I couldn't stop myself from crying. The object of my lachrymosity? Watching a frumpy 47 year old unemployed woman from a village called West Lothian in Britain stun everyone, including the often acerbic Simon Cowell, on Britain's Got Talent show.
When Susan Boyle first came out, you could see the look of sceptism on the faces of the judges, especially when she said she wanted to be like Elaine Page. At one point Simon rolled his eyes when Susan swayed her hips in an attempt to be provocative. You could see that the judges weren't giving her much hope but were resigned to enduring the few minutes her audition would last.
And what an audition it was. When she opened her mouth to sing "I Dreamed a Dream" from the musical Les Miserables, a different persona revealed itself. Susan's voice was that of a seasoned performer -- strong, sure and pitch perfect. Close your eyes and you would imagine someone from Broadway or West End, a Glenn Close perhaps, performing to an adoring crowd.
Everyone should see the clip if only to see Simon Cowell's jaw drop at this unexpected treasure from what he and the other judges had written off as rubbish. After Susan sang the first stanza, the crowd could not stop cheering and as Susan continued singing, the expression on Simon's face changed from one of shock to one that I could almost describe as adoring.
Susan's performance was, to my mind, bolstered by her choice of song. I Dreamed a Dream was sang by the character Fantine, a single mother forced into prostitution to provide for her child's well-being. The song speaks of longing for a time when her dreams were not yet crushed. As Susan sang the last few words "Life has killed the dream I dreamed...", I could not stop myself from crying. This woman, who admitted that she lived only with a cat and had never been kissed at 47, must have had a tough life as well. But after her performance on the show her dreams, unlike Fantine's, will be one where hope is high and life, worth living.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Saturday, April 4, 2009
Child's Play
A few months ago, I went with my mother, my son and yaya to SM City Cebu to attend the opening of an art exhibit. My mom took some time entering through the doors and when we went back to the entrance to see what was holding her up, we saw, through the glass doors, that she was still outside the entrance talking to a young boy—perhaps about 8 or 9 years old—thin, dark, wearing tattered clothes and wearing only one slipper on his foot. His appearance was not the most unusual thing about him; it was the fact that he was crying as if his heart were breaking and his chest and shoulders were heaving every so often, his thin frame wracked with sobs as he recounted to my mom whatever it was that upset him greatly.
As I drew nearer to see what was happening, I saw my mom reach into her bag, take out a bill and give it to the boy. The boy looked at the money in confusion, as if he didn’t know what to do with it. Then the two mall security guards, who had also been listening to the boy, urged him to take the money and go. They opened the door for him to enter the mall and one of the guards even accompanied the boy inside.
When my mom joined us, she told us the young boy’s story. The young boy, who apparently lived in the squatter area around SM City, went inside the mall to that area in the lower ground floor near where the arcade games were located. He said that he was just playing with friends when a man suddenly grabbed him by the arm and forcibly dragged him all the way past the exit and pushed him outside. He was crying with indignation by the entrance when my mom espied him.
She said that the boy kept on saying “I didn’t do anything, we were just playing. (Wala man koy gibuhat, nag duwa raman mi).” A bystander, who had witnessed the entire incident, told my mom that the boy was treated like an animal (“gi baboy siya”). When my mom asked the boy if he knew who his assailant was, the boy said he didn’t even know the person. What broke the boy’s heart was, apparently, the fact that he lost one of his slippers when he was being dragged from where he was playing to the exit, a distance of a few hundred yards. No one really knew the man’s reasons for dragging the boy bodily out of the mall but we surmised that because the boy was dressed in tattered clothes, he was perceived to be a thief or troublemaker.
The boy told my mother that he lived nearby and said, with a hint of pride, that his family owned a store (which my mom understood to be a sari-sari store). The boy, although he was in tattered clothes, was most probably not a mendicant either because when my mother gave him money, he looked at the money she was proffering bewildered, as if he didn’t understand why she was doing this. It was only upon the security guard’s urging that he took the money. And the reason why Mom gave him money was that she wanted him to buy himself a new pair of slippers to replace the one he lost and a new t-shirt so that he would not be treated badly again.
That night, a young boy learned in a most painful way that some people do make assumptions about a person by the way they look. We can only hope that life will be kinder to him after that.
As I drew nearer to see what was happening, I saw my mom reach into her bag, take out a bill and give it to the boy. The boy looked at the money in confusion, as if he didn’t know what to do with it. Then the two mall security guards, who had also been listening to the boy, urged him to take the money and go. They opened the door for him to enter the mall and one of the guards even accompanied the boy inside.
When my mom joined us, she told us the young boy’s story. The young boy, who apparently lived in the squatter area around SM City, went inside the mall to that area in the lower ground floor near where the arcade games were located. He said that he was just playing with friends when a man suddenly grabbed him by the arm and forcibly dragged him all the way past the exit and pushed him outside. He was crying with indignation by the entrance when my mom espied him.
She said that the boy kept on saying “I didn’t do anything, we were just playing. (Wala man koy gibuhat, nag duwa raman mi).” A bystander, who had witnessed the entire incident, told my mom that the boy was treated like an animal (“gi baboy siya”). When my mom asked the boy if he knew who his assailant was, the boy said he didn’t even know the person. What broke the boy’s heart was, apparently, the fact that he lost one of his slippers when he was being dragged from where he was playing to the exit, a distance of a few hundred yards. No one really knew the man’s reasons for dragging the boy bodily out of the mall but we surmised that because the boy was dressed in tattered clothes, he was perceived to be a thief or troublemaker.
The boy told my mother that he lived nearby and said, with a hint of pride, that his family owned a store (which my mom understood to be a sari-sari store). The boy, although he was in tattered clothes, was most probably not a mendicant either because when my mother gave him money, he looked at the money she was proffering bewildered, as if he didn’t understand why she was doing this. It was only upon the security guard’s urging that he took the money. And the reason why Mom gave him money was that she wanted him to buy himself a new pair of slippers to replace the one he lost and a new t-shirt so that he would not be treated badly again.
That night, a young boy learned in a most painful way that some people do make assumptions about a person by the way they look. We can only hope that life will be kinder to him after that.
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