Sunday, November 22, 2015

Eating In The Dump

Today I was offered some food by one of the dump families I have known the longest. My rule of thumb is that whenever a poor person offers you food, you take it, no matter what it is and eat away. It would  be insulting to them if you do not accept the food. Even if I am not hungry I gladly eat what is given me.

They gave me a deep fried wanton like vegetable called "Kup Bong Joh". I ate while standing outside their shack home.I also shared a sweet coffee with man of the shack (he is always extremely friendly with me, I need to learn his difficult Burmese name). I enjoyed this fairly large snack, the Kup Bong Joh was quite good. It was filled with vegetables I did not know but the combination tasted like potato. During the meal they showed me an old colour photo I gave them back in 2013, which was carefully being taken care of.

They offered me some more food when I was done eating but I thanked them and told them no I needed to make some photos.  They also offered me a cloth to wipe my greasy fingers and asked me to come into their shack to eat and rest (I am too big for that!).

It is a bit dicey eating food in a dump site after you have been touching garbage of all types but I feel great. The fried vegetable wanton (spring roll like) was a nice treat from some kind people. People who have very little but still want to share their food and home with you. I can still see the father, mother and their young daughter smiling at me as we shared the food. They tried so hard to be hospitable and asked nothing in return. I will remember their smiling faces for a long time.

Another amazing moment, another great memory from this short 7 week trip.