母の日に寄せて、イギリスで出逢った特別な一冊です。愛する家族を養うために子供たちに良い教育の機会を与えるために祖国フィリピンに子どもたちを残して単身海外へやって来たひとりの女性Junningの一生。故郷で暮らす子どもたちの強い母親であり、住み込みのナニーとして暮らす外国の家庭の心優しき母親がわりでもあり、生まれた国も育った環境も何もかも異なる同時代に生きるふたつの家族のストーリーが紐解かれていきます。非情なまでの色濃いコントラストのなかを一歩ずつ前進していくその先にみえてくるものとは・・・？
モスクワにもロンドンにも移民は多く、多民族・他宗教を感じます。ロシアで仕事のときにとても心強い存在だったフィリピン人のナニーさんのことは、息子も私も今でも印象深く覚えています。
Someone else’s mother /Caroline Irby
On Mother’s day in the UK I read the book again. All the photographs made such an impression on me. And the book binding is made from cloth, and the design and balance of beautiful colour contrast inspired me so much. So at first I thought I loved the book itself as a photobook. I’m actually a booklover from my childhood. Mum always called me a bookworm. I read a lot, so I usually borrowed 20 books(10 books were maximum for 1 person, so I used my sister’s card too!) from the library. And only when I deeply loved the story and I felt I’d like to put it nearby, I bought it and put it on my bookshelf. I love reading stories but love a book itself also. That’s why I bought the book.
As the author wrote in her book that she would like to be a storytelling photographer, the book was structured as half photographs and half essay. After reading it, now I love it as a storybook also. I love her writing style, how she chooses words and phrases with calm eyes and a warm heart. I can feel as an essayist the book was made over a long period of time, a kind of biography. She gathered pieces of memories and weaved them together like a gorgeous patchwork tapestry by hand. In the process she needed to face herself and her life a lot as well as Juning’s life and their families lives beyond time and beyond the sea. There were truths which sometimes she wanted to look away from, but she coped with bravely, and eventually overcame and achieved her aim to make a book.
It is the story of Juning, someone else’s mother, an immigrant working abroad. Basically everything is different from my life.The story and photographs were set in London and one of the islands of the Philippines. But in the book I could feel the author and Juning as if their lives were like my own as a girl, a working lady, and a mother with her photographs and essay. I believe the greatness of the book is in this.
In the first half of the book she looked back on the lives of 2 families around Juning. And in the middle part she featured the life of Juning (she lived a life full of ups and downs!) and had an interview with Juning and her 4 children. And in the last part, time had passed, she herself became a mother and she decided to go to the Philippines to meet Juning with her 2 children. It was the best ending to create a finale!. They were open to new things and the future in front of us all. We live now because we have mothers. Everyone has a mother and someone else’s mother lives all over the world now.
