15 May Realization in Every Life Experience
When did I last thank God for this life????
I don’t exactly remember when? Guess I never did. I had only remembered him on my bad days. “God why always me?” After this particular experience (which I am going to write here), I guess an ignorant part of me has woken up. I thank god for this life.
We complain because we forget. We forget to appreciate what we have been blessed with. For us, we only possess very little share of everything. Nothing is ever enough for us. This is being human. This is Me. This is You. This is Us.
We always have so much to say but very little to do. As a Social Work student, theories that I had learnt during my Bachelor level were just limited. It seemed to me that their only purpose was for the degree. By the time I graduated, I realized action is a key to a purposeful living. Hence, I joined SAATH to learn about social work practice pragmatically.
It’s been two months, since I have been working here in SAATH as a volunteer for the Hakuna Matata project. Every day has been a learning experience and last Wednesday I got a chance to go for a home visit. Home visit of the kids of Hakuna Matata. I have read about the importance of Home Visit. But never have I imagined that this home visit would compel me to think this complex. I was all excited for my first Home visit. I even internalized the principles of social case work, thinking that they would help me to act rationally. But in the field, I realized how hard it is to act out what you have studied. Upon hearing the hardship of life, the people whom I visited have been facing, I was emotionally driven by. I knew it that I had to control my emotional involvement. But this emotion, I couldn’t keep a hold on. I had a fight going on inside my head and thank god, it was inside me. Not that a scene visible for public. And I have to pour it down, my emotion-I mean and couldn’t find a better way than this– writing.
I got an opportunity last Wednesday to go for a home visit with Chandni Didi (Program co-coordinator of Hakuna Matata) . We visited three families and a NGO where kids infected and affected by HIV/AIDS are living with their parents and guardians. I had met these kids before. It was on a two-days- workshop where I got to know these amazing kids and their even more amazing families. I tell you why I am using this adjective “amazing.” Upon looking at them, I realized how small my problems are. How effortless my struggles of life are. And how naïve I am about life.
Amidst of everything going on in their lives, these kids and their parents are still hopeful about life. They are happy about the little they have got. . That is when I felt how naïve I am about life. Living with HIV/AIDS is one of the most difficult challenges one has to live with. It takes a lot of courage to cope with something that can be life changing. But what I learn from them is that HIV/AIDS don’t stop you living a long, happy and fulfilling life. There are many misconceptions about what it means to be living with /AIDS. If one gets the right treatment and support, it is possible to live as long as the average person. I experienced the same in that Home Visit. And for me, if superheroes exist, they are these parents and their kids. They have got social stigmas to face, poverty to live in and physical instability to deal with. But they seem calm and hopeful. They are vibrant and level-headed. They are hardworking and very generous enough to offer us food even though it is difficult for them to manage it. This should be the spirit of living. Take life as it is, understand the frustration, grow along with the struggle and live the life.
Contributed by Alisa Bajracharya (Volunteer for Hakuna Matata)