24.09.2011 – 24.09.2011  19 °C

Had a very interesting (but depressing) start to my day to day. I got up and had my usual morning chat to the ladies sharing my dorm.. You know, nothing exciting just the obligatory “good morning, how did you sleep? Weather looks good today” type of conversation. Three of my fellow roomy’s gave the usual reply “I’m well, slept ok, yep looks like a great day today” my other roomy gave me a fairly unusual reply. She had gotten up very, very early this morning (I could hear the shower going before 5 am) and at the time I assumed her and her daughter (who is also staying in the room) must have been taking an early flight or train from Oxford to somewhere. Her reply was that she was well and slept very poorly. She then continued by telling me that staying in a hostel probably wasn’t a good idea for her and her daughter (English isn’t her first language and her daughter could speak none of the language). I thought she meant that it isn’t a good environment for a little girl to be in (a room full of adult women where she doesn’t speak the language) so I hastened to assure her that everyone would look after her daughter and would watch out for her etc.

I didn’t think too much more of it and went downstairs to have brekky (telling the lady on the way that I was going downstairs to eat). Probably 15 mins or so later I was back in the room and starting to pack up my stuff so that I could get going and see some of Oxford before heading back into London. The lady was quite shocked that I had returned so quickly and in fact was quite suspicious of me.. she questioned me on how quickly I ate etc… Anyway she continued on the same dialogue as she had when I left for brekky talking about how hard it was for her not having a job and how expensive the hostel was to stay in etc etc. At least an hour later I was still sitting in the hostel room and by now had worked out that this lady is somehow on the run from either the law or her family or… and that she had very little money and only had her daughter left. She was basically without hope except it was clear that she wanted to make something of the remainder of her life for the sake of her daughter.. Eventually I had to just leave this poor woman in the room with her daughter. I offered everything I could think of, other options for somewhere to stay, welfare support for herself (help to find a house etc), women’s refuge type stuff.. the poor woman had apparently tried some of these avenues and the avenues had told her family (or whoever was looking for her) so that she had to run again.. It was like a really awful movie.. How are you supposed to help someone who doesn’t actually want help but is desperately afraid and clearly wants anyone to help her (I mean she spoke to me forever and she didn’t know me from a bar of soap) but at the same time doesn’t actually want help????? This poor woman was that afraid that she wouldn’t even tell me her name or her daughter’s name and responded when I asked what their names were with “I don’t know who you are so why should I tell you my name?” (she didn’t say it in a mean awful way but in a scared way)

I know I’ve said it before but I swear I walk around with a sign around my neck saying “I’m a sucker and will happily talk to you about any topic that you desire”. I’ve got to learn to not be so friendly to people who I just don’t know!

To say that this woman’s plight had soured my day is probably the understatement of the century. I felt so depressed, helpless and at the same time felt terrible that I had potentially abandoned a woman who really needed my help, that I ditched my site seeing plan for Oxford got straight in the car and headed to London. I think this was a great plan because by the time I got to London I was so caught up in the ‘need to find my rental car return place and then the tube station’ that by the time I got to my hostel I wasn’t feeling quite so poor and spent the remainder of the arvo surfing the web and planning the rest of my trip after the Shetlands. Moral to today’s story- don’t get emotionally involved with a complete stranger’s problems, you are on holiday and you are not a trained psychiatrist!!!!!

Off to the Shetland’s tomorrow with Scott from the Arctic trip– Puffins and seals here I come!