There was once a boy who had big dreams, of a world where justice prevailed and people were treated as equals. He had this dream before he read of utopia and communism. He had this dream before he had heard about rebels and revolutionists.
He had this dream when he was a kid, who had seen how unfair the world was. Segregation in schools was based on race, where the Tamil kids were in one class and the Sinhala kids in another. They tried to hide this fact by adding the term medium, so people thought one chose which medium one wanted to study in. Some did, to be fair to the system. There were a few Tamil students in the Sinhala medium class, but they were outcasts. This wasn’t because the Sinhala kids were cruel, but because each group viewed the other as different, weird. He once tried to befriend a Tamil student, and was told to go hangout with his own kind. He didn’t understand why, but he did, because the system seemed too concrete to not follow.
Then he noticed how different people were. His mother could be seen waiting for him at the school gate, wearing either a knee-length dress or jeans and a blouse. Next to her would be a lady wearing a similar outfit. However, there were other parents, who wore either a salwa, sari, hijab, lungi and blouse, full suits or pants and shirts. If the drivers of the vehicles were waiting at the gate, they would be wearing a shirt and sarong. So many different outfits and he realized how he connected attire with ethnicity. Surely, there was something wrong about that.
He noticed other differences. How people worshiped different gods, even though each god said there is no other god but himself. And he wondered why gods were all male. At his home, he was sure his mother was the most powerful. She decided who ate what and when. She decided how the house would look, what color the walls would be and what design the new sofa would be. His father merely earned money. He didn’t make any decisions. His mother did. He doubted other households were any different from his, and if so, shouldn’t the gods too be female?
He noticed how people preached about unity, but still believed their race or religion was superior. They claimed ownership of land, but he could understand how nature can be owned by man. Didn’t they know that nature owned us?
And so he decided on a dream, an ambition and a goal. He wanted a world where people were treated equally, where one wasn’t better than the other. He wrote in a Grade Five essay, before he knew the words equality, justice or fair, “I want everyone to be happy.”
That essay was the first hint that he was going to put up a fight in this world. He grew up, learning about politics and society and all those battles fought and lost. He tried to understand why people love money and why people chose wealth, ethnicity and language to divide. People would look at him, notice the over grown hair, the unshaved beard and the fire in his eyes. Here was a boy who had grown up to be exactly what he dreamed of all those years ago.
A rebel. That’s what people called him.
A cliché. That’s what some thought he was.
A lunatic. That’s what his relatives said of him.
He was everything and nothing. He wrote poems, read fiction, biographies, journals and anything he could find. He was a fighter.
But then...
He had to choose between staying in school and completing his A/Ls or fighting for equality. His parents reasoned with him, saying he could postpone his battle. Who would follow an uneducated fool, they asked him.
So he chose school over fighting for equality.
A few years later, he had to choose between completing his degree and fighting for equality. His lecturers told him he was intelligent and smart. “Don’t you worry, child. When you have a degree, you can be a stronger fighter. These paper qualifications matter in the real world,” they told him.
So he chose a degree over fighting for equality.
He was young, bright and had the energy that companies were looking for. Offers came his way, but he turned down many of them. His parents had a chat with him, and explained that they couldn’t support him forever. He needed to earn money. He needed to be independent. After all, a poor man cannot afford to fight.
So he decided to find a job.
Life went on like this. He chose things that would better his life, make him a better fighter, prepare him for battle but he never chose to fight. Before he knew it, he was in his sixties, hair the color of a cold winter morning. His eyes looked liked they were slowly sinking into his face. His hands constantly shook, when he picked up a newspaper, brought a cup of tea to his lips or served rice and curry during meal times. He felt weak, defeated. With each sigh, each breath, life seemed to escape his body. He was dying. That much he knew.
And then he remembered. He remembered his dream, his fight for equality. The memories flooded back to him and he felt a dull fire in his heart, his mind. He was still a fighter, but he no longer had the energy to fight. All he could do now was spend his days wishing he hadn't chosen school, a degree, a job, money, family and wealth over that dream he had as a kid.
If he had decided to begin the battle, to declare war against injustice, discrimination and division, maybe life would be different, better. But it was too late to have regrets now. What good would they do? His heart bled at the realization that he had slowly become part of the system he hated, he had become the person he had once hated. He had lost the battle, not against the system or the world, but against himself.
And so he became just another dreamer.
We could all end up like this. We forget the fight. We choose luxury, wealth and comforts over that battle we all want to fight. We forget our dream. And even if we don't, we don't make an effort to make our dreams of a just world a reality. It's not only because we are cowards, but because life is intimidating and if we don't join the race with every one else, the race against each other, we think we will fail. And we are afraid of failure.
So if you dream of a just world, where people are treated equally, start now. Fight for justice. Don't postpone it. Don't wait for tomorrow, start today.
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