I’ve been home now for two days, and it’s still hard for me to fathom my two months in Nicaragua. I’m still exhausted, emotional, and confused by many parts of my experience. Navigating through my thoughts and emotions and the life I lived while in Nicaragua compared with my life here has turned out to be a much more trying journey than the 15+ hours of travel it took me to get home. Many aspects of myself have grown and changed, but at the same time I’m fundamentally the same and can see myself with greater clarity.
Before arriving in Nicaragua the word I focused on was risk, that traveling to a third world country that I had little experience in outside of textbooks was a risk that I was willing to take and necessary to my development as a human being and a disciple of Christ. During my time in Nicaragua, I was faced with many negative situations that tested my faith and showed me a side of Nicaraguan life that’s tough and not so pretty (I decided to emit most of these experiences from my blog). I often found myself frustrated with the religious experience I was having in the midst of terrible human suffering and a loss of innocence in a city full of crime, sex, and poverty. However, at the same time I was witnessing incredible beauty- the beauty of the landscape, the people, and above all the beauty of the human spirit and the relationship with the divine. Before my time in Batahola I prayed all the time, but my prayers consisted of “Lord, Please help me to…” “Lord, I want…” “Lord, I need…” Plain and simple, coming to Batahola taught me how to pray and more specifically how to give thanks. Being surrounded by people who constantly praise God and instead of asking Him for things thank Him for all of the blessings that they have received and simply ask Him to bless others was something extraordinary. I found myself thanking God for every moment, transforming my life into a life with God as opposed to a life that God watched unravel from a safe distance. All parts of my life were given greater meaning and significance, and nothing was taken for granted. I am able to appreciate the infinite number of blessings in my life, and feel grateful for them as opposed to asking for more and more and more. This may seem overly basic, but a large part of my “transformation” was owed to spending time with my host family around the kitchen table. (I was not supposed to eat three meals a day with my family, but I did just to spend more time around them.) Every meal began with grace, and by grace I mean prayers deep from the heart about all of God’s blessings and constant presence in our lives. Many times it was our prayers that sparked the most interesting conversations during dinner. My “despedida” or final goodbye dinner with my host family was a little too much for me to handle on Saturday night, but when it came time to say grace I opted to go. All of my previous graces had been in English, and it had been a semi-joke within my family. However, this time I was prepared to pray in Spanish and even brought a copy of my grace to give to my family. Here is the English translation and I think it sums up my experience in a way:
Prayer Before Dinner for my Nicaraguan Family
Thank you Lord for all of the blessings that you have given us in our lives
Thank you for each experience, each moment- the lessons that we learn
Thank you for this nourishment and food, for our health, and for the love we have for each other and this land
Thank you for the time we have together to share our blessings, our talents, and our stories
Please utilize our talents in order to transform the world in which we live into Your Kingdom
And use our talents in Your name to defeat injustices and to show our love for You
Amen
Me and the Family- Gerardo, Sarita, and Maria Eugenia
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