They Walk Among Us! - Unnoticed

They are not invisible.  We just stopped looking.

I was at a hypermarket in Karama, the kind where the aisles overflow on weekends. The cashier a thin man in his late 50s, uniform a bit faded and looked exhausted. His name tag read “Ram **12 Years of Service.”  My bill came to AED 82.75. I handed him a hundred.  He hesitated. His hands trembled just a little as he sorted the coins. The line behind me was long with families with carts piled high, impatient glances, someone muttering "Faster yaar."

I smiled and said to him gently, “Take your time.”  He let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “My roommate went home,” he said quietly. “We were sharing rent. Now… everything is double.”  

He forced a smile. “But it’s okay, madam. We manage. What to do?”  He said softly.

He wasn’t “just a cashier.”   He was someone’s father, someone’s hope back home, carrying the weight of survival in a city built on speed.

They walk among us.

Next stop: a Shawarma stall in Mankhool.  The young guy behind the counter maybe 21 years old, was juggling orders in Arabic, English, Hindi, Tagalog, all while assembling wraps at lightning speed. A man in front of me slammed his fist on the counter because his order had “onions even though I said NO onions!”  The boy froze. “Sorry sir… I make new one.”

When I reached him, his cheeks were still flushed.  “You’re handling it well,” I told him.

He shook his head. “I’m on 14 hours shift today, madam. Morning also very busy. But no problem… life goes on.”   His eyes told a different story.
A mixture of ambition and exhaustion, dreaming of something bigger, but stuck in a moment that leaves no time to breathe.

They are all around us.

One evening, I saw a taxi driver parked near Zabeel Park, sitting outside his cab. Maybe late 40s. He wasn’t scrolling. He wasn’t smoking. He was simply… staring at the skyline and beautiful Dubai Frame glittering with the sun rays.

“Nice weather today,” I said as I walked past.

He smiled. A real smile, not the practiced service smile.

“I come here to feel I am part of this city,” he said softly. “Driving whole day… sometimes you feel invisible.”

We sat for a few minutes, talking about the breeze, traffic, family back home.
It was the most grounding conversation I’d had all week.   I felt visible.  Alive. 

At home, weeks ago, I got a call from an elderly Indian woman living alone in Bur Dubai. She is managing a small business her husband left behind, when he passed away suddenly to a heart attack 3 years ago.   She wanted to continue his legacy as she had no one to fall back and go back to India.  Her voice was trembling.

“Beti, my WiFi is not working. I can't see my son today. He is in Canada... he said he will wait online.”

After guiding her through it, just a loose cable, there was silence on the line. Then I heard her sniff.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I talk too much. You must be busy.”

She wasn’t a burden.
She wasn’t “another call.”
She was a mother fighting loneliness in a city where community lives next door, but isolation lives inside the walls.

I could find a desperate mother, whose all-energies uplift to that one call for few minutes every day.  Video call is her only solace, to feel alive, to feel seen and heard. 

During the last summer, I stopped with my cousin for petrol at an ENOC station.
A worker with sunburnt skin walked to our window holding a bottle of water.

“For you, madam. Weather very hot.” I thanked him and asked, “And did you drink water?”

He hesitated, then smiled sheepishly. “Not yet. Break time after 10 minutes.”

I gave him a labaan bottle I had and insisted he take it. He took it with both hands, a gesture of gratitude rooted in dignity, not dependency.

He wasn’t “the petrol guy.”
He was someone keeping the city moving while standing on hot asphalt for hours.

Earlier this month, at Burjuman metro station, I saw a woman sitting on the steps with her child, a toddler with sleepy eyes. She was a cleaner from a nearby building, waiting for her night shift to start.

The child leaned on her shoulder. She kept brushing his hair gently, whispering stories in a language I didn’t understand.

She looked up, gave me a tired smile.

“This is the only time we get together,” she said.

Not a complaint.  Just truth.

We walk past people living entire worlds inside 30 seconds.

They all walk among us. Mostly unnoticed.   That few seconds of your attention changes the day for them- positively.  It helps them cheer up, forget their troubling thoughts, may be just for a minute, but it brightens up their day.

In a city that dazzles, Skyscrapers shine.
Advertisements scream luxury. Everything moves fast.

But in between the towers,
in the corners we rarely look, live the people who hold this city together.

The cashier sending money home.
The delivery boy dodging traffic to meet impossible deadlines.
The construction worker who eats his lunch sitting on the pavement.
The taxi driver who hasn’t hugged his children in two years.
The security guard who calls everyone “boss” but rarely gets called by his own name.

They are not invisible.
We just stopped looking.

There is no “them.”
Only us.

Their struggle keeps our convenience alive.
Their patience carries our impatience.
Their courage powers our comfort.

All they need….
is a smile,
a moment,
a kind word,
and for us to see them.

They walk among us.
And so do we.

Let’s start acting like it.