4.07.2003
-Migration-
The phone is ringing.
"Hi, Dad."
"Have you heard about anything in Hong Kong? I've just spoken to some Koreans living in Hong Kong and they're telling me they are sending away their children back to Korea."
Since Saturday my father has taken to calling me twice a day to tell me about some new fact he has found out about SARS (and yesterday he even managed to remember what the acronym stands for). I have not been feeling great about these daily reminder calls. Apart from the intense annoyance I feel when he tells me yet again about how fatal this is, part of his actions appeal to the questions and doubts that I have myself about moving to a new country to build up a new life and start all over again and I sense myself turning into a quivering wreck as I face my doubts about the enterprise.
Perhaps that is why in the recent weeks I have found myself drawn to exhibits such as the black and white photographs of Sebastiao Salgado and films like Michael Winterbottom's In This World as well as books such as Pascal Khoo Thwe's From the Land of Green Ghosts.
Of course there is no parallel that can be drawn between the experiences featured in these works and my own - I have a choice, I am certainly not a political or economic refugee and I am not risking my life (contrary to what my father and loved ones may believe). But there is a small sense of understanding I can gather as regards the basics of the feeling of fear of the unknown and the displacement, the loss and dreadful anxiety as loved ones are left behind, the unwillingness to accept that change is inevitable as we move from one place to another. I draw small crumbs of comfort from the fact that I am not charting unknown territory in migrating. I also feel the most selfish of all human emotions as I see the face of a young girl my age staring out blankly from a makeshift tent in Rwanda - "I am tremendously lucky, and thank goodness that is not me." Then I feel ashamed at myself for having been so cowardly and worried about it all - I have the luxury of making all these choices. At least my only worry is how to deal with an over-anxious father.