28 days, 100+ curries;

From the beginning of January through to the start of February, I undertook what could be described as "the trip of a lifetime". With a group of others from my High School, I travelled to India, where we spent time working with children in a remote primary school, among many other things. I don't want to go into detail about what these things were, because this post is about something much larger than the experiences I had. It's about what I learnt from my month spent in a developing country.
The first thing you notice when you arrive in India is the immense poverty that the majority of the country is living in. After being in the midst of it for a period of time, you really appreciate what we have in our first world societies . I found myself missing little luxuries that for the whole of my life I have been taking for granted. Examples: A comfy bed (of which I had 0 of for the month), a hot shower (of which I also had 0 of) and fresh (readily available)food. These are all things that I no longer take for granted, and I feel a better person for it. They are also things that most of the people I met in India go without their whole life, which leads me to lesson number two:
You really don't need money or material goods to live a happy, fulfilling life. The Indian's whom we associated with were in many cases more generous and welcoming than any Westerner, despite the fact that they were living in such severe poverty.
We really have many lessons to learn from these industrious people. So everyone out there living in a first world country, from America to Australia, think to yourself "I'm in a privileged position. Am I taking it for granted?"

VF.