One of the toughest things about volunteering is that, while the most joyful and rewarding experiences of your life will happen, the direction of your life’s path might also change. Once you have seen poverty, and more specifically – extreme poverty, you simply cannot continue to do nothing about it.
My whole family came down to visit me and my husband for a couple weeks between my first two Kiva placements, and my sister left Peter Singer’s latest book, “The Life You Can Save,” in my hands. I was telling my husband that when I read it, my heart starts pounding and I get angrier and angrier. I read a chapter and then look up to see a local Bolivian woman with a baby on her back, begging each person in the café for some coins. Then I look up and see something less glamorous, like a group of teenage glue-sniffers awkwardly stringing together sentences, also asking for money.
I remember reading that Marx wrote part of his Communist Manifesto from a basement during London’s Industrial Revolution. There was a window where he could just see feet marching by, the dirtied feet of the abused and exploited working class marching to the factories. I imagine the scene of anonymous dirty ankles and worn workers boots, one after another, and think my heart might’ve also pounded enough to produce a manifesto.
As I read Singer’s book, the toughest parts aren’t the statistics on poverty, but thinking of all those people back home, making lots of money and spending it frivolously without regard to the truly needy. But, in the end, I am happy that volunteering now – when young – allows me to choose an entire life of giving. Get on a plane, and come meet an illiterate Aymara woman raising eight beautiful, barefoot, and poor children, on a weaver’s salary. And her husband, who stands outside of local hardware stores to look for someone who needs an extra hand in their home construction. While they may not know the impact, you will find yourself forever indebted to the memory of that visit.
Latest posts by suzypm
- Redemption for Our Hearts, for Haiti - January 28th, 2010
- 33 Tips from Kiva Fellows in Latin America - December 2nd, 2009
- The Biggest Mistake Volunteers Make - October 30th, 2009
- Amazon Burning: Blog Action Day 2009 - October 15th, 2009
- So You Spin the Globe... - October 2nd, 2009
- When Boredom Attacks - September 25th, 2009
- The Harder Days - August 28th, 2009
- For the Best Fruit, You Gotta Go Out on a Limb - August 14th, 2009
- Where We Pull Apart, We Bind Together - August 3rd, 2009
