Minimum Wage, Maximum Life

Growing up with very little, teaches you a lot.

A lot about life.  A lot about love.  Money.  Power.  Respect.  Time.  Value.  What’s important and what isn’t.

Character.  Poverty builds character.  Characters.  I have seen many.

Fair or unfair, we are all a product of the life we are given.  We are not born with a choice.  We are just born.  The circumstances around that are out of our control.

Who we become, some of those decisions are taken from us too.

I’m not sure who I would have been if I hadn’t been broken so early.  If I had ever known what it felt like to be whole.  If I hadn’t experienced so much shortage.  Pain.  Anger.  Violence.  Hurt.  Loss.  If the external influences in my life were more positive than negative.  If I knew what love was supposed to feel like.  Who knows what that Sandra would have looked like today?!?  Not me.

Still, I have never been concerned with who I might have been.  I’ve never been uncomfortable with who I am.  I’ve never been afraid to find out who I will become next.

I may not have been born with choices, but I’ve made many since.

One of the most important choices I made, was in the design of my career.  That choice was built around experiences.  Feelings.  Having felt poverty.  Having felt hunger.  Having felt homelessness.  Having felt a dependence on various systems.  I have felt what having nothing feels like and therefore, I have no fear of it.

Not being afraid doesn’t mean I want to ever experience it again.  I don’t!  It just means that I know what I am able to survive, regardless of how much, or how little I have.  It means that I understand the value of something, and the lesson in nothing.

Growing up with little left me with the belief that I had 3 options in life…

1. Continue with nothing.  Be content with shortage.  Struggle.

2. Search for something different.  Something more.  Be bigger.  Be better.  Hustle.  Strive for money and power.  Live a life of material wealth.  Forget what shortage ever felt like.

3. To find a balance.  To find comfort.  To find true happiness outside of money.  Outside of luxury.  Satisfaction without concern for the expectation of others.

I chose option 3.  Again.  Always option 3.  The happy medium.  Never too little.  Never too much.  Good enough for me.  Plenty.

I built my life around that.  Balance.  Money would never be my motivation.  Power would never be my motivation.  Luxury, I didn’t need that.  I still don’t.  My goal was simple, if I were to rise, it would be without regret.  I was content with simplicity.

Minimum wage, maximum life.

Balance.

I’ve lived that reality for most of my life and I’ve loved every minute of it.

When I started my current job, it was part of my journey.  A natural progression for the career path I’ve chosen to walk.  It came with more money and more power but it also came with much personal sacrifice.  It paid more, but I made less. It meant working long hours. Evenings. Weekends. More time away from my family. Less time with friends. Less time for the gym. Less time for school. Less time for recreational activities. Hobbies. Painting. Writing. Less time for all the things that made me, me.  Still, I loved it.  I loved the possibility of it.  How it provided an opportunity for me to work on so many of my different personal passions.  How it combined the ability to learn, grow, be creative, be active, be flexible, affect change where it really mattered.  It was perfect.  The trade-off was worth it.  It was just me, happily rising without regret.

As a baby, I was given the nickname “estrelhinha”, meaning “little star” in Portuguese.  Told that I’ve always been able to light up a room, I have been known for my smile.  It’s the one thing you will never see me without.  My smile.  Even with nothing, I’ve always had something.

The last few weeks at work have become increasingly difficult.  An internal struggle between the love I have for the position/people I serve/the possibilities, and the dislike I have for the egos of some of the people I have to work with.  Today was a reminder of the option I chose so many years ago.  Happiness.

Somewhere along this path, I seem to have lost my balance.  Somewhere along this path, my smile has begun to fade.  I needed the reminder.  I’m not sure where my path will take me next.  I don’t know what choices I will make in order to find that balance again.

When I was in Sierra Leone, we had daily surveillance meetings at the local hospital.  In the room where the meetings were held, there was a sign on the wall with the following written on it:

If you lose your wealth, you’ve lost nothing.

If you lose your health, you’ve lost something.

If you lose your character, you’ve lost everything.

 

I can live with nothing, but I can’t live without my smile.

Time to refocus.

Making changes.

 

 

Run to the water…and find me there.

The water has always been two things for me:

Where I can be found. 

And where I find myself. 

It’s been a life long love affair.  Still going strong after 34 years. 

Today was beautiful.  

I couldn’t think of a better way to start my journey home.  

We left the Kenema Pastoral Centre at 9:30am.  I got the best hug I’ve had in 5 weeks.  It’s a no touch mission but some hugs need to be had.  I can’t believe how much I didn’t know I needed that.  

It was a half hour drive to the field where the United Nations helicopter would be picking us up.  We had an hour and a half of waiting before our flight was scheduled to depart. The flight was on time, not something I usually expect in Africa.  We drive up to the helicopter. There are children and adults running towards it from every direction.  This trip is made three times per week and everyone wants to watch it take off.  My driver tells me how lucky I am to be able to ride the helicopter, I agree that I’m quite fortunate.  While my job is not always very glamorous, we do often get to experience the world in very different ways.  I see and appreciate the blessing in that.  There are two passengers already on the flight before Claire and I board.  It’s a 25 minute ride to Kono, where we are dropping off the two and picking up three others.  

  

Kenema and Kono are two of the main diamond mining areas in Sierra Leone.  There are diamond mines and dealers everywhere you turn.  Although I know this and I’ve seen this, I’m rendered speechless as we fly over a massive diamond mine.  To see the magnitude of the operation from the sky actually hurts my heart. This is a country that is so resource rich and yet it’s people don’t benefit from any of it.  Blood diamonds. Corruption.  Poverty. 

  

Shortly afterwards, I see the Kono Ebola Treatment Centre; our first stop.  We land. Two get off. Three get on. Children and adults gather again for the take off. It’s just over an hour to our next destination, Cockery (Freetown). 

We fly above the clouds this time so I can’t see much on the ground.  I didn’t sleep very well the night before and I’m tired now.  I close my eyes and manage to fall asleep for a half hour.  I needed that. I wake up refreshed and just in time for the view. 

The ocean.  It stretches for miles.  So does my smile. 

We land and our driver is already waiting for us. It’s a 20 minute drive to the hotel.   After spending a month on dirt roads populated with mostly motorbikes and pedestrians, seeing so many four wheeled vehicles feels like a culture shock.  

There are Ebola signs everywhere. Freetown is still experiencing new cases of Ebola regularly.  They recently lifted their quarantine and have now scheduled another one, beginning on the 27th of March.  A few days notice allows people to prepare and stock up their homes with whatever they will need to sustain themselves for the duration.  As soon as we arrive, I’m even more happy to be here between the quarantine periods. 

The hotel is right on the water. I can see the ocean from right outside my door. I can hear it. I can smell it. I can feel it.

We arrive at 2:30pm for check in.  The four of us hadn’t eaten since breakfast at 7am. We quickly drop our bags off in our rooms and meet for lunch at the Retro Cafe.  I order a club sandwich with bacon. Although I’m sure anything would have tasted delicious at that moment, that honestly could have been the best club sandwich I’ve ever had.  I must remember to add sliced boiled eggs to my club sandwiches at home. Brilliant. 

We finish our meals and each order a cappuccino. It’s also delicious.  It’s been a long time since I’ve had coffee that wasn’t instant.  It’s perfectly frothy and hot and it hits the spot.  Immediately after we pay the bill, I say goodbye to the others and walk as quickly as I can across the street to the beach. 

My flip flops are off the minute my feet touch the sand.  There are no words for that feeling.  

  

I walk towards the water and I can literally feel the weight of the last five weeks lifting off of me.  I don’t stop until I’m in the water.  It’s warm.  Just as I imagined it.  I’m tempted to just dive in but I don’t want to leave my bag on the shore alone.  Instead, I let the waves crash over my legs, from the knee down.  I start walking in one direction with no intention of stopping.  Before I know it, I’m a few kilometers from the hotel and decide that I should probably start walking back.  This has been the first time in five weeks I’ve been truly alone.  It’s amazing. But short lived. 

There is a man walking the opposite direction and he smiles and says hello. I smile, wave and say hello back.  He sees the tattoo on my arm and comes over.

I have only met two people in Sierra Leone with visible tattoos.  They are always curious about mine, so I’ve had many conversations about the process here. Tattoos are done with just a needle and ink.  Very basic. Simple designs.  Not very regulated.    Tattooing has virtually stopped since the Ebola outbreak began, it’s risky.  

As he walks closer to me, I can see that he has both his arms and legs covered in tattoos.  He asks me about my arm as he notices my leg and foot.  And so, alone time is over. 

Victor is a local tattoo artist.  He is his own canvas.  His “sleeves” are not like the beautifully detailed, colourful scenes you would see back home.  They remind me more of the collection of little pictures you see drawn on paper, hanging in a tattoo shop.  Those pictures that you look at when you don’t really know what you want and need ideas. Victor is covered in ideas. Random thoughts. Images.  Words.  He’s got a basketball net and ball, which makes me smile.  Basketball is not really a popular sport here.  We spend the next hour together, walking on the beach and talking about tattoos and life.  

He speaks to me in both English and Krio and is surprised at how much I can understand.  

The other night at the Pastoral Centre, we were finishing up our dinner.  Daisy, one of the cooks, came by and said something to me. My response was “no, I’m still drinking my water but I’m almost done.”  Everyone looked at me in shock and Daisy said “how did you know what I asked you?  I said it in Mende.”  I had no idea how I knew. I just did.  I hadn’t even noticed that she was speaking a different language during our conversation.  

I’ve never known life without languages and accents.  My first language was Portuguese.  English came afterwards. French. Spanish.  Italian.  Patois.  My first serious relationship was with an Egyptian/Canadian, my introduction to Arabic.  My first “real” job in the field was working for World Vision. They used to operate a shelter for refugee families in Toronto, and I was employed there for a few years.  The residents were admitted directly from the airport, the majority of them being refugees from all over Africa. Many had very limited knowledge of English and we would have to teach each other.  I had to learn how to communicate without words.  I paid attention to actions, voice pitch, facial expressions, body language, the little universal signs that we forget about when we understand each other’s words.  I’ve had to communicate that way my entire life, it’s so natural to me now that I don’t even notice I’m doing it.  

It makes Victor happy to know that I understand him.  I’m happy he’s happy.  But it’s time for me to be alone again. We say goodbye, exchange email addresses and take a picture together before parting ways.  

  

I cross the street to the hotel and walk through the security gate. They take my temperature, 36.5.  I wash my hands with chlorine.  A routine I’ve become quite familiar with here.  I walk down the road to my room and a deer starts walking beside me.  I take a picture with it. Clearly the universe has decided that I don’t need alone time right now.  I get the message and smile. 

  

There was a little street market with some carvings in front of the hotel.  I walked by without looking.  I can see my room, I can see the deer and I can see the carvings.  I choose the carvings. 

When I get there, I see the man who is selling the carvings.  He is sitting alone and I smile and say hello.  He looks at me, smiles and asks me how I am.  We start to chat about the carvings and he gets up to tell me what each one represents.  He has crutches, I hadn’t noticed that before now.  He is an amputee.  A very visible reminder of the civil war in Sierra Leone.  I ask him if he carved these himself and he says yes.  I tell him he’s quite talented and he responds with “if you don’t have strong legs, you have to have strong hands.”  We both start laughing.  I enjoy his logic. His positive approach to a negative experience. It’s one of my favourite qualities in people, one I don’t see often enough. We spend the next half hour laughing even more as we talk about carvings, crocodiles, and Sierra Leone.  I don’t have any money with me to buy anything but he doesn’t mind.  

Some things are better than alone time.