courtney's india journal - July 1

I'll never forget tonight. It's our last night, and Sarah and I were on our way back from dinner going to our hotel. We walked by a sleeping baby on the sidewalk. He had to have been under a year old...laying down on a piece of cardboard, covered up by a worn-out little piece of cloth. As normal as this is on the streets of India, it really hit me because it was the first time I'd seen a baby sleeping by itself on the streets. And I guess it didn't affect me until later when I thought about it, when I pictured that little baby. Walking down the streets it's hard to be affected by all I see because I just get so used to it. The poverty becomes normal. The images of people laying on the ground is something I saw all the time. Picturing that little baby in my mind, I can't get it out of my head. Sleeping so peacefully, but knowing what a hard life that little person has. Why does this happen in our world? Why is there so much poverty, but also so much wealth? It made me question my own life, how can I continue living the way I do when I know there are little babies without a bed to sleep in? Little babies growing up learning how to beg before they can walk, before they can even talk they are pointing to their mouths motioning for me to give them food. Little babies...oh it blows my mind...it breaks my heart. For the first time I feel like my heart has broken. It makes me sad and confused that it happened the day before we leave. I feel like I've been so excited to be here, just loving the culture and the people and everything, that the poverty is just part of it all. But tonight I feel like things changed for me. I saw the injustice of our world, how unfair it is that millions of people are living on the streets when others are living in mansions. My heart breaks for the poor and oppressed, those who seem to have no hope, who live such hard lives. My heart breaks for wealthy Americans, like myself, who have no clue what it would be like to have no place to live, no clue what it means to be poor.