The
nature of the volunteer opportunity that I have acquired in the Office of the
Governor in West Hawaii is such that I cannot really share much of anything
that I have been doing with you. This blog is essentially the minutes of my
trip, written down and carefully organized by who and where and what and how it
felt. And as you can guess, the most enthralling part of working in the Office
of the Governor is meeting and handling the constituents who come in there. I
have met such extraordinary characters, criminals, and down rights nut cases,
but due to the privacy contract I signed upon taking on this volunteer
position, I am unable to share any of these people and their problems with you.
When I informed my mother of this fact, she simply said “in a few years, with a
few different names”. So maybe I’ll do that, better read the fine print on my
volunteer agreement first though…
What
I can relate here is everything I’ve been doing outside the office, though that
might get boring so I’m narrowing it down to just the things that fit into the
school of thought I’ve been entertaining lately. Merely describing our time
here does not do the Big Island justice because it’s not as action and
adrenaline packed as the cliffs and hikes and jungle adventures we had on the
farm on Maui. But it’s certainly been just as exciting. Yes, I work in an
office, and yes, I wear shoes everyday. But I also talk to every kind of person
you can imagine. And seeing as Barbara has invited us into her life, we’ve
become a part of it.
In
any conversation regarding my gap year, the words “travel is important” are
almost guaranteed to come up. And after I’d said and heard them enough, I
really thought about why I believe that’s true. And what I’ve come up with so
far is that I want to travel so that I can collect enough experiences and
perspective to help me understand who I am and inspire who I want to be. I feel
that to really know myself, I need to know me in comparison to people,
lifestyles and places that aren’t me. The concept of self is relative; there is
who you are and who you are in contrast to everyone else. You can claim to be
extremely adaptable, until you find yourself uncomfortable in a new place, and
watch as someone else slides through with ease. And then you can consider how
truly adaptable they are, and accept and be content with the fact that you are
simply not them, or strive to be more like them. The same can be said for
lifestyles you observe, as well as attitudes, morals and practices. When you
experience something new, you understand better who you are by accepting what
you’re not, or stand inspired, by who you could be.
Self-financing
has definitely made me think about who I’d like to be in terms of how I use
resources. Barbara is putting a roof over our heads from the kindness of her
heart, but Claire and I are not complete mooches so we’re paying for our own
food. Aside from a brief and heavily bullshitted Econ project, I have never
done my own food budgeting for a long term plan. And it hasn’t been as easy as
you might think. The real reason for that is that Claire and I are a certain
type of consumer. We’re not particularly wasteful or greedy; we grew up
recycling and being resource conscious, composting and saving leftovers. But
we’ve always had a broad and plentiful supply of resources, even if we have
been careful with them. Simply put, Claire and I eat like people who have
always had enough to eat. We eat like people who have had choices regarding
what they want to eat. Because that’s who we are. So as pre-college students
with tight budgets from our own hard earned cash, we had to get over the
concept of surplus. It’s a very middle class American concept, to have a whole
fridge full of food, a whole pantry and shelves and cupboards, from which you
can pick and choose what you eat and eat whenever you want. Why not instead
shop for just what you need for the week, and buy exactly what you need for the
meal, instead of buying the ingredients for every meal ever invented and then
just picking the ones you want. Why not eat and shop in such a way that you
never throw food out because it’s gone off or sat for too long, because what
needs to get eaten does and what doesn’t, doesn’t exist. So we’re learning, and
it’s been an education. Lesson one: a lack of surplus does not mean you’ll be
hungry.
The past few weekends, we’ve left Kona
to go down South with Barbara to her country house in Captain Cook. For the 30
or so years that she and her family have lived there, at least 10 of those
years were spent off the grid. Off the grid living is extremely common here;
many people have built their own homes on their own land and they value that
seclusion. The house had electricity put in a while back, but still runs on
it’s own tank water. There is a huge metal cylinder outside the back kitchen
door and all of the water for the house is stored there. Rainwater adds to it occasionally,
but for the most part it has to be filled up and then used sparingly. Filling
up means you need a friend with a pick up truck and a lot of very large plastic
containers. Also, it’s not potable. So drinking water has to be acquired
elsewhere. When Claire and I arrived at the house, there were just a few inches
left in the tank. We flushed the toilets using old bathwater kept in buckets.
Dishes were all sat in one side of the sink to soak, scrubbed, and then set in
the other side to all be rinsed in one inch of water. On our way up to the
house, we had stopped by the pump and filled up a few large jugs with drinking
water. We stayed three days, and on the third day, we were rather anxious to
bathe. Barbara filled about one third of the old bathtub with scalding water
and I went first. I sat in the hot water and used biodegradable soup and then
washed my hair and rinsed it by using a cup to dump water over my head. There
was something about the simplicity of the whole thing that was comforting. I
hadn’t used a bath to actually wash since about age eight. Baths were a leisure
activity, for soaking in hot water with salts. But with limited water, running a
shower for any more than a minute and a half would use more water than a full
tub. So I washed in the tub. And then Claire washed in the tub, in the same
water I used, just a little soapier and not so hot. And then we put it all into
buckets and used it to flush our toilet and water the plumeria trees outside.
And as we drove away on the thistle filled dirt road, I looked back at the old
house and considered the way I was accustomed to living and if I wanted to make
what I was accustomed to doing into what I would do for the rest of my life. If
I do, I’ll be using a lot more water than Barbara does.
The
house in town is fully on the grid, but because we’re essentially taking a
freebie from Barbara for living there and the utilities, I’m more conscious
than ever about what and how much I’m using. At the end of the day, we’re not
paying her any rent, but every shower we take, light we turn on, load of
laundry we do, and phone charger we plug in, she pays for. So I’ve made how I
use resources shorter, less frequent and more efficient. I guess where I’m
going with this whole thing is that how we consume is totally altered when A.
you start paying for it B. there is a tangible limit C. someone is gifting it
to you.
When
I tell people I’m in Hawaii, they immediately assume beautiful beaches and
sunsets, ocean side pools, drinks with umbrellas, sundresses and unlimited
beach days. It is beautiful and I have been to the beach, but for the people
who live and work here (and for those of us who join in) paradise still
requires maintenance. We work in an office from 7:45am to 4:30pm Monday through
Friday and we are just volunteers. Everything in Hawaii is more expensive than
the mainland and to get a solid public education is much more difficult.
Barbara owns her land in the country, but she also hauls her own water and has
to go to a separate pump in order to get anything that is safe to drink. Hawaii
is beautiful, but being here has reminded me how grateful I am to have grown up
drinking tap water that never ran out because my parents paid the bill.
Barbara
doesn’t like Thanksgiving because of the gluttony and indulgence that the
holiday has come to represent. I’ve never liked Thanksgiving that much because
I find it boring. But in the true spirit of giving thanks, tomorrow I’ll be
grateful for what I’ve been given, including the ability to work for what I
need, independently. I am grateful for the family that provided for me, taught
me to provide for myself, and always provides love. A common plight associated
with the liberal, middle class, young, educated, and self-aware individual is
the oppressive guilt they feel about the privileges they have. I understand
that guilt, been there homie. But something else that I’m beginning to
understand is that feeling guilty isn’t really what should take priority. So
you have clean drinking water and a healthy sized pantry? Be grateful for it.
And be considerate. Use only what you need and be grateful that it has been
provided for you. Don’t get bitter about it, don’t get angry with your peers
because they don’t understand your struggle against your privileged up bringing
and lifestyle and that you’re sensitive and you feel the plight of the third
world. Don’t be snotty about a quality of life that most people are striving
for. Be grateful and gracious. Appreciate what you have, use it wisely, and
then make an effort to give back. Volunteer, travel, teach, learn, strive to
understand what makes your lifestyle different from the people you meet, and
then, do something about it.
