What I Leave Behind

Yes, this post much like my other post is about 

what I am leaving behind. 

Sitting alone in my Buenos Aires apartment it is hard to believe I have been here for three months. It seems unreal for a lot reasons. One, it feels like I just arrived yesterday. Two, it feels like I have been here for an eternity. Its funny just how comfortable I have become with my life here in Buenos Aires. I never would have imagined that anything that has happened to me over the last few months would ever have happened in my entire life. Looking back on it right now I am not completely unconvinced that it wasn't a giant dream and this is how it is ending right before I wake up and have to go to work, or class, or get screamed at by my mother. Much like the first time I wrote this post it is completely and utterly self-indulgent....do not feel obligated to read it. 


This post is so very different than the first one. I would love to write the same things, my family, my home, my town, but what I leave behind is not as concrete this time. Buenos Aires isn't my home, it's not my country, and my family isn't here, but that doesn't mean I don't leave things behind. It just means what I leave behind is a little different.


Just like the last one though I thought a little music might be in order....


Temporary Home- Carrie Underwood

My APARTMENT!

First and foremost I leave behind this amazing apartment. This was truly the first time I have ever lived ALONE. Completely alone and completely self-sufficient. I'm not going to lie, I was petrified....its scary enough living alone for the first time but to do it in another country, seriously what kind of drugs was I on when I thought that was a good idea? The reality is though I did it. My apartment here in Buenos Aires will always have a small place in my heart for helping me survive. The kitchen, the balcony, my big bed, or the table and chairs I have planted myself in front of right now. They all belonged to me for a few months and only me. Its weird how much I like the idea of having my own place and how much I still am afraid of it. 


Along with my very own apartment I have to say I am leaving behind my building and my wonderful super Carmen. She really has been great! I think I see here everyday and she never ceases to say hello, how are you, have a good day, or comment on my Spanish or her need to learn English. Its funny that these three months I have really become sort of a real person who has very adult interactions in their daily lives. 


The last and probably most important thing I am going to miss is my freaking roof! I LOVE it. Two jacuzzi's, a giant barbecue, and some nice lounge chairs. Its great to just go up there and lay out, read, have a drink and just enjoy the fact that you are in South America. 


So in short the first thing I leave behind is my apartment. My first living alone experience and everything that goes along with that. 


Now for another song....

Sara McLachlan-I Will Remember You

My work at Ciudadanos del Mundo....

The most important thing I leave behind is the work that I have done with my NGO. I could  not be happier with what I have done. By creating a curriculum with supplements and teaching the social workers how to actually teach and utilize the material I gave them I leave behind something far greater than myself. I hope that what I leave behind there makes a difference. That it helps even one person makes me think that this entire experience and trip was more than worth it. If one woman recognizes a symptom of an STI or a complication from an illegal abortion and seeks life saving medical treatment because of my curriculum then it has all been worth it. 


It is honestly very hard for me to think that I am leaving something like this behind. I never fathomed that I would be involved in a project like this and I still can't understand how I am one of the first people to really fill this need. I am thrilled to have been given the opportunity and to be able to help, but I am also a little disgusted by the fact that no one else had stepped up to do the same thing. 


So what do I actually think I leave behind with this project? I would like to think that the time I spent working with the social workers and with some of the clients didn't only teach them the curriculum. I hope that it taught them the importance of advocating for those who can't or don't advocate for themselves. In the US I feel like there are, not a lot but a handful of truly dedicated people to serving those less fortunate and in poor social circumstances, but in Buenos Aires those people seem to either not exist or lack a brazen passion to advocate. Hopefully, a little piece of that hard-headed-root-for-the-underdog-spirit that people from the US are known for stays behind and motivates the people I worked with to make significant changes in the status quo here.

Who I am right now today.....

"You get a strange feeling when you're about to leave a place, like you'll not only miss the people you love but you'll miss the person you are now at this time and this place, because you'll never be this way again."

Azar Nafisi, Reading Lolita in Tehran

Yes that quote again! I think now more than ever I understand it. I am clearly not the same person I was when I arrived in Buenos Aires. So many things have changed, some temporary and some permanent. Some things have changed for the better and some for the worse. Some parts of me are exactly the same and I think knowing that makes me realize what parts of me are really true personality traits and what parts of me are fabricated based upon where I am and the company I keep. The thing about who I am today that I truly love and hope doesn't change ever is the person I was in the post titled the Last two days. I realized while here that the person who presented for the embassy one day and passed out condoms to prostitutes the next is exactly who I want to be. I want to be able to speak theoretically and be one of the people "in the room" making decisions, but I also want to be one of the people on the street, pounding the pavement and doing the one on one educating and care. For some reason being one of the people who does the suit and tie presentations is nice and  I know its necessary, but to feel like I am actually doing something and making a difference in someone's life I need the hands on, feet to street, experience. And that is who I am as I end my journey here in Buenos Aires. I think I really got a feel for how to have the best of both of those worlds. Working in a more sophisticated theoretical realm and getting to see the practical reality of what the theories meant to real people. I hope that this trend continues....I hope that it will happen again.....that I will be thrown into some situation where both sets of those skills are needed so until then....I will end with this song.....

Goodbye Until Tomorrow!!