Always, but especially so this year, I am reminded during this joyous season of Eid ul Fitr of people who are far away from their loved ones. Not the sons and daughters who study abroad, fathers and mothers who work in foreign lands to make a living, but the people who have family members who are in prison, in lock-ups, detention or rehabilitation centres. While we phone and sms our friends and family members, telling them that we love them and think of them, the fathers and mothers who have a son in prison, the women and men who have a brother, sister or parent in rehab do not even mention the names of their loved ones to anybody. They are ashamed to do so.
Visiting the family of a close friend on the first day of Raya, nobody asks the father where Aladdin (not his real name) is. He has been an addict for the last 15 years, in and out of Pusat Serentis (rehabilitation centres), and in and out of prisons. None of the visitors know whether Aladdin is in prison or rehab. Nobody dares to ask, as nobody wants to embarrass the family. So later, at the house of an uncle of Aladdin, we ask. “Dia ambil khursus” (He is attending a course), is the laconic answer. “Where”, we ask. The uncle did not know.
I know that it is very bitter for the family that the only son is a drug addict. But if they do not support his recovery, how is Aladdin going to make it? If we just leave him alone in rehab or prison, how is he going to recover? Pusat Serentis’ failure rate is tremendous – less than 10% of ‘rehabilitated’ drug users stay off drugs permanently (see: http://www.med.cmu.ac.th/dept/psychiatry/AJP-2/Microsoft%20Word%20-%20064070_Gill070910.pdf), and prison sentences are for punishment, not rehabilitation.
I have known Aladdin since he was born. His mother was a close friend, and the family were our neighbors for many years, until they moved away. He used to come to my house to play with my children. He is like family to me.
Family members of rehab or prison inmates suffer in silence. They feel as shunned as the prisoners themselves. How did Aladdin become addicted? We do not really know the details. All I know is that when he was in his late teens, his mother died of a serious illness. As she had been a government servant, the family got quite a lot of money from insurance. Aladdin and his three younger sisters got around RM 25,000 each. The two teenaged sisters put the money in the bank and used it later for setting up their own families, the youngest was just a small child and her money was kept safe by the father. But Aladdin, who is the eldest, insisted on being in charge and managing his own money.
First he bought a car. Then he started to hang out with all kinds of new ‘friends’. He lost his job and his fiancé. About then we heard that he was addicted to drugs. He sold his car. He had used all money on drugs in a short while. He visited our house, and my husband’s new expensive leather shoes and my ‘good’ walking shoes disappeared. Right after that he ‘took his first course’.
Today we have lost count of all the ‘courses’ Aladdin has taken over the years. But going to visit his father’s house yesterday made me realize how sad it is for the family for not having Aladdin there with them to celebrate Hari Raya. And how deafening and artificial the silence is regarding Aladdin. A presence through absence!
Why do we not speak openly about him? I don’t really know. But I am determined to find out where he is and to visit him, as soon as I can. We cannot bring his father with us, he is bedridden. But maybe we can get one of the sisters to come with us. Maybe with renewed family ties Aladdin can find new strength to fight his addiction better?
On this day of forgiveness, I feel the pain of the loss these families have to endure, and I wish to make a commitment to help and support mending and reinforcing broken family ties in whatever way I can.
Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri everyone.
Maaf, zahir, batin.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Saturday, September 12, 2009
T*
When you come around the corner of the long corridor and enter ward 4C at the Selayang Hospital, you can hear some of the patients moaning. In that ward you can find men who are in great pain, some dying. It is a ward where “pain management” is the cornerstone of medical treatment.
So when I went there to visit one of “our” patients, I could hear the long drawn-out moaning long before I could see that T* had the curtains pulled all around his bed. The nurse asked me if I wanted to talk to T* and then pulled the curtain away from the bed to announce me, a visitor.
Apart from MSRI’s interpreter/translator Mohammad, T* had no visitors during his whole stay at Selayang Hospital. He has no family here, only very few friends, he is a Palestinian refugee who suffers from Buerger’s Disease.
We had come to know about him in the course of a survey that MSRI is doing among the refugee community in Kuala Lumpur. One afternoon in July, I got a phone call from our researcher, who told me with agitation in his voice that he has just met one of the people he was supposed to interview and found that that man, T*, had gangrenous feet and fingers.
I immediately phoned one of the doctors who extend medical care to people referred by MSRI to them. He suggested to bring the patient to a private hospital. We did that, and T* was seen by three specialists there. He was then referred to Putrajaya Hospital. From there he was referred to Selaying Hospital, to Dr. Mary Cardoza, a pain specialist.
Buerger’s disease is a relatively rare disease which is very little known. It is thought to be an auto immune disease which is triggered by a substance in tobacco. The initial symptoms are pain induced by insufficient blood flow in feet and hands, which may radiate into other parts of the body; numbness and tingling in fingers, toes, hands and feet; extremities turning white when cold; skin ulceration and gangrene of the fingers and toes. Pain may be very intense in the affected limbs.
There is no known cure for the disease, only some treatment for the symptoms. As the illness has a ‘tobacco connection’ any further primary or secondary contact with tobacco has to be prevented as this would aggravate the situation. Ultimately, if the progress of the disease cannot be stopped, the affected limbs have to be amputated.
T* is a young man who just has turned 30 this year. His family is originally from Gaza, but he grew up in Jordan. He is a Palestinian refugee.
The last time he was discharged from the hospital, on the way back to his squalid little room, he told me: “You know, before I had many dreams for my life. Now I have only one: to be able to walk again!”
What lies ahead for T*? How will his future be? Does he have a future?
He left Jordan, the place he was born and grew up in, because as Palestinian with a temporary passport T* did not qualify for medical treatment. He came to Malaysia because it was the only country for which he did not need a visa. But his ultimate aim is to be resettled by UNHCR to a third country, if possible, to Germany because there is a doctor in Germany who has assured T* that he could cure him of his disease. And that is T*’s one remaining dream. Can it be fulfilled?
On 8 December of this year, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for Palestine Refugees in the Near East will be 60 years old. This agency was set up as a response to the suffering of the Palestinian people displaced and disempowered after the partition of Palestine - in UNRWA’s own words: “UNRWA is unique in terms of its long-standing commitment to one group of refugees and its contributions to the welfare and human development of four generations of Palestine refugees. Originally envisaged as a temporary organization, the Agency has gradually adjusted its programmes to meet the changing needs of the refugees. Today, UNRWA is the main provider of basic services - education, health, relief and social services - to over 4.6 million registered Palestine refugees in the Middle East.” (from: http://www.un.org/unrwa/overview/index.html).
Where there is no UNRWA office – like e.g. in Malaysia – the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is responsible for Palestinian refugees. And for a better understanding of the situation of Palestinian refugees it must be said here that UNRWA does all of the above mentioned, but does not have a resettlement programme. Through UNRWAs work, the misery of Palestinian refugees in the Near East is – in a way - perpetuated indefinitely, as the money invested for education, health, relief and social services is just enough to maintain the status quo, not enough to change their situation.
It is only the UNHCR that will help Palestinian and other refugees to find a new home in a third country, where – usually after a number of years – they will become full citizens, a dream for any refugee. However, will resettled refugees forget about their ultimate dream to return to their place of origin? I don’t think so.
So how does T*’s dreams for the future look like realistically? First, to be resettled and become a healthy, painfree, able-bodied man again. This might yet happen. Even though he still lives in utter squalor and poverty, and in constant pain, with only a minimum of financial and medical support, he might get resettled in a developed country that not only provides him with a home and citizenship, but also sophisticated medical treatment which can completely cure his illness. With the fulfilment of this dream, the life of T* would again be whole. With his newfound health and a passport from his new home country he might even be able to travel to his place of origin, Gaza. What are the chances that by then Gaza will be a free and independent country, part of a nation called Palestine? Very slim indeed.
But I have been proven wrong before. So don’t lose hope, for Hope is Born of Lack of Hope (Sufi proverb).
So when I went there to visit one of “our” patients, I could hear the long drawn-out moaning long before I could see that T* had the curtains pulled all around his bed. The nurse asked me if I wanted to talk to T* and then pulled the curtain away from the bed to announce me, a visitor.
Apart from MSRI’s interpreter/translator Mohammad, T* had no visitors during his whole stay at Selayang Hospital. He has no family here, only very few friends, he is a Palestinian refugee who suffers from Buerger’s Disease.
We had come to know about him in the course of a survey that MSRI is doing among the refugee community in Kuala Lumpur. One afternoon in July, I got a phone call from our researcher, who told me with agitation in his voice that he has just met one of the people he was supposed to interview and found that that man, T*, had gangrenous feet and fingers.
I immediately phoned one of the doctors who extend medical care to people referred by MSRI to them. He suggested to bring the patient to a private hospital. We did that, and T* was seen by three specialists there. He was then referred to Putrajaya Hospital. From there he was referred to Selaying Hospital, to Dr. Mary Cardoza, a pain specialist.
Buerger’s disease is a relatively rare disease which is very little known. It is thought to be an auto immune disease which is triggered by a substance in tobacco. The initial symptoms are pain induced by insufficient blood flow in feet and hands, which may radiate into other parts of the body; numbness and tingling in fingers, toes, hands and feet; extremities turning white when cold; skin ulceration and gangrene of the fingers and toes. Pain may be very intense in the affected limbs.
There is no known cure for the disease, only some treatment for the symptoms. As the illness has a ‘tobacco connection’ any further primary or secondary contact with tobacco has to be prevented as this would aggravate the situation. Ultimately, if the progress of the disease cannot be stopped, the affected limbs have to be amputated.
T* is a young man who just has turned 30 this year. His family is originally from Gaza, but he grew up in Jordan. He is a Palestinian refugee.
The last time he was discharged from the hospital, on the way back to his squalid little room, he told me: “You know, before I had many dreams for my life. Now I have only one: to be able to walk again!”
What lies ahead for T*? How will his future be? Does he have a future?
He left Jordan, the place he was born and grew up in, because as Palestinian with a temporary passport T* did not qualify for medical treatment. He came to Malaysia because it was the only country for which he did not need a visa. But his ultimate aim is to be resettled by UNHCR to a third country, if possible, to Germany because there is a doctor in Germany who has assured T* that he could cure him of his disease. And that is T*’s one remaining dream. Can it be fulfilled?
On 8 December of this year, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for Palestine Refugees in the Near East will be 60 years old. This agency was set up as a response to the suffering of the Palestinian people displaced and disempowered after the partition of Palestine - in UNRWA’s own words: “UNRWA is unique in terms of its long-standing commitment to one group of refugees and its contributions to the welfare and human development of four generations of Palestine refugees. Originally envisaged as a temporary organization, the Agency has gradually adjusted its programmes to meet the changing needs of the refugees. Today, UNRWA is the main provider of basic services - education, health, relief and social services - to over 4.6 million registered Palestine refugees in the Middle East.” (from: http://www.un.org/unrwa/overview/index.html).
Where there is no UNRWA office – like e.g. in Malaysia – the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is responsible for Palestinian refugees. And for a better understanding of the situation of Palestinian refugees it must be said here that UNRWA does all of the above mentioned, but does not have a resettlement programme. Through UNRWAs work, the misery of Palestinian refugees in the Near East is – in a way - perpetuated indefinitely, as the money invested for education, health, relief and social services is just enough to maintain the status quo, not enough to change their situation.
It is only the UNHCR that will help Palestinian and other refugees to find a new home in a third country, where – usually after a number of years – they will become full citizens, a dream for any refugee. However, will resettled refugees forget about their ultimate dream to return to their place of origin? I don’t think so.
So how does T*’s dreams for the future look like realistically? First, to be resettled and become a healthy, painfree, able-bodied man again. This might yet happen. Even though he still lives in utter squalor and poverty, and in constant pain, with only a minimum of financial and medical support, he might get resettled in a developed country that not only provides him with a home and citizenship, but also sophisticated medical treatment which can completely cure his illness. With the fulfilment of this dream, the life of T* would again be whole. With his newfound health and a passport from his new home country he might even be able to travel to his place of origin, Gaza. What are the chances that by then Gaza will be a free and independent country, part of a nation called Palestine? Very slim indeed.
But I have been proven wrong before. So don’t lose hope, for Hope is Born of Lack of Hope (Sufi proverb).
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