RICH!!!

Before I left to return to HK, I was looking around my winsy little cottage when I remembered something that made me realise something great and grand.

What I recalled was, many years ago, sitting around in our little cottage in Deuba, in Fiji, having afternoon tea with my mother and talking about an Australian documentary we'd recently seen on a current affairs program.

It was about poverty in Fiji, and what struck a chord with all of us was a Fijian marama interviewed who said "How can you call me poor? I have a gardenia bush under my bedroom window and every night I fall asleep with the smell of gardenias coming in on the breeze and it makes me feel like I'm the richest person on earth."

Interesting, isn't it! Beautiful too. And very worthy of discussion, yes?

We began talking about what was the very least we needed to make us feel rich:

Mum said it was shelves full of preserves, chutneys, jams and marmalade, all made by herself from produce she'd grown in her own garden. And an orange tree outside her kitchen door that produced sweet oranges that she could pick every morning to make herself juice. And maybe a fine stereo system too and the best version of all the music she'd ever loved.

And since she had all those already, she suddenly realised she indeed felt very, very rich.

Keith concurred with the fine stereo system and the music, but said he also needed a fine guitar or maybe several so he could make music himself.

And since he already had those, he too realised he was entitled to feel rich.

As for me, I could take or leave the food and the music, but that I needed a deep metal bath, an endless supply of hot water, really good soaps and bath oils, a really good mattress, fine bedlinen, and far too many strings of pearls. And good art ... I'd need that too!

At the time I didn't have any of those things ... but looking around my little cottage several days ago I realised that, while I may not have much according to other folks' standards, I do have all those things I said I needed to feel rich ... so now I am indeed entitled to feel very, very rich!

I even have the gardenia bush growing near my bedroom window!

What about you? What is the very least you need in your life to make you feel very rich indeed?