My father has always told of how he and his family lived in poverty when he was a child. Being one of ten children during the era of World War II life was very hard. My father grew up on Cat Island, one of the many outer islands of The Bahamas. His parents supported their family by subsistent farming and fishing. As soon as a child was old enough he either joined his parents in the fields or stayed at home to take care of his younger siblings or helped out where ever he was needed. My father’s family was poor by the world’s standards but was rich in love and concern for each other, and they are still closely knitted to this day.
Although he loved reading and learning my father was only afforded a few years of school and as a result, he did not complete high school. As a young man, he traveled to New Providence, the capital island in the Bahamas in search of employment. He worked well with his hands and took the opportunity to apprentice with licensed electricians and obtained his three-phase license. With this skill, he was able to support his family. Today he is a strong believer in education and has ensured that all five of his children have completed high school and the minimum four years of college.
The country I will look at where poverty is still being felt in a great way is Haiti. I saw a documentary on National Geographic a few years ago that showed some of the people eating ‘cookies’ made from dirt to still the hunger pangs in their stomachs (Katz, 2010). I am so thankful to God to live in a country where there is food to eat and people do not have to resort to eating mud. Yes, I recall my father talking about eating ‘flour-pap’ a type of gruel made from flour and water and a little salt and sugar as available, but this is still much better than mud. Food prices around the world have gone up because of higher oil prices so Caribbean countries such as Haiti which depend on imports have been greatly affected.
As a result of global price hikes, together with floods and crop damage from the 2007 hurricane season, UN Food and Agriculture Agency to declare states of emergency in Haiti (Katz, 2010).
Reference
Katz J. (2010) Poor Haitians Resort to Eating Dirt. National Geographic News Retrieved from
Thank you for sharing your story. It is so touching and brings to life how very real poverty is. I cannot imagine how it must have been growing up in those conditions.
ReplyDelete