Saved by a blog

Have you heard story about the man who cried for the shoes until he saw a man with no feet ?

This week that was me who craved for the shoes.

I found my self between a rock and a hard place and wished I have reached the bottom , and was not still on the fall , reaching a new low as each moment go passing by.

Then I stumbled upon a blog written by a young Sri Lankan, who is working in the middle east . His wife and 3 year old daughter are left back home . He misses all the important milestones of the little girl. All because he has to work his way out of debt . The debt also is a result of trying to help out a friend . To digress a bit , there is an apt Sinhalese saying “Hitha Honda Gaani Hamadama badin” , which loosely translates to a reference of a lady who due to her goodhearted nature who is always pregnant. (But the essence of it lost in the translation. )

Writing seems down right honest. No frills , no self marketing, no ego trips . Written just to relieve a heavy heart. At the last full stop , you could almost hear the long sigh.

There were 74 comments . I teared up reading some. . They were that heartfelt. This is a close community all right, and some sort of comradeship is expected . But in the words (at least) I could feel more than that. A sense of some thing familiar, a nostalagic warmth . Through the lines, Sri lankaness shone through like a beacon . The thing that makes us feel another’s pain although we would have killed each other for a couple square feet of land . Which we try to suppress in our quest to become posh or professional. Peer deep within , and you find it and then realize what genteel beings we really are.

People have written about how they toil in foreign lands to ease the debt burden , to put food on the table , for a better future for their kids . I know a few such people , I am sure you do too . Try to remember they are not just stories or characters , they are people

About how grown men stuck over seas , take a photo of their child from their wallets and gaze. How lonely evenings ,make them sit for hours in park benches and cry.

People have written about their childhoods, without fathers to attend their school prize givings . The anger,the envy ,the shame and the loneliness they felt seeing other children with their fathers.. Then when they themselves had to do the same., they finally realized what their fathers went through. The full circle .

Reading done, my problems were still there and I was still struggling with them. Then I closed my eyes and pictured my daughter waiting for me at home .

Suddenly , as we say with the grammatical correctness of Colombo , my problem was no problem.