Trapped in the trappings of luxury

People with relative wealth often look on, astounded, at those who live with so little: how can they survive? How can they be happy? And, embedded in those questions, is the assumption (or the assertion) that these people would be happier if only they had more money or possessions.

It happens at all levels of the prosperity ladder. Celebrities and footballers cease to understand how anyone could possibly live without multiple cars, full time hair and make-up artists and first class travel. People who work in the City can’t conceive of giving up their morning latte, or of preparing their own lunch to take to work, or of travelling across town on a bus rather than taking a cab. Parents visiting their grown-up children bite their lips, but behind closed doors justify the brevity of their stay with references to the lumpy mattress, the lack of en suite facilities and the noise of the occasional plane flying over head. And even those of us living relatively modest lives in the developed world, experience books, documentaries and images of the developing world with a sense of wonder – how is it possible to live on less than $1 a day? How can people put up with sleeping on mats, in dirty, infested homes?

When one signs up for something like VSO, part of the experience you’re anticipating – perhaps even looking forward to – is a more basic way of life. It’s an adventure to see how you’ll survive with no electricity or running water, and it’s a volunteer badge of honour to live with no air conditioning, no generator, no chauffeured cars: we sniff at the luxurious expat way of life, and are proud of the fact that we are toughing it out (although, of course, we live very well compared to many local people). So in that sense, because it’s a definite choice to live in that way, and because we’re prepared for it before we come out here, living without the usual trappings of our lives at home isn’t too much of a hardship.

But I’ve noticed, since moving into this new expat-style house, that I’ve started to get annoyed about things not working. Things like the air conditioning, which we didn’t even have in the old house – now, if it doesn’t work, I get frustrated. We’ve been having a (-nother) problem with our electrics, in that when the generator is on, it seems only to power one side of our home, and that has been making me really angry: but we rarely had power at all in the old place! And last night the TV stopped working and I was desperately trying to get it fixed: I didn’t even want a television, and have enjoyed not being a slave to it over here, but the second it was taken away I was furious. It’s like my frame of mind has changed with my physical relocation: I am no longer in the mindset of “whatever we have is a bonus” and “we’ll make do”; instead, I’m thinking “well, if it’s here, it should work”.

As one moves up this ‘prosperity ladder’, it seems to me that there is no easy route back down. With the exception of making a deliberate choice to sacrifice certain luxuries (as in VSO), once one has a certain standard of living, one becomes reliant on it (even addicted to it) and quickly forgets how it was possible to be happy with less.

This recent experience, for me, is a timely reminder: a reminder that I need to try to hold onto what I have learnt and experienced here, even when I return to the hustle, bustle and affluence of the UK. I have loved living with fewer conveniences and material possessions over here: this, combined with a much better work-life balance than I had at home, has made me happier than I ever remember being in recent years. As I start to look for jobs for after my return to the UK, and as I begin to experience this illogical frustration with broken appliances I don’t need and was happy without, I can begin to see how easy it would be to slip back into a frantic life of ‘things’ – and, frankly, of greed – and to forget completely how blissfully happy one can be, sitting and thinking by candlelight.