Ordinary women, and extraordinary women.

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire
National Organiser
Ógra Shinn Féin

As some of you will know, if I am asked to write an article on an issue, I will invariably go for an obscure and slightly odd angle. And so it is here. But bear with me…

A short time ago, I was watching a programme on BBC 4 about the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway, pretty humdrum stuff, usual BBC4 fare but there you go. It used this railway in Northern India to tell the stories of the people living in and around the area. And it was one of these people who inspired me to write this article. One of the people that was featured in the programme is a female railway porter by the name of Sita. By now in her 50s, her husband died when she was in her 30s, and she was left to provide for a family of five on her own.

Her only option for employment locally, was the Railway as a porter, normally a job for young men. This involves the most gruelling, back breaking work imaginable, hauling large bags and suitcases up steep hills and narrow streets. She is a slight woman, and visibly struggles, but doesn’t complain and just gets on with it. As the programme goes on, it becomes clear why she is willing to do this work. We see her arrive at what looks like a small fragile looking shack - the family home. The inside looks almost like a different house, tidy, well decorated, and with a television in the corner. She takes good care of the small amount she has. Her sons are well dressed, and she ensures they do their schoolwork, and reach the highest educational standard possible.

We meet her eldest son, an intelligent young man, and a hard worker. Sita wants him to go to college, but not only that, the very finest college in Darjeeling, St Josephs, which would cost much more than she was presently earning. Despite her sons protestations that he ought to go working, and earn money for the family, Sita would not hear of it, and insisted he sit the entrance exams. He was successful in his entrance exams. However reality hit home for Sita and her family, as it became clear that she would not be able to afford the fees. Undaunted, she went to speak to the president of the college, and persuaded him to waive the fees, so her son would be able to go to college, and to not be forced to live a hand to mouth existence. She and her son had succeeded against all the odds.

The above story was not to justify the discrimination, both class based and gender based, which she suffers, far from it. However, I could not help but find this woman hugely inspirational in a whole variety of ways. She was wiling to endure almost torturous work, and think nothing of it, for the people she held dear, and was utterly selfless, thinking only of her children, and their interests. She disregarded whatever scornful looks, and insults she had to endure as a woman doing a 'man’s' job, because she wanted something better for her children.

What struck me about this, is that while we highlight heroes of ours, and people who are recognised by history as having played an essential role in their political struggle, whatever that may be, or indeed in their personal struggle, as is the case with Sita, that’s not the be all and end all.
We recognise, and commemorate these people, and rightly so, but quite often it’s the ordinary woman on the street, who gets mentioned in no history book, who’s sacrifice is most impressive and extraordinary. These are my heroes. And indeed it is the women who are far more likely to be written out of the history books. The likes of which can be found in some of the below articles. The likes of Sita.
Or closer to home, the likes of Mary Manning. Mary Manning was an ordinary 21 year old working class woman working in Dunnes in the 1980’s, who became the first worker to refuse to handle South African fruit in protest at the apartheid regime. For this she suffered abuse, harassment and ridicule.

A plaque in Johannesburg dedicated to Mary Manning

But an ordinary woman, the same age as many of us, was able to send a message to the world through this small action, and yet an action that required extraordinary bravery.

The point I’m trying to make is that there is no difference between extraordinary women, and ordinary women, except circumstances.

Put to the pin of their collars, your mothers, your sisters, your aunts your grandmothers, and you yourselves will react in the same way, and find the strength that Sita finds as she gets up every day to do what she can for her sons, and that Mary Manning found to take a stand against apartheid, from behind a till in Dublin.

Within every ordinary woman is an extraordinary woman willing to what’s necessary, and what’s right.