it's foreign to me

I remember when I was very young
and came across an article about
debilitating shyness

there was a photo of three teenagers
two girls happily chatting with each other
and a boy looking from afar, wistfully,
hesitant to join

the magazine was western
all the people in it where white

i was shell shocked

how can white people in
developed, western nations
have such a mundane problem
like shyness,
which i thought only afflicted me?

we grow up believing
a host of such things about
'developed' western nations

that there is gender equality,
for example,
that men and women both work,
and equally share the housework
that if women don't like
how they are treated
they can easily divorce
and get on with their lives anew

we never heard the reset of the story
that it my not be as easy for women
as we imagine it to be

we heard the word 'system' a lot
there is a 'system' in developed nations
laws are upheld
in fact, you don't even need to
enforce the law
because the people are so lawful
crimes are punished
the government is so good
you don't starve
even if you are not employed
because you get an unemployment bonus

there is no poverty, there is no crimes
even today, the staaatistics or news
of crimes, continues to surprise many
my god!
why would they need to do that in america?
where they have everything they could ever want?

since we saw so many bikinis
we thoguht everyeone in america
is always naked
or if not, then
very fashionably and weirdly dressed

maybe the next generation won't have such images
because there are nepalis all over the world
and also becuase social media and superfast internet
makes every reality accessible

but for us,
travelling
was not so much for enjoyment
or education
but an eye opener
for long held beliefs such as these

the realisation
that people are human
all over the world
there are social problems
no matter what
and that society goes
in cycles and spirals
where one ascent
naturally leads to
other descents