As a child I was never one to dare. At sleepovers the other girls would be out running naked in the backyard, mooning the neighbourhood or putting their heads in toilets while flushing simultaneously.
But as for me, I would always choose the other option. Telling the truth to any question had to be better than kissing your best friend's brother. Besides, I knew that if I still didn't want them to know my deepest, darkest secrets, I could always make up an answer. After all, Truth or Dare is just a game.
Life itself, I soon found out, is not just a game. Everyday you will inevitably encounter situations that call you to choose, not between truth or dare, but whether to dare to be true, or not.
We have the choice to live amidst half-truths and falsehoods, or the choice to live authentically, naming the confusion, the oppression and the injustices in order that we may begin to address the ugly problems in the world.
It's often easier to hide in the shadows, because to dare to speak the truth requires much courage.
Speaking has never been an easy task for me. Coming from a girl who didn't say a single word to anyone on her school bus as she traveled to and from school for 3 years, I know that I have come a long way, but recognize that I have much further to go.
Oftentimes, it may be true that silence is golden, but in the face of depravity and despair, to speak is a responsibility and to remain silent is unforgivable.
For four weeks this summer I had the opportunity to work with a non-profit organization in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. Bolivia is an impoverished country, heavily oppressed by a corrupt government, the elite upper class and foreign investors.
Not only are the people of Bolivia enslaved by poverty, but drug addiction also contributes to the many social problems such as malnutrition, disease, sexual and physical abuse and crime. Living in one of the 75 orphanages within the city of Santa Cruz, I bear firsthand witness to the hopelessness of their situation.
If you met me today, you would probably never even guess that I had been away. I rarely talk about my experiences in Bolivia because it's far easier for me to just not think about it.
It's not that I'm apathetic to their desperation, but detaching myself from the memory of the trip is a means of coping with my feelings of helplessness. How can I articulate my experiences in Bolivia? Where do I even begin?
Do I begin with Prudencia? She was the 20-year old "house mom" in charge of the orphanage we lived in. During the time I lived in Hogar Canaan, she was already a mother of 2 children and 7 months pregnant with her third child. On top of caring for her own children, she was responsible for feeding and looking after the other 26 children in the orphanage.
Should I tell the story of how she only sees her husband 3 times a year, but needs the "protection" of another man each night at the orphanage? Or should I emphasize her lack of education in the basics of hygiene and sanitation? Our team of seven students not only taught her how to cover, store and refrigerate food properly, but also provided supplies for their simple propane-stove kitchen.
Do I begin with the children and their state of health? The doctor we hired diagnosed the children with malnutrition, lice, skin and intestinal parasites and other diseases. When the waste from neighbouring houses are burnt, the ashes are carried by the wind into the children's food because they have no room to eat indoors. When the propane runs out for the stove, they must resort to cooking over an open fire. Each night when the one toilet becomes flooded the children have no choice but to defecate and urinate out in the courtyard. In the morning, we've seen the children lift the lid to the underground pipes and scoop out the raw sewage using the bottoms of plastic water bottles in their bare hands.
Perhaps I should start with the Director of the orphanage and how he hasn't paid the phone or electricity bill in months. How he used the children for free labour, and how he most likely pockets the 2 Bolivianos (about 40 cents) government subsidy per child per day to fuel his shiny red Jeep.
Should I mention how a few months after coming back from Bolivia we found out that this Director had also been sexually abusing the girls? Our contact in Bolivia went back to Hogar Canaan a month after we left and found the children locked in without any adult supervision. Prudencia had disappeared and the Director had been replaced.
Do I find consolation in thinking that these children are better off in Canaan than on the streets? Or do I feel that our contribution on the lives of the children was more damaging than good?
How can I even begin to describe the contrast between life at the orphanage and life with the elite class?
As Canadian volunteers we were invited speak at an International Volunteer Conference. We dined with the provincial governors, met with very important and very rich businessmen, and were interviewed for radio and television broadcasts and the daily newspapers. When we weren't spending time with the poor, impoverished children, we were going to hotels, country clubs, dance clubs and holiday resorts. (This was "justified", of course, because we were raising funds and supplies for the orphanage and raising awareness of the spirit of volunteerism).
I have had the privilege of experiencing both extremes of Bolivian life, and my crime is in remaining silent. I have come face to face with depravity and despair, and I have not spoken about them.
I am responsible for my inaction. I am guilty of trying to forget the oppression and injustice I witnessed, and carrying on as before. My punishment is dealing with this guilt and grappling with the questions on my own. Questions about injustice, poverty, exploitation, privilege and the value of life. Questions that I alone cannot answer.
I know that I cannot solve these problems alone. When I feel like I'm unable to do anything about it, instead of doing nothing, the least I can do is tell the story and share my experiences so that others may know. The least I can do is to share.
Authentic living begins when you come out from the shadows and darkness. Perhaps my liberation can begin by taking the dare and speaking the truth.
To live is to dare. To dare is to live. We must dare ourselves to let go, to love and to be loved, to hurt and to laugh, to show ourselves as we truly are, to be vulnerable and to be able look at ourselves fully in the mirror.
We must dare to tell our stories. Through every story we tell, we relive the experience and breathe new life to the story. We cannot begin to live until we begin to dare and speak with truth.
Used with permission of the author.
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