Sitting on a pink cloud

autor:: zgirl

rubrika:: poviedky

There I was, sitting on a plane heading to India, wishing to change the world, to save some starving little girl with a piece of bread, to help to an old sick man to stand up and start a new life, or just to spend some dollars to increase the amount of wealth in this poor country. That was my idealized vision of how I was to spend my spring break with my family when I was fourteen-year-old, my dream of becoming Mother Theresa for at least a week. For my family on the other hand, this trip was just another vacation, spent in a completely new and foreign culture.
With these heroic and pretty generous plans in my head, I looked disgustedly at my two brothers and parents, who were just enjoying their food and sharing some jokes. I thought, how can you laugh and eat all those delicacies, when you know that these Indians we are going to meet only in few hours, have never even heard about pasta with mushroom sauce and cheese on the top? Exhausted with thinking of all the insensitive passengers sitting on the plane that were enjoying the attention of stewards in business class, I had fallen asleep. I woke up in a totally different world, in a world where every new day means just another struggle to survive.
Now, I stood in the air-conditioned baggage area waiting for my luggage, listening to traditional Indian music, realizing that only the glass exit door of the New Delhi airport was separating my safe, comfortable life from poverty, leprosy, and tuberculoses. I closed my eyes for a minute, took a deep breath, and crossed the doorstep.
The traditional Indian music suddenly switched into chaotic noise of honking cars and overlapping voices. The second after I opened my eyes, I got chills. I was surrounded by a

crowd of people touching me, pushing me, pleading me, tearing my clothes, trying to reach me, and squeezing my hands. Suddenly, all my kindliness disappeared. I found myself
standing there shocked and stuck to the floor. My whole body was stiff like a dead body, with
no blood circulating in my veins. The only recurring thought I had running through my head was, You have to get out of here, you have to get out of here, you have to…I can’t remember exactly how long all this lasted, but as fast as I experienced this culture shock, I was sitting back with my family in a taxi driving to a safe five star hotel.
Confused, with no thoughts in my head I decided to take a hot steamy shower. The water began waken my brain and senses. Suddenly, I found myself scraping my skin hard with a sponge, trying to wash down the dirt of the people who touched me at the airport. I sank down to the floor and burst into tears. What am I doing? Where is my compassion to those who suffer? Where is my bravery? I was disappointed in myself and felt guilty about my disgust and fear of poor, sick people. In a few hours, I decided to change my attitude, to give myself another chance, in and effort to make up for my insensitive feelings.
The next morning, I was in a good mood and ready to take action. I was unafraid to stand up and face poverty and diseases. My family and I dressed modestly, took only a camera, chocolate bars, and few dollars with us. It was a beautiful sunny day and the moment we stepped into the streets, we were again surrounded by beggars. This time, I stayed calm and replied to each person honestly, gently, and with a compassionate smile on my lips. ‘‘I am sorry, but I really don’t have any money.’’ A compassionate smile froze on my lips after seeing a few monuments, mostly Hindu or Muslim temples, visited daily by thousands of struggling people. Occasionally, a group of small kids with thumbs in their mouth wondered around us, looking at our pale skin and blond hair. I gave them a chocolate bar, and they studied it as if it was an alien.

Later that day, we met our tourist guide in a small van, who was supposed to accompany us for the whole stay in India. I was happy to hop into the air-conditioned van,
and stretch my stiff cheek muscles. Waiting in a traffic jam, listening to the monotonic Indian music, and smelling strong incense sticks, I heard a knock on my window. It was a little boy ‘surprisingly’ begging for money. I asked my father for some dollars I could give him. My father with a little hesitation in his face handed me a roll of one dollar bills. I opened the window a little and suddenly the small hand from outside tore the money away from my hands. It was just a second. The boy was smiling widely at me. Satisfied with my good will, I smiled back and then fastened my sight back on the traffic jam in front of us.
Another knock on my window…It was the same boy, pleading for more money. I couldn’t believe it. I thought, how can he beg for more money? There are millions out there like him, and we should give all our money to one boy? The traffic suddenly moved, but the boy didn’t give up. He ran next to our car, screaming something in Hindi dialect and knocking on the window. After about a half a mile, we stopped at the red light. The boy used this time to catch his breath. All red in the face, he gave me another one of his heartbreaking dog eye looks. I copied the same facial expression looking at my father. He replied with another frown. The car moved again. The boy put all his effort into the run. You wouldn’t see such an effort even at the Olympic Games. The boy ran next to the car for another mile, until we reached the next red light. Sweat drops were rolling down his desperate face. He knew that juggling with my emotions would secure him food for another month. My father finally opened the window, gave him another roll of dollars and closed the blinds.
My father, a very adventurous man, always gets the whole family into an exciting, risky situation. In the afternoon, he decided that we hadn’t experienced enough adventures for

the day and he persuaded the guide to take us to see ‘Real Indian life’. The guide felt that it wasn’t such a great idea, but my father persisted on visiting some small village, where the people were unaware of city lifestyle. The village we chose was really tiny, with only a few one-room houses made of mud. Other than hens running around, there was no sign of life. But, we were wrong! In a few minutes a small girl showed up. It was obvious that she had never in her life seen people like us who were white skinned, tall, with blond hair, strange clothing, and a magic box called a camera. We gave her a lollipop, and suddenly more and more people were coming out of their hidden nests. There must have been at least ten people living in each of those tiny houses. They wanted us to give them something. Anything! Even the clothes!
“Run!’’ the guide screamed, sitting and watching us from a safe comfortable seat in the van. Grabbing my little brother’s hand, being chased by the mob, I ran straight into the van. We closed the door, but we couldn’t move the car. The mob was smashing and bouncing the van. My father put a small roll of dollar bills through the gap in the door. In a half second, the mob tore the money into tiny pieces. The driver took advantage of the half chaotic second, and started away at full speed. Since that moment, we only gave money to people occasionally. We figured that if you offer people a finger they will eat the whole hand.
The next day, I having learned form the previous experience, I decided to get used to all those beggars around me and just to ignore them. I even stopped smiling at the people because I knew that they would consider my smile as my emotional weakness and use it against me. I thought, smiling just attracts more and more begging hands. Frigidly, I marched through the streets, looked straight ahead and pretended that I didn’t have a heart beating in my chest.
We came to an asylum of nuns of Mother Theresa. It was the asylum for people with

various diseases, mostly tuberculosis, leprosy, or mental problems such as schizophrenia. The nun, who personally knew mother Theresa, explained to us that most of the people were waiting to die here. The building was small with no windows, too small to hear so many
screams of pain, moans, and prayers to God to end their suffering. Outside, in the garden, were the patients with the easiest cases, people with schizophrenia who would never recover. I really wanted to see all those people inside of the building. Not that I wished to see someone dying, but I felt I had a duty to see them. I felt I should suffer like them, at least for a few minutes, as punishment for all those things I got in my life for free, family, friends, food, housing, education and most importantly, the chance for similarly good future. These people didn’t have any of it, and it wasn’t their fault. I felt guilty for the privilege to be born in my country, Slovakia, and to live my comfortable life.
My mother stopped me from entering the building. When I was younger, the doctors found some signs of tuberculosis bacteria on my lungs and then cured me. But my mother still found it risky for me to get in touch with people infected by tuberculosis. So, my parents ordered me to wait alone outside the asylum. Surrounded by mentally sick people, who were shaking from fear of an invisible devil, I started reevaluating my acts and feelings again.
I realized that I didn’t help again. I was sitting there, outside, in a safe shelter, separated from the real world, the real pain. I was taught since my childhood to wash my hands whenever I came home from the outside. I couldn’t resist the urge to wash my whole body after someone with leprosy, without fingers touched my leg. I was too scared that the person would infect me with luck of hope for a better life.
My heroic goal at the beginning of the trip was just a dream of a young, naïve, and inexperienced fourteen-year-old girl. I was sitting high on a pink cloud when I hoped to change the world in one week. I found out that the person had to first grow mentally to be

able to stand such a horrific reality and then to try to help.
There I was, sitting on a plane after one week spent in India. Enjoying the last view of
Indian land, while taking off, I noticed a pink cloud. Hypnotized by its beauty, I couldn’t
stop staring at it. But as we were moving away, it totally vanished from my view. The pink cloud stayed in India forever.


napísanísané:: 18.6.2008

prečítalo:: 1249 ludí