More Than a Little Bag

NHK Documentaries are my favourite. They capture and deliver so much, all without having to say a word.

The other day it featured a documentary about Emma, a lady who was posing in bikinis. Now, what’s so strange about that I thought. On a closer look, I noticed a small flat pouch hanging near her stomach.

It was a colostomy bag. A colostomy bag is a bag that is used by ostomates or people who have undergone a surgery with an opening in their body to enable them to discharge their waste. Usually the surgery is required due to intestinal or colon rectal cancer.

A transparent stoma bag

And so we are taken on a journey where Emma approaches the colostomy bag manufacturer to request that they make opaque coloured colostomy bags, which were available overseas instead of the transparent ones which are currently the only ones available in Japan. The reason, she cites is that even as an ostomate and a doctor by profession herself, seeing her own waste discharge through the bag puts her ill at ease.

Ostomates need to clean and change their bags daily, to feel positive and joyful with their colostomy bags, it is her hope that more pleasant bags can be designed so that ostomates can feel good about them

Next, we see Emma visiting a 4-year old ostomate who has become a fan after seeing photos of her in her bikini and colostomy bag.

Through their encounter we hear the 4 year old say how she is sometimes embarrassed when her bag explodes with her waste sprawled all over the floor, she demonstrates with her tiny arms flying to the opposite ends of the earth, and how she would love to have the better looking opaque colostomy bags.

I surprisingly hear of such similar sentiments that a toddler ostomate felt as would an adult.

Well, no opaque bags yet, but Emma has brought a special gift for her little friend. Emma has made some specially cut out stickers that fit perfectly on the colostomy bags. They sit together and start pasting away on the colostomy bags. The little girl’s eyes light up. She is completely stoked at her new bags!

It was a beautiful moment to watch.

Size doesn’t matter, they say. And so, it doesn’t.

What matters most is that if we fix our eyes on truly seeing issues with empathy - be things as tiny as stickers or as gigantic as skyscrapers, we most certainly can create the most beautiful and valuable things in this world.