While window shopping at Chatswood Westfield today I ran into an elderly man who used to live in the same building as me in Ashfield some ten years ago.

I was still renting at this early years of my life in Sydney, so was he, sharing the apartment below my floor with his even older sister. I remember the day I moved into my apartment and had to guide the removal van into the driveway. The elderly sister of the man came out and we had a short conversation about how the truck should not be coming in from the driveway, rather should be coming from the side of the building where there was a paved road leading into the building. She looked frail and her voice was very faint, but she was very friendly and corteous as she mentioned the driveway had just been repaired at an expensive cost to all the dwellers of the building. I did as she said and she was very happy. Few months later one morning, the old man came up to my flat, knocking on the door panicking. With tears rolling down his eyes and his body shaking, he told me that the door to his sister’s room was locked from inside. There was also a note on the door saying do not try to open. I went down with him to his flat and found the door to his sister was indeed locked with the note. I could guess what might have happened, the old man also knew it. Our knocks on the door went unanswered. I decided it was time to call the police and ambulance. The cops arrived at the place soon and would not let anyone enter the room anymore. It was clear the sister had died. The old man was crying a very sad sad cry that hounds me to this day when I think about it. It was a hauting cry of a man who is now truly and completely alone in this world, there was no one left in his life.

I used to sometimes help them carry their meagre shoppings from the street to their rooms. Their rooms were barely furnished and had very poor lighting. Obviously, the government grant would not go too far in terms of luxury, it was not even close to bare minimum required for survival in one of the most expensive cities on earth.

Fact that the old man is still living today is honestly quite surprising to me, pleasantly. He must be in his late eighties now, or even ninety. He could barely walk today but hey, no walking sticks yet! Just heavily slouching, and no glasses. His skin had completely peeled off and seemed to be hanging off like a loose plastic bag on his face. I saw him and went close to greet him, he did not recognize at first. After a moment of recollection, he remembered me. Then a smile lit up his whole face. He made my day. We talked a little about the past and how it used to be in Ashfield. He told me about his life after there, there was not much except being transferred from one government shelter to another or some other places he could barely afford to live and his walks every day. He said he can barely see anymore and he forgot his glasses today. He told me that he can no longer recognize people’s faces, and people have been saying to him that he has been rude as he does not respond to their greetings. He pleaded in his faint voice that I come and chat with him if I see him anywhere, that if he walked past me without greeting it would be only because he did not see me at all, not becasue he is rude or impolite.

We said good bye, I watched him disappear into the other side of the road. I could not help think, eventually, it could be me, it could be any of us.

During an afternoon chat with a friend living in Hong Kong today, the city of billionaires, the discussion eventually turned to its current situation and future. While it is not shocking to know about the gap between haves and have-nots widening, a familiar story around any capitalist society, it was rude surprise to find there is more room for shock, it is also number one in many other rather unflattering categories. It is the most expensive place to live, least hopeful city in the world! And slowly going up the ladder of most youth suicide rates. For the city with diamond like night sky, it also has a very rotten underbelly, literally. People living in worse than third world like shoe box rooms with leaking roofs, three generations living in three rooms, no sanitation, power or running water. Its quite astounding to know that almost half the people live this way.

Government spends hundreds of billions on welfare, but not on providing cheaper hosing to the have-nots. A place where a two bedroom apartment costs ten million Aussie dollars, I don’t know what hope the young people would have. No wonder they are leaving Hong Kong in droves, similar to South Asian youths flocking to rich Arab nations in the Middle East. The net result is same. Another consequence of this is the old ones ending up in streets or living in literally rat holes.

It seems almost that this city, built by the British Empire and handed over to the Chinese as the goose that lays golden eggs, wants you to become rich, nothing else. Nominal taxes, lax business rules, world class infrastructure at fraction of cost of other developed nations.

But what if you don’t? Or what if you failed? If you are not rich, it appears it does not know what to do with you. So basically, if you want to make it this is the best place. But with current generation losing hope at this rate, and things don’t improve, how long before it turns into a junk yard of billionaires?

 

 

“Look in the mirror Stevie, see, that is Stevie!”, the father yells at his comatose boy. The boy stares at himself in the mirror wondering who he is looking at. Is it dad? is it mom? The irony of not recognizing himself does not bother him, because it does not even occur in his mind. I saw a father and his unresponsive son in a bathroom at a local shopping mall, having this conversation today, I saw a completely different world in front of me. The mirror I was also looking at and seeing them was like a curtain to the other world they live. Little boy was probably around four, otherwise looking healthy except for his lost and expressionless eyes, opened mouth. Probably a case of severe autism or some kind of brain development issue, father a young guy in his mid forties. Our gazes met for a couple of seconds, I had nothing to offer. The boy can’t talk back, what kind of conversation would they have? I got out controlled, but my mind was numb. What is the point of creating such a world?

On the way driving back, my son was playing with my wife at the back seat of the car, I was occasionally glancing at him through the rear view mirror and looking at us all being reflected, my world. My mind kept drifting to the father and son in the shopping mall, wondering what is going on in their world at this very moment, if the boy had been fed.

If luck was rationed, we all have our potions. Sad and grateful.

Like a Dire Straits song..
There’s so many different worlds
So many different suns
And we have just one world
But we live in different ones..

 

Life goes on
In the garden in rain,
Different they might seem
they are all the same,
they all start under the earth
they all rise higher,
towards the Sun.
Then they fall, back to the ground
and go down, buried under the earth.

Imagine for a second, asking this question to someone you know, your wife, mother, father, brother, friend, colleague: what do you think when you think of me?

Imagine what pops into their heads? I guess the first thing that pops up would be the strongest image of you they have in their minds, and most likely all different from the image you have, of yourself. Then, there could be sub-versions!

You are different to you, your family, friends, co-workers. “You” have been battered, buttered, fitted, tunneled, changed, morphed, adjusted, encapsulated, formed, deformed, there is possibly an exhaustive list of adjectives that can be utilized to represent the transformation of your “image” before people make up their minds about you. Every person who notices you on street, train, shopping malls would take a “snap shot” of you from what they see of you, and make an image about you without even knowing you. You may see each other every morning for ten years without exchanging a word or even a smile, and the “snap shot” has morphed into the image you make of each other. I’ve had instances where what I had in mind about someone was completely different to what they were like in real life, so the version was upgraded in an instance.

So who are you? Isn’t it funny you think you know “you”? A different version of you exist for everyone who know you. But I guess there could be some common traits that would be common between all the versions that goes into making an image of you. For example, for your mom, you could be her favorite son who can do no wrong so lovely smiling young boy or girl; a golden egg laying goose for your employer, so probably a running belt in a factory; a drink partner for your co-worker, so a full and oozing mug of lager or an ass hole who made him look bad; a ka-ching pot of cash for your favorite restaurant, so a golden goose again, different you to different people.

Hmm..you live in other people’s minds, just like others do in yours, just like you have image of others, imagine. What about your boss, your neighbor,  your spouse? Is that the true “him” or “her”? It is only one of the many versions of someone you know.

I guess we should at least give a chance to ourselves to have an “open mind”. Now imagine