By Ericka Valladares “The poor are not those who have little. They are those who want much. I do not live in poverty, I live with austerity, with renunciation. I need little to live.” Somewhere in the suburbs near Montevideo lives a man in his old farm house. He likes to sit in the afternoons to have a cup of Uruguayan coffee and contemplate the sunset. He drives an old Volkswagen Beetle from 1987. He has no maid, so he cleans the house together with his wife. It doesn’t take much time or effort; it is a small house, having everything necessary for an elderly couple to live. One of his passions is gardening, so he spends most of his time taking care of his plants and cleaning his yard. He has worked all his life, but he is far from being a millionaire because he gives away 90% of his salary every month to social projects. He has no luxuries, no extra commodities, he only has what he considers necessary. And yet I believe he is one of the richest men in the world. He is José Pepé Mujica, president of Uruguay from 2010 to 2015. He preaches a message against materialism, a disease that has taken over society. But this is not only a message that he preaches, but puts into practice every day. He has been named by the media as the poorest president in the world, to which he answers: “I became president poor. I will leave as I came, poor. I define how rich I am by having served my country and staying true to myself.” He dislikes the nickname and wonders why the media pays so much attention to something that should be seen as normal: a man taking only what he needs and not wasting money on superficial things. He is constantly surprised by news coverage about his lifestyle and couldn’t believe it when an Arab sheikh offered one million dollars for his old blue Beetle, when it is actually worth $2,800 dollars, at most. José Mujica believes it’s okay to dream aboutbecoming rich, but in case you do you should go intoother fields than politics. Politics is made to serve the people and not benefit oneself. Those who use power to seek their own riches and their greed for more will not lead their country to a prosperous future, and therefore they would not do the real job of a president. This makes me think: what about the presidents who have governed my own country who have filled their pockets with state money and ignored the needs of the people, the people who believed in them and entrusted a whole country to their hands. I come from Honduras, a third world country where 60% of the population lives in extreme poverty. When I mean extreme poverty I don’t mean that they can’t afford to have three meals a day or pay for their kids’ education, but that they live on a budget of less than a dollar a week in a country in which a liter of purified water costs one dollar. But still our president travels in his own private jet, has three luxurious houses around the world, and stays in five star hotels every time he goes on tour to different countries. He comes from a small town in the west of Honduras, but now he seems to have forgotten his humble roots and embraces an opulent life where there’s no hunger, no poverty. A life which is the opposite of reality for the vast majority of the population. Don’t get me wrong; I am not criticizing my country’s president for having the means to afford a life full of luxuries, for I believe that if we have struggled for something we should enjoy it. Neither am I asking him to be just like Mujica. I know that this requires great effort and Pepé Mujica is an exception to the rule. But it is disappointing to know that most funds come from the taxes of middle class Hondurans, and this money is being wasted without concern. The money should treat people in public hospitals and to give a better public education. Also, I believe that the leader of a country should sympathize with those who chose him and not ignore the fact that while he is spending millions his own people are trying to survive under inhuman conditions. When did humans start to become blinded by power and start to believe material possessions are synonymous with happiness and superiority? We have become a society that circles around the idea of spending what we earn to buy things we don’t even need. José Mujica, we have so much to learn from you! Leaders should take a moment to listen to your speeches, read your writings, and rethink if they are actually being leaders or if they should take their ambitions into other fields. Mujica was not the perfect president. Has there even been a perfect president? But what I want to highlight is his quality as a human being. He refused to go with the flow and ignored the trends, but was still perfectly happy. Mujica teaches us that happiness is not in having the most but enjoying what we have, that happiness has no price tag and can’t be kept in a box. He also reminds us that material possessions just bring a load of stress, taking away our freedom and the valuable time we have wasted getting those things.
It might be true that one single human being can’t change the world, but I strongly believe that people like him can make a great difference, by touching the lives of others and inspiring people to follow a different path than the one society has given to us. a
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The Taida Student Journal has been active since 1995 with an ever-changing roster of student journalists at NTU. Click the above link to read about the authors Archives
May 2024
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