Americano or Cappuccino?

Eight years ago, I interned with the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) in New York. Being in New York City for the first time, I tried to squeeze in every possible thing I could do within the short span of 3 months.

Honestly, I loved the city. I even dreamed of living there until 9/11 happened and living the American dream isn’t quite the same again.

There is still one thing about the country that bugs me, with or without 9/11. It’s the tipping system. If you haven’t been to America, be warned that there’s a fifteen percent tipping policy for services at all food and drink outlets. With this wisdom in mind, hopefully, it’ll spare you the humiliation I went through eight years ago.

I went to a bar in Manhattan (coincidentally situated in one of the World Trade Centre towers) and everything was as how you would have imagined it; chic, classy and the epitome of a Sex-in-the-City lifestyle. The women were all dressed in fashionable outfit, sipping their pink-coloured concoction while they flirted around men who resembled Big in many ways.

I refrained from being another Carrie Bradshaw and ordered a glass of red wine at the bar instead. I can’t remember how much I paid for it but suffice to say, more than enough.

Feeling rather generous, I told the extremely good-looking bartender casually, “Please keep the change.”

He took one look at my money and flashed me a menacing look. With his first and middle fingers still clinging firmly to the neck of the wine glass, he said coldly, “I’m sorry, if you want your drink, you gotta give me more.”

I thought he was joking but he didn’t look amused. Suddenly, he didn’t look that handsome after all.

Feeling flustered and humiliated, I fumbled for my purse, rummaged through it and handed him a five dollar note since it was the smallest denomination I had. It was the first and only tip which I had parted most grudgingly in my life.

I could never really understand the American system when it comes to tipping. I’ve heard many times that such policy is necessary to compensate for the underpaid waiters and waitresses. I can truly sympathise with this since I had worked as a part time waitress and bartender during my university years. I know how unjustifiably disproportionate the pays are compared to the labour put in.

But, my understanding of tipping is somewhat like art.

The price of a piece of art work is often valued by how much it pleases the buyer. Sometimes, you look at a painting and you think to yourself, “Gee, did a clown just pee all over it? And they call this art?!”

The next thing you know, someone has offered to pay one hundred thousand dollars for it. That someone is willing to pay that much money for something you consider trash, because he or she appreciates it and hence, is happy to splurge that kind of money to own it.

So, if I’m really impressed or pleased with a waiter’s hospitality, I am more than willing to tip him generously. If not, I won’t bother because he is already being paid to do a job. Tipping should not be obligatory and it’s not part of my responsibility to pay the waiter, especially when I’m expected to pay for my meal.

Frankly, I would prefer if a restaurant charges more for the food in order to cover its employees’ salary. Some might say, “Oh, but how sure are you that the money will go to the employees?” I would say that it’s really not my problem. I dine at a restaurant for two reasons, to eat and socialise, not to do charity work.

So that’s America. You’re expected to pay for something that is implied but not written. In Italy, they do it the opposite way.

Few years back, I went on a vacation to Siena with my best friend, S. We had a great meal at a restaurant and when the bill came, we habitually scrutinized the items on the bill. (We’ve acquired this habit from our parents who are rather careful when it comes to financial matters. Mind you, thanks to this habit, I’ve once managed to rescue RM1,500 from a miscalculated bill at a restaurant in Kuala Lumpur, which otherwise would have been happily paid by our party host, still in his drunken stupor.)

Everything looked in order except for one item listed as il corpeto. We were convinced that the restaurant was trying to take advantage of two innocent Asian girls and we were not going to let them get away with it. So, we summoned the waitress to explain the bill for us.

We pointed the item out to the waitress and told her that we did not order it. She looked confused, understandably so since she could hardly speak a word of English.

After a few minutes of creative gestures and a lot of si, she nodded reassuringly and pointed her index finger at our empty plates and glasses. She even took away the napkin from my lap, flipped it wildly and all the time repeating the word il corpeto in that strong Italian accent. “Il corpeto, si? Il corpeto?”

After what seemed like hours of gesticulating back and forth, my very intelligent friend finally understood. She whispered to me, “I think il corpeto means charges for the dining utensils.”

“Are you sure they’re not just charging us for the dish washing?” I offered a second opinion. S looked at me quizzically, trying to figure out whether I was trying to be funny.

We finally relented and paid the bill, much to the waitress’ relief.

So, in Italy, many restaurants will actually itemise your bill so meticulously that you know exactly how much and what you’re paying for. Frankly, as long as I understand what the charges are, I’m happy to pay up. At least, in Italy, they don’t harass you into tipping them.

Feel free to share any similar dining experience in whatever country you have travelled to. We’ll thank you for sparing us from looking like fools.

This article was published at The Malaysian Insider on 28 November under the same title.

Differentiating Indifferences

Zohra was 18 when she started to work as an administrative officer with the United Nations. She was bright, innocent, hopeful and idealistic. Her country, unfortunately wasn’t.

She could maintain her feeling of hope and sense of idealism because she spent nine waking hours of her life with foreigners who told her that human rights is for everyone, even if she’s a woman.

One day, she received a fully-funded scholarship to study in the United States. I remember her smiling shyly as she approached me humbly to look at her scholarship application a few months ago. I thought to myself, how proud and confident she must be, now that she had been accepted to study abroad.

On the contrary, she was forced to turn down the scholarship because her family refused to allow her to travel alone, unaccompanied by a close relative. Losing her would also mean losing a huge income for her family since she was earning more than any other average Afghan men.

No reward for chivalry

Afewark and I became friends when I took a trip to Bahir Dar in Ethiopia two years ago. We met in a rambunctious local bar playing live traditional music. He was there celebrating with his best friend who had just graduated from the local university.

Perhaps it was his age, or perhaps it was mine. Either way, he came across as a young, vibrant and idealistic man. He was well-mannered, polite and engaging, all the essential criteria which gained my trust to meet up with him again the next day.

While we were walking along a busy but dimly lit alley in between two strips of restaurants, bars and clubs, a dark figure grabbed my mobile phone from the back and disappeared into the darkness. While I remained immobile and speechless, like the rest of the unperturbed spectators watching from a close distance, Afewark made a quick dash after the culprit (no wonder Ethiopians are famed for their physical endurance in long distance running).

After about five minutes, Afewark appeared crest-fallen and ashamed for not being able to rescue my phone and most importantly for me to experience such an unfortunate incident in his country.

When we reported this to two policemen who were patrolling within the vicinity, they accused Afewark of masterminding the whole crime. He argued with them but they insisted that he plotted with the snatch thief since it was uncommon to see a local man with a foreign woman. By then, not only was he ashamed, he was also defeated.

No pride and a lot of prejudices

Walking into Tom Dy Centre in Phnom Penh, I was confronted by a lush garden and an extremely clean and neat environment. So clean that it was difficult to imagine I was in Phnom Penh. Inside, there are about 60 girls from the age of 16 to 25, faces and names I no longer remember because there are so many of them and each one looks the same as the other — long jet-black hair, dark skinned and petite.

While the environment surrounding them looked and felt clean, the girls don’t. In fact, most of them carried a vacant expression on their faces, which also explains why I find it difficult to distinguish or remember them. In conclusion, they looked as if their spirit had abandoned them.

These girls are rescued victims of trafficking and sexual exploitation. Most of them have been sold by their own families as sexual slaves. With their innocence, trust and dignity robbed away at such a young age, what’s left are their bodies. Some have even died from AIDS. I often wonder, how many of them still have hope in them as they hang on to each day of blatant uncertainty and a life-long of undeserved stigmatisation.

Pause, rewind and play

I’ve started work again in Kuala Lumpur recently. Being used to working in the fields of Timor Leste, Afghanistan, Ethiopia and Cambodia, I must confess that this is a huge shift for me. My current work pace is nonetheless hectic and demanding, more so than in all my previous jobs. I am confronted by a different kind of challenge, more bureaucratic and professionally driven in nature — one which I would have to subsequently learn to deal with.

I spent my first week relearning how to operate technologically advanced office machines, something many of us have taken for granted. When I informed the chief executive officer that my work performance is somehow hampered by my ineptness to operate such sophisticated equipment, he quipped, “You know, we have had this machine since three years ago. It’s not sophisticated. I think it’s you since you’ve worked in countries like….” Point taken.

Then, I’ve had disgruntled office members who are not pleased with my “slow” performance while I try to deal with 10 other priorities. I try to handle all of them as calmly as I can, sometimes more calmly than others would like me to be.

I’ve sat in meetings and observed discussions and debates about issues, what makes people upset and what causes such urgency. Sometimes, I do get riled up, but often I don’t.

When my friends look away uncomfortably at a beggar standing by our dining table, I look at them in the eyes and smile politely before turning them away.

If I don’t get upset when someone screams at me unjustly or when I don’t seem to be moved by the ugliness of my surrounding, does that mean I’m heartless? Does it mean I don’t care when I don’t get frustrated with what others feel as an urgency?

It may seem that way but it’s not, because at the end of the day, I’m able to sit back and think about the countries where I’ve been, where there are real people with real problems. The pressure we’re succumbing to in our daily professional environment is driven mainly by the notion of cost and benefit.

Do I use this as an excuse not to take action for every single request I’ve received? I hope not because I do go to bed soundly every night, feeling satisfied that I have done what I can and to the best of my ability. Trying to behave like a martyr when I’m not is not my style.

Today, my best friend who works in Afghanistan text-messaged me. It says: “Just to let you know I’m OK. I’m still in Sri Lanka on holidays.”

Six UN staff have been reported dead after a Taliban shoot-out and bombing in Kabul. It could have been her. It could have been me five years ago.

Whenever I feel the urge to dramatise my life unnecessarily, I pause for a moment and think about what I can achieve today, instead of worrying about what I can’t. Then, I’m being reminded by people like Zohra, Afewark and the Tom Dy girls how easy and blessed my life has been compared to theirs.

All names have been changed to protect the identity of the individuals mentioned in this article.

This article was first published in The Malaysian Insider on 31 October 2009 under the same title.

Constitutional amnesia?

“You’ve been selected to work as a Civic Education Officer,” a woman with Filipino accent told me on the phone.

“Oh, great! Thank you.” I replied happily.

It wasn’t until I received my job description later that I realised civic education had nothing to do with teaching children on how to become courteous, kind and responsible citizens.

I was the first batch of students who experimented with the new education curriculum when Pendidikan Sivik was changed to Pendidikan Moral. In Moral classes, amongst other things, we learned that if we saw a banana peel lying haphazardly on the floor, we were supposed to pick it up in order to prevent someone else from potentially slipping and injuring themselves.

I finally understood what it really meant when my job description stated that my main duties were to plan, coordinate and implement activities that create and promote awareness amongst the Timorese on their new Constitution, along with their rights as eligible voters and citizens of Timor Leste.

As my work progressed, it began to dawn on me that as young Malaysians, many of us do not really know what our Constitution was all about and, most importantly, the significance of it.

There were moments when I literally felt a sense of sadness because as a “prosperous” country, as opposed to Timor Leste, we are civically bankrupt. It is almost as if we have progressed so quickly that we have forgotten the fundamental basis of what makes our country independent and sovereign.

The saddest thing of all is, it has only been 52 years and we are already taking our constitutional inheritance, something earned through blood and years of struggles and sufferings endured by our fore parents, for granted.

The Timorese may not have much in terms of economic security, but they had one thing that was rightfully theirs: a newly independent country. Like a clean slate, they had a new Constitution, a newly elected president and above all, a citizenship for the first time in their lives.

Thousands of adults, accompanied by their children, would stand in queues every  morning, from Monday to Friday, waiting patiently to be registered as voters before the first presidential election. Once their personal details were entered into laptops, photographs and finger prints taken, they waited with unconcealed glee before receiving their brand new voter registration card. They giggled and laughed shyly as soon as they saw their photos on the cards. When some of them accidentally lost their cards, you could see their distressed faces as they lined up impatiently to get a new one.

When they were told that they would be receiving civic education, they rejoiced in the thought of getting to know their new country and their rights as Timorese, not second-class Indonesians.

In most villages, the four Timorese educators and I were treated like dignitaries. We scheduled our meetings in advance so that the women could plan and organise their domestic chores, and the men, their farming work in advance.

Even before our team arrived at the village centres, hundreds of villagers could be seen from afar, gathered quietly in front of their community halls or churches. Children were less inhibited as they ran towards our approaching car, followed by cacophonies of undecipherable chatter and laughter.

They welcomed us warmly as we shook hands and exchanged pleasantries with the suco (village) or aldeia (sub-village) chiefs. When the meeting finally commenced, they would sit silently on the floor as we took them through customised flip-charts, illustrating the Constitution.

Occasionally, there would be one or two who raised their hands to ask questions or state their comments during the session. Unlike Afghanistan, the women participated freely, although with less vigour.

“Can I also be the president of Tim-Tim (the pet name used by Timorese in reference to Timor Timor) one day?” A Pak would ask sheepishly and his question was greeted by roars of laughter from the others.

“During the Indonesian occupation, where do we have HAM (short for Hak Asasi Manusia or human rights)?” another Pak lamented. “How do we know our votes will be secret?” an Ibu asked shyly.

Most of the time, these meetings lasted for more than three hours. Our Timorese educators’ voices would be hoarse from giving long lectures and answering questions while I usually observed in silence, but not without curiosity. The language used was Tetum and while nearly all understood Bahasa Indonesia and had no problem conversing in it with me, most preferred to use the official language amongst themselves.

At the end of the meeting, some villages presented us with “tais”, a typical Timorese hand-woven scarf, as tokens of their appreciation. We stood humbly before the chiefs as they wrapped the scarves around our necks one by one while the congregations applauded our effort. By the end of my mission, I must have had collected more than a dozen of them.

This was one of the things I loved most working at grassroots level in Timor Leste.  We went with nothing to offer except information and yet the communities welcomed us with open arms.

It was in Timor Leste that I had heard of people talking about the Constitution and human rights so passionately. It may be a nation with a high illiteracy rate, yet there was a strong sense of activism amongst the people. Nearly all the adults I met had either directly or indirectly fought for the independence of their country. As a result, they treasure and understand the value of their Constitution, a powerful symbol that signifies their existence as a free and independent nation.

After fifty two years of independence, we as Malaysians are now experiencing collective amnesia. Never have I once heard or spoke of the Federal Constitution with my family or friends. How could we when our education system does not teach us its values and meaning. We were too occupied trying to pass our Moral examinations and what does that get us today, when young urban Malaysians are becoming more obnoxious and rude?

Come election time, we think about which party will serve the interest of our individual races the best. Many do not even bother to register as voters, what more exercising their rights to vote.

Come Merdeka Day, it’s all about waving the Jalur Gemilang and displaying our patriotism and love for our country. But what is our country and who are we showing our affection for? Is our country represented by the government, or by 26 millions Malaysians?

I think it’s time for all of us to go back to where it had first begun, when we had collectively decided that we, the rakyat (not the government), shall be free and it is us who decide what our Constitution is.

Let our forgetfulness be a temporary amnesia, not a permanent one.

Do share with me your understanding of our Federal Constitution and how we can create better awareness amongst Malaysians on what it means.

This article appeared on The Malaysian Insider on 16 October 2009 under the same title.

The World March for Peace and Non-Violence, Kuala Lumpur – 10 October 2009

The quiet and posh residential area in Jalan Bangkung, Bangsar, was hit by a tidal wave of loud music, vibrant live performances, piercing whistle blows and screams by throngs of people from all walks of life and (not forgetting) smoky scent of grilled meat, last night.

Sounds rowdy enough? Yes, but all for a good cause and it was done peacefully as well.

I usually go to Jalan Bangkung for two reasons; the restaurants and Bali Ayu spa. Last night was special because a group of NGOs; Voice of the Children, Women’s Aid Organization, the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, NurSalam, World Without War and restaurant group Maxim Image (owners of Cava, Leonardo and Opus) came together to organize an event where Malaysians could gather in one place to express their solidarity and commitment to peace and non-violence. The night was marked by a candle-lighting ceremony and a not-so-solemn walk with lanterns around the strip of restaurants.

What I find interesting was how men, women and children from all ages and races were able to shed their cultural and political differences by holding hands and partying the night away. I smiled watching a man of about 60 years old with seemingly mild demeanour, clapping and dancing to the rhythm of hip drum beats. There were two men in the same age group; an Indian and a Sikh, waving the Jalur Gemilang at the front of the stage, while being observed by a foreigner who grinned with amusement.

Pet dogs of all shapes and sizes were not left out from the event as well. Many owners brought their furry friends to participate in the lantern march, much to the envy of neighbouring dogs, barking ruefully from the inside of gated residences. It was amusing observing some of them chastising their over-zealous pooches trying to sniff around the lower regions of those walking at the front.

It was also an expressive night where ordinary people displayed slogans on banners and T-shirts from “Stop violence against women”, “Are you a registered voter?” to “Love us, not eat us”. My favourite was, “An eye for an eye will make the whole world blind” by Mahatma Gandhi and one which says, “I am woman, hear me roar”.

The live performances were refreshing, energetic and pretty darn entertaining but nothing still touch the people quite as much as Michael Jackson’s Heal the World when it came on the loud speaker.

What I saw last night taught me one lesson. We can achieve unity and peace as a multi-cultural nation, if we want to. It was rare for me to see Malaysians of all races gathered together in a place where pork, beef and alcohol were served with the present of dogs, and non-Chinese children  took to the street with Chinese lanterns of all shapes and sizes. Nobody came out and accused anyone of being disrespectful of any particular religion but instead focussed on respecting each other’s diversity without compromising their own.

I wish everyday could be like this and not just during an annual event. We should remind ourselves each day that we need to heal the world and make it a better place.

Peace to everyone!

Losing my virginities

If I can describe Timor Leste in one word, it would be, “Virginal.”

This small island saw very little development despite being a former Portuguese colony during the 16th century and became part of an occupied territory of Indonesia until 2002.

It was almost as if its coloniser and occupier had deliberately wanted it to remain as a child with learning disabilities. This was not congenital by nature but one that had been created and shaped as such through a long process of involuntary subjugation by the Indonesian government.

However, like many children who are unexposed to external elements, Timor Leste maintained a kind of purity and innocence which baffled the minds of those who live in this day and age. After all, it should by now surpass the age of a minor and embark life as a young adult like the rest of its neighbouring peers.

Timor Leste has the most beautiful and untouched beaches I’ve seen in my entire life. If paradise does indeed exist on earth, they will be a coveted choice. There was hardly any concrete buildings in the capital city of Dili (except those that have been implanted by the international community during the period of transitional power at the start of the 21st century).

As you depart further from Dili, such simple and ordinary concrete structures we’re accustomed to are being swallowed by nature, pregnant with the sort of silence which can only be achieved through the absence of motorized vehicles. Majority of rural Timorese live in small thatched huts constructed from mud, wood and dried leaves. Those who are slightly better off live in houses made of naked cement walls and tin roofs.

Such was the level of simplicity that during the night, it felt almost as if everyone had gone to bed with the sun. With no electricity, there was total darkness and calm, except when you looked up at the sky, the millions of sparkling stars could not look any bigger and closer.

Timor Leste was my first United Nations mission and it’s true when they say that your first mission is often the most memorable and in my own personal view, the most exciting as well. I was entering unexplored territory. Very much like sex a la Malaysian style, I had heard very little of it but was left to my own imagination to figure out what it was really like. So, I fantasised about it and when I finally lost it, I was craving for more.

As with sex, there were minor glitches and momentary periods of emotional and physical adjustment. The biggest challenge and discomfort I had while in Timor Leste was having to confront my fear of the fearless cockroaches that were plenty and had the knack of flying amok in small spaces.

It was hell for me when it was time to go to bed. While I could seek refuge under the protective mosquito net, I was left completely vulnerable when the call of nature announced itself in the middle of the night.

Guided by only the smallest maglite torch you could find, I felt like a blind person waiting to be devoured by the vicious cockroaches. As if that wasn’t enough, more were waiting to taunt me in the loo.

I had to fashion an effective way to relieve my bladder without having a series of panic attack every night. The method of choice was admittedly primitive but no, I did not resolve to wearing diapers (hell, it was painful enough having to pack sufficient supply of sanitary products and diapers would have taken up precious space for indispensable items such as wet wipes, books and Knorr tom yum cubes).

Suffice to say that a 1.5 litre plastic bottle sliced into half did the trick.

Growing up in a privileged environment, I had to engage in laborious work in Timor Leste for the first time. One common task was to carry and transport heavy boxes of project supplies and this was usually performed alone. Don’t ask me where the men were but thanks to them, I developed strong arms and I was in my best form.

However, when I went home for my break after a few months, the first thing Mom said to me was, “Hmmm…your hands. They’re not as smooth as before. They’re so rough now, like the hands of a coolie. What exactly were you doing there?!”

The other challenge was to pass my driving test and the vehicle of choice was the crude but extremely sturdy Tata Sumo 4x4. I was obviously out of practice when it came to driving a stick shift but thankfully, the Political Counsellor for the Chinese Embassy, one of the first few international delegates I encountered by chance, gave me a crash course a day before.

Even though I passed the test, I still struggled to manoeuvre the vehicle which nearly cost my life once when it rolled dangerously backward on a strip of narrow and curvy road by the edge of a steep cliff. Once I mastered it, a normal six-hour drive became five and my best record was four and a half as soon as I learned to identify unique landmarks which helped me to navigate my way easily through 215km of barren landscapes.

Of course, these were minor challenges compared to the many new and exciting experiences I had in my first mission. I would subsequently find myself losing my “virginities” over and over again.

I had my first experience of staying in a floating hotel in Dili. Amos was a massive boat which offered camp-style accommodation before any other hotels were built on lands. Lodgers had to share tiny compartments cramped with bunk beds, small suspended televisions offering HBO and BBC channels and a flooded shower room every time one took a shower. But it was also on the Amos that I had witnessed the most glorious sunset in my life.

It was in Timor Leste that I first flew on a four-seater helicopter, small enough to have intimate access to breathtaking views from all angles through the transparent windows on all side.

Hopping on one of these was as easy as riding on chartered buses, scheduled to transport us to villages on isolated mountains deep in the jungle, twice a week.

It was one of the few things I lived for in Timor Leste and the novelty never really wore off.

Ultimately, it was having my own private beach in “The Blue Lagoon” fashion that made my experience in Timor Leste truly memorable. Eight years ago, nobody would have heard of Los Palos, Tetuala and Jaco Island, what I considered as the “holy trinity” of Lautem district.

I spent hours basking in the sun on white sand as soft as talcum powder and snorkel alongside fishes, sea turtles and coral reef that would make any certified divers and crystal glass turn green with envy. It was also the first time I slept on the beach and woke up with the sight of a whale at a distant horizon. I was instantly humbled by its grace and enormity.

All these happened eight years ago and sometimes I wonder whether it’s still as virginal as I first saw it.

This was previously posted at The Malaysian Insider on 6 October 2009 under the title Paradise found…and lost?

Iris Chang: The Rape of Nanking

We’ve heard, read, watched and talked passionately about the holocaust during the Second World War. Then, we did the same for the genocide that happened in Cambodia, Former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. What most people don’t talk about is the massacre of more than one hundred thousands of Chinese civilians in Nanking by the Japanese army in the 1940s.

A few years back, I was told that I should read this book called The Rape of Nanking by Iris Chang. I was naturally intrigued since I had never read any literature touching on this topic. I knew that the Japanese, a German ally during WWII, had committed countless accounts of atrocities in China, Korea, Vietnam, Malaysia, etc. But nobody I knew talked about it as much as they had talked about what happened in Europe. So, when Iris Chang named her book, The Rape of Nanking: A forgotten Holocaust, it really meant something.

As a child, Mom would tell me this story. She recalled that during the Japanese occupation in Malaya (now, Malaysia), my uncles, aunties and her had to kowtow whenever a Japanese soldier walked past. If they didn’t, a strong blow to the face was expected and it did happen to Auntie Number One who was about 12 years old then. I was horrified as I listened to this story. But when I started reading this book, a blow to a child’s face was nothing compared to what the soldiers had done in Nanking. I felt nauseous and sick just reading the graphic account of how men, women and children were tortured, mutilated and murdered without any mercy.

The book was a result of extensive research carried out by Chang, a Chinese American, whose parents had fled from China to America during the war. So, the stories weren’t fictional but supported by first hand testimonies of survivors corroborated by personal entries in the diaries of foreigners who were living in Nanking and countless of other official documents, photos and video footages.

Since the publication of this book in 1997, the Japanese government is yet to acknowledge and take responsibility of the war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by them during the Second World War. This part of the history has been simply wiped out from school curriculum. Government officials insist that these horror stories have been fabricated by the Chinese government as a propaganda against Japan.

On the other hand, there are many Japanese civilians who do acknowledge this event but they are the minority and those who have been really critical are threatened with death.

In 2007, this book was made into a movie and I had the opportunity to watch it a few days ago. I expected it to be a full feature documentary but it was infused with dramatic re-enactments of Iris Chang’s journey while writing the book. To be honest, I was disappointed with the movie as I felt that it was made as a tribute to her, rather than the victims and survivors of the massacre. Chang died in 2004 by committing suicide. Apparently, she suffered extreme emotional trauma from the stories and images she heard and saw during her research.

I do applaud Chang for having the courage and conviction to pursue a cause she felt so strongly about. The world is indebted to her for the publication of this book. She said repeatedly in the movie that she felt compelled to speak for the victims whose voices have been silenced for more than half a century and she did accomplish this through her book, talks and interviews she gave in public. Without her work, what happened in Nanking might have disappeared completely from our history.

However, I could never fathom why she felt the need to take her own life. As I saw the real images of men being used as target practice; women raped and their genitals mutilated; and children who witnessed their whole family being killed, I felt angry that she had taken her own life when others had begged for theirs.

The movie briefly tells the story of Minnie Vautrin, a courageous American missionary who provided refuge to thousands of Chinese during the massacre. Vautrin wrote in her diary of the torture, suffering and pain she personally witnessed in Nanking.  Shortly after, she took her own life as well. What was different between Chang and Vautrin was that the latter was physically present during the war and she saw with her own eyes the atrocities committed. Anyone in her position would have gone absolutely mad.

Then, there were dozens of real life interviews showing real survivors telling their stories. One particularly touched me. By now, the man is in his 70s and yet tears still welled up in his eyes as he recalled how his brother, sister and mother were killed right before his eyes. Before his mother died, she called out to her infant son who had been stabbed by a bayonet. The bloodied child crawled to his mother’s bosom as the latter opened her shirt to feed him for the last time. While nursing, both mother and child died. This man has probably lived his whole life remembering this image over and over again and yet he refuses to submit himself to death, something his mother had died in order to protect him and his siblings from. 

I think I am mostly angry because Chang made a profound impact with her life and she took away that life many people have fought so hard for. I was criticised for feeling this way. I was told that I lack compassion, something which she had a lot of. Perhaps this is true because I couldn’t have done what she did; pursuing a humane cause so zealously that I ended up torturing myself.

In the end, it’s a great irony that someone who felt so strongly about the wanton taking of lives should voluntarily surrender her own life. The mind-boggling part is that she wasn’t even there. The survivors were.

Finally, the movie would have been much better without the dramatization. The role of Olivia Cheng who played Iris Chang was completely unnecessary and the production of a drama cum documentary movie has diluted the essence and spirit of the issue. The story of Iris Chang’s journey should have been told in another separate movie.