The Frustrations of a Simple Life

This week is the first that I have felt consistent frustration with life in Africa and am realizing strongly that life here, plain and simply, is not fair. The more I slowly begin to better understand the culture the more I realize I don’t get it in the least. Life here holds little value, it comes and goes and easily slips away without many noticing or caring. Children aren’t given a chance to survive, it’s a total crap shoot who makes it and who doesn’t. Parents aren’t knowledgeable enough to care and nurture as they are supposed to and have replaced contentment with complacency in regards to their families. Children are raised with indifferent parents and thus they, without realizing the option to be different, grow to become apathetic parents themselves... it’s a vicious cycle and from an outsiders view, its hard to see an end in sight. At the hospital death knocks daily and unfortunately, too often we have to answer the door.
My heart, soul and mind are constantly trying to make sense of how it is that so many can be in so much pain while others don’t feel a thing. I curse my whiteness, my ignorance, and wonder how it is that I once was, and continue to be so naive. As much as I try not to get bogged down with the things I’m seeing, even more than that I don’t want to become desensitized to it either, but after weeks of seeing so many with literally nothing, it’s hard to try to get my head around why it is that so many others are so blessed.

In short... Bush Africa... Malnourishment, Inexplicable Convulsions, Anemia, Pneumonia, Scrub Typhus, Incompatible Blood Donors, Ascites, Still births, Liver/Kidney/Heart failure, Staph Infections, Bronchitis, Meningitis, Tetanus, Typhoid Fever, Snake Bites, Cerebral Malaria, 8 yr. olds with AIDS, frustration and contemplation, injustice.

-Allison