revised script

What is life? What is success in life?
Money? Good reputation? or high social position?
Then, why there are many people who sacrifice their life to help others, like missionaries? What is it means to be a Christian in the world?



On august 2005, I had the first mission trip in Tijuana, Mexico with my church group. The first impression of Tijuana was much better than I expected. I had some stereotypes of the mission. The mission place would be worse than the place I live. The missionary work should take care of poor people. After the Korean War, many American missionaries came to Korea and helped many orphanages and homeless. My knowledge of the missionaries is based on that idea.



The church we were to serve was twenty minutes away from the hotel. Most of people there did not have even electricity and water systems. Houses were shabby and looked miserable. That place was similar as I imagined. I felt pity for poor people. I hoped that I could help them. I wanted to make them happy. We gathered young kids and showed our performances.


After that, we made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. They did not like them that much. They were not starving to death. We send the kids back to home and we ate ham and cheese sandwiches.
On the next day, we made puppies, swords and hats with balloons. Some kids brought the balloons home and played with them. I felt sorry for the poor kids. They did not have fancy playgrounds, toys or Barbie dolls. We decided to buy toys and candies fro them. We bought a hero character pinata and put all candies in there. Small kids started to hit the hero. It was funny to see that. They were killing their hero.
One girl hit that character hard and all the candies fell down on the ground. All the kids started to grab the candies. They screamed and they fought each other. One big boy jumped onto the candies with his body and got half of them. People asked him to share candies with others, but he wouldn’t. He said that was the rule of the game. He was right. I also do not want to share my properties with others. However, there is one thing that boy did not know. We prepared more and better gifts. After all, he could not have any toys.
We went to the center for old people. That place was hot and smelled bad. The Mexican pastor brought homeless people there. There were many people who could not even move. We had to clean their faces, bodies and dirt.
One girl said she did not want to get old. I talked my mom about those poor people. And she said we have to save our money for the future if we don’t want to live like that.
Yes, she was right. Our world is all about money.
I also thought the kids are unhappy because of poverty.
However, could I say I am happier then them? The kids reminded my childhood. My hometown was near the country side so that there were small hills and rice fields. I played with many friends until dusk. Then, my mom called me for the dinner. I was also happy at that time.
Now I left my home country. All my families and friends are still in Korea. I also work hard for my happiness.
What is life? What is happiness in life?

Could I say they are unhappy, if they could die without a fear?