For a research project, my son recently figured out, that there are countries with an average monthly income of less than 7$. Even after being in South Africa and seeing so many people living on the street, this number shocked him. This led to a long discussion we had about inequality. As we did already quite often.
This topic always brings up so much sadness, anger, and desperation inside of me, and it is kind of impossible to find the right answers to the right questions. Driving to school in South Africa we always had to pass one particular street that brought up one particular feeling inside of me: In a radius of fewer than 100 meters, we would have to pass a township, a private school, and one of the most expensive gated communities in the whole country. You just need to cross the street to step from one extreme to the other.
And guess what: None of the people living on either one or the other side of the street aka living with plenty of money or plenty of nothing, didn't do anything to be born on that particular side. That's the inequality lottery as we always call it at home. And it breaks my heart.
It breaks my heart to have talks about an average monthly income of less than 7$. It breaks my heart to see girls not having period products. It breaks my heart to feel that we can't change the world. But it gives me hope that my 12-year-old boy has it on his radar and hopefully will use his privilige to make a difference.
