Aunt Lorna, Anthea, and the real people in Wentworth

I can’t imagine that I have already finished 1/3 of my home stay experience with aunt Lorna and Anthea, aunt Lorna’s daughter. In the past two weeks, I really feel that we have become a real family. Actually, aunt Lorna has introduced me to lots of her family members, and she calls me “my long lost daughter from another country”, and I call Anthea “my sister”.

Both aunt Lorna and Anthea are very different people from me or my family and close friends back in either China or the United States. We have dissimilar background, culture, and interest-- I love reading but hate watching TV, while Anthea is the very opposite of me; I usually stay up late at night, while aunt Lorna goes to bed before 8 P.M. everyday. But all these differences did not stop us from becoming friends. The first day I arrived in aunt Lorna’s house, we had dinner together, and then Anthea and me sat outside of the house on the bench chair in the garden, and talked for hours. Although we didn’t have a lot to share in our experience or interest, we had so much to share about our life philosophy, and our belief in people. I found there is something in common in every friendly heart: the openness, and the love to everyone around.

Thanks to aunt Lorna and Anthea, who are always happy to introduce me to their friends, and talk with me about stories happening in local areas, I got to know so much about people’s real life in Wentworth. People here become friends with strangers easily, and they are always ready to share their lives with each other. Anthea has visitors in our house almost every day, and all her friends share their troubles, confuse, and worry in life with us, even if they just knew me for an hour. I know this is the real life of people in Wentworth. If I am not doing a home stay, I believe I will never get a chance to know people’s real life at here.

After knowing how friendly these people are, I feel even more sorry about things happening on them. One night, Anthea and I covered us with her blanket on her bed as usual and started our thousandth conversation. She told me the girl we just met already had three kids from three different fathers; and the group of nice guys that just said Hi to us were drug dealers, because they were drug addicted and selling drugs was the only way for them to make money. After then, there are so many times I ask myself, “What’s wrong with this place? Who is the person to blame?” If I am not doing a home stay, I will never understand the story behind the data of high HIV population, numbers of crimes, large amount of drug dealers, and single parent families.

During our weekly reflection session, some of my friends also shared their experience in the other home stays, and we noticed the same thing. Although it is hard to help people change their lives in those scenarios, I am happy that we can at least understand them better.