My life is different because…

…I came to Australia.

When I say that, I’m not referring to “Australia the Country”. I am referring to people that makes up the country. 

Multi-racialism is not new to me. I came from Malaysia. A multi-racial country. But a multi-racial country of its own race, with a handful of other foreign races thrown into the mix.

Australia is a multi-racial country. Really a multi-racial country. Living in Brisbane itself is like living in a United Nation roll call.

I’ve met a lot of people, from many different backgrounds since the first day I step into this country.

But the people I will mention here are people that have opened my eyes.

Refugees.

I know one from Afghanistan, to whom it is already second nature to hear that a family member back home has perish in warzone.

I have met people from the Soviet countries who boil stones for soups and stew grass pulled from along the dusty road. Well, maybe not the stones but you get my point.

I have met grandmothers of my friends who still do not understand the concept of washing machine because even in this modern era, they could not afford a washing machine back home. “Home” and “war” is synonym to them. Though they could afford washing machine now, it is something they couldn’t grasp.

I have met people who, even though they live in a peaceful country and living a comfortable life, still have the habit to horde food. A friend from Cambodia who also came here through refuge status would always buy food in bulks. Years of starvation led him to believe that food should be horde any way possible. Just in case. Sometimes I feel sad just thinking about it. The scars are evidently there still.

War stories are not strange to me. I had a great-grandmother who went through the bitter ends of Japanese Occupation. In fact, both my late grandfather and grandmother grew up during the Japanese Occupation. My grandmother still have traumas of firecrackers because it reminds her of wartime.

But you know, it is expected of older generations. We listen to them, we revere their perseverance but we do not feel it applies to us, or any situation anymore. It was from an era long gone.

What happen when the people who were in warzone are your peers? The same age as you? The one sitting beside you in class? Joking with you and speaking in that perfect Australian accent. Living life just as anyone around is. You’ll be none the wiser.

I’ll spare the details of how I met this people. When you know one refugee, you get to know others. They seem to have this network.

However, I will not spare you the details of how they opened my eyes.

This people have changed me beyond words. Suddenly my troubles seem less intense. Worrying about bills is the last thing on your mind if you put yourself in the shoes of people who have cower under their bed when missiles flew past their house. Having trouble catching up with academics seems nothing compared to coming to a foreign country not knowing a single word of English. Barely a year later, they are fluent in English. Being tired from work and Uni seems the last of your concern if you think some of your peers have ventured biting colds and terrains road just to escape their wartorn kingdom.

Sometimes I cannot believe they are not much older than me. You cannot see the traces of hardship in their face. They’re wearing the latest fashion, they watch Friends and Seinfeild, they read People’s magazine. They sure don’t look like ardent peace activist to me–how I usually imagine people who would be emotionally scarred in warzone.

When you want to scream and throw your textbooks away at the neighbours window because you’re so sick of studying? Remember this people who came here at 15, not knowing to read a single English word and had to struggle to get into a 15 year old reading level. And now they are acing classes in Uni. When you complain about eating yet a serving of dismal food on a student budget? Some of the people you know have not eaten a square meal until they came here. Until then they have been eating mouldy bread, plain onion soup. Literally just onion in the soup.

Suddenly I’m not so worried about acquiring material stuffs. About the latest fashion. About having 10 different tubes of the same shades of lipsticks. My troubles and worries seems to be so superficial.

Manicure? Pedicure? New heels? How would it feel to walk through rocky hills with very worn out shoes, clawing your way in the dark because that is the only way you won’t get caught?

I admit, as my friends back home have realized, that I have changed a lot. It is not the country that changed me, but it is the people whom I met, who came here through difficult circumstances. They made me feel like my troubles are little compared to them. Molehills should not a mountain make. There are things less important and should just be let rolling off your back.

I complain less. I am less hot tempered. I am much more considerate towards people who, previously, would have irked me. I am evidently more patient. I smile more, I laugh a lot and I appreciate a great deal of things that I would have taken for granted in the past.

I do have crisis going on in my life. But you know what? That crisis only involves emotions. I am not starved, I am not broke, and I sure am not scared for my life. I don’t wake up every morning devising ways to dodge bullets on the way to Uni. I don’t worry where my next paycheck is coming from, or if I will be eating tonight. I don’t worry if I am going to see the sun rise tomorrow, or even if I would survive by sundown.

Putting it into perspective that way make things look and feel different.

I’ve always said, even before this, that no matter how bad things are happening in your life right now, someone somewhere have it worse. And you should be thankful that you’re not having the worst of it. Now that sentiment took a bolder turn. Now I really do feel humbled by their experience. No matter how bad things are happening and have happened to me, I have never had it as bad as them. And right now someone else has it worse.

It makes you look at life differently.

It makes you determine to pay attention to the small blessings in life.

Of course, Hero has changed me a lot too. The emotional crisis I talked about…if it was not for him standing beside me, being my pillar of strength, I would have snapped a long time ago. He is not nicknamed Hero for nothing. But that is another story, for another time.

So, to all my refugee friends who have opened up my eyes and taught me without even knowing it…

…you all are my heroes too.

 

Entered for November’s Write Away Contest (scribbit’s). I owe my inspiration and this dedication to my refuge friends to her write prompts!