Five years ago, my family got the idealistic opportunity to live abroad in Canada. My mother was hopeful of what the future held from the perspective of a woman who has lived a substantial portion of her life in the UAE. Coming into a new way of living, It was exceptionally hard for my mother at first to integrate into an entirely new way of life. She was no longer able to call for groceries to be delivered, or have people come to do household chores or take care of children.
All of a sudden she had to drive her children to school, play the role of both a mother and a father, having to cook for her children and shovel off snow. What gave my mother the incentive to go on was the frame of mind of the women there, who spent day and night being entirely fixated on fulfilling their obligations financially and socially - having to deposit money at the bank, having to go on doing groceries during the most disastrous weather, making dinner for the family and fulfilling their needs.
My mother gained confidence within herself to become the rock for her children, taking care of them and raising them to stand on their own two feet. My mother developed a life motto: life isn’t about having the best clothes and buying whatever you want.
She discovered her own personality. A person can wear the best clothes the world can offer and have the appearance of social intelligence, but when a person sits down for a conversation and the personality does not appeal as much as the apparel, the accessories on the person hold no value.
Sometimes we find ourselves throughout life taking no time to appreciate the appetite we have for the resources available to us that contribute to our happy and relaxed lifestyles. We should all try to be more aware of the spectrum of living.
- The reader is a pupil based in Abu Dhabi.
