Recently, I watched an award-winning documentary about the plight of some 130 million migrant workers in China. Poverty and the lack of employment opportunities in towns and villages has created a mass rural-urban migration in this vast country.
In school, I remembered being taught about the migrant workers. The figures really didn't mean anything to me then until I caught a glimpse of their lives.
The starting scene was crazy. Every Chinese New Year, the workers would have their annual holiday (their only chance to get home). From the top-view, the umbrellas formed a knitted patchwork, each belonging to one who longed to hop on the train (main mode of transport). Sometimes, these people stood for days in order to get on the train, or even to obtain a ticket. There was no orderly line, but a whole lot of shoveling, pushing, squeezing, crying, people getting injured etc.
The film trailed a couple originally from Sichuan province but who had found work in Guangzhou. The mum of the family hardened her heart when her first-born was barely one to sew clothes in the big city. Although it was a difficult decision to make, it was not a choice for her. So while her husband and her worked her to bring back the bread for her family, her mum took care of her then 17 year old daughter and 12(?) year old son. Long hours of work, substandard housing, and snubbed for being from the country, they suffered and toiled for the young and old. So to have the whole family sit down and to enjoy a reunion dinner 团圆饭 meant everything to them.
The cost of providing for the family far away from home was devastating. With no proper guidance, the Daughter Qin grew up without feeling the love that her parents had for her but were incapable of expressing. Though her parents placed all hopes on her and her brother, -that they would not follow in their parents footsteps but excel in their studies- Qin broke her parent's heart by choosing the same path as them. Consumed by the discovery of a modern china , she worked but spent all her money. The film ends with the mum returning to the village in hope that Qin's brother would, with the love and support, work towards a bright future.
What startled me was the confrontations between Qin and her parents. She blamed her parents for being away, for not caring about her even though she clearly knew that they had no other option. Her parents' only hope rested on their children, on doing well in life and providing for them in their old-age. Yet it seemed like no matter how hard they tried, this hope was robbed and taken away from them. In but one blow of the wind, the light in their candle died out.
The destitution and fragility of this hope
The longings and constant pinning of love.
How many more families are clinging to this crumbled hope? How many more sustained yet broken?
In situations like these and during war times, seeking God is almost unimaginable or impossible.
If only they could know this one and only true hope.
Still, knowing and constantly gripping onto this hope is hard. The moment one turns away from the cross and fixes not upon the Savior, what was once fiery, beautiful and precious becomes not. Left with the knowledge of hope yet not hoping; one cannot possibly turn back, but moving forward seems like a hoax.
There's a song that's inside of my soul
It's the one that I've tried to write over and over again
I'm awake in the infinite cold
But You sing to me over and over again
So I lay my head back down
And I lift my hands
and pray to be only Yours
I pray to be only Yours
I know now you're my only hope
Sing to me the song of the stars
Of Your galaxy dancing and laughing
and laughing again
When it feels like my dreams are so far
Sing to me of the plans that You have for me over again
And I lay my head back down
And I lift my hands and pray
To be only yours
I pray to be only yours
I know now you're my only hope
I give You my apathy
I'm giving You all of me
I want Your symphony
Singing in all that I am
At the top of my lungs I'm giving it back
(Only Hope-Switchfoot)
If this is the only train home, I hope I can catch a ride.
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