep purpley red colour and so I gave it a pass in my short quality check test. Just as I popped it into my mouth and bit into it, squishing juice everywhere, I realised I had made a mistake. It tasted horrendous, as if someone had injected mud into the centre (Yes I know what mud tastes like. I had a fun childhood). I was speaking to Rosaline about it, and she said something that dragged me down memory lane. Rewind to..

Primary School Assembly, Year 3

I always enjoyed assemblies in which a class gave a presentation or a teacher did something interesting. I remember once Mr Bristol was going to be taking the assembly. After the announcements were read out and the general business dealt with, he walked onto stage and began talking.

“I know it is against the rules to eat in assembly, but the head teacher here has said I can. Just this once.”

We were all curious. I sat there stuffing my face with polos.

The head teacher walked over to him, a tin and fork in hand. She opened the tin, stuck the fork inside and fed whatever it was to Mr Bristol. Those children who were sitting at the front, and so had a better view, let out noises of disgust. “Ewwwww!”

“What is he doing?”

“That’s so disgusting!”

“She’s feeding him dog food!”

“I’m going to be sick, how can he eat that stuff?”

As news spread to the back of the hall, the disgust and a fair share of disbelief got louder and louder and louder. The head teacher continued feeding the other teacher. As the contents of the tin were about to finish, he began talking again.

“If any of you would also like to eat some, please come to the front.” He was replied by silence. Not a single child spoke. He pointed to a girl sitting at the front. “Do you think what I was eating is nice?”

“No! I would never eat it,” the girl replied.

He pointed at a boy, “Would you ever eat it?”

The boy replied as the girl had done, “No. I’d not even touch dog food!”

The teacher smiled. “Many of you think that the tin I was eating from contained dog food in it. It didn’t.” He proceeded to remove the label off the tin and revealed another label below that showed it was actually pineapple. Everyone gasped. We had been fooled completely. It wasn’t even April yet. “The lesson I want you all to take away from today’s assembly is that we should never judge anything or anyone on what it or they look like.”

*****

Each and everyone of us portrays a certain image. We all hide behind masks so that others don’t take advantage of us, or know what really goes on beneath our skins. It is usually a protective measure. Only very few people see us with our masks off and barriers down, but even then some of them may not see our naked skin. We are quick to judge. A person that doesn’t conform to the norms, or doesn’t look good is left out, marginalised and the last one to be picked. But the surface is never really real as we only see that which our eyes are capable of seeing. People cover themselves up with make-up to hide the cracks, others distract attention from their sorrow-filled eyes by their beautiful smiles and some people walk tall even when they are broken.

I’d like to end this post with another incident from the past. Back in high school, year 10, the first year of GCSEs a guy dramatically changed. I wasn’t really friends with him at the time, but he was in my maths class and so we occasionally spoke. He was known as being a social, easy to get-along-with type of person, but as time went on he became less and less so. His friends started falling out with him because he no longer took part in their past-times and no longer shared their interests. At lunch times he would sit in the school library immersed in a book or would walk aimlessly around the school building lost in his own mind. “Neek” they called him, “they’re just stupid exams and still 2 years  away. Why is he being like this?” He became quieter and quieter and quieter. No-one knew why, and so people used it as an excuse to spread rumours and taunt him. He wouldn’t reply. One day we discovered his mother had been involved in a serious car accident and was in intensive care. The penny had finally dropped. “Oh s**t, I didn’t know.” A bit late for saying sorry don’t you think?

Unless you’ve crawled inside the other person’s skin, taken a look around, seen the world from their eyes and have some sort of idea about them, the real them and not the mask they wear, be careful of what you say or do. You will never know. Just like they don’t know about you.

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Title: You’re a better man than I – The Yardbirds
Picture of cherries Dee taken from here
Picture of pineapple taken from here
Picture regarding masks was one sent to me by a friend. I do not have a link for it.

“Have you ever had that orange coloured fruit which is really juicy and sweet but after a few seconds it really dries up your mouth and makes it seem like there’s cobwebs growing in there?” I asked the two sitting next to me.

The thinking look came onto the General’s face, "Hmmm…”

“Are you talking about tangerines?” asked Dum.

“Noooo. Tangerines don’t give you oral cobwebs. I don’t know what it’s called.” I replied. “Wait let me google it.”

“I think I know what you might be talking about,” said Dum with his distinctive enlightened ‘oh’ look.

Googling ‘What fruit dries your mouth?’ came up with a yahoo answers page link. “According to this, it’s called a persimmon,” I informed the others.

“Suck this 12 inch baby dry!” shouted Dum randomly, pointing in between his legs. Oh dear, here comes the guy talk.

Which other thing is made to a 12 inch size? “Bloody hell man, that’s the size of a normal 30 cm ruler!” I exclaimed rolling my eyes.

“It would be okay if it was that size when standing up. Otherwise all that blood…” added the General.

“It’d make you faint. Imagine that, you see some one really hot  and just swoon because of all that blood being directed away from the brain.” I said.

“Haha! Gives a whole new meaning to how long can you last,” said Dum.

“But you know, it’s not like we’re 12 any more when it used to randomly just pop up. I think he’d have a bit of self control now… I hope,” General said giving Dum a scrutinising look.

“All you need now is that wooden stump thing that pirates have and you’ll officially have yourself a third leg!” I said laughing.

*****

“Happiness is like a butterfly; the more you chase it, the more it will elude you. But if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder.” – Thoreau. (sent to me by bubblegum)

What is happiness? Why is that when we are happy things are easy to deal with and it all fits into place? But when sorrow is upon us, we can’t wait for it to end. I attempted to answer that question in one of the parts of ‘The Story’ and so would like to shift the focus somewhere else. What do you do when happiness seems to have left your life?

I’d like to present to you another quote which was said to me by a good friend of mine while we were discussing this issue of happiness a week or so ago:

“There are some things in life that don’t come running to you. You gorra get up off your stinkin’ sofa and go get ‘em” – RP.

At first glance it may seem that the two quotes above are contradictory in the message they give. The first tells us that we should wait patiently for happiness to come to us whereas the latter seems to imply that happiness is something that we have to go and actively find ourselves. I agree with both and think you can employ both methods without any conflict. They are, I believe, two different stages of the same process, one coming before the other.

If you want gold for example, you must first seek where gold is. There’s no point looking for it in the kitchen cupboards or in a chemist shop and if you were to do so, you’d never find it. It’s the same with happiness I think. If a person finds themselves bereft of happiness but does nothing but sit at home thinking about the injustices of life and the bad things that have happened to them, their negativity will lead to depression and or other psychological problems. The butterfly of happiness isn’t everywhere, especially in those places that are bound to bring back tear-jerking memories or feelings of anger and hate. First you have to find where happiness is, and then you can wait patiently for it to come to you.

Just before starting this post, I asked a friend of mine of their views on this topic and they said, “happiness is always there in the back of our mind, but we’re so caught up in our sorrow that we don’t pay attention to it.” It’s true isn’t it? When we’re overwhelmed by pain or sorrow we tend to forget the little stars that are shining for us day and night, sparkling around us like little butterflies bringing us laughter and smiles every day.

The gift of happiness is one that we all have the ability to give to someone. It’s cheap to give, but very weighty in it’s value. A simple joke, just giving someone a hand or sitting with a person and talking about random things can bring the light back into the eyes of someone who is looking for a reason to smile. Next time you see someone with a tear in their eye, remember they could be waiting for a butterfly to come to them and that butterfly could be you.