The ultimate prevalence of poverty here is never completely out of reach of your senses: you can smell it, taste it in the air, see it, sense it around the corner, hear it on the streets, and if none of that- step in it. Though I've only been here for a few days, and that enduring sense of poverty here has never faltered, I can't help but feel that India must be the richest country in the world. There is richness in everything here. Every moment, story, breath, is rich with an intangible something.
Nothing comes without challenge so everything seems like a reward. Learning to eat with your hands, to cross streets by purposefully not looking both ways, to accept and embrace the undeniable awkwardness of being stared by at least someone at any moment of time, and to be lost and uncomfortable everywhere but also bubbling with some sort of weird anxious giddy demeanor that is just bewildered at the chaos that engulfs you with every wondering step. These are accomplishments! They are rewards, they are treasures.
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