Differences

One of the things I was naively surprised to find about living on this camp is the incredible diversity of people, of wealth, of abilities to cope. Before you go off to a totally foreign environment, you tend to anticipate things in panoramas of homogeneity – like all the ways that things will be different from what you are used to. Everything you expect is similarly “other” from what is familiar. But then you spend some time getting to know your new context and home, and all the difference within what is now familiar come into stark relief. For example, I was surprised to find that there is such a wide range of wealth in the camp. Simply walking around it is clear to see that some have enough money for luxuries like a bottle of beer and an afternoon at the makeshift “movie theaters” (small concrete and tin structures with an old television and wooden benches) while others struggle to get their children adequately fed. Some of the little houses, I was surprised to see, have generators and gardens and little yards, whereas others contain only a mattress, cooking pot and pile of clothes. Each person and family is having a uniquely different experience.

Although everyone here is a Liberian refugee, the ranges in personality are just as great here as anywhere, and I see this most clearly in my children I teach. Some are embarrassed and shy or lacking in confidence. Others are bold. Others try hard and cry out for praise. Others care most about making the other kids laugh. All this should go without saying. We are commonly human. It’s just that so much in our world is focused on how things are hard or different in other places and it’s easy to let that overwhelm your image of a place. It shouldn’t be a revelation to discover that we are all more similar than different, but for some reason it still can feel like an epiphany.