The Invisible Men
I was taking train to Suzhou yesterday morning, when I heard the two people (one
beside me, the other opposite me) talk to each other. The one besides me was a
some-fifty-year-old man dressed in worn-out clothing with a blank but haggard
expression on his face. The one opposite was a young student-looking guy dressed in neat down jacket and blue pants. If they two didn’t talk, I would have thought they were strangers.
But from their scanty talk, I came to know actually the old man was the young guy’s father. He came to see his son off at the station as this long distance train would take his son far away from him. But somewhat the son seemed to be humiliated. His body language and his absent-minded look and reply seemed to indicate
he didn’t want others around to recognize his relationship with the old man. I
am not sure what the father thinks? Maybe he didn’t notice his son’s intention. Or he just pretended not to.
The scene reminded me of those numerous migrant workers, who we may see on the streets anytime and anywhere. You may see them work at the constructions sites, dig roads around residential areas, stoop down on the bridge with their marginal
retail booth, or do decorating and carpentering in to-be-running shops, help clean the stinky drain by the roads, and carry heavy-duty items such as furniture,
machines, gallons of water by hand or with the help of their tricycles. People in the city and sometimes the city itself would like to ignore the existence of those workers. Or even if they were noticed, to each no individuality would ever
be acknowledged.
The other day when I was out, I passed a construction site and actually saw them
in the sun. Their diligence and craft actually forced me to re-think their role
in this developing city. I wonder if they themselves have ever thought of how hugely they contribute towards the development of this metropolis, and this country in a further sense. While they are building those high-rises, I wonder if they have ever imagined living in those high-rises themselves one day. Their meagre
salary shows that, no matter how hard they try to save up, in their life time probably they can never afford to live in the buildings and use the facilities they build themselves. Will that be a frustrating feeling? Or have they never thought that far ahead?
Here mostly when mentioning migrate workers, the image of a dirty peasant-looking man, spiting and scatting garbage around, will come to people’s mind. They don’t have any manners; they push you around with their chalky dirty luggage at the railway station; and they may rob you with the result that your steps move faster whenever you pass them at night. You get scared because from tabloids you read that how disruptive and distrust-worthy those people are at times. It is just as the saying goes: Bad news travels fast. But is that the only reason?
When I read Rich Dead, Poor Dad not long time ago, the writer mentioned the importance of financial literacy. I wonder if the same principle apples here. People
tend to fear and distrust things or people they don’t know more than otherwise
. If migrant workers, as a unique group in the city population today, are more known to people, they may get more respect and recognition than what happens in reality. Then for that boy, he may not need to feel humiliated (though here I don
’t mean that his feeling humiliated has been well justified.).
Months ago when I watched BBC episodes about China, migrant workers actually got
acknowledged in detail in one of those episodes. In the program the camera carried the audience to the every day life of those people, who had to leave their hometown and drifted into cities in order to make a living. Tears actually crept
into my eyes when the mother wept, but with a smile, in front of the camera, saying how she had to leave her two young kids home, and could only go back to see
them once a year due to the heavy expense of transportation. I wonder if the media and those "important people" in China have noticed this invisible group yet.
