Tuesday, March 8, 2011

What to do with poor pestering people?

I am an American, my family lives in El Salvador. I recently went down to visit and traveled Central America. I met a lovely young lady in Masaya Nicaragua. I like her family, they are loud fun to be around. They like to drink dance and tell jokes. The whole time with my nice backpack and white skin I stood out like a sore thumb. I was only pestered in Nicaragua because where I was the whitest person so it was clear I wasnt local. I was pestered at all hours of the day for money and food and scamed by doctors who lied and said a minor fever was malaria. I lived with my girlfriends family for a month and during that time I had hundreds of requests from her 19 and 13 year old brothers to bring back laptops, gamecubes, ps3 you name it. Her too brothers were constantly asking me for gifts. This made me feel bad because I want to be around people that like me not people that want to use me. My girlfriend never asks me for expensive stuff neither does her mom. I am coming back to visit in a few weeks with A LOT of gifts none of which are very expensive. Bluetooths, perfume, watches, tools so the 13 year old can work on cars (the type of stuff that is imported and costs alot). I really like the family but I don’t like the feeling of constantly being asked. The 13 year old and I are good pals we hung out a lot, he cried when I left. I refuse to bring what the brothers requested because I am not Santa Claus. A gift is from the heart. Also I am not a materialistic person, I wish these poor people understood that its not what you have but who you have.

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