Slums

Doesn't even matter the country - I see it over and over and it is getting to the point that I almost don't SEE it for how horrible it really is. I want to stay tender to the people who live in houses made of whatever cast offs they can scrounge up. The contrast is often so great with what I come home to, I reel for days.

This last trip witnessed a woman's meal of stinking garbage gathered after the trucks dumped the days old remains of airplane food into the garbage mounds where she lived. One bagged and smashed roll and the remains of what I knew to be an apple pie only because of the label. And this to feed her and her six kids.

Thousands - THOUSANDS - lived this life where I was visiting. But, I could leave. I did. I flew home and couldn't eat my airplane meal because I saw over and over in my mind where it might go.

Far worse was the story of the young, beautiful girl I met. I won't post her photo here, but believe me, her eyes would haunt you. At nine years old, she was brutally raped - so badly, in fact, that she no longer has a uterus. She has tested positive for hiv and other stds. Why did she get raped? One reason is because her mother was too poor to put her into school. So, she was home alone. They have not found the man or men who did it, and she won't talk about it.

Gotta run. Time to go to out to eat or buy more stuff. Life is so tough when you really wish you had granite countertops . . . .