Retrospect

My summer in Nicaragua has just come to an end. Ten weeks go by faster than the mind can imagine. I arrived yesterday evening to LAX to news that my stepfather died of a heart attack literally an hour before I landed. It’s funny how I could spend a summer away trying to help those so far removed from my immediate life and yet neglect those who surround me daily. To say the least, this summer was an eye-opener. While I accomplished many things, I can never forget that sometimes, the help we do for others is never enough and that no matter how much I desire to help those in desperate need, I can’t forget about those dearest to me.

Looking back on my time in Nicaragua, the small villages where I spent many a night, the impoverished communities, the starving children, and the smiles I received just by visiting the rural peoples immediately bring joy to my heart. However, and in all attempt to sound the least pessimistic as possible, I can’t help but feel that pain and suffering exist everywhere, is inevitable.

Towards the last few weeks of my stay, Stephanie, John and I got to visit and stay with a few families in some very rural communities, where even water was scarce. Our last few working days were spent visiting houses asking set questions regarding the typical conflicts encountered in day-to-day life. We were to report back on the frequency of animal theft, border and land disputes, and toughest of all, domestic violence. While at first the task seemed intriguing, which in fact it was, it shortly became similar, as trite as this may sound, to pulling teeth. Imagine walking into a rural home, built of plywood and covered by a large piece of sheet-metal, where the best of amenity is a wood burning oven with constant harmful fumes permeating the small house, and where everyone, sometimes two or three, sleep in a single hammock, and then, more or less barraging them with questions. While few families were responsive, for the larger part, the community was shy, evasive, and most of all scared to answer such intrusive questions by foreigners. I know in my heart that the work of Nitlapan only has but the best of intentions, but I cant help but feel the route taken, this sort of PR done by “gringos,” hurt more then helped. Despite this however, we were at least able to get the word out that mediators would be in place within their small communities so that when future conflicts arise, they will have local community members to turn to. (Pictured left, the shy nature of residents we encountered).

In the end, just being surrounded by purity of life that Nicaraguans enjoy, the simplicity, the love for one another’s family, living on open land, and using only the most basic of necessities is to say the least enlightening. Now that I’ve returned home, to Orange County, California, to expensive cars, expensive homes, expensive everything, more and more I feel that with all the things I’m surrounded with, I actually have less than I did in living in rural Nicaragua. (Pictured right, another family I visited, both suprised to see a camera but yet also content with life.)

This summer has definitely changed me. For the better, I’m sure. I recently finished reading a book entitled Emergency Sex and Other Desperate Measures detailing the work of three United Nations human rights workers: a Harvard Law graduate, a doctor, and another UN official, working in Cambodia, Rwanda, Liberia and Haiti. While this collection of stories has encouraged me greatly, the ending reverberates with me now more than ever. At the end, the three reflect on their journeys, the life lost, the people saved, the naïve dream of saving the world, and come to a resolution that I am currently finding myself at: “So that’s the easy answer: foreswear idealism; resign myself to a sad maturity; put away the things of youth; be thankful I survived and move on. But that’s horseshit too, a craven capitulation. I’m not ready to let the youthful part of myself go yet. If maturity means becoming a cynic, if you have to kill the part of yourself that is naïve and romantic and idealistic—the part of yourself you treasure most—to claim maturity, is it not to better die young but with your humanity intact? If everyone resigns themselves to cynicism, isn’t that exactly how vulnerable millions end up dead?” With this ending note, and with the current moment I am in, having to console my crying mother, the old adage really does ring true; death is a gift, a gift of life, and gift to fight harder to save more, and more than anything else, a reminder to not forget about those around you while on a mission to save those so far away.

Above, the local school teacher and his children.