23 September 2004

Heartened by humanity, for a change….

Turn off all the media noise that’s going on around you, switch off to other people’s moans and groans about “person x that did y the other day which makes them evil” and how “something good will never happen in this place, so you might as well give up”… and you might just find something that inspires you!

I must say, I have been a bit of a Lizzie Bennett from Pride and Prejudice of late – “the more I see of this world the more I am displeased by it” (or something similar). But this week at work, no less than 2 people have inspired me a great deal!! I temporarily feel a little bit like my 12-year-old self, when my sheltered and safe existence allowed me to blindly put a positive spin on just about anything.

Person 1 – on a fixed term visa, living here year to year with her family, not knowing where they might end up, learned English as an adult prior to coming here from a former communist eastern European country, not able to get secure employment and has a boss that is quite frankly a prick. We take her out for her birthday, and shout her an inexpensive lunch and coffee. She insists on repaying us by inviting us to her home for lunch, which was delicious. She repays kindness 10-fold and bears her burdens with an amount of grace I rarely see in people.

Person 2 – rich lawyer with enough money to buy yachts and stuff. Donates large sums of money to researcher in desperate need so that important area of research can get off the ground. Doesn’t want to be publicly recognised for what he has done, and wants area of research to be widely available one day soon to people in the third world to help reduce a form of pollution. Lawyer doesn’t see why he should keep all this excess money that he doesn’t need. Donation is not even linked to tax write-off!

I feel myself climbing out of my grey (not quite black) hole this week!

And this weekend, I am going to the nation’s capital, to visit friends!! But more on that next week!

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