Unfortunately i couldn´t be there to celebrate with you on your birthday, even though we probably would just go to ???applebees (bc of libby) but i am stuck on a 36 hour bus ADVENTURE (no bus ride is calm or boring in SA) and only a computer to communicate with you on your birthday.
I am priveldged to have traveled all that i have and i thank you and dad for the opportunities that you have given me. Traveling is not easy, far from it, as i have experienced last week with my bag getting stolen, but it does teach you valuable life lessons. I never really realized how much i care about every single person back home, from friends to family.
Traveling alone is not being alone wandering through exotic countries with no one to speak to but you are alone in a sense. The cycle of meeting new friends, experiencing amazing things, and then it ends with a solemn goodbye that will probably turn out to be your last goodbye to them. Traveling has allowed me to appreciate my family and friends more. I think the daily routine of life numbs our compassion and love for one another, and sometimes we need to step back..break a little contact..and then we can re-realize how much we do in fact care for one another.
Traveling has always thing i HAD to do, it just wasn´t me to stay in the same place forever. And sometimes i feel that i walked out on or that peole think that i think that the places that i go are more important than they are. Both of these are not true. If i could shake a magic wand i´d have taken everyone to the adventrures that i have been on. From playing with tigers in thailand, to climbing mt. fuji in japan, shooting guns in cambodia, crawling thru vietnam tunnels in ya...nam, experiencing machu picchu, and riding exetremely LONGGG bus rides (though not sure how much u would enjoy that).
These past couple of weeks i´ve witnessed again real serious poverty. The poverty that makes me question why i´ve had the privedged life i have now. And it makes me really cherish what i do have in life, an education and a stable healthy life is all that you can really ask for in this world and i have it. I´ve seen poverty that kills, from the slums of la paz to the ghettos in lima there are things in this world that nearly all americans will never experience but that is real as death itself.
I´ve seen children, no more than 4 or 5, digging through massive heaps of trash alongside dogs looking for food. Old Ladies, over 70 practically dying on the streets as the beg for spare change, and i've seen thousands of families that have nothing, maybe a 4 walls, and that is it. Their most prized possession may be a jesus statue and fat hog. The daily luxuries that we take for granted these people will never ever experience. A hot shower, a pizza from pizza hut, a 2 day vacation, simple things that we would never think about are serious luxuries for most people on this planet.
However in the face of all this pain and suffering i have seen optimism and hope that is almost incomprehendable. From a young girl smiling, singing, and skipping along with her father having the time of her life, picking plastic bottles out of trash bins with her father. Just the idea that a child could enjoy themselves with their father in that circumstance is unbeliveable how powerful family can be. I've also seen young children giving food and coin to beggers, bus drivers picking up a hitchiker in the rain, all sorts of extraodrdinary gratitutes amongst such dire living conditions. I guess this article is just to express to how thankful i am of the work you have done, the hours you put in, to allow me to be what i am today, an educated young man with a prosperous future in this world. And i hope that all who read this think about how they view our own lives, their own mothers fathers, family, and realize that we (the priveldged) are blessed through fate, most time beyond merit, and we have the responsibility to be humble in our thoughts, and actions regarding the immense world around us.
Sorry its long but a lot has been on my mind the last few weeks
ps the photo is of the girl picking bottles out of the trash with her father.
