Joys of Living

Friends,

Never have I been so thankful to be living in the great dorm of Alumni Hall, Notre Dame. Despite its lack of air conditioning, personal space, functioning kitchen, and cleanliness, it is still the place that I proudly call home and one that I have so often taken for granted. I think that more often than not, we college kids like to complain about our living arrangement, whether it be our annoying roommate, lack of room to put all our stuff, or that the bathroom is all the way on the other side of the building. I know I have done my fair share of complaining. 

However, since I have seen the living conditions of the students attending the nursing school and SMK (school after high school, but not college) here, I have come to appreciate the simple luxuries that Alumni Hall provides. After playing soccer with some of the guys (more on that on a later post) they invited me over to their place to hang out. They all were excited for me to come by and show me around and teach my Indonesian / learn English. What they showed me was a 1 story building with a doorway, but no door. The walls were much like propped up garage doors. Only a .5 inch piece of cardboard separates the inside from the outside. The floor is just dirt and it consists of rows of bunk beds. Unfortunately I did not have my camera at the time since we just played soccer, but you could imagine living in these conditions. I’m sure most of us could not dream living like this, and yet, my friends were excited to show me. They were proud of where they lived. They didn’t show any discomfort living there. No complaints or anything. Maybe they don’t know any better, but they were perfectly content living like that. They had to boil their water, wash their clothes by hand, and deal with the hot and humid weather all year round, and yet they were content. 

I feel like although they have very little, we act poorer than they do. It seems like there is always something wrong in our life, something more that we want, or something better out there. This is something that I have experienced so often back at home, people that have everything but still feel like they have nothing. It is something I have been working on for a greater part of the year. I have been trying to view life and materialism as my friends here do: be content with what God gives you, and ask for nothing more. I find that this has made me a much more joy-filled person, and have seen much happier people here in Lela, Flores, Indonesia than in most of America. Although they have little to nothing, they have the one thing that surpasses most of us, and that is joy, one that I long to have as I spend the rest of my time here and for the rest of my life.