My little experiences with the truth: The tenth exploring expedition.

Dear readers,

The exploring expedition was took place in an area of the city that is quite crowded with people and the streets were quite lively. Surely as the landscape changes the crowd of people also changes with their faces, backgrounds and purpose related to where they are. I traveled today from a street full of desperations of the less fortunate ones and charities of the different ministries and organizations, the South division Street; to a street full of high end restaurants and bars which placed itself right along side the biggest entertainment structure of our city, the VanAndel Arena; then to the Central Bus Station where diversity of people shown, celebrated, ignored; then to the river front which lined with expensive hotels and apartments; then at last ended up at an area more so for the public to gather, the Rosa Park Circle and the Monroe Center Street. It was truly a roller coaster ride like of a journey traveling from all these vastly different landscapes to another. It is such an interesting thing to experience. The city have so much purpose and being use in so many way. It is a gathering place for all. It is a place for the less fortunate ones to find aids. It is a place for the rich to find estate. It is a place for entertainments. It is a place for business to flourish. It is a place humans created to accomplish something. The city never was just being or an end of its own... it is always there with a purpose and it is always expected upon to accomplish something.

I am again amazed by how many parking lots there are in the city and how many spaces they take up. Everywhere I go in the downtown area, I would see a parking lot full of cars with shinny metal tops and soil black tires. The existence of parking lots in the city surely destroy the flow of the streets and its aesthetic value. Those empty spaces lined with yellow or white lines make the spaces look wasted and rejected. It is just not a pretty sight and also not a efficient way of utilize lands. What if those spaces can become parks, small nature reserves or gathering places of some sorts, how wonderful would that be! But first, humans need to stop driving as much they do now.

As I had mentioned that in a short distance, I was able to experience such diverse of living situations, I wonder how much conflicts are there between all these people of different backgrounds, different status in society and different living situations. I think and know that conflicts between all these different people are real and quite frankly, inevitable. I wonder what is the main cause of those conflicts. Is it conflicts related to money, security, uses of spaces? I want to find out. When I ask myself those questions, a story stick out alway. It is the story about this new built park, The Cherry Pocket Park, on Cherry Street between Division and Commerce. This park was built to help beautify the South Division Street so it can attracts more investments and businesses. Only a few weeks after the park was open that many local businesses had complained to the city about the fact that the park attracted many local people who are less fortunate in their situations, to gather there and sighting of alcohol usage and drugs usage had been reported. Few local business had notified to the city that their customers had felt threaten to come to shop with the gathering and the rowdiness that the park carries. Here is a great example of the conflict between different people living in the same area with different backgrounds, between the city planners who want more investments into the city, the less fortunate ones who don't have private home to gather with friends, the local businesses, the shoppers and the residences in the area. There will always be conflicts if people of different living standards, of different interest and of different purposes come together. So a city need to provide for all a equal possibility for all to have the same living standards; also to help illustrates a clear, fair and share interest and purpose to all its citizens.

I also ate at a local ministry food kitchen today. I followed in line as I curiously looked around. I felt no desperation here, but small, short live satisfactions with hints of loneliness. I know fully well that many of the people I saw today in the kitchen are desperate and dissatisfy, but I did not see those struggles in their eyes in that kitchen. May be I did not look close enough or food had its comforting power at work. I felt a bit strange as I always felt when I came to ministry food kitchen before. The atmosphere always surprise me. Food is truly something essential to us, not just its value on keeping us physically alive, but also the gatherings and conversations that a meal brings about between people. It is truly necessary to all humans. Food provide not only physical fulfillment but also create opportunities for humans to fulfill their yearning of communities and relationships. I ate my late lunch and say hi to a few friends I had made over the year. I gave my left over to a friend and as I put the plate and cup into the trash can, I saw how much foods were being wasted. My heart sunk. The wasteful nature of this country is truly soaked through and through to every corners.

Here is what I marked on my map today: