It is late at night (or early in the morning, however you look at) and though I have been pretty avid about going to bed early since I arrived in Bangladesh, tonight after lying in bed for a while, I thought I might as well share some of my wanderings.
Picture this, you are walking down a city street and you see him coming. He approaches you and starts off on the typical story about how he ran out of gas down the road and only needs a few bucks to get him back to X where his 5 children are waiting. And in your mind you are assessing the situation, assessing the man. What is the probability that he is telling the truth? Is he really in need or just scamming you? Is it his own fault that he is in this position?
Now, picture Bangladesh. Though I have been approached by more beggars here than all the rest of my life combined, nothing close to a scene like the one above has ever occurred. And why?? Why because no one in his right mind could question the intense need of people here. No beggar need tell their sob story, it is written on their emaciated faces. As they tap on your car door and put their hands to their mouths, you don’t wonder if they are really hungry. As they lay, barely clothed, along the road, baking in the sun with their hands outstretched, you don’t wonder if they really just want to by beer and party.
The other day while walking home I saw a man with no legs rolling himself down the street while singing loudly. And I mean THE STREET, the street where cars and bicycles are swerving to avoid him. It was at this moment when I suddenly remembered that people with disabilities being simply lain out on the street to beg was not normal in the U.S.
What is bothering me is not guilt as I thought it would be before coming here. Though I do sometimes feel guilty, the greater feeling is flat out rejection. I walk down the streets and starving, disfigured, abandoned people hold out their hands to me. I reject it. I will not believe it. Because if I believe it, if I stand and stare into their eyes, I fear the weight of this reality might crush me. I have read about much worse things, and yet, the first time you see something… well, I guess sometimes seeing is believing in a whole new way.
So there you have it, I have finally allowed myself a negative post.
I am thankful that Mother Teresa did not reject what she saw in Calcutta.
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I've struggled to respond to this post, because I just don't know what to say. I think part of me wants to reject and deny it to. To forget that there are people like this in the world, like you, to not believe the desperation and poverty and ugliness and despair that exists in the world. It's easier to try to help these people from a distance. For about 6 years, I've sponsored a child from compassion international. He's sent me a few letters, but I've never responded. Part of it was because he addressed me as "Mr." and asked me about my family and my children. I couldn't bear writing him and letting him know that I was "just" a college girl. I felt ashamed that as a college girl with no job, I still had money to support him, and in his country, this is not the case. Also, it's somehow easier to just throw out money once a month, knowing that I'm making a difference in someone's life, but it's much harder to actually connect to that person.
ReplyDeleteAha, so now you have started approving your comments too :) Good move friend!
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