A couple of days ago, I watched a TV talk show. It was a kind of tear-provoking program, which is now very popular on our TV. The hostess was interviewing a girl of 16 who come from a poor one-parent family in the countryside. I just caught the later part of the program. From some playback clips, I pieced together the story. No sooner had the girl’s mother given birth to her than she ran away with another man to a more affluent area maybe because she could not endure the hardship or she had crush on that man. In 16 years she never came back. So the girl even does not know her mother. She and her father live a very hard life. They have to go out singing in the street for money during weekends and holidays so that the girl can pay for her education. The father is doing heavy physical labor to earn RMB 2 dollars a day, which can barely make both ends meet. When the father tries to give the girl some money, she always refuses to take. At school, she is among the last to have lunch at canteen because she only eats rice with no dish to go with it because she wants to save every penny. At home she does all housework. Washing clothes proves to be most painful during wither. She has to break the ice on the river and wash clothes in the freezing cold water in a chilly wind. Every other while, she has to put her hands near the mouth and blows out some hot air to warm up the freezing hands a little bit so that she can continue to wash…
What struck me most is not only these touching pictures but also the fact that even though she is enduring such hardship, she is not complaining and instead she has developed great maturity, understanding and above all tolerance.
The director of this program managed to find her mother. But out of obvious reason, she did not want to appear on the program. Instead she agreed to talk to her daughter over the phone during the show. When the mom heard her daughter’s voice, she was crying and kept saying she was guilty. But the daughter said in tears: “I do not blame you, mum. I do not expect everybody to be a saint. Our area was indeed very poor and our home could barely make you happy. You have every right to pursue your happiness. Now, you have your husband, your son and a happy family. What I am requesting, dear mum, is that in the tiny part of your heart, you have me there and you love me too. After all, you brought me to this world; you give me flesh and bone and in my vein runs your blood… Do you know, mum, all these years I have been longing for calling somebody mother, longing for the tightness of mother's hug and warmth of mother's chest...”
When the time was over for this heartbreaking telephone conversation, the hostess asked the daughter to say one final words to her mum, she said “Mum, I wish your now husband loves you as much as I do! ”
During the interview, the hostess put this question to the girl. “ Are you afraid of letting your classmates know that you beg in the street? ” The girl said with a corrective tone “ Auntie, I am not doing begging, I am signing to make a living. I do not volunteer the information because it is not something I am proud of. But if they get wind of it, I will just admit calmly that I sing for living. I do not feel I am inferior. I could not choose my family and being poor is not my fault. I am proud to say in all the aspects of life where I have a choice I am doing as good as the others. Now I am the monitor of the class of 50 some students They elected me because I am doing second to none in class in terms of score and extracurricular activities…”
At the end of the show, when the hostess was kindly giving her a tight hug, the girl cried and murmured with tears dropping like detached pearl necklace " Autie, may I call you mum...?
She has rightfully pointed out that not everybody is a saint. But in my eyes, she is a saint! I have no doubt that she will turn out to be a very successful woman who enjoys a kind of success and happiness her mother even did not dare to dream of.
