All Under One Heaven

I came to India looking for something enitrely different. What I found was something entirely similiar. Even in the place I was told was "as far from America [in every sense] as you can get on the planet" I was struck by how similiar we all are. In the warf slum of Tenali I saw the same despairing faces, the same teen pregnancy, the same lack of health care and poor health education, the same trash, the same insecure housing and the same desperate humanity that I see every weekend on the Skid Row of Los Angeles.

It seems like all of the differences I've found are choosen, learned, or superficial. In the grand scheme of things, skin color, clothing and art styles don't really justify distinction; language, cultural behaviors, and interests are shifting and fickle; and the rest is just how what we feel like doing in the moment.

I wanted a new context, a new cultural lense to see the world through. I was looking for the things that were hidden from me when I was in the West. I'm a little disappointed that my Indian vantage point hasn't revealed many of those things; but I have been pleasantly surprised to learn what things haven't changed. What things are universal to humanity. The things that make us the species that we are, all living on the same planet. Looking up at the same sun and moon; dreaming of the same stars. And reaching to grasp the same truth.

I came halfway around the planet to learn what I already suspected: We are all under one heaven.