Oct. 19th, 2005
food for thought
Oct. 19th, 2005 09:02 pmToday I spent my lunch hour shopping with my mum, both of us desperate to find something - anything! - to send my sister and her husband for their first wedding anniversary this weekend. While shopping, we noticed a new shop had opened, one of those dirt cheap general junk shops that appear to serve the pre-Christmas rush, and then vanish again after the holidays.
We went in, browsed, and mum picked up a few bits and pieces. Waiting to be served at the till, the young man ahead of us almost left without his baby, sleeping in the pushchair, and rushed back all embarrassed to collect it again. The young Chinese woman at the till was quite cheerful, telling him not to worry, she'd have looked after the baby, and then chatted to us for a bit while serving my mum. She's come over from China just to work for a few weeks, to make a bit of money, but had to leave her own daughter behind. Her baby is just nine months old, and she misses her dreadfully...
Makes you think - how bad must the economic situation be in China to force a young mother to travel to the other side of the world, leaving her baby behind, just to work for a pittance in a cheap shop like that?
Ironically enough, after work I went to this month's free seminar at the school of Lifelong Learning, and the paper being given was about Chinese dock workers in France during the First World War!
We went in, browsed, and mum picked up a few bits and pieces. Waiting to be served at the till, the young man ahead of us almost left without his baby, sleeping in the pushchair, and rushed back all embarrassed to collect it again. The young Chinese woman at the till was quite cheerful, telling him not to worry, she'd have looked after the baby, and then chatted to us for a bit while serving my mum. She's come over from China just to work for a few weeks, to make a bit of money, but had to leave her own daughter behind. Her baby is just nine months old, and she misses her dreadfully...
Makes you think - how bad must the economic situation be in China to force a young mother to travel to the other side of the world, leaving her baby behind, just to work for a pittance in a cheap shop like that?
Ironically enough, after work I went to this month's free seminar at the school of Lifelong Learning, and the paper being given was about Chinese dock workers in France during the First World War!
food for thought
Oct. 19th, 2005 09:02 pmToday I spent my lunch hour shopping with my mum, both of us desperate to find something - anything! - to send my sister and her husband for their first wedding anniversary this weekend. While shopping, we noticed a new shop had opened, one of those dirt cheap general junk shops that appear to serve the pre-Christmas rush, and then vanish again after the holidays.
We went in, browsed, and mum picked up a few bits and pieces. Waiting to be served at the till, the young man ahead of us almost left without his baby, sleeping in the pushchair, and rushed back all embarrassed to collect it again. The young Chinese woman at the till was quite cheerful, telling him not to worry, she'd have looked after the baby, and then chatted to us for a bit while serving my mum. She's come over from China just to work for a few weeks, to make a bit of money, but had to leave her own daughter behind. Her baby is just nine months old, and she misses her dreadfully...
Makes you think - how bad must the economic situation be in China to force a young mother to travel to the other side of the world, leaving her baby behind, just to work for a pittance in a cheap shop like that?
Ironically enough, after work I went to this month's free seminar at the school of Lifelong Learning, and the paper being given was about Chinese dock workers in France during the First World War!
We went in, browsed, and mum picked up a few bits and pieces. Waiting to be served at the till, the young man ahead of us almost left without his baby, sleeping in the pushchair, and rushed back all embarrassed to collect it again. The young Chinese woman at the till was quite cheerful, telling him not to worry, she'd have looked after the baby, and then chatted to us for a bit while serving my mum. She's come over from China just to work for a few weeks, to make a bit of money, but had to leave her own daughter behind. Her baby is just nine months old, and she misses her dreadfully...
Makes you think - how bad must the economic situation be in China to force a young mother to travel to the other side of the world, leaving her baby behind, just to work for a pittance in a cheap shop like that?
Ironically enough, after work I went to this month's free seminar at the school of Lifelong Learning, and the paper being given was about Chinese dock workers in France during the First World War!