By Christina Moncado
I only read the poem or song about the footprints in the sand but I have never heard anything about shoe prints on a pavement. But now as I was walking around the streets of Brussels I found shoe prints on the street pavement close to the legendary mannequin piss. Were these the shoe prints of the rich man who was looking for his lost son for three days and only to find him pissing on a corner?
That was just one version of the story of the peeing mannequin in Belgium. Or perhaps these are just shoe prints of somebody who just want to leave his or her shoe prints on the street.?
I suddenly took interest in trying to follow the shoe prints. I found out that my Igorot feet are too small compared to the size of the shoe prints. As I tried the length of each stride I have to stretch my two short legs to cover the length. It turned out to be a real struggle to follow the shoe prints going up the steep street.
Probably just a product of sleep deprivation or a whim of the wandering mind, but I suddenly associated fanciful (if not realistic) meaning of each symbols, the small feet on big shoe prints and the long stride.
My small feet represent me as an individual while the shoe prints stands for this foreign country.What I am trying to say here is I am an Igorot with a different cultural background trying to fit in a foreign culture and foremost a first world country that is so much different from my country of origin which is a third world country.
The struggle to cover the length of the stride symbolizes my inept attempt to integrate and accept the culture of this foreign country… or if not my struggle to fit in an alien society? Or perhaps a struggle to find my identity in a foreign society?
Just a wishful thinking and hoping that in the near future, I hope I will find another set of shoe prints on a pavement that I can step on exactly just the size of my feet and the length of stride.
