"Oh the weather outside is frightful, but the fire is so delightful".... Not it's not Christmas, it's just winter in Cape Town.
What a winter it has been. Thankfully I missed out on most of the harsh winter weather while I was home in the States for 8 weeks, but in the four weeks I've been back it has been absolutely abysmal.
It is cold. Freezing in fact. It's almost become a joke. It's that bad. And the complaining about the weather is even worse.
Daily attire should include snorkel, flippers, wool socks, boots, snowsuit and a scarf to boot. It is one big wet wintry mess down here.
The wind here has been gale force for weeks now. They don't call this place the Cape of Storms for nothing. The rain comes in sideways and the hail comes on the hour. The house shakes and the thunder keeps booming. I feel like I live in a car wash.
Everything is flooded. The roads are flooded. The houses are flooded. Living Hope is flooded. You name it... it is flooded. It was literally raining inside the grocery store yesterday.
Here's an article published by our local paper about the damage, followed by some photos of Living Hope...
Living Hope parking lot... knee deep in water...
Row, row, row your boat...
The ducks have found a new home...
But today, I have never in all of my life been so grateful for the basics... for electricity, for running water and for a sturdy roof over my head. How quickly I am reminded of what we actually "need" to survive.
And I can't help but think of those that don't have what I have, even when I feel like I only have the basics. Oh how much I have learned. I'm learning a lot about my "American-ness" and all of the assumptions that my "American-ness" brings with it.
Assumption #1 - Obviously everyone in the world has running water.
Assumption #2- Obviously everyone in the world has electricity.
Assumption #3- Obviously none of our houses are going to be blown down by a winter storm.
Assumption #4- Obviously all of us go home to warm showers and hot meals and sources of heat to warm us up.
My eyes keep being openened. I keep being challnged. I keep learning.
I know that these experiences makes me grateful and keep me grounded and provide me with perspective, but I think that there must be more to it than even that. What does this teach me? What does it teach you? How then should we live?
Amy, being in Afghanistan for the last 6 weeks, it would be easy for me to just say "Ditto" to everything you just posted (except the winter part, it's HOT here).
It is truly shocking the ease with which we have everything in the states.
I too am learning about what we regard as "important", and how we are so spoiled.
Obviously you've been there much longer than I've been here, so I still have a lot of eye-opening, but the process has started.