This is a rather strange Canada Day for me as I am actually in the US this weekend.  Although I’m not at home, I am celebrating with all of you.   This holiday always gets me thinking about how truly blessed I am to have been born into this great nation.  What are the odds that my soul would land here, in Canada, instead of another country?  I am truly blessed.  I have freedom of religion, education, career choice, freedom to marry or divorce as I wish, freedom to raise my children as I choose.  As a woman especially, I am blessed.  I can go about my business and not worry about my safety.  I am FREE, in every sense of the word.

In trying to gage just how lucky I am, I came across this interesting summary of what the world would look like if it were reduced to just 100 people.

Sobering.

If we could reduce the world’s population to a village of precisely 100 people, with all existing human ratios remaining the same, the demographics would look something like this:

The village would have 61 Asians, 13 Africans, 12 Europeans, 9 Latin Americans, and 5 from the USA and Canada

50 would be male, 50 would be female

75 would be non-white; 25 white

67 would be non-Christian; 33 would be Christian

80 would live in substandard housing

16 would be unable to read or write

50 would be malnourished and 1 dying of starvation

33 would be without access to a safe water supply

39 would lack access to improved sanitation

24 would not have any electricity (And of the 76 that do
have electricity, most would only use it for light at night.)

8 people would have access to the Internet

1 would have a college education

1 would have HIV

2 would be near birth; 1 near death

5 would control 32% of the entire world’s wealth; all 5 would be US citizens

48 would live on less than US$ 2 a day

20 would live on less than US$ 1 a day

So… if you’re celebrating Canada Day today, as a Canadian, I’m guessing that you either have a college education or would have been free to pursue one should you have chosen that route.  I’m guessing that you live on more than $2 a day, that you have access to the internet, electricity, clean water, medical attention, proper housing, and so many of the other things that we take for granted in our society.

A heartfelt thank you for my good fortune of being born into this great nation and to those who fought and died so that I could enjoy the freedoms that I do today.

Happy Birthday Canada!!!

Note – these stats were taken from www.familycare.org