Nov.4 – Monday – This is a country coming rapidly into the modern world.

The infrastructure has suffered through long periods of war and poverty. There is little in the way of regular trash collection and what is eventually collected lies in heaps and piles around the countryside. They actually burn most of their trash. They have little infrastructure or technology for getting rid of farm waste other than burning. The air quality suffers from that, of course. But this is the way it has been done for thousands of years and this is the way it will continue to be done. Some crops do not lend themselves to large machines and technology.

The air is not perfect, but the world is not perfect. We need to remember that while traveling, especially if we come from a country like the United States. We live in an exceptional place in many if not most ways. Much of the rest of the world has changed little for thousands of years except for the advent of the internal combustion engine and electricity. Those improvements do not reach everyone, sadly or thankfully. You pick.