Friday we left for WOMAD in New Plymouth, it was suppose to be a weekend of fun, music and dance. This was the first time we went to a festival as a family of three and we were going to spent the night in the teepee tent arranged by the festival.
Half way through the 5 hours drive from Auckland to New Plymouth, Magnus told me to check online and see what happened in Christchurch. I went on NZ Herald website and when I read there were 6 people killed by a gun man at a mosque in Hagley park, tears just burst out of me. That moment on 15th March is the date changed New Zealand in the most unimaginable ways. For the rest of the drive, we listened to the radio and all kinds of information were flooding in, the death toll kept rising. Initially people thought there were more than one gun man as two mosques were attacked. Also there were bomb devices mentioned and hospitals and schools were all in locked down.
It was such a weird thing to go through, on the way to a festival celebrate the cultures from different corners of the world while listening to the unfolds of an horrific event due to a man who is a white extremist. My thoughts went straight to that winter afternoon when I saw the bombed bus. The blood shed, the snow and the panic in the air. My heart was broken, for the innocent people who were shot at the back, when I heard there were very young children amongst the victims as well, its just all become too much to bear.
With this mixed emotion we reached WOMAD. It was a beautiful late evening. However the teepee tent was far less than what I imagined it would be. It came with three foam mattress and nothing else. We settled ourselves in the tent then went to the festival grabbed some dinner. After 10 mins at the big stage watching a performance, Isabella started crying and she was so tired. We head back to the tent then had the worst night of sleep in the humid tent. I woke up and completely lost my voice. We visited my fried Anna and her family before driving back to Auckland.
On the way back I had fevers and chills throughout the way, once got home head straight to bed and slept till next morning. Now feeling refreshed and energised, I still could not shake the sick feeling in my stomach and the deep pain in my heart of what happened in Christchurch. The death toll is now 50, with many more seriously injured. I read the news of a father shield his 2 year old son from the bullets, luckily both of them survived.
More information came out about the gun man. He travelled the world before settled in Dunedin two years ago. When I read the countries he visited, Pakistan, Turkey, I wonder if he ever felt a slightest warmth in his heart when he was being treated as a guest in those countries. In my eye he is no different from the extremists such as ISIS. He became the same people as his own enemy and yet he thought he was so special. A low scumbag.
The world is changing constantly, I think it was naive of us to think NZ would remain the last pure land on earth forever. However, this tragic event will not make me fear for the future. Instead, it makes me even more firm in my belief that we need the world to be an open place, tolerance and love are the remedies to heal this world. I will raise my child as a global citizen, she will not have the closed mindset and see the world as full of threats and danger, she will see the world as a place mixed with love and loss. Love prevails .
LIYANG'S THOUGHTS 