Sometimes I wonder, how in the world did I end up so blessed? Why was I born into the family I was born into, in the country I was born in? Why was I able to receive university education? Why have I been able to travel to 21 countries and counting? Why have I been able to have my needs taken care of always?
Having traveled so much, I've been able to see poverty, desperate, unfortunate poverty. Why was I so fortunate as to never had to experience that?
Being in India, surrounded by such in your face poverty, makes me appreciate and thank The Lord everyday for the blessings I have.
Every day we go to have clinics in villages that are pretty poor. Places that have trash lying everywhere, raw sewage everywhere because there are no proper latrines, and animals are allowed to freely roam and go to the bathroom wherever, even next to where dinner is being made in the pot over the coals outside the front door. These places are sanitation/hygiene nightmares. For those of us who are clean freaks, it's unimaginable how people live like this...but they just don't know any different. They don't understand about germs or how disease spreads, they've never been taught. In one village, I had to go to the bathroom really bad. I asked our contact where the bathroom was, who then asked some of the villagers. I assumed there would be a squatty potty somewhere for me to use, but there wasn't. There wasn't a single squatty in the whole village, people just go out in the bush. Me not realizing this yet, was directed to the pastor's wife who had me follow her and looked around puzzled, trying to figure out what to do. She then led me into this run down shack that was missing a wall, had a cement floor, and leaves & trash all over inside it. She pointed for me to go in and then walked away, leaving behind a young girl, who I assumed was to stand guard for me but just ended up watching me instead. I'm sorry, but I just couldn't do it. Aside from my own personal sanitation habits, I just spent 3 months learning about sanitation and the ways different diseases are spread, and you expect me to just pee on the floor? That goes against all that is in me...not to mention the audience that I had. I would rather just go out in the bush, but for some reason I wasn't supposed to. So I held it...for 3.5 hours until we went to someplace that had a squatty.
Living in these villages would be unimaginable to me. No electricity, maybe a village well if you're lucky, but it's not clean water; dirt, trash and sewage everywhere. I go there to help people, but at the end of each day, I get to come "home" to a nice home. It's basic, but I have electricity, running water (still not safe, but it's there), a mat to sleep on, clean clothes to wear. I get to take a bucket shower to wash off the dirt and disease I've just dealt with, and have a chance to feel semi-normal,for me, again.
Why do i get to be so privileged to be on the other side of poverty? In America we always talk about how we have no money, or that we're poor, but compared to most of the world, even our poverty level is still richer than most people in India.
Don't get me wrong, I'm so thankful to be as blessed as I am and I'm ok staying blessed, I just wonder, why me? The bible talks about to whom much is given much will be required...so perhaps the answer to my why is in that.
There's not really a point to all this, I'm just musing over things I've been noticing recently. But I guess it wouldn't hurt for us all to stop and thank God a little more often for the many blessings in our lives...and for soap! :)
Having traveled so much, I've been able to see poverty, desperate, unfortunate poverty. Why was I so fortunate as to never had to experience that?
Being in India, surrounded by such in your face poverty, makes me appreciate and thank The Lord everyday for the blessings I have.
Every day we go to have clinics in villages that are pretty poor. Places that have trash lying everywhere, raw sewage everywhere because there are no proper latrines, and animals are allowed to freely roam and go to the bathroom wherever, even next to where dinner is being made in the pot over the coals outside the front door. These places are sanitation/hygiene nightmares. For those of us who are clean freaks, it's unimaginable how people live like this...but they just don't know any different. They don't understand about germs or how disease spreads, they've never been taught. In one village, I had to go to the bathroom really bad. I asked our contact where the bathroom was, who then asked some of the villagers. I assumed there would be a squatty potty somewhere for me to use, but there wasn't. There wasn't a single squatty in the whole village, people just go out in the bush. Me not realizing this yet, was directed to the pastor's wife who had me follow her and looked around puzzled, trying to figure out what to do. She then led me into this run down shack that was missing a wall, had a cement floor, and leaves & trash all over inside it. She pointed for me to go in and then walked away, leaving behind a young girl, who I assumed was to stand guard for me but just ended up watching me instead. I'm sorry, but I just couldn't do it. Aside from my own personal sanitation habits, I just spent 3 months learning about sanitation and the ways different diseases are spread, and you expect me to just pee on the floor? That goes against all that is in me...not to mention the audience that I had. I would rather just go out in the bush, but for some reason I wasn't supposed to. So I held it...for 3.5 hours until we went to someplace that had a squatty.
Living in these villages would be unimaginable to me. No electricity, maybe a village well if you're lucky, but it's not clean water; dirt, trash and sewage everywhere. I go there to help people, but at the end of each day, I get to come "home" to a nice home. It's basic, but I have electricity, running water (still not safe, but it's there), a mat to sleep on, clean clothes to wear. I get to take a bucket shower to wash off the dirt and disease I've just dealt with, and have a chance to feel semi-normal,for me, again.
Why do i get to be so privileged to be on the other side of poverty? In America we always talk about how we have no money, or that we're poor, but compared to most of the world, even our poverty level is still richer than most people in India.
Don't get me wrong, I'm so thankful to be as blessed as I am and I'm ok staying blessed, I just wonder, why me? The bible talks about to whom much is given much will be required...so perhaps the answer to my why is in that.
There's not really a point to all this, I'm just musing over things I've been noticing recently. But I guess it wouldn't hurt for us all to stop and thank God a little more often for the many blessings in our lives...and for soap! :)
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