Gratefulness: We Don’t Know What We Have Till It’s Gone

Water, education, dress codes all seem like common rights that everyone has, Right? WRONG! Starting at a very young age, we as first world children learn to take things for granted. We can look at common rights in our lives that not everyone around the world has access to. These four images demonstrate that,  the privileges that we as first world citizens, take for granted can only be truly appreciated when we see the differences in education, freedom of choice, and wealth between us and those in third world countries.

           How many of us use to run through the sprinklers as children? Or have had long hot

 

showers and stand there for a long time? We don’t think any of it, because we think “oh it is just water!” According to water.org(2014), a 5 min shower is more water than an average person in third world counties use in an entire day. Over 783 million people in third world countries do not have clean drinking water. The image on the right shows a young boy from a third world country that has a water bottle with dirty water and is still happy. The photographer uses posture and position of the little boy to illustrate the joy and pride of his water even if it may not be the cleanest drinking water.  Although the water is not clean the boy is very grateful that he has water to drink, shown from the huge smile on his face. How many of us, first world citizens would drink that water?  Even if we had to drink the water we wouldn’t be grateful for it, as we have always had an abundance of clean water to drink, thus proving the privilege of clean water taken for granted by us Canadians.

What are you wearing today?  Have you ever been told to change? For us first world citizens we have the freedom to wear what we want when we want. For those people in

different countries this isn’t the same right. The image on the left shows a Saudi Arabian woman dressed in cultural Hijab and Burqa, looking at a wedding dress. In Saudi Arabia women have to be completely covered from head to toe when they go out in public, as well as the head (oldest male) of the family can reinforces this rule at home. For this woman, she is forced to wear the hijab and burqa, although she wants to wear this dress on her wedding day.  Has there ever been a moment of time when there is something you want to wear, but culturally you are not able to wear or obtain it? No? Well in other countries this is a norm. The attitude in this photo shows a woman all in black from head toe, wishing she could wear the wedding dress. This is shown by the posture of the woman and the way she is holding the sash of the dress. Although you cannot see her face, one can only assume there is an image of longing that she displays. This photo enhances the idea, that there is a difference between dress codes and freedom of choice throughout first and third world countries, demonstrating how we take the freedom of dress for granted.

“I don’t want to go,” and “Do I have to” are a few things we as students from the first world think when it comes to school. The image on the right portrays the idea of how

privileged we are when it comes our education. This picture shows a school in a developing country. The photographer uses the attitude of the children to further show the children’s feelings towards their current education. Look up, how many peers are on their cellphones right now or talking. Now look back at the picture. Take a note on how all the children look engaged and truly involved in their class, in comparison to people in your school. The children in the photo are truly grateful for the opportunity to learn as it is not a common right for them to get education.  Look around your classroom do you see walls, do you have air conditioning, do you have desks? Though these children have none of these “basic necessities”, they are still grateful to go to school and learn in these conditions. The privileges we view as basic necessities are all absent but the children are still even more engaged than any classroom I have ever participated in. This proves that we take things such as education, books, computers, and teachers for granted.

          

           How much did you eat today? Let me guess. You had a breakfast, some snacks

before lunch, lunch, more snacks after school and then a dinner? The image on the left shows a large man at a table with the world in front of him and a little man standing beside the table collecting the scraps.  The large man symbolizes the first world countries and the small man symbolizes third world countries. The large man is so large showing how much we as first world countries have compared to the little man who is so small and scrawny with not much in front of him. You can see on the large man’s face that he is still unsatisfied by the amount of food he has, compared to the little man who has no food and is waiting patiently for the scraps from us. This clearly illustrates how we as first world citizens take the privilege of having food for granted and always having an abundance of food so that you never have to worry when your next meal will be.

In summation, we as first world citizens don’t truly understand how privileged we are till we look at what others have. Enjoy the little things in life because those little things to some people are their big things!

Image Reference 

Picture 1 

"Boy with Bottle." NALC. Kathy Jacobson, 14 Mar. 2014. Web. 9 June 2015. <http://thenalc.org/celebrate-water-sunday-2014/>.

           Picture 2

Larbi, Louafi. "A Woman Wearing a Hijab in a Shop." Times Live. Anonymous, 11 Dec. 2011. Web. 9 June 2015. <http://www.timeslive.co.za/ilive/2011/12/22/a-letter-to-islam-we-are-women-not-things-ilive>.

              Picture 3

White, Howard. "Indian Children Attend a School Run under a Bridge in New Delhi, India." The Guardian. N.p., 26 Sept. 2013. Web. 9 June 2015. <http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2013/sep/26/educating-world-children-developing-countries>.

         Picture 4

"Economics as If Gross Disparity Mattered." LIMITS TO WEALTH. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 June 2015. <http://www.limitstowealth.com/>.

Reference: 

http://arabsinamerica.unc.edu/identity/veiling/hijab/

http://water.org/