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The Other Half The Other Half
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Lots of people send me e-mails – jokes, challenges, petitions – and I enjoy them, pass some on and then (usually!) get on with my life. Last week I heard from my cousin and she headed the mail with “Take time to see this” and I am SO pleased that I did! This video shows the winner of “Ukraine’s Got Talent”, Kseniya Simonova, 24, drawing a series of pictures on an illuminated sand table showing how ordinary people were affected by the German invasion during World War II. Her talent, which admittedly is a strange one, is mesmeric to watch. The images, projected onto a large screen, moved many in the audience to tears and she won the top prize of about $130,000.00. She begins by creating a scene showing a couple sitting holding hands on a bench under a starry sky, but then warplanes appear and the happy scene is obliterated. It is replaced by a woman’s face crying, but then a baby arrives and the woman smiles again. Once again war returns and Miss Simonova throws the sand into chaos from which a young woman’s face appears. She quickly becomes an old widow, her face wrinkled and sad, before the image turns into a monument to an Unknown Soldier. This outdoor scene becomes framed by a window as if the viewer is looking out on the monument from within a house.In the final scene, a mother and child appear inside and a man standing outside, with his hands pressed against the glass, saying goodbye. The Great Patriotic War, as it is called in Ukraine, resulted in one in four of the population being killed with eight to 11 million deaths out of a population of 42 million. Kseniya Simonova says: “I find it difficult
enough to create art using paper and pencils or paintbrushes, but using
sand and fingers is beyond me. [I think she means something else moves
her! – possible translation problem!] The art, especially when
the war is used as the subject matter, even brings some audience members
to tears. And there’s surely no bigger compliment.” At the end I realised that some people take what talent they have and develop/extend it beyond our expectation. I immediately thought of the parable of The Talents in Matthew 25 (I’m playing with words here because I know that “talent” means money in the parable!) and I felt sure that all of us have a gifting which God has given to us but what have we done with it? Have we accepted it passively, perhaps worked on it a bit or maybe accepted it as a place of starting, a place of challenge, a gift to develop / improve? Probably our gift will not be as spectacular as Kseniya’s - it might be very practical, quiet, even un-noticed by those around us. But, because God gave it to us, it will make a difference to people – it will change their lives. I felt very challenged to step out of my comfort zone. Is there something extra in me that I should be aware of? © Sue Whitehead
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