Felix the Polio Boy
One little fellow on the island was physically disabled. The other islanders referred to him as Felix the Polio Boy. He couldn’t stand so he couldn’t walk, but he did sort of bounce along with his legs tucked under him as if he were sitting cross-legged, swinging his arms and using his hands to propel himself forward. So he could in fact get from one end of the village to the other. Mentally he was sharp as a tack.
But what bothered me was that he was “made fun of” all the time. They’d mimic his awkward movements and his clumsiness with tools or cooking pots, and point at him and laugh. While he’d laugh along with the others---as they carried on---I was convinced his heart was breaking. I pitied Felix.
In the West we know that concept well---pity. It motivates us to do all kinds of things we consider to be charitable acts, benevolent acts---to be “helpers”. On Sabarl Island “pity” didn’t seem to exist. Everybody made fun of everybody else, with a focus on an individual’s shortcomings, and it made everybody laugh. If you stop and think about it, pity is about the most disrespectful, humiliating appraisal you can direct at another human being.
Each boy on the island had a miniature outrigger canoe for a toy, a tiny replica of the full-sized sailing canoes that took them to their gardens on another island, that sent them out fishing and collecting coconuts from atolls near Sabarl and that transported them to villages on other islands. Constructed by their fathers, there was a sense of pride in the best-made and fastest---because all their sons raced them---those miniature outriggers.
The village itself was comprised of fifty or more houses on stilts, built that way to keep them cool inside and to help keep the creepy-crawlies out. They were constructed along the shore at the edge of a white sand beach extending roughly seventy feet from the forest to the water’s edge. The whole place was protected by a horseshoe-shaped cove that had large rocky sections at both ends. It made for a tidy, sheltered little bay.
Not every day, but some days when the wind was just right and there wasn’t work to do, the boys would race their miniature outriggers from one side of the bay to the other, noisily cheering and leaping through the waves to keep them on course. Felix, like all the other boys, had an outrigger, built by his dad for him alone.
I watched from our house as the boys lined up their boats for the start of a race. With a shout for a starting signal thirty little outriggers were released by their captains and began sailing across the bay in the shallow water.
I couldn’t take my eyes off Felix. He was bouncing along slowly, following the leaping boys down the beach. I was pitying him again.
Suddenly Felix’s outrigger blew over on its side and came to a halt. Instinctively I started down the ladder-like steps of our house to give some assistance. And just as quickly another boy reached out for Felix’s outrigger, righted it and sent it on it’s way without hesitating. Felix was back in the race. Although his boat didn’t win, it didn’t finish last, and the boys kept up the races all afternoon, someone always there to right Felix’s outrigger if it got into trouble, and doing so with sober dignity and without pity.
Days later someone got the idea that it would be useful if I learned how to climb a coconut palm to harvest coconuts. A couple of brief demonstrations by teenage boys were held to give me an idea of how to do it.
The coconut palm can grow pretty tall---up to eighty feet. The trunk itself looks and feels like cement and it usually has a gentle curve over its entire length. The boys would get a run at it and virtually walk up the tree with a hand over hand motion that kept them from slipping while moving upward. They came down the same way.
When it was my turn I took my run, made it about five feet up and fell off. Again and again I tried to get up the tree and each time I’d fall. The whole village howled with laughter at my feeble attempts and soon I was laughing, too.
But nobody was laughing louder at me than Felix.
© Kent Jones 2016
One little fellow on the island was physically disabled. The other islanders referred to him as Felix the Polio Boy. He couldn’t stand so he couldn’t walk, but he did sort of bounce along with his legs tucked under him as if he were sitting cross-legged, swinging his arms and using his hands to propel himself forward. So he could in fact get from one end of the village to the other. Mentally he was sharp as a tack.
But what bothered me was that he was “made fun of” all the time. They’d mimic his awkward movements and his clumsiness with tools or cooking pots, and point at him and laugh. While he’d laugh along with the others---as they carried on---I was convinced his heart was breaking. I pitied Felix.
In the West we know that concept well---pity. It motivates us to do all kinds of things we consider to be charitable acts, benevolent acts---to be “helpers”. On Sabarl Island “pity” didn’t seem to exist. Everybody made fun of everybody else, with a focus on an individual’s shortcomings, and it made everybody laugh. If you stop and think about it, pity is about the most disrespectful, humiliating appraisal you can direct at another human being.
Each boy on the island had a miniature outrigger canoe for a toy, a tiny replica of the full-sized sailing canoes that took them to their gardens on another island, that sent them out fishing and collecting coconuts from atolls near Sabarl and that transported them to villages on other islands. Constructed by their fathers, there was a sense of pride in the best-made and fastest---because all their sons raced them---those miniature outriggers.
The village itself was comprised of fifty or more houses on stilts, built that way to keep them cool inside and to help keep the creepy-crawlies out. They were constructed along the shore at the edge of a white sand beach extending roughly seventy feet from the forest to the water’s edge. The whole place was protected by a horseshoe-shaped cove that had large rocky sections at both ends. It made for a tidy, sheltered little bay.
Not every day, but some days when the wind was just right and there wasn’t work to do, the boys would race their miniature outriggers from one side of the bay to the other, noisily cheering and leaping through the waves to keep them on course. Felix, like all the other boys, had an outrigger, built by his dad for him alone.
I watched from our house as the boys lined up their boats for the start of a race. With a shout for a starting signal thirty little outriggers were released by their captains and began sailing across the bay in the shallow water.
I couldn’t take my eyes off Felix. He was bouncing along slowly, following the leaping boys down the beach. I was pitying him again.
Suddenly Felix’s outrigger blew over on its side and came to a halt. Instinctively I started down the ladder-like steps of our house to give some assistance. And just as quickly another boy reached out for Felix’s outrigger, righted it and sent it on it’s way without hesitating. Felix was back in the race. Although his boat didn’t win, it didn’t finish last, and the boys kept up the races all afternoon, someone always there to right Felix’s outrigger if it got into trouble, and doing so with sober dignity and without pity.
Days later someone got the idea that it would be useful if I learned how to climb a coconut palm to harvest coconuts. A couple of brief demonstrations by teenage boys were held to give me an idea of how to do it.
The coconut palm can grow pretty tall---up to eighty feet. The trunk itself looks and feels like cement and it usually has a gentle curve over its entire length. The boys would get a run at it and virtually walk up the tree with a hand over hand motion that kept them from slipping while moving upward. They came down the same way.
When it was my turn I took my run, made it about five feet up and fell off. Again and again I tried to get up the tree and each time I’d fall. The whole village howled with laughter at my feeble attempts and soon I was laughing, too.
But nobody was laughing louder at me than Felix.
© Kent Jones 2016