Love Your Toilet

Latrines are not a joking matter. We take our toilets for granted. In Nicaragua, people with latrines are privileged, because most people here do "their business" on holes on the ground. In most Nicaraguan communities, there is no running water, so the thought of building a flushing toiled is unheard of, therefore, never take your toilet for granted.

Last year, I went on the yearly school trip to Nicaragua, and if you do a little research, you will find that it is the second poorest country in the globe.

The most remarkable thing I observed in the duration of this trip was that the rural members of the poor communities we worked on, were the happiest and most thankful individuals I have ever met to this day. You have to keep in mind, that 68% of the Nicaraguan population lives off less than $1 a day, and their daily goal is simple, to survive

During the trip, we experienced what it was like to be a Nicaraguan for an entire week, meaning bathing with a bucket of cold water, the non-stop diet of beans and rice, no wifi, mosquito nets, and the latrines. I had never been to an area where the poverty was nearly the whole population; yes I have seen poor areas in different parts of the world, but in small chunks…never in such a mass like it was in Nicaragua.

The people in Nicaragua were so much more appreciative than most American individuals that literally have it all, which was something that I looked back to and thought about after coming back from Central America. Most kids in the community we visited had no shoes; the “houses” they were living in didn’t have a stable floor, so as soon as it rained, these houses would quickly flood. The outsides of the houses were made out of debris or trash, to be entirely honest. The kids in this community had nothing compared to the things we have in our daily bases that we aren’t thankful for because its something we automatically expect to receive. These young children were always wearing dirty clothes, had never seen an advanced cell phone in their lives, had no toys, didn’t have a place to wash themselves, had absolutely nothing, and yet they always had a smile on their face, and were thankful for the little they had.

After this trip, I am a more appreciative individual, and make sure I thank my parents daily, for whatever it might be. I will be attending this year’s Nicaragua trip again, only because I thought the trip had an immensely positive impact on me. Seeing all the needy have such bright smiles on their face everyday, even thought they were simply trying to survive after the day was over, was something hard to understand at first. We complain and are not thankful enough for what we have, and this trip taught me to appreciate more, because there is people in the world that have nothing, and I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to see it with my own eyes.