Top 10 Things I Appreciate More Than Before

(In no particular order, except for #1)

10. CLEAN WATER. Such a simple thing, really, and certainly something we take for granted. Not just for granted, we actually spurn our tap water for overpriced “cleaner” water packaged in plastic. I’m going to put my mouth under our faucet at home and just gulp when I get home.
9. WASH MACHINES. We don’t have a washer or dryer in our condo unit and I admit that I have whined on occasion about the walk down the hallway I have to make to do/change a load of laundry. Although there is something satisfying about hand-washing and air-drying all your clothes, I can’t wait to fall asleep in sheets emanating the smell of an artificial spring meadow.
8. TRASH CANS. In a country where so many people struggle just to survive (literally, as in to live and not die, not as in to how do to pay the bills or manage their maxed out credit cards) it’s understandably hard to get the population fired up to stop dumping trash everywhere. The omnipresence of garbage does make me grateful for the public bins, recyclable containers and trash collectors back home that I usually don’t give a second thought to.
7. ELECTRICITY. Yet another luxury I expect to be able to depend on all the time. Temporary power outages make top-of-the-hour news in Chicago. Here, there are daily outages at unpredictable times and for unpredictable lengths. Truthfully it doesn’t impact our routine all that much, we just take out our flashlights, light the candles and carry on.
6. WARM WATER. Enough said.
5. TAB. Is it the bright pink can that says, “I was made to appeal to women in the 60’s”? Is it the indescribably unique taste, somewhere between cherry coke and iced tea? Is it the slight film that coats your mouth after every sip? Is it the bold use of a saccharin blend, undaunted by rat-cancer studies? Or is it because my Dad bought it when I was a kid and I didn’t know it was diet so I drank it and never looked back? All of the above, my friend, all of the above.
4. RAIN. It’s been weeks since it rained and while it still makes me smile to wake up every day to a golden sunrise, the air is so dry and dusty it irritates your nose and throat and there’s a layer of red dirt on absolutely everything.
3. CHEESE. What an amazing food that can be enjoyed in so many varieties and in so many ways! Parmesan (on Mom’s Saturday night spaghetti sauce), mozarella (on those crackers from Specialty’s), cheddar (a cube on a toothpick, neat), feta (on a big Greek Salad), Velveeta (okay, not quite cheese but still really good)...I could go on but I don’t want to dream about cheese again so I’ll stop.
2. FRIENDS AND FAMILY. Thanks to the internet (even the internet of the 1990s that we have here) I haven’t felt as isolated as I’m sure I would have without it. Still, I deeply miss the circle of people with whom I talk, laugh, celebrate, share, analyze, and eat with semi-regularly and am looking forward to reconnecting when I return.
1. MY PARENTS. I’ve had people comment that I am brave for doing this but the truth is that I was hard and soft-wired by my parents in a way that makes going to Nepal to teach for a couple of months seem not all that brave. My mom and dad travelled with four small kids in tow to Africa and then lived there for months at a time, and they did this TWICE. That’s brave. Having a child (or four) and not just providing them with every material need and quite a few luxuries but also a first class education and an unwavering knowledge of their unconditional love and support, and then continuing to love, nurture, support, laugh and cry with them through adulthood, now that’s amazing. I just had to give up Tab and a few conveniences, hand over the logistics of my life to my fabulous husband, and go with the flow. My parents are the bomb.