Garden of Simple

I was feeling pretty dizzy and unfocused the last couple of days. Yesterday morning while getting into a Taxi, a man grabbed the door and grabbed my arm. I had about enough time to look up at his very cut and scraped face and to register the glassy-eyed look of a drug user when the cab driver reached across me, pulled the door shut and slapped the man's hands away, shouting something I didn't catch in Darija. I looked over at the driver and said "La Afhim?" ("I don't understand?") and he didn't say anything. I realized later that this was actually kind of a terrifying thing, but I didn't feel scared. In fact I promptly forgot the entire incident, until today.

This afternoon I took a nap in the lovely garden outside of Alif. Afternoon naps = the best possible idea.

(This made me think about the Ani Difranco song "garden of simple" and that is where the name of this post comes from.)

Yesterday we had a class meeting and discussed various issues about our host families and our home stays. I think that most of us feel pretty lucky on the whole, and those who are having problems are finding them manageable enough, or at least better than the unknown. I didn't bring up something at the meeting, and I'm not even sure if I ought to now. I am having a difficult time ignoring the blatant disparity between my own opportunities and those available to my host sister. She's exactly the same age as me. She's also a college student. But while I'm given the biggest room in her house she shares one room with her mother, sister and brother. While she wakes up to make me breakfast, spends the evening cooking me dinner, and the time between shopping for food and helping her mother cook and clean, I get to spend the day studying, napping, shopping, and going to cafes with my friends. Her family depends upon the money they get housing students and so taking care of me & my roommate is how she helps support them all. She had a major exam this week and barely had time to study.

Back in America, I think of myself as pretty poor. I share a 2-bedroom apartment with 3 other girls, we all work for just more than minimum wage, I have no health insurance and I qualify for all kinds of need-based aid. This experience is really putting the relative comfort of what I consider "poverty" in my own life and what actual poverty looks like.

It's not fair. My host sister should have the same chances I do. She should get to travel, she should get to spend her days tending to her education. It's just not fair. I understand that we don't actually live in a simple world, but I think the parallels between Senna and I make this injustice more obvious to me. I don't know what to do with this emotion. For now I'm trying to participate more in the house work, and eventually the cooking as well. It isn't enough, but at least it makes me feel better.