Cast your bread upon the waters
At the end of my first year of junior college, my class went on a community service trip to Taiwan. It was entirely student-initiated, and most of the students who went on it were from my class. It was my first time going overseas without my family, so it was very new and exciting to me.
Our destination was a rural school in Taiwan. Our aim was to encourage the children there to learn English. After all, English is one of the most economically important languages today. We were going to stay at the school for a week, and take over English lessons for that time period, as well as organise fun activities for the children for one whole school day. We wanted our presence to signify more than a week to skive for the kids and teachers, so some of my classmates formulated lesson plans to help the teachers teach English more effectively. I wasn't involved in that because I was busy planning the one day camp, which was to have very many fun and enriching activities, of course.
There were a lot of memorable moments. One was looking at the stars with a certain Mr G until my chem teacher caught us outside and scolded us (unduly harshly, really, because she hadn't said we weren't to go out at all. Though at that time, being a teacher-fearing student, I was very affected by it). I also remember how the guys stayed in a room that they renamed "the MAN room" and christened with a sign of a stick figure with muscles. Yet another memorable moment occurred during a bartering game we conducted in the school auditorium. I caught a certain other classmate (going by the initial A) bartering sweets (that were not his) with the Taiwanese kids, instead of trading the (approved and regulated) pictures of cows and other farm animals! Upon discovering this fact, I quickly figured out why the kids had all been crowding around his table. Yes, it had totally disrupted the traffic flow and our strategic plans. And no, my ire at the time was not in great part due to the fact that the sweets were mine.
Haha. So. We managed to tick off several things on a to-do-list of things we might potentially have wanted to do before we kicked the bucket. We stayed in a creepy hotel room with the wall behind our headboards festooned with mirrors (in fact the hotels we stayed in were all quite dodgy). We ate some classic Taiwanese breakfasts. I got some shopping done (really cute ice cream spoons and glow-in-the-dark apples and other trinkets) and tried dried blood (extremely gross).
But recently, I was reminded of this moment that affected me greatly. And it was this: Someone caring.
During that trip, I had a friend who was angsty about some things I didn't understand, and it affected me a lot. I was greatly distressed and unable to enjoy myself. This was on top of some other incredibly emo figure from my class ignoring me because he had personal problems (TRUST ME HE REALLY DID, but then that had been going on quite a while).
I remember the last night of shopping. A lot of people were trying to buy all their last minute souvenirs and instead I sat in the park and cried in front of three of my classmates. One of them was G; another was a good friend; and the last was in my PW group and is quite an interesting character of his own actually, but that's another story. G waited in his patient way, and the interesting character was busy feeling awkward I think. Then the second friend, who was male and unromantically interested in me, told me what he thought. And amongst his words was this sentence, "I care about you."
There are many things you can say to people. You can say, "You are pretty," which tends to make people happy but in a somewhat fleeting way. You can tell them, "You are kind," which makes people blush if they are really kind, because kind people do that not to be praised and often feel the furthest from kind and they really do have to make an effort to sacrifice for others. (Editor's Note: This can actually be an insult of sorts, from people who despise kind people. You see, some people think that kind people are weak.) You can say, "I like to hang out with you," which can mean that you find their sense of humour funny or that they are easygoing because they don't mind the things you are naturally inclined to do. And one can say, "I care about you," which means that because of your attributes and after hanging around you and just somehow because of you being you, the speaker cares about what you think and how you feel and whether you are hurt.
Sometimes it means a lot just to have someone care about you. As a human, from another human. As a friend, from another friend. And I felt it then.
I was thinking about it recently and this is one word I would use to describe myself: Stark. In fact, in ancient times I would decree myself Alaris the Stark, although someone on reading this will probably laugh at how it doesn't sound majestic at all. But stark; because sometimes I feel so alone and fiercely myself and stark in my principles and ideals, my dreams and uncertainties. When I was younger, I would say I was a lot more stark. A lot more unforgiving: I thought my elder sister was a criminal for jaywalking, yet now I do it fairly frequently!
I have always felt some pull in myself to care for people. But when I was younger, I was a bitter child. I felt strongly that my parents didn't see me, with three other siblings competing for attention; a practical, sensible mother demanding practical and sensible behaviour; and a very busy father. And so I did not know how to care. I went around feeling like such an uncared-for little weed. It is amusing, in fact, that I could be so young and so unquenched.
But that friend showed me that it can be said. Such things can be expressed. Even though he was a guy, and guys often don't say these sorts of things, and this was in front of two other guys (some guys would have feared judgment for something so indicative of caring, which is still viewed by some (mostly other guys) as a feminine trait). He taught me how much such a thing being expressed could mean, because it touched me.
Recently, I saw that he was in distress. I hadn't talked to him for a while. In J2, he started dating a girl whom I don't know well, and he's also studying overseas, and in general we have grown apart. I wasn't too bothered; though I missed him, I believed that our closeness was an easygoing circumstantial one rather than one which draws us to seek each other out continually for the other to feel renewed. And people do grow; just because they grow apart does not mean they're growing wrong.
I wasn't sure what was up with him, whether it was a big catastrophe or a mere annoyance. But I was reminded of something that he once said to me, and I reminded him of it in turn. "Life can be a multiple choice question. Sometimes you feel like giving up, so you choose not to answer at all. But if it's a multiple choice, then even if you guess blindly, you might still get it right. In fact, the worst choice might be not to answer at all."
I didn't even know if he would reply, but he did. He said thank you, that I would have no idea how much it helped.
This is what I wanted to tell him: Do you know why I could say that? It is because you taught me that even if I might fear that it's going to be awkward, caring is something that should be communicated. It's because you told me that you cared and imparted all the other things you have encouraged me with, in your caring. I am merely reminding you of what you have given me. Caring is something that if you don't share with others, if you don't act on, you will never know how much or how little you could have helped. (Pretty sure this sentence is grammatically wrong or something, but yeah.)
And I think I'm learning that all the time. So, even though you don't know how much it meant and that I still remember it five years later and that I plan to always practice it, thank you. Thank you.
So I end with this last thought: I don't really know what you think is the most important in life. I don't know what you think will last the most, or that you'll enjoy the most if you spend your time to achieve. But in the midst of it all, remember to care and be brave about it. Because sometimes that's the most important thing of all.
Our destination was a rural school in Taiwan. Our aim was to encourage the children there to learn English. After all, English is one of the most economically important languages today. We were going to stay at the school for a week, and take over English lessons for that time period, as well as organise fun activities for the children for one whole school day. We wanted our presence to signify more than a week to skive for the kids and teachers, so some of my classmates formulated lesson plans to help the teachers teach English more effectively. I wasn't involved in that because I was busy planning the one day camp, which was to have very many fun and enriching activities, of course.
There were a lot of memorable moments. One was looking at the stars with a certain Mr G until my chem teacher caught us outside and scolded us (unduly harshly, really, because she hadn't said we weren't to go out at all. Though at that time, being a teacher-fearing student, I was very affected by it). I also remember how the guys stayed in a room that they renamed "the MAN room" and christened with a sign of a stick figure with muscles. Yet another memorable moment occurred during a bartering game we conducted in the school auditorium. I caught a certain other classmate (going by the initial A) bartering sweets (that were not his) with the Taiwanese kids, instead of trading the (approved and regulated) pictures of cows and other farm animals! Upon discovering this fact, I quickly figured out why the kids had all been crowding around his table. Yes, it had totally disrupted the traffic flow and our strategic plans. And no, my ire at the time was not in great part due to the fact that the sweets were mine.
Haha. So. We managed to tick off several things on a to-do-list of things we might potentially have wanted to do before we kicked the bucket. We stayed in a creepy hotel room with the wall behind our headboards festooned with mirrors (in fact the hotels we stayed in were all quite dodgy). We ate some classic Taiwanese breakfasts. I got some shopping done (really cute ice cream spoons and glow-in-the-dark apples and other trinkets) and tried dried blood (extremely gross).
But recently, I was reminded of this moment that affected me greatly. And it was this: Someone caring.
During that trip, I had a friend who was angsty about some things I didn't understand, and it affected me a lot. I was greatly distressed and unable to enjoy myself. This was on top of some other incredibly emo figure from my class ignoring me because he had personal problems (TRUST ME HE REALLY DID, but then that had been going on quite a while).
I remember the last night of shopping. A lot of people were trying to buy all their last minute souvenirs and instead I sat in the park and cried in front of three of my classmates. One of them was G; another was a good friend; and the last was in my PW group and is quite an interesting character of his own actually, but that's another story. G waited in his patient way, and the interesting character was busy feeling awkward I think. Then the second friend, who was male and unromantically interested in me, told me what he thought. And amongst his words was this sentence, "I care about you."
There are many things you can say to people. You can say, "You are pretty," which tends to make people happy but in a somewhat fleeting way. You can tell them, "You are kind," which makes people blush if they are really kind, because kind people do that not to be praised and often feel the furthest from kind and they really do have to make an effort to sacrifice for others. (Editor's Note: This can actually be an insult of sorts, from people who despise kind people. You see, some people think that kind people are weak.) You can say, "I like to hang out with you," which can mean that you find their sense of humour funny or that they are easygoing because they don't mind the things you are naturally inclined to do. And one can say, "I care about you," which means that because of your attributes and after hanging around you and just somehow because of you being you, the speaker cares about what you think and how you feel and whether you are hurt.
Sometimes it means a lot just to have someone care about you. As a human, from another human. As a friend, from another friend. And I felt it then.
I was thinking about it recently and this is one word I would use to describe myself: Stark. In fact, in ancient times I would decree myself Alaris the Stark, although someone on reading this will probably laugh at how it doesn't sound majestic at all. But stark; because sometimes I feel so alone and fiercely myself and stark in my principles and ideals, my dreams and uncertainties. When I was younger, I would say I was a lot more stark. A lot more unforgiving: I thought my elder sister was a criminal for jaywalking, yet now I do it fairly frequently!
I have always felt some pull in myself to care for people. But when I was younger, I was a bitter child. I felt strongly that my parents didn't see me, with three other siblings competing for attention; a practical, sensible mother demanding practical and sensible behaviour; and a very busy father. And so I did not know how to care. I went around feeling like such an uncared-for little weed. It is amusing, in fact, that I could be so young and so unquenched.
But that friend showed me that it can be said. Such things can be expressed. Even though he was a guy, and guys often don't say these sorts of things, and this was in front of two other guys (some guys would have feared judgment for something so indicative of caring, which is still viewed by some (mostly other guys) as a feminine trait). He taught me how much such a thing being expressed could mean, because it touched me.
Recently, I saw that he was in distress. I hadn't talked to him for a while. In J2, he started dating a girl whom I don't know well, and he's also studying overseas, and in general we have grown apart. I wasn't too bothered; though I missed him, I believed that our closeness was an easygoing circumstantial one rather than one which draws us to seek each other out continually for the other to feel renewed. And people do grow; just because they grow apart does not mean they're growing wrong.
I wasn't sure what was up with him, whether it was a big catastrophe or a mere annoyance. But I was reminded of something that he once said to me, and I reminded him of it in turn. "Life can be a multiple choice question. Sometimes you feel like giving up, so you choose not to answer at all. But if it's a multiple choice, then even if you guess blindly, you might still get it right. In fact, the worst choice might be not to answer at all."
I didn't even know if he would reply, but he did. He said thank you, that I would have no idea how much it helped.
This is what I wanted to tell him: Do you know why I could say that? It is because you taught me that even if I might fear that it's going to be awkward, caring is something that should be communicated. It's because you told me that you cared and imparted all the other things you have encouraged me with, in your caring. I am merely reminding you of what you have given me. Caring is something that if you don't share with others, if you don't act on, you will never know how much or how little you could have helped. (Pretty sure this sentence is grammatically wrong or something, but yeah.)
And I think I'm learning that all the time. So, even though you don't know how much it meant and that I still remember it five years later and that I plan to always practice it, thank you. Thank you.
So I end with this last thought: I don't really know what you think is the most important in life. I don't know what you think will last the most, or that you'll enjoy the most if you spend your time to achieve. But in the midst of it all, remember to care and be brave about it. Because sometimes that's the most important thing of all.
for this reason, i believe that many times even though we don't know what to say, the holy spirit or something in us, prompts us to say the most unexpected things in the most unexpected ways.
i really do believe in it. your post struck a chord in me, and reminded me to not give up in caring. even though i'm really really exhausted.
Posted by
martian |
9:15 pm
Post a Comment