Sunday, October 9, 2011

Guest Rooms Ready!

With guests coming in October,
we have been busy getting rooms ready.

We started first with this:
And changed it to this:
Next room was looking like this:
Now it's a little more suitable and we have this:
Porter B&B is open for business.
Come on over!

Saturday, October 8, 2011

World Politics

I know, it's a taboo subject anywhere you go. In Kenya it was tribal divides (that caused a LOAD of violence). In Hungary it's liberal vs. conservative vs. extremist vs. a whole lot of parties. In America it's always Republican vs. Democrat (meaning "Christian vs. non-Christian" from the Republican perspective and "non-thinker vs. enlightened" from the Democratic perspective). Everyone has a point of view. Everyone has an opinion. Some people listen to various opinions. Some people don't want to listen to anyone else's opinion because they KNOW. I've heard politics preached from the church pulpit (in more than one country) and politics come up in conversations on the public tram. Living rooms, kitchens, coffee shops, meetings... people talk politics. But what are they really talking about? Mostly what I hear in those conversations is what is wrong with the "other side". What is wrong with the Muslims. What is wrong with the Americans. What is wrong with the Africans. What is wrong with Christians. What is wrong with non-Christians. The truth is, we're all wrong. No one has it right. Because if we were, then we wouldn't have all the mess we have in the world. People in every country would have homes and food and jobs. Political leaders wouldn't be so greedy and would actually want to HELP the people they represent. People would look a little beyond themselves to view things from a different perspective.

I've had the privilege to live in a few different parts of the world now. And naturally, my perspective changes a little bit with each new place and each new person I meet. I can go off on my soap box like anyone else (maybe that's what this post is). But after seeing the perspective from a few different places, I have to say... Politics will always be the same no matter where you go. It's never going to get better because people are involved. Greedy, selfish, ego-centric people. And that includes all of us because we all have a perspective we want heard.

A few months ago I was living in Africa next to a slum where people were starving. I couldn't handle the sadness and frustration anymore, so I moved to Europe. Now I'm buying new furniture and new clothes. All the while, knowing friends in Kenya who have no jobs and can't feed their kids, throwing a few coins into the homeless guy's cup on the Budapest street. What am I really doing to not be greedy and selfish and focus on myself? Still working on that one. It's all politics - even internally. And I think, if we all ACTUALLY tried to see from another perspective, how would our politics change?