Day 18

It’s unbelievable that I’ve been living here in South Africa for 18 days already. The days have passed by too quickly, perhaps it’s because I’ve been enjoying my stay here. I must admit that rarely, if at all that I get home sick, minus the obvious things like family and friends………and of course real good Khmer home cooking meals. I was watching Amelie with my roommates last night when my sister called. You always get excited when you get a chance to talk to others from home. Besides it’s so much cheaper when they called me. It’s ridiculous how expensive it is to call from South Africa to Canada. Anyways, that call literally made my day since I got to chat with my sisters and my mom.

Each day you learn something new about yourself. I’ve always been an independent individual and did, said and went wherever I wanted too. But living in Canada…..heck a Western country we are so sheltered by issues that affect others daily in 3rd world countries. We have this mentality that when we see war, crime, or poverty on tv……….for that split second we feel bad, that’s such a horrible thing that’s happening, but we move on with our daily lives. Since I’ve been here you see the extreme differences in class. You see those that are disadvantaged and often neglected, like the young burnt victims at the school I visited this past week (Children of Fire – a school for severely burnt & blind children). And I keep asking myself why are there no one helping these people? And so you become frustrated with the system. . . . as we often do in such countries. I suppose I can only do my share.