14/11/07
Attention / Be careful
- Smoking?
- No.
- Massage?
- No.
- Fucking?
- No!!!!
Un soir je croise un sikh et tandis que mon regard s'attarde sur son turban il s'approche et m'attrappe le sein comme s'il voulait l'emporter avec lui. Je mets longtemps, apres cela, a ne pas me proteger la poitrine chaque fois que je croise un sikh!
Mais il ne se passe rien de pire que cela a Mumbai: quelques hommes envahissants et une chaleur qui n'en finit pas de monter.
Et puis il y a du rouge que je ne veux pas voir. La, tout pres, il y a le quartier rouge de Mumbai. La des familles vendent encore leurs filles pour payer leurs dettes. On les enferme dans de petites cages. Je n'arrive pas y aller. Tous les jours je me dis "aujourd'hui j'y vais", et je rennonce. Je n'arrive pas a monter dans un taxi et donner la destination effrayante. Elles sont la, tout pres de moi, ces filles perdues et apeurees, il n'est bientot pas un jour ou je ne pense a elles.
Un soir un tout petit garcon passe a cote de moi. Il a l'air d'avoir 4 ou 5 ans. Il est si petit, si fragile... il ne demande rien. Il passe. Je le rattrappe pour lui donner de l'argent. Ils ne disent pas merci les enfants des rues. Ils s'enfuient avec leur butin. Assez d'argent pour manger, assez peut-etre pour nourrir aussi un frere, toute une famille. Une fois j'ai crie a l'un d'entre eux de me dire au moins merci! J'ai eu honte de moi pendant des jours. Merci de quoi? De lui donner si peu que cela ne fait aucune difference pour moi et cependant toute la difference pour lui.
Je dois apprendre a marcher quand meme dans la rue. A dire non. A etre indifferente quand je devrais etre en alerte. Et j'y arrive. Jusqu'a ce que je croise le regard affame d'un plus petit, d'un plus maigre, qui m'arrache le coeur. Et je donne le plus gros billet que j'ai dans mon sac. Et je pleure a l'interieur. Je pleure de honte de ne pas faire plus, je pleure de colere contre les parents absents. Je pleure de ne pouvoir le prendre dans mes bras cet enfant, le rassurer. L'emmener pour lui faire prendre un bon bain chaud. L'asseoir a table avec le meilleur des diners et puis le border dans un lit blanc, lui raconter une histoire jusqu'a ce que ses yeux cillent et que le sommeil l'emporte doucement.
Cet enfant, je ne veux jamais cesser de le voir dans la grise indifference des foules. Toujours je veux qu'il attrappe mon regard, et jusqu'a mon coeur, aussi surement que s'il etait vetu de rouge.
At the end of the day I go back to the YWCA in the wet night. I step over bodies asleep right on the dirty ground. I turn down taxis. Men look at me and sometimes speak to me.
- Smoking?
- No.
- Massage?
- No.
- Fucking?
- No!!!!
One evening I cross a Sikh and while my eyes are wondering on his turban he get closer to me and grap my breath as if he wanted to take it with him. It taks me a while, after that, to not protect my chest every time I cross a Sikh!
But nothing worst than that happens in Mumbai: a few invading men and a growing hit.
For 10 days I follow the road that leads me from the art galleries to Indigo, with a growing feeling of guilt. Because in fact there is not much red here, or so little: there are the wonderful trees along the streets, with their tangled trunks, there are the public phones.
And there is the red that I don't want to see. There, very close by, there is the red quarter of Mumbai. There, famillies still sell their daugthers in order to pay their debts. They are locked in little cages. I cannot make up my mind to go. Every day I tell myself "today, I am going", and then I give up. I just can't get into a cab and ask for that terrifying destination. They are there, very close to me, those lost and scarred girls, soon there is not one day when I don't think about them.
The slums are also very close by. I have seen on my way from the airport those crowded little houses made of cardboard or iron. Very small houses with doors that don't shut. In the morning they come out with the hit and wash themselves on the sidewalk. They wear rags very close to the expensive hotels. Children come and grab at the car's windows at the red lights and beg for a few roupies. And at night they hang about in the streets, close to the restaurants. Some don't even beg anymore. They fall asleep in their colorless clothes, curled up against each other like cubs.
One night a very small boy passes next to me. He must be 4 or 5. He is so little, so fragile... He does not ask for anything. He is passing by. I run after him to give some money. The street children don't thank you. They run away with their booty. Enough money to eat, maybe even enough to also feed a brother, a full familly. Once I screamed at one of them to at least say "thank you!". I felt ashamed of myself for days. Thank you for what? To give so little that it does not make any difference for me and all the difference for him.
I have to learn to still walk in the street. To say no. To be indifferent when I should be open-eyed. And I manage to do so. up to the point when I cross the gaze of an ungry child, a bit smaller than the others, a bit skinnier, who tear my heart apart. And I give the bigest bill that I have in my bag. And I cry inside. I cry out of shame of not doing more, I cry out of anger against the missing parents. I cry not to be able to take that child in my arms, to reassure him. To take him and put him in a good hot bath. To have him sit at the table with the best diner.To put him to bed in white sheets, to tell him a story till his eyes blink, till sleep carries him away.
This child, I never want to stop to see him in the grey indifference of the crowds. I always want him to catch my eyes and up to my heart as surely as if he was wearing red.
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