I'm Back

After almost a month in Ireland, basking in the luxury of a warm open fire, lots of fish (scallops...ahhhh), retail therapy (too poor to buy anything and there's just too much choice), running hot water on tap (pardon the pun), parents, relatives and friend who utterly spoiled me, roads that are mostly (though it depends on where in ireland you are driving) that are fully paved and devoid of enormous potholes, generator-free (though definitely not free) electricity... well, it was nice.

but you know, Ireland is RICH! And people are SPOILT. Not in a spoilt child way though not far off it.... We have SO much and I'm not sure that the gratitude is there but you could say that for most if not all developing countries. It doesn't make it right though. Shops are just full to the brim of products, people are in a spending frenzy. Okay, it was Christmas so spending had reached epic proportions. And although this is the society in which I grew up in, though it wasn't nearly as rich until around ten years ago, it still shocked me to the core for the first time in my life.

I sat in my parent's bed (I'm still a child), on the second morning home, and was able to look fairly objectively around the room - from the lush bedspread covering me to the matching curtains, beautiful pictures, coloured TV, built in wardropes, electric blanket etc etc etc and I can honestly say that no Tanzanian, that I have met anyway though I am sure they must exist, lives a life of such luxury. My parent's house is not opulent or decadent in any way - they're just comfortable and very typical of any middle class family. But it's a very, very comfortable lifestyle.

Although I could certainly look at my old world in a new perspective, it never felt alien to me. in fact I fitted in pretty quickly and became immune to my cozy surroundings within a very short time. And I know when I go home, it will become that way.

But I would like to think and I certainly hope that I will never, ever forget how very lucky we are. I hope that I can always look at the world I was lucky enough to be born into and appreciate that not everyone lives this way. I hope that I can give a little more than I used to and know that by doing so, I will be far richer. I am not a different person for having lived here - hopefully I'm just a little bit more enlightened and appreciative and fingers crossed, just a tiny bit wiser.