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Idol of Un-Wealth
8/19/09
My experience post-Trek has been a little different than those of most other students, since I'm still in India. However, I'm in a different part of India and doing completely different things, so I have definitely experienced some of the same things as my friends who have returned to the U.S.
I think for most of us, it's been a mix of positives and negatives, since we're happy to see our families and friends, sad to be away from our Trek family and new friends in Kolkata, and struggling to re-integrate or re-form ourselves in light of what we learned. I'm really unhappy to be away from the group. We're in touch via email and Facebook, but that's just not the same as falling asleep and waking up together, with people two feet away on all sides and someone's foot in your face.
Coming out of the program has been strange because I think I had an idea that after participating in a Christian mission trip I would have everything figured out. I know that God did some really critical work in me over the past four weeks, but now is when the real work begins.
I realized I'd put "India" into a neat box that looked a lot like lower-class Kolkata, but not much like the rest of the sub-continent. In my excitement for simplicity, I'd forgotten how to appreciate God's gifts.
There are lots of places in the Bible where God rewards people with material blessings, like money and family and comfort. However, I've had a really hard time accepting those things. I thought I had stopped participating in the idolatry of wealth, but it turns out I was only worshipping the idol of "not having wealth," or self-deprivation for its own sake. This is just the other side of the money-worship coin.
It's hard to know how to communicate about the trip. Sometimes I just want to sit alone with memories and my knowledge of exploitation and be tragically unhappy. Sometimes I want to sit someone down and make them listen for hours and hours; and sometimes I just want to shout at the world, throw out air conditioners, boycott shopping and make everybody drive rust buckets.
I thank God I went on the Trek. It was horrible in a lot of ways and I will say that the program has its flaws, but through it all, God had room to work and amazing things did happen, including my own growth. I got to put faces to concepts like poverty, suffering and development.
Now instead of statistics, I will remember visiting friends from my placement in 8x8 rooms with one bed and a bathroom and kitchen shared between several families. I will remember the beggars in the metro station, sprawled out next to the dogs. I will remember the women who face abuse for being female and for stepping out of their homes. And I will remember the contradiction of multi-story apartment buildings erected next to winding, twisted neighborhoods that seem lost in time.
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