I know it may sound ridiculous or even arrogant, but have you ever thought about the problems we - people living in Austria - consider as real "problems"? This video is not exactly what I'm going to talk about but to me it is one of the best videos to remind ourselves how happy and glad we can, or even must be, to live in this beautiful country. Austria always seems to be an island to me. An island where (fortunately) nothing "really bad" has happened over the last few years. Of course we have our own little tragedies like crimes, financial difficulties that could be avoided (just thinking about the "Hypo-disaster") or accidents and violent crimes. Despite all these things I still believe that we can consider ourselves as really lucky to live here. Austria has a social system that other countries can only dream of, natural resources and land to cultivate. We don't really know what water scarcity or famine really means. Compared to other countries our unemployment rate is actually at a very low rate and people grow older and older because we have an excellent health system and medical treatment. I could go on and add numerous points to this list but I think what I want to say doesn't need any further explanation.
source: wallpapergang.com
When I open the newspaper every morning I keep asking myself whether we are fully aware of the fact that Austria is such an "island". Do we really appreciate this? I'm not sure about that. When I watched the video for the first time I caught myself having complained about some of the very same things - and to be honest, it seems absolutely ridiculous when I think about it now. What is a phone charger that doesn't reach my bed compared to the Crimean crisis, a plane that suddenly disappeared or even got hijacked, civil war-like conditions in more than one African country, millions of refugees looking for a safe place to stay, water scarcity, a famine, natural disasters ...? Yes, exactly. I shouldn't even ask this question. But that's the way people are, we lead our lives and consider the problems we have as tragedies, because - as I already said - fortunately, we aren't used to tragedies of these extents.
Please don't get me wrong, it's not my intention to convict anybody of anything. I'm glad to live here in Austria and feeling guilty for the injustice that exists won't make it any better. I just think that it's important to get aware of the fact that there is a world beside Europe, beside Austria where people haven't got the same opportunities that we have. Just think about it for a moment :-)
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