The Chinese Engine

The light was dim, and the air musky. I followed the shopkeeper as he dragged me to the back of the store, where he took me down an abandoned passageway behind the wall. At the end of the corridor was a small room stacked with an illegal cache of DVD’s. Even though I thought against purchasing them, the pity for the ragged man and his starving family overcame me, and I paid the full price for two DVD’s. It was only after I stepped out of the shop into the night and hailed a taxi that I fully realized the enormity of my mistake.

In the back seat of the grimy cab, I tried to think of why I felt the whole incident was so erroneous; the motive behind the purchase of those two DVD’s was simply the sympathetic nature of my human heart. But I had to think deeper. The question wasn’t why I felt as if the purchase was wrong, but the cause for the purchase itself. It was the pity that I felt for the ragged shopkeeper and his starving family. The pity that was inadvertently the collateral damage from the communist Chinese government. I realized that the deprived condition of this family was exhaust directly from the immense engine of poverty set in motion by the government. By falling into the amoral trap of these victims of such a harsh reality, I had, like many others, fueled the existence of the underground black-market out of pure sympathy. The capital gained from my purchases would ultimately promote the existence of such stores, continuing the cycle: fuel, burn, fuel, burn.

Once I understood the theory behind the mistake, I questioned the reason to which I made it in the first place. I thought back to my hometown in Southern California. Raised most of my years in the elite city of Newport Beach, I spent the majority of my childhood knowing only of the sheltered environment of my community. It never occurred to me that the destitute settings that I had only seen in movies could possibly exist in the safe world that I lived in. The ghettos where the innocent passersby could be the next victim of a fatal gunshot wound, the dark alleys that are hosts to so many drug transactions, and the hidden rooms where black-market DVD’s are sold all seemed utterly irrelevant and unrelated to my world. I was completely oblivious to reality my entire life.

During the taxi ride back to my hotel, I understood that purchasing those two DVD’s gave that family enough money to last a few weeks. But it only fueled the illegal trade. I realized with repulsion that I helped the continuation of this immoral market. I realized that I was meant for something more than just existing in the safe and censored confines of Newport. I realized that I want to go out and open my eyes to reality. I want to experience pain, sense danger and feel fear. I need to end my ignorance. I want to go out and make a difference in the world. I want to help that poor family in China and others like it. To do so, I need to break the chains of Newport’s idealistic falsehoods and find somewhere with a real view of the world.

As I got out of the taxi, I numbly paid the driver, closed the door, and threw the DVD’s away. I vowed to expand my narrow vision and help the people of the world, one step at a time.