i’m generally an analytical person -- overanalytical, sometimes (ok, often). everything that happens to me, everything i do and say, everything others do and say to me is usually subjected to some type of analysis. what does it mean? what are its implications for me, my life, the lives of those around me? what does it say about my world, or *the* world, generally? how should i change my perceptions based on this, how should i adjust my behavior accordingly?
so, naturally, being on the other side of the world and being sick non-stop for over a month have got me thinking. sure, everyone gets sick in india. last week, the interns were dropping like flies -- 3 other people in the office got delhi belly the same day i did, and a handful of others have had colds for the past week. india can be hard on everyone's immune system (it would be hard on mine if i had one, but we all know i have no immune system). ;-) really though, illness is a routine part of traveling to many parts of the world, india definitely being one of them. and i was expecting the routine illness, but i was not expecting this. i think if i had just gotten sick for a few days and gotten better, as most people do here, i wouldn't be wrapped in the constant analysis that i find myself wrapped in these days.
having been sick and miserable for quite some time now, i've had ample opportunity to try and figure out what's going on in my body, in my head, in my environment. i'm not sure i have the answer on any of those dimensions yet. i certainly don't know what's wrong with my body, since it's been over 2 weeks since my last dose of lariam and i still feel ill. that doesn't help what's going on in my head, since i frequently wonder if there's something seriously wrong with me, but i'm just trying to stay calm and rational and take as good care of my health as possible -- there's not much else i can do right now. but i still find myself sitting down and crying out of sheer frustration at least a few times a week. i can't travel the way i was planning to, i can't get as much done at work as i would like to, i just can't have the indian experience that i was planning on. and at this point, i don't really know why that is, since i don't really know why i'm still sick -- and that can be truly maddening. so i cry in frustration.
and then, i look around me. i'm surrounded by people whose daily, normal lives are much harder than mine is in its current aberrational state. yes, there are plenty of people in india who are rich and live very well. but the majority of the 1 billion people here have next to nothing -- many of them, even the ones with jobs, live in the street. they sleep on their vegetable carts or in their auto-rickshaws. they have no opportunity to truly rest, to ever be hygienic, or to enjoy pure food and water -- they drink the amoeba-ridden water from street taps, they eat the contaminated food on the street. yes, they're used to this lifestyle, but they still probably get sick all the time, have all kinds of ailments that they can't afford to attend to. and they just keep on surviving. that is their life as they know it, and they continue to live it.
and yet, here i am bemoaning by plight. why? because i've never been sick for this long before, i've never been sick when i'm away from my family before, i've never been to india before, and i've certainly never done all 3 at the same time. i like to think i'm a fairly resourceful, adaptable person. maybe i am, maybe i'm not. but even if i am, this might be a bit much to handle. i've been miserable and frustrated because, to me, this is bad. but, i live in an air-conditioned flat, i can afford to buy (relatively) clean food and water, and i can talk to my mom and my fiance in the US on the phone everyday. so even my present state of illness, to the vast majority of people around me, is not bad at all -- my life is actually pretty wonderful. relative to what i'm used to, i've been fairly miserable since i got to india. relative to what many of the people around me are used to, i've been living well since i got to india.
in fact, relative to these people, i've been living very well my whole life. i didn't grow up rich, and these days i'm a poor student who lives off loans. but i firmly believe that the poorest people in america are much better off than huge percentages of the world's population -- even those who are not considered poor where they live. that's the nature of the country i grew up in. america is a mixed bag; there are lots of good and lots of bad things about it. but i'm very grateful for having grown up there -- more and more so as i continue to travel to new places. my middle class existence in the suburbs meant that things that were standard to me -- potable water and temperature-controlled plumbing, a variety of clean food, an air-conditioned house, a comfortable non-infested bed to sleep in, television -- are unimaginable luxuries to plenty of people around the world. i don’t think i’m spoiled, by any means, but relatively speaking, my life has been and still is fabulous. i'm only miserable relative to what i've known thus far. which makes me realize, far more than i have before, how relative perceptions and emotions truly are.
on the plane from chicago to india, i wrote in my journal (a cherished practice that i refuse to give up, even after my conversion to blogging). i wrote about a lot of things, but mostly about gratitude. i have so much in my life to be thankful for. *so* *much* -- i'm blessed in so many ways that attempting a list of my blessings would be futile and silly. even now, i'm grateful.
so (in my usual spirit of analysis), i find myself wondering why this whole experience has been so mentally and emotionally difficult for me. truly, i have so much to be grateful for, and this really isn't all that bad, especially relative to how bad it could be. so why is this so hard for me? i know that at least part of it has to do with my expectations -- i wasn't expecting my experience to be this trying, so lack of preparation meant i didn't react as well as i could've (at least initially -- i'm sure i've improved as the weeks have gone by). i also know that part of it is that i'm a control freak -- not when it comes to other people and things, but definitely in terms of my own life and my own behavior and decisions. so, naturally, most of my tests have to do with learning to be detached and patient about things that i can't control. over the years, i have learned how to do that in various situations, but i'm always presented with new ones that i haven't mastered yet -- this is apparently one of them.
i've been praying a lot these days, maybe more than i ever have for any one period of time in my life. and i know there are plenty of other people praying very hard for me as well. and yet, i'm not well. who knows... maybe i would be a lot worse right now were it not for all the prayers. and... my mom once told me that God always answers prayers -- it's just that, sometimes, the answer is no. she also said that prayers always work -- but they work in the way they're supposed to work, not necessarily in the way we think they should work or expect them to work. so maybe i'm asking for healing or normalcy, and God is just saying no. the prayers are working, but for whatever reason, i need to be having this experience right now. of course it's good for me to be tested -- i'm learning, i'm growing, there's a wisdom and a blessing in this, just like there is in everything. there are a myriad ways -- both very concrete and abstract -- in which this illness and my consequent frustration benefit me. again, attempting a list would be futile.
for now, at least, i keep seeing my life relative to those of others and wondering what it is that i'm taking away from this experience. for instance, after a full month of feeling like hell, i started wondering what it's like to have a chronic illness. people who have cancer or AIDS are constantly trying to maintain their health -- taking meds, undergoing treatments, fighting low energy and trying to get lots of rest, generally not doing things others are able to do or that they would like to do. that's life for them. and i wonder if the harshness of that reality is mitigated at all by the fact that they know exactly what's wrong with them and they have to accept the long-term trajectory of their illness and their lives at the outset. would i be dealing with my illness better if i knew what it was, what it would entail, and how long it would last? probably. i know i'm frustrated, at least partly, because i feel like i'm supposed to be young and healthy, and there's nothing seriously wrong with me that i know of. so peace of mind helps, i think. but even now, even with my cognitive frustration, my several-week sickness is still not much relative to a true, serious chronic illness.
…i’ve also started wondering what this means for my future and my career. even assuming that it's the lariam that made me sick, i still have a very sensitive stomach and i generally get sick easily. so, taken together, does that mean i can't take malaria prophylaxis and i'm always gonna have an upset stomach? and would that mean that i just can't handle developing countries? i want to practice international law, i want to advocate on behalf of oppressed populations, and i want to see what it is that these populations are dealing with. but these populations often live in oppressive environments -- delhi is a fairly modern city, and it's nothing compared to the difficulty of a lot of places i could be working in this field. conditions could be a lot worse if i were in a more trying location, and my situation could be a lot worse, too.
so will i be stuck in industrialized countries for the rest of my life for health reasons? that's a frightening prospect. i don't want to be insulated from the problems of the world or the injustices that need to be remedied (which is one of the reasons i fear and loathe suburbia). i want to be able to go places and live places and see what's really happening in those places. to me, that's a good way to find inspiration and gain practical knowledge so that i can be a better agent of change. but what if i'm stuck doing research and writing reports in a sterile, air-conditioned office for the rest of my life?
yes, research and report-writing and policy-work are very important. but i don't want to be the pansy that has to do them from the safe confines of a medically equipped large city in a developed country because i can't handle the reality that most of the world deals with everyday. if that's what i'm relegated to, then so be it – i guess we can’t change our own biology. and i know plenty of people choose to work in palatial offices and get paid tons of money. i also know that even if i work in a large western city, i will probably never be anywhere palatial and i don't think i'll ever get paid much. so relative to those people's lifestyles, my lifestyle will not seem excessive or ridiculous to me. but relative to the lifestyles of the people that i would like to be helping, my lifestyle will seem isolated from their problems and perhaps too easy -- at least to me. i suppose i can't yet know how my future career plans will work out. but these past several weeks have given me cause for concern.
...i don't really have a neat little piece of wisdom to tie in a bow around all these musings. i'm not sure if i had planned on coherence or if i even had any idea how i expected to end this entry. apparently, i'm not going to be able to wrap it up, bring it together, and end it poetically. and i'm definitely not going to use some cliche like "its all relative" that fails to encapsulate what i've been thinking and feeling. not all pieces of writing resolve themselves, i guess – sometimes they just stop somewhere. i think i just wanted to say a lot of things that have been occurring to me for a while now, so i did, and now i will stop.
Posted by naseem at July 7, 2006 01:20 AMI don't know that where you are based when helping populations should affect the work that you're doing. In other words, whether you work in an air-conditioned office or a hut in a field, the work itself is still important. People can judge how much you are helping all they want, but the only thing that matters is that you are doing that work.
Besides, having money (and other resources) is not inherently bad. It may, in fact, give you the opportunity to be of even more service.
The mere fact that you are aware of the possibility of being insulated from the real problems of the world is already a step in the right direction. As long as you remain aware of it, you will have the right outlook.
Hope you feel better.
Posted by: Sholeh at July 7, 2006 04:06 PMah, nas. i love you. i am so moved by your candor, and i love you for questioning yourself and bringing yourself to account. i agree with sholeh that awareness is so key. congrats on that piece of it. i can relate - directly and indirectly - to what you're experiencing. i got seriously ill when i went to china ten years ago (as a side note, i can't believe it's been TEN years!!) and it lasted a good 2-3 weeks, which sucked since i was only going to be there for a few months anyway. it was a good lesson for me though, and i learned A LOT from the experience. it's all personal, though, and it's all relative, as you so poignantly indicate. hang in there, babe. it sounds like you're in exactly the right spot at the right time, even though it doesn't feel like it. trust... and, once again, i love you. :)
Posted by: delara at July 11, 2006 01:20 AM