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so...
Just recently, my family and I have found out that Tamás their son and my
host brother will be traveling to Ohio in late August to pursue a year
abroad as an exchange student...
as you can imagine, this has been a surpassingly stimulating time for him
just as it has been for me...I find myself very proud of him and think of
him as one of the best, if not the best to be included in this program for
the upcoming year of 2004-2005...
Because my real brother Richard and I are so close...I thought that coming
here would make me feel solitary in a way that I could have no other
relationship like this with just a member from my host family...but the
truth is, I do and I can sincerely say that I love Tamás and the other
members of my family unconditionally...and I think nothing will and could
ever change that...
For me, time is not a threat...true love lasts a life time right?
I understand that when I leave on the 29th of June...it will be the last I
see of them for a while...and it hurts me...and I have tried to escape that
reality...but even myself said that the more we run from something, the more
we are victimized by it...
So...instead, I try to embrace it...
…
From
this point on…this will no longer be a Rotary report…but an accumulation of
my thoughts towards my life now…I am not sure as to if any of you have
experienced any of this before…but I can assure you that it is quite common
for me now…
I have chosen to write this because I think that relation is and should be
very important for people…and if it is so that the other exchange students
will or are reading this…I hope that their exchange year is as important as
mine is to me…I understand that we are all diverse, but it is as though that
at times we are not so different as we act to certain things similarly…such
as these emotions and feelings that I have written about…here goes…
…
I woke up in a dream today…if it makes sense to think of it…or even to
conceive a belief such as this.
Falling into the oblivion of a world only I know…
In the midst of a crowd, bigger then the population of my country itself, I
stood…amongst people that were once strangers…
Aliens to everything I’ve ever known – they felt far from me…
And now, everything that I feared before has subsided…
I have been received
…
Hungary has held no barriers/boundaries before me…
I am hesitant to leave - it will be so different from when I left home...
I won’t have the comfort of knowing that I will ever see these people again
as I did before...
So many things happen because of time...people forget the importance of
relationships and they forget how intense definite things were perceived to
them…
I am apprehensive that the things that I have experienced here will fade and
become more like a dream rather then real experiences and I will be unable
to comprehend all that I had here...
It will all become a reflection, a succession of images – sensations, which
I will never again be able to capture...
It will hang over my head for years to come and I won’t be able to reach
it...
Just as this instance had risen, it disappeared into recollections that will
be my obsession…
…
People have told me that I have altered their lives and that they feel
allied to me...
And what they fail to grasp, is that they have entrusted the same in me.
I don’t want to depart from that, but I am fortunate to have had that in my
life…
Its been a long time since I have been this genuinely happy...I don’t think
that it will be hard for me to find this again...its just the fact that it
could never be the same..
I don’t want to come home and live in the past, and in the memories that I
created here...and I fear that if I do, I won’t accomplish anything
I understand that with time, things come and go...but I don’t want these
moments to pass...
I am the same person, just grown up...with more respect and affection for
life
My eyes have been opened completely...it has enhanced my aptitude to do all
that I can commit...
I will leave a fragment of myself here...in the people that I have
acquainted...in the places I have encountered...
…
I have just two more months left here...even if that...and I know that it
will go by fast...and I wish that I had the ability to slow down time...but
even then, it would keep me from home.
…
The other day, I cried with my best friend...he was truthful with me and
told me that he never had a friend like me before. He told me that he
doesn’t know what he will do without me...
Just knowing that I had such an impact on someone like him, makes me feel
that I have completed what I came here to do...
I was relied on…and I helped him.
He has opened up, just as this journey has itself.
It is the oversimplified actuality of his placing his trust in me that makes
me so elated– submerged.
He has shown this to no other – I am alone in those he confides.
I am afraid to leave him, to leave this place…
But I refuse to let it slip through my figures…tears must be cried…
…
It wasn’t hard for me to let go for this year...it is everything that I have
wanted…
I have explored this world and myself…
It was what I intended to do
…
People say that childhood living is easy to do…
But what about it is so easy?
I linger on this, always.
Despite my age, I have lived many lives. optimism-reliance-faith-assurance-
But nothing quite like this.
I am obligated to this realness – it carries me from an asylum that protects
me from being sheltered – from limiting…me…who I am
“Don’t start looking back before the end – Love always, Stretch”
Thanks Richard…
So, to Rotary…I thank you…you have given me the chance to express and
experience more then I thought was possible…you have given the world and so
much more to many of us…I fear that we can never be grateful enough…
You have changed people with the opportunities that you have given them and
they have articulated it positively…
Within one day, one night, one moment…
You have given me belief
You have given me a new earth across a distance that has become
My passage
My destiny
My life
I am myself because of you…
…
I cried a little while ago…
And it felt good…
I cried for other people and for myself…
I cried about yesterday, today and tomorrow…
I cried about things I have no knowledge of - things I wish to change.
My tears embodied happiness, hope, serenity
Streams covered my face –touching my skin
I am naked with ambition…
I cried…
And it felt nice…
My eyes bled for a while…
I cried for love and for hate…
I cried because I realized that I couldn’t change all that has gone astray…
Lost aspiration, lost dreams, lost meanings
I cried because I realized that I couldn’t make all that I wish…disappear –
Undesired pain, undesired hurt undesired wounds
I cried…
I cried because my thoughts are bruised
I am uncertain
I cried…
I cried because I realized.
My eyes are swollen – swollen with sentiment.
Memories seep through them
My past is expressed through them
My present is expressed through them
My future is expressed through them
I cried…
And it felt pleasing
I cried because I have too much – when others…have…nothing
I cried a little while ago…
And it felt reassuring…
I cried because I realized that people are numb…weak…they are suffering…
They are falling – apart
I cried because they can’t feel what I feel…
I cried a little while ago…
And it felt hopeful…
I cried because I miss you…
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