After about a gallon of drawn blood, a change in nationalities and soon to be missing 3 wisdom teeth (I'm hoping it won't affect my intellect), Kristi and I are eagerly awaiting for peace corps to pick a town in Southern Africa and say " hey why don't you come live here for 2 years?" It has been an experience in itself just to get this far. Lately I have been reading about other individuals experiences and it has ranged from the worst experience of their lives, to a two year government paid vacation. I remember during our initial interview I was asked why do I want to join peace corps and I have been thinking about that a lot lately. What is it that makes me want to leave the US and dedicate two years of my life laboring for free in a less fortunate country? Is it a self righteous altruistic mission..? No I am not that naive. Is it to soothe the guilt of us raping the third world for the last century..? perhaps a little. More than anything it is the fact that poverty, disease, warfare and aids rubs the comforted soul the wrong way, and I like that. There is this scene at the end of Little Miss Sunshine where Frank and Dwayne are standing out on a dock discussing suffering. Frank brings up the great french writer Marcel Proust and states " he gets down to the end of his life, and he looks back and decides that all those years he suffered, those were the best years of his life, 'cause they made him who he was. All those years he was happy? You know, total waste. Didn't learn a thing." So if I get anything out of the experience, it is to learn. To learn more about the world God has created, the people that live here and how exactly i fit into that. I've often heard that to those who much has been given, much is expected. I feel this is but a small sacrifice compared to the blessings that have been bestowed on me. It is so easy living in the US to be lulled to sleep by the temporary self satisfaction of this material world. I hope this trip shakes me to my core that i may once again realize the reality in which most of the world lives.
Often I wonder what will i think when I am 70 and look back over my life. Will my highlights be that nice car I bought, or a house i got at the beach. I hope not. We are the few, the lucky, the ones living under a regime that strives for freedom. However for most of us, this was not our choice but rather handed to us on a silver platter. Others don't have that privilege.
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6 comments:
What is freedom? Is it really freedom when the government regulates your tv, takes your money to pay for wars on other continents, and then after all that isn't able to make gasoline cheaper anyway.
freedom is obviously relative but on the world freedom scale the US is not doing so badly. Now the imposition of freedom is something completely different but that we will no doubt discuss at a later time.
Oh and as you will well remember from our little field trip to venezuela, cheap gas does not constitute a good living standard.
gasoline is an example, but I think I'm preaching to the choir here. Question, is it right to violate others freedom and way of living for your own concept of freedom?
America has never based it's own concept of freedom on how well it can impose it on others. I agree that the imposition of freedom is no freedom at all but the statement was that people in america are born into a fortunate society if you measure it by worldly standards. (money, influence and opportunity) Whether or not you ideologically agree with them ...well that's why America has another great law granting freedom of speech so that you can dissent.
My final response would be that the opportunity is that the money, the influence, and even the opportunity are not what they once were in the US. Just as in past times it often depends on your gender, race, and creed.
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