nanny's journal

Sunday, March 20, 2011 ♥ 11:34 PM

They say a picture speaks a thousand words. So from this, I have pretty much written an essay. How I wish I could do the same for my assignments! =X

Let me summarise my ‘1000 word reflection’ for you. It was such a coincidence that on the exact same day of our pre YEP activity, while waiting for the bus home, something happened. There was this particular guy sitting at the bus stop waiting for the bus. He looked normal and all was well until he went to this lady and asked for $2. The lady then scolded him and said “why you want to take money from me? You got hands, you got legs. Go work lah!” and she went off. At first I thought they were mother and son and things weren’t pretty at home. So I ignored.

He then went to another person and asked for money. This time round he got scolded and shoo-ed away by the guy. He approached me and did the same. Sad to say, I didn’t have small change so I couldn’t give him any. He continued doing the same thing and then sat down to rest.

Then suddenly, he just ‘burst out’! He was calling the guy who scolded him crazy and all. Those sitting beside him walked away and he was left sitting alone. A couple came over and when the wife wanted to sit down, the husband took her hands and shook his head. They too walked away from him.

Then did I realise that he was suffering from some mental illness and have been viewed as ‘crazy’ by those at the bus stop. From this, it’s pretty obvious how the society view these people. It’s kind of sad to see such things happening around you. I mean, they don’t even say things nicely to him. They just shout and scold and avoid being near him.

This continued even on the bus. Everyone was ok with him boarding the bus at first. Until he started to throw his ‘tantrum’ did everyone decided to move away from him. All he wanted was $2 and he asked them politely. But just because he was ‘crazy’, everyone treated him with lesser respect and like as if he was not part of the society.

It made me ponder. How will I feel if I was the one that’s been labelled as ‘crazy’? It really made me think deep but sad to say, I have no answer to my question. I hope I will be able to find an answer through this YEP and hopefully from there find a way to help people like him cos it was really very sad.

And how is this linked to pre YEP? Well, I thought I should share about this and make you ponder with me too on how you will feel if you are one of them with disabilities. Hope it can help to change the mindset/stereotyped that people have and make this country a better place to live in. :D