Myanmar Stories part 6 (The Beggar and the Mandarin)
12/1/06
While waiting at the Mawlamyaing bus station for the bus to bago an elderly Lady Beggar arrived. At first I tried to ignore her or at least not to make eye contact. As she hobbled around with her tin I couldn’t help but notice she had obviously suffered horrific injuries. She was missing most of one foot, most of the fingers on one hand and the other hand was deformed. She also had a serious problem with her chin, like her jaw had been badly broken and never got set right before the bone healed.
I don’t like to give money to beggars, not because I am being tight but it doesn’t seem that giving them my change will really help them. Especially younger able bodied beggars, it doesn’t seem the right thing to so. I have no problem however in giving food to people who obviously can’t help themselves like the elderly or disabled.
I looked in my bag of snacks and decided that a mandarin was the best option. I was hoping she could eat it ok. As soon as she got it her eyes changed. She scratched the skin and cupped the fruit in her hands and smelled it with a few deep breaths. She seemed so happy like she hadn’t smelt mandarin for years but she loved them. She bit through the skin and peeled it constantly sniffing the skin. While she was eating it she looked almost as if she was about to burst into tears.
Such a small thing and this lady obviously can’t afford to buy one for herself. For the price of the mandarin (AU$0.10) I guess she could have a meal of rice and maybe a little bland soup for the day but a mandarin will never fill her up so I guess that’s the choice she would have to make.
How lucky are we, really?
While waiting at the Mawlamyaing bus station for the bus to bago an elderly Lady Beggar arrived. At first I tried to ignore her or at least not to make eye contact. As she hobbled around with her tin I couldn’t help but notice she had obviously suffered horrific injuries. She was missing most of one foot, most of the fingers on one hand and the other hand was deformed. She also had a serious problem with her chin, like her jaw had been badly broken and never got set right before the bone healed.
I don’t like to give money to beggars, not because I am being tight but it doesn’t seem that giving them my change will really help them. Especially younger able bodied beggars, it doesn’t seem the right thing to so. I have no problem however in giving food to people who obviously can’t help themselves like the elderly or disabled.
I looked in my bag of snacks and decided that a mandarin was the best option. I was hoping she could eat it ok. As soon as she got it her eyes changed. She scratched the skin and cupped the fruit in her hands and smelled it with a few deep breaths. She seemed so happy like she hadn’t smelt mandarin for years but she loved them. She bit through the skin and peeled it constantly sniffing the skin. While she was eating it she looked almost as if she was about to burst into tears.
Such a small thing and this lady obviously can’t afford to buy one for herself. For the price of the mandarin (AU$0.10) I guess she could have a meal of rice and maybe a little bland soup for the day but a mandarin will never fill her up so I guess that’s the choice she would have to make.
How lucky are we, really?
posted by Dylan at 5:25 PM
4 Comments:
I love all your stories Dylan, and this one brought tears to my eyes, you wrote this so beautifully I could picture the old lady and her joy, & I can almost smell the mandarin myself.
Hi Guys,
love all the photos, you both take such beautiful ones, i can't wait till you get back to see them all. might take a whole weekend though!
ciao,
Ivanka
Lovely words and images there...very touching and sweet.
Now diving off to read more of your tales!
Kimba (one of Katie's contacts from THAT forum!!)
Sop.. Sop.. That was so touching. What a life. So dark and hopeless. We are just very lucky. By the way, your writing skill is superb. And for the record, Its been a long time already I haven't read such a powerful story. Believe me. But believe me, there are still thousands of them in Burma. I witness. And thank for your kindness for the concern over our poor little country. God bless you.
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