belly rumblings

I was lying in bed early this morning listening to the children laugh and play in the street. My belly started to rumble and I held it for a few minutes. I could feel the morning hunger creeping in. I am reading a book titled "What is the What" by Dave Eggers. It is based on the life story of a Sudanese “Lost Boy”, Achak, who traveled through Sudan to Ethiopia and then to Kenya on foot, displaced by a horrific civil war. Thousands of Sudanese boys made this walk; hundreds died along the way. Achak speaks of the pains of hunger; the signs of death. As I lie in my comfy bed I think of Achak and the hunger he must have felt. I have no comparison. Its easy to think of this story when you’re reading it as a horrific account of war; painful acts of violence in a different time. Except that it’s not a different time. It is still happening today. Many children are hungry all around the world. Many have pains in their bellies; their bellies extended, their lips cracked. Achak tells of the boys rubbing their necks to try and get moisture in their painfully dry and cracked throats.

I don’t see this hunger here in Mozambique. I’m sure it exists. It may even be here in Quelimane or outside in the zone. But it’s not visual to me on a daily basis. I wondered how I would feel when faced with the hunger season. I am no longer in the village and therefore my eyes are shielded. My belly is quite full. It doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. I just can’t see it. I wish I lived in a world that if I couldn’t see it, it didn’t exist. I wish I could live a positive and joyful life with complete confidence that if I do, everyone else will. We speak about faith being a belief without seeing. Do we have faith in the people we don’t meet? In their lives, their circumstances to be real without seeing it for our own eyes? Do we have faith that someone else is caring for these unseen? Or do we just lie in our comfy beds long enough to think of what we should eat for breakfast, forgetting what’s outside our windows? I admit, my brief moment of thinking of Achak and his story was fleeting; my hungry belly won out and I found some coveted granola with berries (which we don’t have here - thanks Mom!); once the cold milk filled the bowl everything else faded away. Its far too easy.