Thank you Laura for graciously agreeing to share your experiences with us.
After a guest post at Fake Plastic Fish, I was invited to write here about my green journey. I spent the last year volunteering at an orphanage in Mexico and the experience shaped many of my views about the world. At Fake Plastic Fish, I wrote about waste being a luxury. It is a luxury to waste food, clothing and other resources. Working at the orphanage also taught me that the best moments in life can be found without using planetary resources.
I worked with a section of 29 teenage girls at Nuestros Pequeños Hermanos, a home for orphaned, abandoned and disadvantaged children. I had the role of mom for these amazing, young girls. We didn’t have much, but we passed the time playing sports, swimming, studying, watching movies (only on the weekends) and talking.
I built lasting relationships. Our lives weren’t about acquiring new toys, we made due with what we had. My favorite moments at the orphanage didn’t involve lots of resources. We didn’t entertain the kids with computer games or by buying them new toys. We went for walks and talked about life. We organized swimming races in the pool. We made up dances and had a dance contest with the other kids. We did scavenger hunts. We made a haunted house out of mostly bed sheets. We went for runs. We read together.
I learned to treasure the simple things in life instead of worrying about who had the nicer handbag. Those things stopped mattering. It taught me that caring about the environment does not mean deprivation. Using less resources can actually enrich your life.
Below is a picture of Laura with 2 girls she cared for at Nuestros Pequeños Hermanos
Thank you Laura for reminding us that having fun does not always have to cost $ and that spending quality time together is what matters most.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment