There are a lot of NGOs (non-government organizations) in Cambodia. Everywhere you go you meet people who are here to do good for the Khmer people. Some provide food, some education, some safety. It truly is beautiful, so many people from around the world saw that this place was in need and came to help.
Being in this environment where people are doing good left and right, I really began to realize that there are two different mentalities when it comes to helping people.
First, there are handouts. Now handouts are great to a certain extent. When someone is dying from starvation or illness, they just need to be well. The first focus should be giving this person food and care, expecting nothing from them. Sometimes you are so stuck in the cycles of poverty, disease, and slavery that you have nothing to give. This is where we need people to step up and care for the unreached and unloved without expecting anything more from people.
But after someone is fed, healthy and free, we need to do more. You can provide food for someone everyday for the rest of their life. But then what have you done? You've fed them, yes, and that is great. What about their value as a human being though? What about their ability to create and find meaning in life?
A friend here told me about a recent conversation with a local woman. The woman told her daughter that she shouldn't bother trying to go to school, because if she goes to a certain place they will give her rice every day. This woman had been trained for so long to simply take handouts that she saw no reason to work and want more out of life. To the extent that she would take the opportunity of an education away from her young daughter. This isn't to say that the organization giving rice was bad, it just means we need to do continue beyond that.
Then there's the alternative, of helping people while simultaneously teaching them how to help themselves. For example, the organization I work with has helped a family (and is in the process of helping another) by building a cricket farm in their home. They bought all of the materials, did the research, and then taught the family. Now the family raises and sells crickets. They are able to provide for themselves each month with a sustainable trade. They have stability in their lives and they have value in knowing that they worked for what they have. Instead of feeling like their income could disappear on the whim of some NGO, they are secure in knowing that they can provide for themselves as long as they want to.
Again, I'm not saying anything against organizations whose main focus is a handout, because that is necessary sometimes. I'm just saying that I see the contrast now, and in different situations each option has its strengths.
Bear with me, I'm trying to be vulnerable here.., I think that most of my life I have had a handout mentality. Giving someone a handout is quick and easy. I think my pride led me to seek after things where I could help quickly and look like the hero rather than taking the time to provide guidance. If someone was overwhelmed with a project, I'd take the project on myself rather than helping them through it. I'd clean the entire house on my own (humble-bragging the entire way through) instead of teaching the kids how to do part of it. This leaked into most areas of my life- work, family, friendships, school... I actually gave up a mostly paid for education to be at home with a family that probably could have survived without me. We look down on parents in this country taking their kids out of school and forcing them to work instead, but I did that exact thing to myself.
Honestly, I never saw how damaging that was to myself and the people around me. I'm just now starting to realize the destruction caused by living that way. When you see a cycle of endless handouts, you see people who are fed, but dehumanized and incapable.
That's all I have to say on this one, let's aim for more. Let's be gracious and give handouts where they are needed, but then give people a hand-up. Rather than assisting within a cycle, let's end the cycle and provide new beginnings.
