You can't understand poverty and not fight it, but you can't fight poverty without understanding it. ~ Gustavo Gutierrez
Y ahora….
In my first essay, I wrote about the difficulties I had coming home from my time in Honduras. I had seen so much poverty yet so much joy. I wanted to bring all of the children back to the States and give them the amazing opportunities I have had, yet I would never want to corrupt their little bit of remaining innocence in the way this lifestyle would. The constant tug and pull of the contradictions of our world has been something I have struggled with over the past semester. As Bill Holm described in his essay, I feel like I have “come home crazy”. My struggle with this whole process has essentially been figuring out what to do now. I did not want to be, as Talya Zemach-Bersin says, just another American student abroad who failed to be a global citizen. That would have completely defeated the purpose.
In “The Art of Coming Home” Craig Storti discusses this contradiction of a life experienced abroad reuniting with the life previously had in the home country. In coming home, I felt so lost in such a big, busy world of productivity and competition. Where did the value of relationships go? Why did no one smile and say hi as they passed on the street? What happened to the joy of flying a kite or playing soccer? Why did everything have to be so tied up in technology? In the 2 months I was gone, did everyone forget the pleasure in a simple face-to-face interaction?
I have realized a strong contradiction in our world. Father Gustavo Gutierrez, founder of liberation theology describes it as this. He says that there is a material poverty in the countries of Latin America. Many people lack the necessities of survival, yet they are often so joyful and grateful for what they do have. In the so-called developed world, where we have everything and more that we could possibly need, there is a spiritual poverty. All of the questions I faced when I came home reflected this. So what do we do about this? I have come to one, tiny, conclusion. That is, we need each other. So often people look at the poor and think If I help them and give them money or services, what are they going to give me? Ask anyone who has spent more than a few weeks with the joyful children in an orphanage in Honduras or the dying women in the slums of Calcutta, and they will tell you that what they gave was nothing compared to what they received in return.
We need each other. How simple this is, yet how hard it is for our world to understand the mutuality of our humanity. Yet it is the people who realize this that are changing the world. So, ahora qué? Ahora, we need people to take the experiences they have had and the things they have learned and change the world with them. These stories and experiences change us. And while we must find a balance in re-entering into our realm of responsibilities and stress, we must incorporate those stories and experiences into our “developed world”. In “Local Theologies, Local Solutions” Sedmak Clemens says, “We are bound by responsibilities. But we can make an effort to think about priorities, to discover the underside of our societies with the destinies and stories we encounter”. In living between two cultures, we will inevitably be faced with contradictions. What we make of them is what matters. That is what coming home crazy is all about. It is about looking at issues and being bothered by them, both home and abroad. It is about seeing our role in the problems of the poor, no matter how far away they are. We are connected due to the simple fact that we are all part of one world. But it does not do to just talk theoretically about it. We must act. People like Paul Farmer are wonderful examples of such action. In “Pathologies of Power” he takes his experiences and turns them into a social analysis for people, who cannot see what he has seen, to understand.
So where does this leave the case of the Finca del Niño in rural Honduras? A multitude of volunteers have been in and out of the Finca over the past 15 years. And every single one of them would tell you that that place has changed their lives. Whenever they have the chance, they talk about the Finca. Why? Because that is their way of making a difference now that they have left. That is, essentially, the point of this whole project for me. To show people what amazing things a small property on the orilla del mar in Hondruas is doing for the lives of hundreds of children. To show what unfair and inappropriate conditions these children were in to begin with, but how the love and devotion of a small group of people has literally turned their lives around.
To conclude, I would like to use a quote from the Apple campaign in the late 1990s.
“Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. - - The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo.
- You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them.
- Because they change things. They push the human race forward. While some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius.
- Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”
So, here’s to the voluntarios at the Finca, to the students in this class or anyone else who has come back with a passion to change the world, to you who are hopefully reading this wanting to now find some way to make a difference. Here’s to anyone and everyone who has ever seen inequality or disparity and wanted to change it.
Here’s to the ones who have come home crazy.
In my first essay, I wrote about the difficulties I had coming home from my time in Honduras. I had seen so much poverty yet so much joy. I wanted to bring all of the children back to the States and give them the amazing opportunities I have had, yet I would never want to corrupt their little bit of remaining innocence in the way this lifestyle would. The constant tug and pull of the contradictions of our world has been something I have struggled with over the past semester. As Bill Holm described in his essay, I feel like I have “come home crazy”. My struggle with this whole process has essentially been figuring out what to do now. I did not want to be, as Talya Zemach-Bersin says, just another American student abroad who failed to be a global citizen. That would have completely defeated the purpose.
In “The Art of Coming Home” Craig Storti discusses this contradiction of a life experienced abroad reuniting with the life previously had in the home country. In coming home, I felt so lost in such a big, busy world of productivity and competition. Where did the value of relationships go? Why did no one smile and say hi as they passed on the street? What happened to the joy of flying a kite or playing soccer? Why did everything have to be so tied up in technology? In the 2 months I was gone, did everyone forget the pleasure in a simple face-to-face interaction?
I have realized a strong contradiction in our world. Father Gustavo Gutierrez, founder of liberation theology describes it as this. He says that there is a material poverty in the countries of Latin America. Many people lack the necessities of survival, yet they are often so joyful and grateful for what they do have. In the so-called developed world, where we have everything and more that we could possibly need, there is a spiritual poverty. All of the questions I faced when I came home reflected this. So what do we do about this? I have come to one, tiny, conclusion. That is, we need each other. So often people look at the poor and think If I help them and give them money or services, what are they going to give me? Ask anyone who has spent more than a few weeks with the joyful children in an orphanage in Honduras or the dying women in the slums of Calcutta, and they will tell you that what they gave was nothing compared to what they received in return.
We need each other. How simple this is, yet how hard it is for our world to understand the mutuality of our humanity. Yet it is the people who realize this that are changing the world. So, ahora qué? Ahora, we need people to take the experiences they have had and the things they have learned and change the world with them. These stories and experiences change us. And while we must find a balance in re-entering into our realm of responsibilities and stress, we must incorporate those stories and experiences into our “developed world”. In “Local Theologies, Local Solutions” Sedmak Clemens says, “We are bound by responsibilities. But we can make an effort to think about priorities, to discover the underside of our societies with the destinies and stories we encounter”. In living between two cultures, we will inevitably be faced with contradictions. What we make of them is what matters. That is what coming home crazy is all about. It is about looking at issues and being bothered by them, both home and abroad. It is about seeing our role in the problems of the poor, no matter how far away they are. We are connected due to the simple fact that we are all part of one world. But it does not do to just talk theoretically about it. We must act. People like Paul Farmer are wonderful examples of such action. In “Pathologies of Power” he takes his experiences and turns them into a social analysis for people, who cannot see what he has seen, to understand.
So where does this leave the case of the Finca del Niño in rural Honduras? A multitude of volunteers have been in and out of the Finca over the past 15 years. And every single one of them would tell you that that place has changed their lives. Whenever they have the chance, they talk about the Finca. Why? Because that is their way of making a difference now that they have left. That is, essentially, the point of this whole project for me. To show people what amazing things a small property on the orilla del mar in Hondruas is doing for the lives of hundreds of children. To show what unfair and inappropriate conditions these children were in to begin with, but how the love and devotion of a small group of people has literally turned their lives around.
To conclude, I would like to use a quote from the Apple campaign in the late 1990s.
“Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. - - The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo.
- You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them.
- Because they change things. They push the human race forward. While some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius.
- Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”
So, here’s to the voluntarios at the Finca, to the students in this class or anyone else who has come back with a passion to change the world, to you who are hopefully reading this wanting to now find some way to make a difference. Here’s to anyone and everyone who has ever seen inequality or disparity and wanted to change it.
Here’s to the ones who have come home crazy.