Giving Thanks: A List

I am currently stuck in South Africa because the Nigerian Embassy in Washington's concept of "expedite" is very different from mine. I had to overnight my passport there mid last week to get a business visa to enter Nigeria, where I should be right now. So far the Nigerians (at least those working for the immigration service) are living up to the stereotypes (absolutely hilarious stuff here) that other Africans have of them - they don't answer their phones, they don't return messages, their working hours are a misnomer all around, they're extraordinarily rude, and you have to bribe them to get them to do anything.

Yes, I realize making broad generalizations like that about the 160 million Nigerians is the same thing as saying all Americans drive around in the most fuel inefficient pickup trucks available, equipped with semiautomatic rifle racks that enable short reaction times for when they come across Muslims, but this has been a horrendous experience and I'm furious with them.

I also spent the better part of the past two days dealing with the general incompetence of our IT organization - my computer had been battling a virus for the past month or so (we think we traced it back to sharing files on memory sticks in Kenya... if that isn't a perfect metaphor for the HIV / AIDS pandemic here...), but it finally succumbed to the disease the other day. Turns out IT's solution was to install a third antivirus tool and re-run all the scans... Gee, I wish I had thought of that. Anyway, I spent all evening yesterday trying to fix the problem myself (as well as attempting to raise hell with the immigration service in Nigeria, the Nigerian Embassy in Washington, the US Embassy here, and the US State Department), which I think I've finally done.

Along with everything else that has happened on this trip, those experiences and the holiday inspired me to make a list of reasons (in no particular order) for why we should be thankful for being born in the US / the West in general.

World travelers, what else should be added to the list?

Reasons we should be thankful for living in the US:

• It is generally not necessary for hotel security staff to outnumber guests


• You typically don’t have to worry about your hotel’s housekeepers banging on your door at 6:30am, yelling that they need to borrow the ironing board for another guest


• If it’s after 8pm, you have retail options that don’t involve fried (or more accurately, “soaked in warm animal fat”) chicken, inventory stored in roadside garbage bags, or prostitution


• Businesses operating hours aren’t determined by a daily spin of the wheel of fortune


• Prices are printed on tags and aren’t calculated using a sliding scale based on a light meter reading of skin pigmentation


• You don’t have to pay people for guiding you out of your parking spot


• You can’t get black lung disease from riding public transportation


• Bathrooms are preferable, clean alternatives to street corners and alleys


• Gutter puddles are a nuisance, not a primary source of drinking and cooking water


• You don’t have to re-use cooking oils for days because you can’t spare the penny to walk a few kilometers and buy a tablespoon of new oil that you carry home in your reused plastic bag (though my grandma grew up in Oklahoma during the Great Depression and she used to save cooking fats)


• Going to school is a more lucrative option for families than having your kids do barefoot tumbling and gymnastics on dirt streets littered with rotting food waste, petroleum residues, and human / animal waste


• You can afford to buy shoes for your kids, even though they need a new pair at the bank-breaking rate of at least once a year (maybe more? I have no point of reference when it comes to kids)


• You don’t have to prioritize nutrition and health care for your livestock (village food source and difficult to transport to distant veterinary facilities) over your children (village food drain and more mobile)


• When bribery happens, it’s at least for respectable sums (Chicago and some Congressional Representatives excluded)


• When you ask five people for directions, you don’t get eight different responses, all absurdly, inexplicably, wildly false (Boston excluded)


• When you run out of all other options, you don’t have to go get yourself infected with HIV in order to qualify for the local soup kitchen


• The majority of adults don’t think “burning dinner” is a perfectly justified reason for beating a woman


• Criminals and the mentally deranged can afford to actually load their semiautomatic weapons with bullets (er, wait…)


• Security guards can afford to actually load their weapons with bullets (ok, better)


• When you order a medium Diet Coke, you don’t get a Dixie Cup filled with Coke Light, and you don’t have to worry about the ice poisoning the drink


• You associate the smell of chlorine with lazy summer days, not safe, thirst-quenching refreshment


• You don’t have to first test the sink for running water before lathering up with hand soap


• Restrooms involve toilets and toilet paper, not toxic waste pits and watering pots


• Washing your clothes is a nuisance to be put off as long as possible, not a backbreaking work day in its own right (trust me… it takes about two hours to do a very light week’s worth of clothes for one person by hand, plus another couple of days to dry, if the weather is right… if not, then we’re talking mildew and another round of washing)


• When you set off a metal detector, security actually looks for a metal object


• If you get hit by a car, the first question usually concerns what the driver did wrong, not why the hell you didn’t get out of the way


• Getting the first ding in a new car is a negative experience, not a relief that you can finally go back to driving “normally”


• A reduced level of smog isn’t the primary criterion for declaring a beautiful day


• You don’t have to pay the police to get your lost or stolen property returned


• You don’t have to worry about taking off your “outside” pants before sitting on any light-colored furniture (New York excluded)


• A mid-life crisis involves a Porsche and a divorce, not becoming a grandmother at age 25