Each time we travel out of the city I get hit hard with the reality of the situation here. The main industry on the island is sugar cane farming. Most farms do not have tractors and the workers use water buffalo to plow the fields.
Next they will meticulously plant the fields by hand. Once the cane has grown the workers manually harvest the cane with machetes and bundle them. The bundles are loaded into trucks (usually manually) and stacked so high that I wonder how they do not tip over. It's hard work, there is little automation, and the workers get paid very little. It's a hard life just to subsist at the poverty line yet there are still smiles on the people's face.
What hits me the hardest is when I see the children. This little boy is probably the same age as my oldest son. I know my son will grow up, go to college, and do whatever he chooses with his life. I'm quite certain that in the not too distant future someone will put a machete in this boy's hand and he will be sent to the fields so that my boy will have sweetener for his drinks. The only difference between the two boys is a matter of circumstance and where they were brought into this world. And that realization brings me to tears.
Each time we travel out of the city I get hit hard with the reality of the situation here. The main industry on the island is sugar cane farming. Most farms do not have tractors and the workers use water buffalo to plow the fields.
Next they will meticulously plant the fields by hand. Once the cane has grown the workers manually harvest the cane with machetes and bundle them. The bundles are loaded into trucks (usually manually) and stacked so high that I wonder how they do not tip over. It's hard work, there is little automation, and the workers get paid very little. It's a hard life just to subsist at the poverty line yet there are still smiles on the people's face.
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