Have you ever been to some rural town in the middle of nowhere and observed how people there live their lives? Have you ever noticed how time seems to move proportionally slower the further you travel out of the city? Have you ever noticed people in these rural villages, hanging around seemingly doing nothing and wonder "Don't these people have anything to do? Isn't it a weekday?"
A while ago, I spent 4 days sitting in a small town 2 hours drive out of Bangkok, and these are the questions I have been asking myself.
It's always an eye opener for a city dweller like me, to go to rural places and observe how other people live life. It's not like I an unaware of them, or how they live. It's more that I am seeing it first hand how things are. While most times, we mentally note how rural life is, being there forces you to experience it in the flesh. And I must say, it makes a big impression on me.
On of the things I always observe is this - rural foll are just as, if not more happy than people who live in the city. This despite the fact that you do not get Wifi coverage, 7 Eleven, Starbucks or shopping mall every few hundred meters like we do in the city. All the things that we think make life in the city such a great thing really don't count for much when you look at it closely. People in the village have simple road side huts instead of Starbucks.They ride motorbikes instead of fancy cars. They use payphones instead of iPhones. But they couldn't care less. It doesn't bother them the way it bothers us.
They don't get swallowed into the pursuit of money, power, success or status the way we do. They seem so much more content in accepting their lot in life, doing the simple things they are in charge of - like working in the grocery store, or being the security guard or operating a simple road side hawker stall. The rest of us in the city often concern ourselves with the kind of house we live in, the car we drive, our career progression and most of all, we feel this need to be different from everybody else. We feel that we owe it to ourselves to make a difference in something, anything.
City folk live in state a of deficit. We feel the need to make up for loss ground, keep on par with others or simple excel in something before we pat ourselves in the back. We want to earn the merits, because we feel a person with no distinguishable merits is not worthy of praise. A person of value is a person with merits.
The city is often the forefront of human civilization. New or old, all our knowledge of science, all our ideas of philosophy were born out of a city. We in the city are so focused on breaking new ground and exploring new frontiers that somewhere along the line, we have forgotten to be content with what we have right now.
To me, it's a simple lesson about contentment.
Something I think those of us living in the city would do well learning
Something I think those of us living in the city would do well learning
