Comments on: Little street vendor

By: Wilfried

Wilfried — Sat, 22 Sep 2007 04:55:24 +0000

Thank you for your contribution in the latest comments, Bradley. It is very much appreciated.

Also a heartfelt merci to Jim F and ed42 for their kind thoughts in the comments preceding Bradley’s.

By: Bradley Ross

Bradley Ross — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 19:16:14 +0000

The BYU Center for Economic Self-Reliance is having their 10th annual conference in November. Working through this center might be a good way to help for those who are interested. They are doing some great things with microcredit and microfranchising. The little girl in Wilfried's story was running a little business. Generally speaking, anyone can start up a McDonald's restaurant because the business plan is well established; all you have to do it run it. Microfranchising is based on a similar idea, but with businesses appropriate to the developing world. Perhaps with the right opportunity, this girl's family could find a way up and out of the poverty that seems to be their current lot in life.

By: Bradley Ross

Bradley Ross — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 05:06:57 +0000

BYU-TV recently played a 20 minute documentary about Napoleon Dzombe. Watching it stirred up a lot of the same emotions for me that Wilfried stirred up again in this post. If you want to watch the video, it should be available for another week or so. You can see how one African man is helping his fellows.

By: ed42

ed42 — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 03:05:30 +0000

Hmm… I think I’d be happiest (most blest?) if I spend the 3 hour block teaching her English, math, whatever and maybe ‘hire’ her to teach me French.

By: Jim F.

Jim F. — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 02:45:26 +0000

Wilfried, I think you know how much I admire your ability to capture a moment that defies our analysis, as the various comments have shown. Thank you. These vignettes help me reflect in a very fruitful way on my own life and my relation to my sisters and brothers. And, of course, they convict me.

By: Wilfried

Wilfried — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 21:53:59 +0000

Thank you, Bev P. Your comment adds another dimension to the relation we have been discussing. I had hoped this would come up too. From the viewpoint of the girl, and from her actions, nothing but an acceptable approach: she is looking for an opportunity to earn her daily cents to survive. She does not know about our Sabbath norms. She has also deduced that a three-hour “mass” makes the children deserving some reward: their happiness is also on her mind, while it will also serve her needs.

Let me add this piece to the story: when I left the church building, some 15 to 20 minutes after the meetings ended (after talking inside with some people), the little street vendor was gone. I do not know if someone chased her away, or if someone told her that from now on “no sales” was the rule, or… that she still sold everything because some members “disobeyed” – deliberately to help her, or under pressure from their children…

By: Bev P

Bev P — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 19:46:31 +0000

The heartache I felt for this little street vendor, and what future she may or may not have, is matched, I think, by my feeling from reading so many responses. This little girl was not begging. She was not asking people to give her money. She was asking people to buy goods from her, to go away from her having made an exchange, to take something away from her as she would take a little money away from them. She knows with some confidence that she can read. Maybe she already knows she is a child of God.

By: Ray

Ray — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 17:30:23 +0000

Well said, Wilfried.

I used to work with some non-profit, charitable organizations. Someone I like very much said, to the best of my memory, “Misery hurts only when it’s experienced. The challenge of charity is to experience misery on a regular basis without becoming desensitized to it – since nobody desires to experience it. Nobody wants to feel pain and despair and grief that they do not need to feel. Since we naturally shy from misery and pain, if we are not careful, we will insulate ourselves from those we say we serve and begin to value the process of giving over the receiver of that giving – and that is a dangerous result.”

By: Wilfried

Wilfried — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 16:55:37 +0000

Indeed, John and Ray, the topic raises questions of perspective and relations. The Sunday School teacher probably saw the little vendor as he perceives thousands of little vendors: a routine sight, so very much part of his daily life that the person behind the vendor disappears. When I was walking in town with Sister LÃ©onie, the Catholic nun who helped me in Kinshasa, we were constantly assailed by boys, clearly hungry boys, begging for a little money. I would have given each something, but Sister LÃ©onie just pushed them aside, sometimes with a harsh word if they were too pressing. She didn’t seem to give them a single thought, although as a Catholic nun she spends her life caring for others. Living in such realities indeed changes the way you handle things. My experience with the little vendor was different, because we had a moment to interact, though the three questions and the three answers took less than 30 seconds. Afterwards I made a long description of my reactions, feelings and related memories. That changed the perspective of my readers and made the words of the Sunday School teacher so contrastive, triggering the emotions we saw in the comments, but also the differences in opinions. I believe there is a lot to learn from this. On many levels, things are not always what they seem to us, when viewed through someone else’s eyes, inasmuch as we can do that.

By: Ray

Ray — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 16:24:29 +0000

John, perhaps not, but when you do stop in, if you have a few minutes alone with her, should you engage her in conversation and see where the Spirit leads? Should you try to get to know here a little better, smile, ask about her family or her life in general, etc. You personally might do these already, but I know I need to do a better job of “opening my mouth and letting it be filled” rather than just handing people my money and going away.

Also, we have to go to the 7-11; the little vendor girl came to us. I think that changes the dynamic more than just a little.