Books are like old friends. The first time I read The Overlook was when my neighbour loaned me about ten Michael Connelly books.
The second time I saw it and had access, it was in my host family's library. Since Dr Loo had like twenty five Readers Digest condensed books, I did not choose to reread it.
This is my third time meeting this book, I borrowed it from the Sabah library. Flipping through this story which I still remember brought to mind my good friend's ordeal.
While many people chose to marry others of different nationalities, my friend chose to marry someone from a northern country. When the marriage broke down, she not only lost her marital home and the joint account, but also the custody of her children whom she loved dearly. You see, she is a simple honest woman who happened to be naïve, he is a crafty lawyer. While she got on well with him, it never occurred to her to apply for citizenship. After her divorce, she lost her permanent residency because she could not find a good job there.
In one sense, I could say that he would be kinder to have killed her physically. In real life he turned his children against her, almost framed her for child abuse. To escape from a fate of living in prison, she run. After two years of living from hand to mouth teaching English and subsisting in a dingy rented room, she swallowed her pride and returned to her home town.
Now with the COVID pandemic raging, effectively she has no access to her grown children except through whatsap and email. Now I see the wisdom of my mother, "Do not marry a person from another country unless you are willing to live there until you die." she said prior to my boarding a Pan Am flight to New York city in 1981.
No comments:
Post a Comment