Originally Posted by Lisanne
Thanks for posting the info. I could live on oranges and limes and plantains and chicken & vegetable stews...
I was noticing how very clean and healthy the schoolchildren looked. Of course, with the daily lunches and uniforms, maybe they're better off than other kids there, but still, things look primitive but not actually terrible.
No bugs? Maybe I'll move there...
all the people in the country are clean and healthy. also, neither fat nor skinny. they get the lunches, but they eat fresh foods at home also. definitely primitive, but not unlivable. they drink bleached water or rainwater that they catch in barrels. remember, they're not cold so they don't need hot food as much as we do, or warm clothes. they hardly need clothes. they do their hard work, they feed their families and eat with them and they relax before sleeping. in the houses there are two or three bedrooms. one for the parents, one for the children, one for the grandparents. when the boys become young men, the houses are added on to for another room or the young men sleep in the common room.
the city people are less lucky, actually. just as clean, but mostly no jobs. they can't be self-sustaining. i don't know where they work if not in tourism. some in construction and other odds-and-end jobs, like storekeepers, etc. but only a small percentage. whole families live together to make it. they really can't manage if one youngster leaves for england or america. it keeps the young ones trapped. and they don't believe in ANY kind of birth control. even the kind that the catholic church allows.
when you talk to the hotel staff, they ask about how you live, do you live in a house, how many families do you share it with, is it attached to a store, how many children do you have, does everyone have a job, can you save money, how big is your house, how many rooms do you have, do you really have a car? two? did your children go to high school (it's not free there), university, vocational training? do you have a lot of clothes, do you go to a lot of different places? they cannot imagine any of this being real. it's only a fairy tale from t.v. they want to know if everyone is rich. they don't understand that it takes saving to go on this vacation,because in the city they can't save enough to buy a motorbike, the rents are too high and they have to buy all their food. also, in the cities the kids MUST go to school and finish grade 8, however old they are, so they're not available to work, but they still eat. and by then some of them have families of their own. the country folks are a lot better off than the city poor, as always.
they want to get out, but when they do, they can't compete with better educated people around the world and then they want to come home. they also don't want to be cold in an unfriendly city.