There are few REAL lessons I remember on perspective. The only other lesson I remember at the moment is the one I learned from a woman who didn’t have AC in her car for 12 years.
Anyway.
Let me ease into this/wrap my mind around it.
Studying International Relations exposes me to a lot of international … issues. I’ve studied all of thattt. .genocide, politics, economies, war, poverty, blahblahblah
and I think in studying these things, I’ve become really… desensitized? to all of IT. You read about civil war and I automatically start thinking about how it probably crippled their economy, making their economy inefficient, going into debt, being unable to innovate the economy enough to create enough gdp, thus going deeper and deeper into debt and thus needing some western help. the politics behind is probably ridiculous too..but don’t get me started on that………….
You see, your mind glazes over the war part. You hear “hundred thousand refugees” and all you see in your mind is a number. 100,000. 100,000 heads living in a camp. 100,000 lives that need water, CRAP where are they gonna get water from? 100,000 people? you think 200,000[ish] pairs of feet needing shoes. Shoes ->Money->hm, which economy will be lucky enough to get the opportunity to make all those shoes and get freaking rich? 100,000 refugees? Where the hell are they going to GO?! what country is going to have to take them in and house them? Wow they are going to be set back BIG TIME….
Which great mind out there is going to make that fantastic plan on how the “West” is going to solve the issue of world hunger?
Which country is it gonna be this time, to bail another HPIC country out?
You forget that when BBC said “militants opened fire on the crowd gathered in Liberia protesting the new government” that 58% of real people were murdered and their blood was on the streets.
And then, you forget that these 100,000 DEATHS were people, with beating hearts, smiles, voices and stories.
It’s just easier to think of “those people over there” as these passing things…like a fleeting thought.
…and then on a Tuesday night, you’re reviewing over a citizenship test and the conversation topic goes from the job of the judicial branch to why this person is even taking this blasted test and not back home in Liberia.
Stories about refugees don’t become real to you until you MEET one.
I’ve never been OFFENDED by hearing a refugee story…until I heard the story about my friend getting oppressed and persecuted, or about how his son was horribly beaten and is now emotionally unstable and can’t adjust to life here.
His daughter, now 21 was separated from her family for 2 years before being reunited to them, simply because it was too dangerous to go look for her after being separated during the civil war.
His family’s safety depended on the mercy of the UN. Was their story sad enough? Did it invoke enough pity? Was their story horrible enough that they could get out? What about everyone else? What about everyone else who didn’t lose enough family members, who didn’t starve enough, who weren’t beaten enough…what about them?
Working with the kids over at jamestown, you forget where these kids come from. To me, they’re just a buncha little rascals, trying to jump rope with their runny noses and scampering around with their jackets barely hanging onto their elbows. They’re the ANNOYING little punks who won’t let you out the door when you REALLY have to get going, or the charming angels with huge grins that try to get you to give them one more piece of gum.
I guess in a way, I don’t want to know their stories. I don’t want to know what horrific things they experienced…because then I would feel less uncomfortable sitting there in my expensive clothes; ipod in one pocket and cell phone in the other. I could look past their dirty flipflops worn in 30 degree weather, and I could ignore the fact that these children are living in a world that is foreign to them, with parents will be more lost than they are.
…and so it would be easier to teach. it would be easier to teach them and it would certainly be easier to smile.
