The Camp

Dear Friends,

I was reading through my journal from this summer…it’s the same journal I’m using now because I didn’t quite fill it up last time. I was reminded of the tensions I experienced that no longer haunt me here. I think I have changed a lot…perhaps during that summer, perhaps after.

I found this excerpt that was the last one I wrote from Meulaboh before I left for Bali.

What it is that I cannot even confess here is my own fragility. My uncertainty that what I believe and see and feel is even what I really believe and see and feel – or should I be feeling something else? Perhaps I enjoy writing because it does not let me change my mind. Such that for once, my thoughts are still and eternal. In reality, every thought is a quiver and every belief just a trembling stumble into a certain direction.

Yes, that feeling lasted all summer…until I finally reached Bali I think…and even then, not until the third day. It was my birthday. I bought myself a drink and sat at the bar of a hip restaurant listening to a band that played international new-age music. I think I told myself I had arrived at something I could call my own accomplishment – probably one of the first in my life that wasn’t invested in, demanded, or deemed important by someone else. It was my own choice, one of my first choices I really owned.

This time around, such choices seem more natural to me. I guess I’m growing up.

It’s incredibly hot outside today. There are so few clouds in the sky such that there’s just no avoiding the sun. These days I would rather work in the airconditioned office than be on vacation out in the heat.

We had a large meeting with the community leaders yesterday along with the boyscouts. It was a major milestone and crucial step: the response from the community really makes or breaks this project. There were 16 block chiefs, one village secretary, and one village chief. I was most impressed by the village chief who is also the religious leader in the village. He was a short man, maybe only a couple inches taller than I am, and he had one of those faces that seemed to have found everlasting peace. He wore a plain white garment and white pants and a hat men here wear for religious activities. He spoke very softly throughout the meeting and really spoke very little at all. Every motion and word had a sense of finality and deliberateness. He’s one of those leaders that upon the first glance, one could immediately understand why he was the chosen one. I am looking forward to meeting with him again.

It was Professor Azrul’s last day today. He is the national boyscout leader in Indonesia. He was to leave at 6am this morning. I happened to be awake then due to my sluggishness in overcoming jet lag so I rushed out to say goodbye to him. He came out of his room to sit and chat for a while. He leaned back in his chair and spoke as he gazed off into the distance – his usual posture while telling tales of his life past. Just looking at the way the light glazes over his dark leathery skin, one senses the many lives he must have lived: writing books on everything from romance to biostatistics, serving public offices with various titles, traveling around the world giving lectures on public health, being shuttled from place to place by an entourage of young scouts. He says to me ‘I pray to God and ask Him to not make me too wealthy…it’s the wealthy ones that have the problems…why do you think all those men have mistresses these days?’ I joked to him that I will make sure I don’t find a husband who is too rich.

We visited a scout camping event last evening. It was held at the school where the children go. There were 7 or 8 tents of various shapes and sizes set up in the school courtyard. Most of the children were eating in one of the classrooms. They had cooked the food themselves. We asked the boys who were better cooks, the boys or the girls, and they responded quite seriously that it was one of them in particular, as though there was no question. One table of girls were singing a song as we entered. I fumbled to switch my camera to the video function but failed to capture it on time as the room was lit only with a few small candles on the tables. The children’s families had donated the materials for them to cook: the rice, some chicken and vegetables. It was simple but the children seemed content. This was the first camping event the scouts in this city have had since the tsunami, the scout leader said with pride. We congratulated him. I felt very excited for the children, to imagine what it must be like to be the first to have this experience in years in all of Meulaboh (although nearly invisible on the map, it’s a big place for the children here). I remembered the sheer bliss that small events out of the ordinary had brought me when I was younger: the unquenchable excitement of what could happen, of sleeping in a tent outside of home, of being surrounded by my friends past dinner time, of staying up past curfew…these are degrees of excitement I no longer reach…I again recalled that these peaks of happiness have been eroded by the sands of persistently lingering worry and disappointment that comes with age. The happiness I know now is one of contentment, a warm glow with tapered edges. Only through watching the children do I come close to feeling that kind of happiness again.

It’s time for me to move on with my day. Hope everyone is well at home…don’t take cold weather for granted!


Bev