Leann+Lew

LEANN LEW



14/2/11 'The Man from Snowy River' Analysis

15/2/11 'The Man from Snowy River' revised

15/2/11 'The Man from Snowy River' vs 'The Drover's Wife', Paterson vs Lawson

Migrant Australia - the "White Australia Policy" and racism following afterward
Two Poems:
 * White Australia - David Keig
 * Australia - Ania Walwicz

Original Commentary for "Australia" by Ania Walwicz Might versus Right – S.T. Gill c.1862-1863

Might versus Right by S.T. Gill is a visual text representing the violent nature Australians had to the Chinese. The Chinese were migrating to Australia in masses in time for the gold rush. In fear that the Chinese threatened white Australia they rioted against them which is portrayed in the picture. The Chinese in this picture are all dressed in "typical" Chinese wear of that time and are all mobbed together - a trademark which made the Chinese easy to recognise. Their short stature, non-white skin and their identical faces make the perspective of this visual text ambiguous. The perspective could have been to promote of demote the riots which were going on. The obvious negative connotation is that one Australian (or perhaps European) is being violent towards the Chinese man on the ground, without an apparent reason. There is no law and obvious violence. The other Australians are seen encouraging the first man therefore encouraging violence which is not a positive idea to spread. The positive connotation for the riot is that the Chinese are not represented as something good. They are all almost identical, in a mob and give a sense of powerlessness. The picture was also made in a time in which the Australians would have tried to protect their nationalism and might not have been viewed as a negative thing if they were to attack someone else for not being Australian.

Commentary for 'Looking for Alibrandi':

=SHORT STORY ON AN ISSUE:=

=
Have you ever wanted to die just to see who came to your funeral? Ever wondered who would care to watch your dead body being lowered into the ground? I can imagine mine now. I’ve thought about it over and over again until it bores me. Whether rain or shine I know I’ll be lying in a bed of white carnations and hydrangeas. My parents were always suckers for secret meanings. Perhaps they want me to know that I’ll be remembered. Maybe for the next twenty or so years before they hit the sack and all I’ll ever be is another rotting corpse, ready to be food for the next animal that trots on the ground above me. =====

=
I know they’ll spray air freshener around, to mask the mixed scent of the flowers and whatever caused my death, it might be the coppery smell of my blood or the retched smell of my vomit because my parents know I don’t want to hide anything. I want every single soul to know why and how I died. The grass will be dewy because it’ll be morning and more than half of those attending will worry more about the grass stains on their clothes than the corpse lying in front of them. =====

=
It’ll be a relatively empty funeral. I know that much. It’ll consist of my family, most likely my extended family that was roped into it, the few friends that actually cared and my ignorant bastard of a boyfriend. My parents would weep, my friends would well up with tears and the rest would just look as if trying to care. I’ll give them props for even getting up in the morning to see me off, even if they’d rather be snoring away in their comforters. =====

=
In the end, we’re all just numbers. We’re just one of the six billion and something people in this world. One lonely person isn’t going to affect anybody. They’re all too busy making your life miserable so they can feel at the top of the world. One more depressed person to them means being ten levels more infatuated with themselves. They think that everyone’s just a retarded bimbo, thinking I don’t know they’re talking about me but in actuality I’m cursing them to hell every few seconds. =====

=
They’ll be my friend because I have things that can benefit them; money, luxury and the brain that they wished they did. Then when they think they’ve run me dry they’ll turn around, red in the eyes and stab me with any sharp object they can find;in the front, back and side. They’ll create rumours and twist any and every word I say. When I run they follow, their words biting at my ears and slowly everything will start turning gray. I don’t even need to wonder whether death involves the fading of colours because soon enough it’ll all be dull, the colour of ice cream and sprinkles mixed to make a slate concoction. =====

=
I should be disgusted. I should be upset. I should turn around now and slap him in the face but I won’t. This is the he. The he that never looked at me and never will. One of my last sources of comfort that had gone behind my back and added another knife to the gallery that lay imbedded in my body, right through my beating bloody heart. Stabbing it endlessly until it stops forever. =====

=
He’ll whisper sweet nothings in my ear, kiss up and down my neck, roam his hands everywhere and I’ll just smile with a grin he can’t see through. And every time he enters me I’ll block out that text message I accidentally found on a warm cozy movie night. Just so I can feel alive. Deny the truth. Thinking that everything is just the way it should be. =====

=
But the truth is the truth. And reality will slap me in the face soon enough. Most likely in the next morning when I’ll leave promptly, without breakfast, with a believable façade and the cold hard sting of fact. =====

=
This is one of my only friends. Beautiful and nice. Smart and loved. She actually cares and sometimes I wish she didn’t. I don’t really deserve it. And partially because I’m scared she’s just going to snap and stab me too. I don’t want any more blood dripping down and staining my body, permanently. =====

=
My voice seems hoarse, I think. I don’t talk anymore. I used to. Now, I’ll plaster a nice little smile on my face and a happy look in my eyes and no one will ask any questions. Only she’ll see through it and I don’t want her to. =====

=
It was my last comfort stop. A little fluffy bit of comfort. A foreign artist singing in a foreign language. The lyrics made me smile, if only for a while and his performances I watched online made me want to see it in person. It gave me a sure escape but soon enough even these words couldn’t reach me. It all reminded me of the words he used to tell me. Before he grabbed the closest pen and pushed it through my body until it pierced through the other end. It all became nonsense music, a bunch of words, a set of dances and smiles that couldn’t penetrate. =====

=
Every time I’ll get closer and closer. I would just blank out and later find my hand wrapped around a pen knife, a kitchen knife, a pair of scissors, my favourite leather belt, that small bottle pills I never dare touch or even my secret bottle of rat poison. The blade will be a little closer or the chemical will fill my glass a little fuller. Maybe the belt will draw a little closer to my neck or a couple more pills than the bottle prescribed rolled onto my counter. I don’t know why. I’ve never hurt myself, done anything to make it hurt. Perhaps I’m just wondering what death is like again, how people will react. =====

=
So with my fingers placed around my bleach again I reach back into the cupboard and put it into place. I feel my lips curling as I remember every moment of pure torture I experienced and wanted to pay back tenfold. Everything goes black for a while, blurring before becoming clearer but still grey. And I slowly recall every solution I thought of. =====

=
If I live they’ll be in hell. They would've failed. They will know they can't touch me no matter how many times they throw poison into my veins. So, I'll just smile in their direction and make them look like they're talking to air. =====

Then maybe I won’t have to curse them anymore.
= = =Short story:=

HIDE AND SEEK That iridescent smell of yellowing grass calmed her, like a tranquiliser on mute. That transparent breeze flew past her, wisping through her hair, her fingers and clothes. She waited. She held her breath. One movement, any movement, could ruin it or perfect it. A steady hand and a still body, the key to her hidden hobby and opaque talent. The lens zoomed and focused. That feeling, the one only she knew, the one only she could feel, hot and bubbly. It was a hot spring bubbling inside, ready to spill over at any moment and consume everything. Consume her. Crisp leaves squeaked beneath her, registering in her ears and barely in her eyes. The bright light swam around and her lips curled into a smile.

Fingers flew on the keyboard, cords lying callously on her already disarrayed desk. It was almost like tangled hair in an already messy bedhead. She glared at the screen, eyes behind contacts, like almost every other girl in her grade. Big bold letters covered the top of the screen, spelling ‘HIDE AND SEEK’. Her own personal getaway where she could be more. Flawless, graceful and stunning. All just words. All just mindless praise. She only looked for one word. Perhaps two. She wanted more. That hot burning sensation rising up again, simmering to the top as she waited for someone to say them. Someone to comment without pause that it was perfect. Without hesitation that it was unique. That it was //seen//.

Did she really just want it to be seen? Did she really just want her work to be seen? Or did she want people to see her? To see her face. To see her effort. To see who she was. But she couldn’t. Who was she to say that she wanted to be seen? She had no right. No privilege. She was one of the sheep being herded into the barn, mindless and without any will. She’d follow the crowd and just take it. She wasn’t good enough to be one of them that stood out. That one black sheep. That one with the strangely coloured spot. She couldn’t even be the one who made more noise than the others. She was just the plain white one, ready to be shaved and sent back bare.

But still she waited. She prayed inside and hoped that that one person would see it, or perhaps see her, and tell her what she was yearning. Give her the one salvation she was waiting for. More people commented. More people praised. Behind usernames and avatars they told her sweet nothings. All they did was send ice into that scorching feeling and slowly force it back down her throat, to be locked away behind bolted doors and freezing clamps. And slowly that hot airy feeling sulked back behind those doors, cold and alone, with no key in sight. And just as the doors were closing the words showed up on her email like a hero come almost too late.

//‘Wow. I’ve never seen anything like this before. Good job! Keep this up, okay?’//

She breathed and sighed. When had she been holding her breath? She didn’t know. Something rose in temperature, aching and searing from her chest. Ice melted and the sun rose. Like in every other submission. Did he always wait? Did he know she was waiting for his offhanded remark? Did he know that every single time he said the words she was waiting for, wanting to grab with her greedy little hands, she couldn’t help but smile with relief? Did he know that that feeling inside just kept getting stronger and the flame just kept growing? He probably didn’t. He didn’t know her. But every single time she saw his username she’d see the words she wanted. She got everything she wanted that all the others couldn’t give to her.

So, when her mum called her to dinner, her dad hugged her and her older brother patted her head – like almost every other family in her school – she smiled just a little bit more. Feeling that little bit warmer and a little less transparent.

Her mum sent her to school, just before her dad kissed her forehead and right as her brother plopped himself next to her in the car. Just like every other day. Just like every other person. Her friends greeted her. Her best friend gave her a hug. Her guy friends patted her back before rushing off to class. Just the usual. Just the normal. Another day. Another nameless face. Another leg among the thousands that crowded the hallway.

But every so often, someone a little different would walk down and almost all those eyes would stop and turn. Almost every head would tilt. Almost every pair of eyes would shift. It could be the head cheerleader. Or perhaps it was the smartest girl in the school. Today, it was the school captain. Girls cooed and boys growled with jealousy. Teachers greeted him and underclassmen looked up with slight admiration.

She looked on with jealousy. Envying every single spot on him. Some wanted his looks. Some wanted his leadership skills. Some wanted the fact that he could get anything he wanted, girlfriends included. Some wanted the way he was friends with everyone. No. She didn’t want any of that. She wanted his uniqueness. She wanted the way he could stand out. She wanted people to remember her face they remembered his. She wanted everything that made him special. She was greedy and envious. With two firm hands she wanted to rip that glowing presence off of him and keep it hoarded within her. She was an artist, disgusted by her own imperfections, wanting to keep all things beautiful and perfect to herself.

So, when he bumped into her when they were walking into the classroom she smiled just the way everyone else did and barely noticed the way he said ‘Hi’ to her instead of the usual ‘Good morning’ he gave everyone else.

“We need to go shopping this weekend!” Her friend spread words into her ear, already planning the date and time.

“Oh yeah! The new makeup collection is out!” Her other squealed, clapping her hands together in excitement.

“I don’t wear makeup, remember?” She couldn’t help but point out; her eyes couldn’t be crowded with layers of mascara and eye shadow. Her eyes were for seeing perfection from behind a lens.

“Then I am so doing your eyeliner! Black eyeliner goes best with brown eyes right?”

“I call shaping them! Her almond eyes need to be perfected by a pro!”

She smiled softly. A bare and empty smile. Filled with the want to break away. To burst from the tight bubble she was trapped in. No, she couldn’t. She could never. She wasn’t good enough. She wasn’t special enough. Her eyes didn’t entrance others the way he did. What she wouldn’t give for those round brown eyes everyone loved. For that smile that graced his lips so easily. Constantly surrounded by that magical atmosphere.

“Umm… Angelina, was it?”

She tilted her head slightly, seeing the very object of her jealousy standing behind her. For the first time she could see him from up close. Could see his high cheek bones. See his double eyelids. See the tiny piercing on his left ear. See the edge of a tattoo peeking out from under his sleeve. She saw everything there was to see in him. And with it a thousand more things she wanted to steal.

“Um, it’s our turn to get class materials.” Shy and cute. Just the way everyone loved him. Had anyone observed him as closely as she had in the past five seconds? Could no one see that piercing? Or that tattoo? Was he just hiding behind that façade called perfection?

“Okay.” She smiled. Falsely and simply. He took the first steps first, almost walking slowly enough to wait for her.

“That’s so unfair, Ange! I want to go with Jacob to get class supplies!” Her friends continued to complain to her. Of course they would. Everyone loved him. Every girl had a crush on the great Jacob Yamamoto. Half-Japanese, half-American to boot. The best of both worlds.

“Sorry guys. My name just happens to be next to his on the roll.” She waved slowly to them, following Jacob out of the room.

“Ah! I wish I was Ange Young right now!” She could hear her friends protests from behind, loud enough to be heard of from the classroom.

“So, where do we go?” Ange said simply, folding her arms behind her, like every girl did when they were faced with him.

“Actually, the teacher didn’t ask us to get materials.” Jacob admitted, hand rushing through his mop of dark hair.

“So you wanted to talk to me?” She asked bluntly, seeing through every single one of his movements and signs.

“How did you know?” Surprised and apprehensive.

“When you’re the background, you see a lot of things.” She said looking away, her voice barely a whisper.

“You’re not background.” When he moved to touch her, she flinched. Anger simmering and annoyance coiling.

“You don’t even know me.” She growled, almost biting the air with her eyes, “You’re special. I’m not.” Her fist clenched, her breath drew. It was almost like there was no air. Like her very words were eating all the oxygen. “You wouldn’t even know my face, if it weren’t for the fact our names are next to each other on the roll. I’m normal. I’m just a face in the crowd. You’re the fucking school captain everyone adores. What would you care?”

“I care because you are special.” His eyes were understanding but they were filled with something that Ange couldn’t quite decipher. Jacob Yamamoto never had that look in his eyes before.

“//I’m// special?” She couldn’t believe it. Something in her chest swelled and deflated like a balloon with a hole in one end and a person blowing on it unknowingly. “Are you saying that because you’re trying to be nice or what?”

“You are special, Angelina.” Jacob almost snapped, his voice crude and slippery, “I’m not just trying to be nice.”

“This is crazy. I’m not listening anymore.” With that her tongue stuck in her throat, glue stuck inside her mouth, “Go back to standing out. Go back to being special. Someone like you isn’t fit with someone normal like me. We’re too different.”

Hands still. Breath. She let the echo of perfection fill her. The feeling rising up from her toes to the tips of her hair. Slowly eating away everything inside out. A snake winding around her neck, stealing her breath and life slowly. She was strangling and choking but she didn’t care. She felt warm and that toe curling feeling appeased the suffocation she was suffering from it.

Once again, the light swirled and flashed, the thick air dispersed, allowing her breathing to resume. Swinging the camera around her neck she lifted it back up, covering her eyes and nose as she spotted another moment of perfection.

“Angelina…?”

Her breath caught. Time stopped and the world went grey. Everything blurred at the edges and she barely could register what breathing was. She refused to bring down the camera from her face or turn to face him. She wouldn’t dare move as everything crackled and faded.

“Angelina Young? That’s you, right?” His voice swam with curiosity and familiarity, filling her ears, setting everything back in motion.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She tried to hide it. Desperately. Was her voice wavering?

“This might sound a bit weird but I comment on your blog every night.” He looked away bashfully but she didn’t want to look him in the eye. She never wanted to look him straight in the eye. Too much truth was staring back at her. Too much of what she didn’t have was glaring back at her with a vengeance. “You’re ‘HIDE AND SEEK’, aren’t you?” He took a step closer, hoping to bridge the gap that was infinitely long, “Why won’t you show me your face?”

“I’m just some face in crowd. I told you before, didn’t I? Even if I were to take down this mask you wouldn’t see me.” Her voice shook, unstable like a building in an earthquake. “Why do you think my blog is called ‘HIDE AND SEEK’? Because I’m hidden. No one is going to find me.”

“But I found you.” He tried to reason with her, hoping that deep down his voice was somehow reaching her.

“This is coincidence. I’m nothing to you. How would you know that blog is mine? You don’t know anything about me.” Ange could’ve sworn she felt something prickling in her eyes, something wet and painful.

“You know, my parents are divorced.” He said it callously, like he had just said he was the school captain, “I went through a rebellious phase. I thought unless I did something outrageous no one would notice me.”

“People notice you now, don’t they? I’ll never get noticed.” She growled and she couldn’t believe her mask was falling, piece by piece, crack by crack. Her hand slipped and her camera fell from her fingers, the strap bouncing on her neck.

“I’m only noticed now because I saw you.” He finally raised his voice, shouting like it was the end of the world, like he was confessing to her. How silly. He would never.

“What are you talking about?” Ange wanted to shut her eyes and ears forever. She was one of the millions of white sheep. He was one of the only black sheep which led the rest of them. That would never change. Because people were born with it.

“Look, I know this is probably a little weird. You probably don’t believe me.” He sighed, a little defeated and overpoweringly upset. “Here.” He tapped something on her shoulder, balancing it so she wouldn’t drop it, “See you.”

The small piece of paper was staring at her. The neat print was just looking at her like there was no tomorrow. She wanted to rip her hair out but couldn’t. How would he know her? She almost never took pictures of herself and always made sure they weren’t showing her face. How? How? How? Now that paper was laughing at her. Ridiculing her for falling in love with comments on the internet just because they said she was different from the rest. Now it was haunting her.

//‘Wow. I’ve never seen anything like this before. Good job! Keep this up, okay?’//

Those ominously beautiful words died inside her head. Every single comment he had left before had stuck to her mind, it was sticky and gooey, refusing to leave her alone. She was falling deeper and deeper, wondering just what to do. Grabbing the miniscule, almost so small she couldn’t see anything – or was she thinking this way just to make herself feel better? – piece of paper, she read it through a thousand more times just to get it through her head.

//“I’m going to be on chat tonight. Please go on. My username is on the back.”//

She wanted so badly to talk to him. She wanted to know how it felt to be special. She wanted someone special to notice her and one finally did. He had understood what she had wanted even if it was accident.’ But she was too greedy. She would never be one of those which made heads turn. Which made eyes stare at her with admiration or hatred. Was it wrong for her to want it? For her to want to jump head first into the centre of attention? For her to want to be more than just background? She craved it to the point of almost starvation.

So she let her laptop light up and watched his username pop up on her chat list.

“Hi.”

Eye bags. She knew she had them. There were probably dark circles as well. Talking with someone until 3am was definitely not something she wanted to try again. But then again she wanted to do it again, she was tempted to almost need for it. They’d talked on almost an endless amount of topics. His old school. Where her parents were from. Childhood stories. Where he got his ears pierced. Where she liked to go for her pictures. His first girlfriend. Her most insensitive boyfriend. How he got his tattoo when he drunk after his parents had finalised the divorce. How she had started the blog because she couldn’t be special in real life and wanted to be special somewhere. How he had gotten out of rebellious phase by seeing her take pictures. How she had always envied him, how he could stand out from the rest. How he had seen her blog by pure coincidence and noticed they were taken from the very spot he had seen her. How she had known that spot since she was an elementary school kid. How he knew that spot since he was in middle school. How she had always favoured his comments over others. How after seeing how happy she was even though she didn’t get noticed at school, he felt he needed to change. How she was happy because photography was always her secret passion. How he had fallen in love with her after seeing her at school.

She’d logged off shortly after.

Why would he say something like that? Did he want to make fun of her? Someone like him would never fall in love with someone like her. He barely knew her name. He could barely distinguish her face from the others in the class. She was just getting to greedy. She couldn’t believe that for one second she thought someone had actually noticed her. Had finally found her. How stupid.

So when he said “Hi, Lina.” She just passed him seamlessly; ready to leave him and his stupid comments behind.

Frustration welled in her eyes, twirling around her in a never ending spiral. Why couldn’t she get it right? She’d found the perfect scene. An example of picture perfect. Yet she couldn’t quite get it right. Her hand kept moving. She kept on missing the focus of her attention. She was supposed to be good at this. This was the only thing she had to herself. The feeling refused to creep up from the deep dark corner it always hid itself in. She was dying inside. She couldn’t even keep the one thing she treasured so much, locked away in the chamber of her body. It had run off and now her head was a mess.

“Why? What’s wrong with me?” She was tempted to throw her camera down. She wanted to curl up into a little ball and just scream. Everything was falling apart all because she was greedy and wanted to be found. She wanted someone to notice her in the millions of identical faces. Someone had and she had lost everything in just one moment.

“Lina, are you all right?”

That voice. That stupid voice. It was that smooth creamy voice which floated above her head and stabbed her from head to toe.

“This is all your fault.” She wouldn’t hold back. It was her fault. She wanted to be seen. For someone to differentiate her. And he did. But he’d appeased her. He’d given her a taste of the food she was starving herself for. But he’d pulled it away from her and laughed at her face. “If you hadn’t found me I wouldn’t be like this. If I had just stayed hidden I would’ve continued to take my pictures and treasure your comments.”

“I wasn’t joking.”

“Yes you were.” She wanted to run away. She wanted to turn around, slap him across the face and then take her leave. But she couldn’t. She couldn’t move. Her legs were frozen to the ground with an unbreakable vice. She couldn’t turn around because she wouldn’t be able to look him straight in the eye and slap him. She’d turn around, avoid his eyes and stop her hand halfway. She knew she would do that. So she couldn’t move. She couldn’t hurt the very object of all she wanted.

“I really do love you.” He wanted to reason with her, pleading with his eyes even though she had never really looked at them. “You helped me. If it weren’t for you I don’t know what I would’ve done. When I knew you could have such a happy face even though your life wasn’t perfect I wanted to change. Is it so wrong to fall in love with you?”

“You barely know my name. How could you love me? I’m just some girl sitting amongst the other hundreds whose face you can’t even connect to my name.” Her fist tightened and her finger nails stung. Her hands were probably decorated with the outlines of her long nails. It hurt but it was numb. It was painful but mind numbingly cold.

“You had everything I wanted. I wanted to be able to smile like you did. I wanted to feel warm inside. I like that part about you the most.” He touched her shoulder and she didn’t move. She wanted to. She wanted to flinch. To get angry. But for some reason something in her chest swelled and pushed against the walls of her heart. It calmed her. It made her ears heat up. It was white hot and almost painfully amazing, “I wanted to feel the way you do when you take pictures. Before I knew it, all I could think about was the smile on your face and that hot feeling inside.”

“How would you know how I feel inside?” Ange felt it swell even more. It was a pleasant feeling but so hot it burned. “How would you know that feeling which feels like any second I’ll fade into it? How would you know anything about me?”

“Because I’ve felt it too.” He sighed and placed both arms around her shoulders, noting how she didn’t flinch and noting how her ears were as red as his, “I’ve had that smile before. I know how hot it feels. I know how it feels like it’ll take over but you don’t want to stop because it feels like your ten feet higher than everyone else.” He sighed and noticed how she was biting her lip, almost to the point of bleeding, “I wanted that smile back. It’s all I wanted and you had it. I wanted all that you had.”

“Even if you’re saying the truth… I don’t think I have the same feelings.” Something stung and she realised it was how hard she was clenching her hands, how red they were and how painful it was, “I wanted everything you were. I was jealous. I wanted to be special. That’s why I love the internet you but I don’t know if I can bring myself to look the real you in the eye.”

“I can wait. I won’t wait forever but I’ll wait for a little bit.” He tightened around her and she felt infinitely warmer, a thousand times hotter and a million times higher. She wanted to accept him. To be found by someone. He’d found her but she didn’t know how long it was take to come out. She was stuck. She couldn’t even bring herself to grasp the hand that was reaching to pull her out. “You know, I think I know why you called yourself HIDE AND SEEK. You’re hidden but you want to be found. I never like to lose so I wanted to find you, indefinitely.”

“I don’t know how someone like you could find me. You saw me and wanted to continue seeing me. We’re so different but I want to be greedy and become more like you. I want to be seen the way you are. That’s okay, isn’t it?” She didn’t know when. She didn’t know how. But she noticed how deep she had fallen. Every comment had plunged her deeper. Every smile had swirled her further and further. And slowly she was in so deep she didn’t know how to get out. Ever. She’d wanted everything he had. But she didn’t know she wanted to keep him for herself. Her greedy side crept up slowly and took advantage of everything that was her. “I want your everything.”

“You can’t have it.” He tightened around her and she felt that hot bubbly feeling spilling over her head and all over her body and burned. It was scorching hot and warmed any numbing pain that was left in her. “Because I want everything that you have.”

She untangled herself from his arms and took a step forward, creating distance between their bodies. She willed herself to move. Willed her legs to break free of the ice that encased her legs and brought her courage ten feet high. The feeling was rising in temperature so much her whole face was too hot to touch. Everything blurred for a second. Everything looked that little bit more colourful. She breathed. Tried to cool herself down to no avail. She felt herself yearning to escape from the prison of being hidden away for the past 17 years. She wanted to be seen. She wanted to be found. She wanted to be seen by him.

So she turned around and looked him straight in the eye, for the very first time.