Iese

August 4, 2011 Thursday

Pronounced “eese.” Iese is a woman from Indonesia that comes into the library every afternoon after she finishes her job cleaning at one of the hotels in town. She’s from Indonesia, 38, and in the process of getting a divorce. She seemed very cheerful each time she came in, and yesterday she pulled out two meat pies from her wheeled bag she pulls everywhere and gave them to us after we talked to her for a while. She was visiting her sister in Tasmania when she met her husband a little over 2 years ago. He is 30 years older than she is. They dated a little and continued to talk on the phone until he convinced her to marry him. She is Muslim and refused to do it the Aussie way, “try it before you buy it,” as she called it.
But sadly, she said he was very different once they married and wasn’t nice to live with at all. So they have separated. He’s living in an assisted living center and she’s doing the best she can to provide for herself. She really likes Australia and hopes to stay here. Anyway, today she came in and said how stressed she is because she needs to find new accommodations. She’s been renting a room and cleaning for a guy, but he’s got a girlfriend now so that arrangement no longer works. She asked if we knew anyone. We suggested she check at some of the churches in the area to see if they have someone who would like to rent a room to her. She can afford a hotel room, but she wants something bigger. So pretty soon, I was going with her to see the local Catholic Priest to see if he knew anyone. Their church is near the library. He was doing mass so we walked to a couple of other places but didn’t find anything. We feel so bad for her because she has no family here, no car, and now needs a new place to live.
We are continuing to be at the library this week. It’s been good. Everyday there are at least two or three people who come in and we are able to help them or get them started in trying to find their family history. One girl sat down and said she wanted to find out her stuff. She said she didn’t know who her father is. Then she said she hasn’t spoken to her mother in a long time and she lives over on the east coast. How do you help someone like that? We encouraged her to talk to some of her half-siblings for starters or aunts and uncles. Some folks really have a sad background to overcome. How grateful we are for our heritage!