stories - Janel Has Wings

When Life Humbles You Twice in the Same Day

by janelhaswings | Jul 18, 2022 | Life Experiences, Uncategorized

This past Thursday I woke up in one of the worst moods. It was a super full moon and my mom always says full moons affect our sleep. Well, this one truly unleashed my insomnia. When I finally fell asleep, the next thing I knew it was time to get up and start my day. I woke up so exhausted that the only thing I want to do was sleep for 48 hours straight but we don’t get paid for sleeping so I had no option other than to get out of bed.

After waking up knowing my day was not off to the greatest start, my sister’s dog that I’m currently dog sitting decided it was time to be a total jerk. I struggled with her on our morning walk and was extremely annoyed that she was acting out. Then I get into the house and my sister’s bougie coffee machine wouldn’t work. Lack of sleep, a super full moon, general fatigue, and my body being decaffeinated made my mood go from bad to foul.

I leave the house and head to work annoyed and pissed off at the world. As Monica would sing, “It’s just one of them days, don’t take it personal.” Anyways, I get to work and decide to recap my horrible morning to my boss when we go to lunch together. While I’m talking about how awful my morning is, I’m also realizing how ridiculous I sound but I’m exhausted and just want to talk about how horrible my day is.

That’s when the Universe decided to humble my overly privileged ass.

We finish lunch and walk out into the restaurant parking lot. I look over and notice a middle-aged homeless man digging through a trash can in the alley. The man was digging through the garbage as if his life depended on it. I didn’t immediately say anything to my boss because I didn’t want the man to hear me. Once we got in my car I told my boss that seeing the man dig through the trash was bothering me and I didn’t know what to do to help. He immediately says, “Hey! I can give him my leftovers.” My boss had a ton of leftover fried rice and then I said, “I think I have $5 let me check and you can give it to him.” With a carry-out box and $5 in his hand, my boss walks over and hands the man the food and money.

While my boss is walking back to my car he doesn’t notice, but I see the man open the box and take a massive bite out of the food. This poor soul was legitimately starving to death. I felt awful. Here I am a few minutes prior complaining over how awful my day is because of a stupid coffee machine and my dog niece acting like a jerk. I felt like a horrible person. To make matters even worse, my boss says, “Tell me again about how you’re having a bad day.”

I started to reflect and think about how I was complaining over something so pointless and minimal. I also started to think that I was turning into the same people that I cannot stand.

When I first moved back to the U.S. one of the things that I noticed is how much people complain over stupid shit and how rude they are towards people. The first year I was back I was so highly annoyed by the number of times I saw someone mistreat someone simply because they weren’t getting their way. The U.S. is the land of the extremely overprivileged and the “you must do what I say because I say” group of people in the world. Entitled is the overstatement of the century. And here I am, becoming what I detest the most.

I had to check myself because I refuse to become ungrateful.

My day continued on and my mood changed for the better. I couldn’t believe how ridiculous I had behaved in the morning and I was grateful for life reminding me that, “Things could always be worse.” I started to think of the things that I’m grateful for in my head and remind myself just how fortunate I truly am. I thought that what happened that afternoon would be the most impactful event of my day.

Then life had other plans.

That evening I decided to stop by Walgreens and pick something up on my way home. While I’m searching for what I wanted to buy, I overhear a Walgreens employee say, “The machine is in English and I don’t speak your langue so I won’t be able to help you.”

My first instinct is to try to help. I speak 4 languages so I think to myself that maybe I speak this person’s language. I walk over and ask the lady, “Where are you from? Maybe I speak your language.” She tells me that she’s from Afghanistan.

I don’t speak Farsi but I still wanted to help her. I asked her what she is trying to do. In broken English, she explained to me that her daughter lives in Russia and she needs to send her money via Western Union. The Walgreens employee is standing there and she tells me that the Western Union machine doesn’t work after 9 p.m. and it was 9:01 p.m.

So I thought, ok. How can I help this woman? I told her I was going to write down the information in English on a piece of paper so that when she went to Walgreens the next day she can show them the information and they can help her send her daughter money.

Thank God for Google Translate because between that, her broken English, and my non-existent Farsi, we got it all written down.

She explains to me that she doesn’t have a car and she had walked to Walmart, Kroger, and now Walgreens to try and send her daughter money and wasn’t able to. I offer to drive her home so she doesn’t have to walk alone in the dark.

While driving her home I ask her how long she’s been in the U.S. and she tells me she has been here for 10 years and 4 months. She said she has no family and no friends here. She says to me that her whole family was killed in Afghanistan by terrorists who bombed her home. She lost her parents, siblings, husband and two year old daughter. The only reason why she is alive is because her and her other daughter were in the hospital together at the time of the bombing. When they returned home they couldn’t recognize any of their family members in the rubble of the bombing.

I’m driving and trying my hardest to hold back tears.

She also has kidney problems and if they get worst she will not be able to travel and she’s crying telling me she may never be able to see her daughter and grandchildren again in Russia if she has to go on dialysis.

My heart literally broke.

She is crying telling me her story and I’m just devastated for her. I told her I’m going to pray for her and she will see her daughter again. I just know it.

We get to her house and she tells me to come in and she will make me tea or give me juice and she keeps thanking me for helping her. I politely tell her not to worry about it and that she doesn’t need to thank me for anything.

She looks at me and says, “You are an angel from God.” (Clearly, she doesn’t know me.) And she asks to kiss my hand. I didn’t want her to feel like she needed to kiss my hand but I also understand cultural norms and I told her that if she felt like she needed to kiss my hand she could. She kisses my hand and says “thank you!”

I give her my name and phone number and tell her to call or message me on WhatsApp if she has any problems trying to send her daughter money and I will try to help her the best way that I can.

After I drop my new friend off, I drive home and think to myself, if that were my mom in another country where she wasn’t fluent in the language, I hope someone would help her.

I get home and start to process the conversation and the day that I’ve had. Then I think.

How fucking lucky am I?

I’ve not lost my entire family to a bombing. I am healthy. I have food to eat. I don’t have to dig through the trash. I don’t have to worry about being healthy and able to travel to see my loved ones.

I am beyond blessed.

I share this story to show how we are all guilty of taking life and what we have for granted. We are all struggling in different ways, some way more than others, but we can always take a look around and be grateful for the things that we do have. As much as I try to practice gratitude and be mindful, there are still days when I forget just how lucky I am.

I also share this story as a reminder to be kind and empathetic towards others. It cost me absolutely nothing to help this woman. It also cost me nothing to help the homeless man. I know some would argue that it did because I gave him $5 but $5 to me isn’t anything in the grand scheme of things.

Kindness and empathy cost nothing and they typically provide you with the greatest reward of all; the reward of knowing that you did the right thing.

The next day I spoke with my new friend and asked her to let me know if she is able to send her daughter money and if she needed my help I would help her. I’ve added a screenshot of our conversation. Her sweet words mean the world to me and are proof that people doing the right thing is always the right thing.

P.S. My new friend’s name means Star in Farsi and I think she

Turkish Massage or the Beginning of Taken?

by janelhaswings | Sep 6, 2019 | #travel

Four years ago, on September 6th, 2015, I found myself in one of the scariest situations that I have been in a while traveling, and the worst part is that I signed up for it. One of my best friends/travel buddies and I had decided to take another Eurotrip, and this time we added a few new countries to our itinerary. One of those countries was Turkey. Istanbul had always been on my bucket list, and finally, I was able to check it off. My mom wasn’t too happy about us going to Turkey because there had been several terrorist attacks in the country and well no sensible mother wants their daughter running around a country that is under attack. I can’t blame her for not wanting me to go, but I am her wild, crazy daughter, so of course, I still went.

Everything was so new to me as far as the culture and just the aesthetics of the city that I fell in love instantly. It was my first time in a majority Muslim country, and since I have Muslim friends, I had an idea of what to expect, but the reality was so much better than my expectations. The beautiful mosques, the call to prayer, the delicious food, and the gorgeous Turkish people were an overdose to my senses. My friend and I spent our first few days doing the typical touristic things like visiting the Hagia Sophia, (a must-see!) going to the spice market, trying the local food and buying souvenirs from street vendors. One of the things that we kept hearing while we were there is to try a Turkish massage or Turkish hamam. Our hostel said that they could arrange for us to go to a bathhouse where they specialize in hamam and that they always recommend them to their guests. My friend and I both thought it was a great idea and signed up. That was our first mistake.

A small, white van came and picked us up from the hostel and took us to the bathhouse that our hostel had recommended. Once we walked inside, we were both pulled away from each other and pushed towards opposite sides. The older lady who grabbed me spoke very limited English, and all I understood was, “This way, this way!” Next thing I know, I’m being shoved into a tiny room sort of like a cabin, and she hands me a towel and says, “Clothes off, clothes off!” At this point, I’m starting to get nervous. I take everything off except for my bra and underwear and sit with the towel wrapped around me. The lady comes and opens the door and sees that I still have my bra on, and she grabs the strap and tells me, “Take off.” I do as she requests and I take my bra and underwear off. She then grabs my arm and pulls me out and takes me to another room where she opens the door to this tiny dwelling. After she shoves me inside, I look around and see that there are hot coals in the middle of the tiny room and realize it is a sauna. Saunas are supposed to be relaxing, and yet here I am freaking out thinking that I’m about to be sold into the sex slave trade or the black market.

My mind was racing, and the other thing that I kept thinking was that I was being kidnapped. I was naked and afraid, literally. After minutes of sitting alone in the sauna, the door opens, and two other girls are shoved inside. I thought, “Holy sh*t, we’re being taken.” I stayed quiet for a minute, and then I looked over at them and said, “Excuse me, do you speak English?” You cannot imagine my sigh of relief after they said yes. They were both from Turkey originally, but they were living in Norway for the past few years, and they said that this is not a typical Turkish hamam. They had never experienced something like this, and they were also freaking out. I was already terrified before them telling me that this wasn’t a typical hamam, and now I was next level terrified. As the three of us sat there, terrified, I couldn’t help but think of ways that we could escape.

Before I knew it, the door opens, and the older lady who had shoved me in was now grabbing my hand to get me out. I am then escorted to another room adjacent to the spa room. The room was huge, and there was a marble square in the middle. The lady tells me to lay down on the square. I lay with my towel covering me, and then she comes and yanks it off.
There I am, butt naked on a marble square wondering how the Hell I ended up there and what went wrong in my life to get me there. The older woman grabs a bucket and a huge sponge and begins to wash my entire body from head to toe. When I say entire body, I mean my ENTIRE BODY. These woman looks like she could be my grandmother, and here she is cleaning every crevasse and touching me in places that I wouldn’t even allow former lovers to touch me. My exact thoughts were, “This is it. She is cleaning me and prepping me to be sold to some mafia guy so I can be used in the sex trade. I’m so f***ed.”

After the intense body scrub, I feel her start to massage my arms, my legs, and eventually my back. I believe that this was supposed to be enjoyable, but I was too terrified to allow myself to enjoy the experience. Once she was finished massaging my body, she pulled me up and handed me the towel. She then leads me to the cabin-like room that had my clothes still in them. She pointed and said, “Clothes on.” I go inside the cabin and dress, and when I come back, she yells, “Bye!” and points to the exit. When I walk through the doorway, I see my best friend waiting for me in the middle of the room. When I see him, I run over to him and say, “Oh my God, I thought I was being taken.” He looked at me and said that he thought the same exact thing.

As we leave the bathhouse, we take a selfie in front of it to save the crazy memory. We quickly realize that the van that dropped us off was not going to pick us up, so we make our way back to our hostel and exchange our crazy massage stories. We were both terrified during the entire massage experience, but since we both survived, we were now laughing about it. If anyone ever asks me what the scariest thing that has ever happened to me while traveling is, this is typically my response.

Side note: Although I had a wild massage experience while in Istanbul, I would still 100% recommend that everyone visit Istanbul if they have the chance. It’s a beautiful city, I’ve seen some of the best sunsets there, and the people are extremely hospitable. I would go back tomorrow if I could.