Jessica
The temples were a wonder...the children hospital brought hope...the orphanage brought a connection...but the beggers brought something else.
"Two for $1, two for $1" It repeats in my head. The 12 yr-old girl sticks out her index finger to show the one piece of green she wants. She wants a dollar that in the states would get you only a hashbrown on the dollar menu. Will they be gone soon?

The thoughts come back again. That was this whole trip so far. A bunch of questions, why did they go through the hammer hitting their skull and not me? Why did my friends not care that they were starving. Beggers surrounded me now. Their hands grasped the tuk-tuk our mode of transportation. No one really had a car here. The motorcycle held the four-person family.
I wonder if they have philosophical conversatons. If the children think about their future. If that girl holding on to the steering wheel knows she has a chance of hitting a mine, or getting brought into prostatiution, does she know that she may never be able to read this story because she'll be illiterite. She just smiles now, and I'm the one worrying.
If I could sell them life insurance, I would. I want to insure that they will be OK, that they will keep that smile forever.
Yet again, they want to have my life. It's a hard concept to understand still. If only we all knew that there are too many problems in the world. Instead in our highschool we get wasted. Wasted so we can waste our life.
I glance out the window. Burnt fields, a girl squating to go to the bathroom, cattle grazing, a shack with no walls. I realize I'm finally fortuanate. This isn't Tenafly, but it is on the same world.