http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/katineblog/2 009/feb/27/development This is a Guardian gem, to think for years we have spent huge amounts of money, time and resources in helping out countries abroad, when all the time it is us that needs the aid.
Can't wait for all those foreigners to give us the aid we need, perhaps that is why they are all coming to this country? But I have yet to see the improvements they can give.
What if it wasn't Africa at all? Imagine that the community being visited is in London, or Manchester, or a poor rural area in the UK, and the visitors are from Katine, bringing their expertise, their culture, their solutions to share with people in this country. I know a lot of Africans, Latin Americans and Asians who are appalled at how we live in this country and who genuinely pity us for our way of life. And they don't just pity the poor. They pity the affluent, the wealthy, society as a whole. They cannot fathom how we put our parents into old peoples' homes to sit in circles watching telly. They are sad that mental health is now as big a concern in our hospitals as physical injury. They find the number of abortions carried out each year abhorrent, to name just three examples.