AsianPersuasion
Saturday, September 09, 2006
The Invisible and Excluded
The musty stench of urine and filth enveloped me as I entered the stairwell. I proceeded to ascend the first flight of stairs. The cameraman and producer were less than a few inches in front of me, but all I could make out was an endless sea of black. With only a rusty banister to my left and dirt covered steps to guide my way through. My feet gingerly climbed up what seemed to be and endless tunnel of darkness.
A dim light shone on the last 5 steps above, we had reached the third floor. Pushing through three lines of dirt stained clothes hanging outside the apartment, we saw what we had come to shoot… but we were not prepared for the impact it would have on our emotions.
The flimsy pale yellow walls were stained with grime and dirt from years of neglect. A shirt and a pair of wrinkled trousers that originally were white, but were now grey, were hanging on a string outside the room door. The little boy who led us there, Imran, who is ten years old, inserted a small key into a padlock, and opened the decaying door, “this is our room,” he said in a quiet voice.
The 6ft by 9ft room was so stuffy, the producer and I had to step into the smelly stairwell just to top up on oxygen. Imran told us that he, his mother, who is a sex worker, and father, who is a drug user, all live in the room, along with three very sickly, scrawny cats who looked like they hadn’t eaten in weeks. “Mother and father sleep on the mattress, but I sleep on the floor,” he said shyly, sitting on a scratched-up plastic chair that was partially broken. It was the only chair in the room, and it was the chair he sat in to do his homework.
As I looked around the decaying apartment, I could see that three other rooms occupied the space, four rooms in total… for four sex workers and their families. How could they all live together in such a small area? The lack of ventilation alone was almost unbearable.
This was not a home, and this was certainly no place for a child to grow up in. The layers of grime and corrosion were what decorated the apartment, where picture frames of family photos or art should have been. Instead of a doormat, two rusty plates, garbage and a dead cockroach were all that welcomed us. The kitchen was a filth-laden dark corner which was undoubtedly unfit for any food to be prepared. I felt helpless. I wanted to grab Imran and take him out of this den of decay and give him something better, because he deserves better.
I had to look away from the crew to fight back my tears. It was at that moment, that I truly understood what poverty really looked like, and it was in that moment that I had a glimpse of what it is to be invisible and excluded in a world of wealth and prosperity.
I am so blessed to be given the opportunity to do work that constantly shows me everyday, how fortunate I am. To be able to use my passion for filmmaking in a positive way, to give back to my community no matter how small the contribution… is a gift. I thank God for exposing me to the disparities of the world.
When I came home that night, I sent both my mother and my father an sms, thanking them for giving me the best education money could buy… and for giving me the tools to carve out a future for myself, that would never ever have to include poverty.
