Maybe I'm a Spoiled Brat

....but I’m sick of waking up in the middle of the night, realizing that it is pouring rain outside, and beginning to feel guilty that I’m in a house with two blankets, a roof, and that I don’t have mud and human waste spilling into my hut that has about 10 people living in the space that should be made for one.

My heart shouldn’t break when I see a child drop a ball of fried dough, but it does because I know that that mandazi is probably the only food he’s going to get for the day, while I get to go eat 3 full nutritious meals, followed by ice cream if I want. And then I have enough money left over to go see a movie, or grab a beer or two, or buy whatever I want.

I’ve spent less than $50 of my own money in the past 6 weeks (keeping in mind that my housing has been covered and that $50 has gone to spending money on baking and restaurants)...this country is as cheap as you can get, and more than 90% of its population works in the informal economy and can’t afford any of these things.

I’m sick of having to question why I’m lucky enough to be a white girl from America, born to two well educated parents that have the ability to cosign my loans so that I can pick up and travel through the world, while everyone that I see here doesn’t even want to go to primary school because they know it’s not worth it. Secondary school for four years here costs about the same as my parents paid to send me to my private school for less than a trimester, and yet nobody can afford to send their children here. My house help, who completed secondary school, shouldn’t have to work in this house so that she can spend a few years saving up for a trade school- which costs less than $300 to complete

People shouldn’t just accept AIDS as a part of their society, and say that getting it is inevitable so why should we even protect ourselves. Knowing that it’s in the school curriculum, but none of the teachers understand it, and that most children don’t go to school and when my friends and I explain it to our families they are completely flabbergasted, makes me irate.

My Mama is one of the most educated women I have ever met, including those in the US. She’s visited the slums twice in her life, and is just blind to everything going on around her.

I’m writing a final paper on development and health, and I have no idea what development is. But I’m fairly certain that all our foreign aid, and the UN, and the awful governments set in place are doing nothing to accomplish any form of it. And I’ve resigned myself to the position of having no clue, and just deciding that I am going to enjoy pumpkin break because I am too frustrated to do anything else, which sets off the whole irate cycle again.