Fin

So the end is here: too soon, finally, unexpectedly, and not quick enough. Time’s humor is ironic: it escapes you and simultaneously drags you along; but in the end it weaves with space to help us be human. Two years abroad was barely enough time to get over the things I missed, situate myself, make a life, and become at one with it. Only in the last couple of months here have I begun to embody this odd sensation of bi-culturalness. I finally feel Siccheñan in some ways, just in time to experience yet another loss upon leaving something that I have become a part of. It’s an odd sort of liminal space, your identity and your heart realizing themselves in two very different realities. I can only begin to imagine what refugees, migrants, and immigrants feel; those who experience such things out of necessity and not out of choice.

And it’s time to go? Yes, it IS time to GO.

The Siccheñans are not making it easy for us though. There’s too much love for it to be easy. Just like the countless people through space and time who have left one place for another, a piece of us will always abide in and with Sicchez. Here is where I learned about the true nature of generosity. And that home is everywhere I step. And that service sometimes means just doing something to be nice, even if it’s not ¨sustainable¨, even if it doesn’t fit the parameters of ¨international development¨. When Siccheñans speak of our service, they mention the extrinsic impacts of trash management and improved cooking stoves, but they really smile and speak with heart when they talk about our friendship.
So we said goodbye the best we could, knowing it’s most likely forever and that we won’t be able to communicate with them. We threw a going away party for the town at the church on a Sunday night with coffee and cheese sandwiches. We visited families and showing a nature movie with popcorn to the elementary kids. Anything we could manage to show our gratitude. There were buckets of tears, moms bringing cookies to our house, women gifting us things they sewed, and people wanting to drink the last and final beer together.

Hardest of all were the goodbyes to our family. My body felt full of rocks that were streaming through my organs and blood. I couldn`t sleep at night. It was awful. Even more difficult was that our grandpa died on the same day we left. Words cannot describe the experience, you can only imagine. How in the world did we manage to give that last hug to a family who has looked out for our wellbeing with never a hesitation? Who took the risk of opening their humble lives to strangers? A noble family indeed, we will sorely miss them.

Emphasis fails me when I try to put into words how much Brian shaped the positive aspects of our experience here, but I owe it to him to try. Those of us who love and know him well understand the breadth of his impulse to realize any and all potentials within his grasp. Brian was the one to animate me when I wanted to sulk in my room, to bend over backwards for someone when I lost my patience, and to go above and beyond all normal expectations. He reliably kept a level head and somehow let the small things roll off of him like the trillions of raindrops that rolled off our roof. Admirably, he has an uncanny ability to always keep people laughing, and I was constant witness to the extremely high esteem that those around him harbored for him. To me, he became the embodiment of true service: Brian does all and everything he can for others just to be nice. Because it will help. Not in the name of ¨international development¨ or ¨sustainable projects¨ (too-often heard lingo in the Peace Corps), but because it`s just a nice thing to do. And he does it most of all when the rest of us would think we had done enough. What Brian knows deep down is that what people really lack is compassion and equal treatment. That they can overcome anything when they are loved and respected because that`s when they develop the self-esteem they need to overcome obstacles. Being nice to them is the best way to help them overcome the challenges that face them. And that`s what Brian did every single minute he was in Sicchez.

So thank you Sicchez, and thank you Brian. May we all try to stretch our hearts towards infinity.