What does it mean to be an American?

Today, I went to lunch with two coworkers of mine. One of them is a Burmese interpreter, her name is TaTa.  As the conversation moved along, she mentioned how blessed she was to be in America now.  You see, Burma is a country that is very oppressed.  From Wikipedia,

International human rights organizations including Human Rights Watch,[68] Amnesty International [69] and the American Association for the Advancement of Science[70] have repeatedly documented and condemned widespread human rights violations. There is consensus that the military regime in Burma is one of the world's most repressive and abusive regimes.[71][72] They have claimed that there is no independent judiciary in Burma. Forced labour, human trafficking, and child labour are common.[73] The military is also notorious for rampant use of sexual violence as an instrument of control, including allegations of systematic rapes and taking of sex slaves as porters for the military. A women's pro-democracy movement has formed in exile, largely along the Thai border and in Chiang Mai. There is a growing international movement to defend women's human rights issues.[74]

The Freedom in the World 2011 report by Freedom House notes that "The military junta has long ruled by decree and controlled all executive, legislative, and judicial powers; suppressed nearly all basic rights; and committed human rights abuses with impunity. The junta carefully rigged the electoral framework surrounding the 2010 national elections, which were neither free nor fair. The country’s more than 2,100 political prisoners included about 429 members of the NLD, the victors in the 1990 elections."[75] Evidence has been gathered suggesting that the Burmese regime has marked certain ethnic minorities such as the Karen for extermination or 'Burmisation'.[76] This, however, has received little attention from the international community since it has been more subtle and indirect than the mass killings in places like Rwanda.[77]

Wow, I can't even imagine.  What is more is I have spoken with both with TaTa and Patrick, who is another of our Burmese interpreters, about their personal experience.  TaTa hasn't talked about it in detail, but stated that she had a terrible childhood and that is all she would say.  Patrick has been much more open, possibly because he has worked there longer.  One day he and I were talking and I asked him why did he come to America.  You see, he had told us all a story in our weekly meeting about how he had been at a gas station and as he was leaving the attendant told him to, "have a good one."  He said he was so confused that he just stopped in his tracks and tried to figure out what the attendant could mean.  Have a good what?  So, finally he went back and asked the attendant, "what do you mean, have a good one?"  After much explanation, Patrick said he somewhat understood what was meant.  Seems like a small thing but Patrick is someone who actually speaks English, fluently enough to interpret in a medical setting.  Imagine being in a foreign country as different from your own as you can possibly imagine, not knowing the language with no money.  I remember that day and thinking wow that would be hard, but didn't think much further about it.  A few weeks later Patrick stood up in our meeting and shared an experience from back home in Burma.  He talked about how every so often the Junta would come around to each village and take 1 person from each family for, "volunteer work."  So one day they come to Patrick's village and he goes for his family.  He is forced to march for days on very little rest and very little food, mostly a type of broth.  Once at there destination, he is forced to dig to set up a railroad.  The only water source is a stream somewhat close by that is contaminated because of the soldiers upstream.  You see, the soldiers use the stream as a toilet which floats down to where the "volunteer" workers are to drink.  There are women, children and elders forced here to work.  So many that have no business working due to physical and age limitations, yet forced they are.  One day, Patrick collapses due to being malnourished overworked and sleep deprived and overheated.  Not only is the water contaminated but the little meat that they are given is rancid.  So, Patrick has collapsed and just can't physically move, let alone dig any more.  A soldier comes over and starts screaming at him with obscenities calling him lazy.  After a few minutes more he decides to start kicking Patrick to try to "motivate" him.  Eventually, Patrick gets up and does everything he can to put one foot in front of the other and made it through.  You know what Patrick says, "By the grace of God I made it through not only this time but the other times I had to go." By the grace of God.  Remember that.  

Back to why he had come to America.  After all of this, Patrick decided it was time to move his family out of Burma.  So he sneaks his family out of the country, it is illegal to leave the country, to Malaysia.  You would think it would get better there.  Wrong, dead wrong.  Patrick gets a job translating for the government.  Now the Burmese are illegal aliens, they have no rights.  Since he works for the government that is overlooked.  But there is still danger.  Every night he walks home Patrick has to worry about people that wait around his neighborhood to attack and rob anyone walking by.  The Burmese have no rights so if they go to the government, they will just be deported.  Unbelievably, the Thai government is in league with bounty hunters that round up illegals and take them back to the Burma.  How it works is that the Malaysian government gathers the aliens up and puts them in work camps.  Then, eventually sells them to the bounty hunters, who are human traffickers,  for a small sum, say a couple hundred dollars.  Then the bounty hunters tell the families of those they now "own" that they can buy them back for a large sum, say five hundred thousand dollars.  The Burmese people for the most part are not wealthy and in fact are very poor, so they cannot afford this, so the bounty hunters just sell them to the Burmese government for not quite as much money but still for a handsome profit.  Back to Patrick, he finally finds a way to get to America.  

I wanted to write about this because after the conversation with TaTa today I can't stop thinking about it.  I am struggling with how terrible this all is.    I am a very selfish person I realize.  In America, we have everything.  Now we do have to "work" for it, but we are blessed beyond belief.  Do we ever stop to count our blessings? I know I don't often enough.  Very rarely in fact.  I see Americans, not all mind you but most, as trust fund babies.  I know , I know pretty strong imagery there.  Think about it, trust fund babies are the most selfish, stuck up people you could think of, most of the time.  They only think about themselves, and always want more.  And, most of the time are not happy at all.  Search your heart, I mean really search your heart, sound familiar? I know for me it is all too familiar.  How many times has something not gone the way I planned or something not work out at all and I am so mad and upset.  What about when a relationship falls through and I feel I am no closer to marriage, one of my biggest desires by the way, how do I react?  Like a selfish child, "But God I want it, I want it."  I get mad and throw a fit, and blame God.  I want, I want, I want. But do I ever look at what I have and thank Him for that? Rarely, if ever. What hit me the most is that after all of the terrible things that happened to Patrick, he said, By the grace of God.  Why is this so important?  He gives God the glory even when things are terrible.  Then I think about how I would react and how I believe most Americans would.  Think about how I reacted when a relationship fell through.  I was angry at God.  While that is a painful thing, does it even compare to what we have been talking about?  By no means!  I would be angry and probably curse God not praise Him or bring Him glory.  And I have been a "Christian" all my life.

 The story of the wealthy man that came to Jesus in Matthew 19:16-28, asking about how to gain eternal life comes to mind. Go read it, don't worry I will wait.  Read it? Good.  Something that hits me is verses 23 and 24.  Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly I tell you, it is hard for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven.  Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”  Do you know what the eye of a needle is?  I didn't until recently.  The eye of the needle is the part that holds the string.  So obviously Jesus is not speaking literally here for it is impossible for a camel to go through that small hole.  So is it impossible for a rich man or for an American, for we are rich in the grand scheme of things, to find salvation? No that is not the point but it is much harder.  To add to that, Jesus tells the man to sell all of his possessions and give them all to the poor.  ALL, Jesus? All, but where will I live, what will I eat, what clothes will I wear?  Jesus says, listen young grasshopper. Earlier in Matthew, Jesus is giving the greatest sermon ever known to man, the sermon on the mount.  Matthew 6:25-34: “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?  Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?  Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?

    “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin.  Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.  If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith?  So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’  For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.  But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.  Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.  I am not advocating that God calls everyone to this life, but I do believe that we should have a heart that would be willing should we receive that call.  Also, I do not believe that "stuff' is bad, things are amoral.  They only do what people make them and only have the value that we assign to them.  So we should value stuff and things appropriately.  

Now don't get me wrong I am not anti-American, far from it.  I love America and I believe that it is the greatest country this earth has ever known.  We have the biggest thing we could ask for, Freedom.  I just think we need to open our minds and see what is going on outside of our little, "perfect" worlds.  I am the first in line and the guiltiest of this.  What are we do with all of this?  Well, I can't tell you what to do, but as for me I will count my blessings daily, hourly, by the minute and by the second.  I will respect the people that have more faith than I do, and pray and strive for more myself.  I will decide to change my priorities with my finances and not buy stuff that I can't afford, and save money, not for more stuff but so I can further the kingdom of God and reach people that need both a half world away and right next door to me.