The "C" Word

A student once said to me, rather philosophically, ”The only two things that are certain in this life are change and death.” I don’t know if he got that from his grandpa or if he formulated it himself, but either way, he’s totally right. 

My relationship with change is a bit conflicted. I liken it to an awkward dance with a guy I have an enormous crush on but barely know. I love it as much as I resent it. I crave it as much as I fear it.

The changes in my life, especially those during my twenties, haven’t been tragic, just big. Think loud, garish colors and a cartoon ”kaboom” cloud followed by nine exclamation marks - the exact opposite of subtle. I am by nature an introvert, but due to circumstances I’ve learned to be more extroverted and to take the unknown in stride. It’s been challenging, but it’s been cool, and now that I’ve gotten used to being thrown into new situations, I’ve started craving it like a drug. I start going through withdrawal if too much time goes by without a change of scene (and when I say too much time, I mean like a month). But God knows me well, and He makes sure to add certain dynamics to my life that keep me interested and dependent on Him. ;)

I’ve grown to appreciate change, not just crave it. And I think there’s an important distinction to be made there. Craving is so one dimensional. If we crave without appreciating, we overlook the opportunity to learn and grow, since appreciation for something is often what propels us forward into a new place of discovery. 

Transition has been one of my greatest teachers. Unless forced into accepting new conditions, my own human nature has the tendency to get comfortable, complacent and lazy. Since I greatly desire to test the boundaries of my own destiny and potential, I can’t afford to remain in my comfort zone. As the saying goes: Ships are safest in harbor. But that’s not what ships are for.

Don’t run away from change. Change is inevitable and it’s not always positive, but the way I see, it’s how you approach it and react to it that allows room to be made for maturity and redemption, and ultimately, tremendous blessing and abundance. 

It's the little things

I was making Shepherd’s pie and listening to some Carole King on a Saturday afternoon when I thought to myself: Life is pretty blissful. So I decided to make a list of some of my favorite things. And I hope that while reading this you feel inspired to make a ”bliss inventory” of your own. 

1. A really good book. You know, the kind that draws you right in, stimulates your intellect, makes you laugh and cry, and challenges you to see life through a different set of eyes. 
2. Dark chocolate, blue cheese and green olives accompanied by a glass of Amarone. 
3. Waking up on a Saturday and feeling inspired to deep clean the apartment. Assuredly I say to you, it doesn’t happen that often.
4. Getting a text message from a friend wondering if I’d like to meet up for coffee after work.
5. A brisk walk in perfect autumn weather: cold, crisp and sunny. 
6. Remarking to a friend, ”I really feel like taking a trip somewhere,” and her saying, ”Me too. Where shall we go?” Me replying, ”Budapest.” And her responding, ”Let’s do it.” (We’re leaving for Budapest next week!)
7. Movies like Singing in the Rain, A Good Year, and You’ve Got Mail. They just make me smile. 
8. Hearing from a friend or relative that a student of mine they randomly ran into said I was their favorite teacher. 
9. Planning a trip back to the States to visit family, especially when it’s for Christmas. 
10. Having my dad look at me while my mom is relaying this super detailed story and say, ”I bet you really just wanted the headlines.” 

Back from Bosnia Part 3

Each time I’m in Sarajevo, I feel inspired. Smog and sad buildings make the city gray; the levels of bureaucracy are so absurdly confusing that even the natives get lost trying to explain them; corruption is widespread and the socio-economic future for Bosnia’s younger generations is uncertain. Despite this, I’ve met great optimism and love in the individuals I’ve come across on each of my three trips. They are passionate about their nation and they are truly making a difference in their communities. They make me feel part of something big. It was a short trip this time, just two and a half days, but it was full of new experiences that will stay with me for the rest of my life. 

These are exciting times.

My day at the U.N.

Anybody who knows me can testify to the fact that I love to travel and dream of working internationally. I’m pretty honest about my ambitions even though my life has been on a detour as of late (albeit a very satisfying one!). But if I could do absolutely anything, I would want to be the General Secretary of the United Nations. I’d gladly settle for a lesser title, but the point is, I want to hold a position of influence in which I can affect real change in people’s lives in an efficient yet compassionate way. (I’m open to suggestions, job offers...) ;) 

Anyway, my teaching colleagues and I were invited to attend a Municipal Development Conference, arranged by the Embassy of Sweden and SIDA (the Swedish International Development Agency), and held at the UNDP headquarters in Sarajevo. The purpose was to ”deepen the dialogue between the international community and the collective of municipalities to stimulate development and reform at the local level in BiH” (Bosnia and Herzegovina). And oh boy, what a collective of municipalities there were. And politicians. And NGOs. And foreign diplomats. And moi.... (say what?!?)

To say the least, I felt like a very insignificant person in the presence of such political muscle. But it was kind of eye-opening. For one thing, I realized that mingling with bureaucrats is maybe not my favorite thing, but that I could get used to it. And I also realized that the implementation of municipal development measures in BiH is a lot more complicated than an idealist like me can imagine. I naively think that reason, logic, and the good of the people are really good directives to style a society after. But when those things aren’t necessarily part of the process or even the ultimate goal, things get a bit intense. 

The highlight of the day was without a doubt meeting Maya Bekto and her sister (whose name I sadly don’t recall), two women who started up a social business called Wool Fabrique. Maya is a designer and her sister is head of production. There are many women living in rural areas who are uneducated and unemployed, but they have a skill: the traditional craft of weaving. So the sisters had the idea of supplying these women with an original design and wool (bought from local sheep farmers) and paying them to weave artifacts such as baskets, tote bags and toiletry cases. 

This has a number of positive social ramifications: 1. Local sheep farmers can sell their wool, 2. Rural women can support themselves and their families (they receive payment in cash immediately upon product completion), 3. The items are sold on the European market (think trade fairs in Paris, London, and Berlin), thereby creating a name for artisanal Bosnian products, and 4. Maya and her sister can live off of the profits and employ people who otherwise have a hard time finding a source of income. This is the essence of social enterprise! 

Wool Fabrique has experienced tremendous success and now the sisters are facing the challenge of balancing high demand with low production. They can’t do it all themselves and they are currently looking for more investors and workers! You can order these stylish Wool Fabrique products online and support a very worthy business. Check out their products here: http://hoolaboola.com/2013/02/08/wool-fabrique-j-adore/

And if you can read French, you can visit the official site: http://woolfabrique.com/la-fabrique/

Center for Healthy Aging

This was a highlight for me. A big social dilemma in BiH is the fact that the elderly aren’t ”seen.” Since it’s not kosher for family members to put them in retirement homes, they live with relatives, but are largely ignored. Most of them sit at home with nothing to do, and often succumb to loneliness, depression and poor health. One woman named Sejdefa Basic-Catic, along with a team of people, recognized this dilemma and got the idea to start a center for healthy aging in which the elderly could gather, fellowship, paint, sing, play chess, exercise, and eat together. The center is the only non-smoking facility in the city (!!!), and ironically, in a society of smokers, it has enjoyed tremendous popularity. 

There is a core team of people that runs the center, but it also relies on a number of volunteers. Many of these volunteers are actually ”troubled youths” who have found a place where they feel needed and valued, a place where they can give to a cause that’s bigger than themselves. I don’t need to explain the enormous benefits of this. It also provides the forum for a much-needed meeting of generations. 

A large number of patrons have relatives who have emigrated to other countries, so they are taught how to use email and Skype to communicate with their loved ones. 

At one point we got to listen in on a choir rehearsal. Ca 20 people sat around a big table and sang old Bosnian (maybe even Yugoslavian?) folk songs. One of them was called (roughly translated) ”O Sarajevo you beautiful city.” If found it very moving: people who have survived a war, and maybe even fought on different sides, joining in unison song about their beloved city that only 20 years ago nearly succumbed to hatred. The significance of this can’t be expressed in words. Only in song. 

I could go on and on about how great this center is, but I think the pictures say it all. You can check out the website: http://www.zdravostarenje.ba/

MoBa

I mentioned him in ”Bosnia Part 2,” and here he is again, because he’s that cool. Eldar Balta is my age but he’s lived so many more lives than me it seems. He knows a lot about a lot of things, and with him you can easily traverse a variety of subjects in one conversation. After the U.N. conference, we all went to the Little Goldfish café (my favorite spot in Sarajevo) and conversed over glasses of wine and pivo (beer). He talked about his work with the Sarajevo Jazz Fest, his life during the war, and his love of home. Unlike me, Eldar has no desire to travel outside of his own country. To me that sounds counter-intuitive since that’s pretty much the only thing I want to do. But he made a remark that made me pause. He said something to the extent of, ”I travel between experiences as other people travel between countries.” Huh.

About a year ago he started MoBa with his best friend Luka (an American ex-patriate from Pennsylvania). Luka is a landscape artist by trade, and one of the visions of MoBa is to engage people (primarily young people) to improve their local communities by cleaning up and beautifying nearby parks. The one you see in this picture is a little green space in the middle of a Tito-era apartment complex. MoBa planted grass and trees where before there was only mud. 

There’s still a lot of work to be done, work that has less to do with landscaping and more to do with changing hearts and mentalities, but it’s a start! If you’re interested in learning more, check out MoBa’s Facebook page (most of it is in Bosnian, but there are some posts made in English): https://www.facebook.com/mobasarajevo

Gimnazija Dobrinja  

Our last stop was Gimnazija Dobrinja, the upper secondary school we’ve had contact with throughout this project. Last year, four of my students lived with four Bosnian students from this school for a week and it was a great experience for everyone. This time around we teachers had a chance to meet a larger group of students to share how we work with entrepreneurship in our own school. It was interesting to hear these students’ thoughts on education, the job market and the future. The overall attitude is one of skepticism and hopelessness. Statistics communicate that the future is not very bright for many of them. The job market is very limited and it’s extremely difficult for college graduates to get a job within their field of study. 

So what’s the solution? Elvir Resic (to the right of me in the photo), the deputy mayor of Novi Grad (a suburb of Sarajevo), posed the question: ”Would you be willing to take any job, if only to pay the bills while you wait for better employment to eventually present itself?” For a lot of students, this seemed to be a new thought. Eldar challenged them to become volunteers. Very few people are willing to work without pay, so this was a bit provocative. But the truth is you build relationships with people and you start thinking in a different way when you give generously of your time and energy to a cause that benefits a greater community of people. Yet another alternative is to start your own business. That’s where my colleagues and I came in. Since there are so few ready jobs available, the only other good option is to become your own boss, invent a new product, create your own niche. This requires creative thinking and determination to become part of the solution instead of the problem. 

It’s not easy trying to change an entire generation’s outlook on life. Parents pressure their kids to get a good education so that they can get a job. But jobs are scarce, politics are corrupt and change moves at a snail’s pace. I don’t blame young people for growing disillusioned with the dysfunction surrounding them. But I was encouraged by the light I saw in some. These are the future leaders of Bosnia and it’s up to them to choose between being changemakers and forming part of the status quo. 

Exciting times indeed.  

Ode to Daniel

I love my brother. And I consider our relationship to be an incredibly close one. We’re transparent with one another, we encourage each other, we’re honest and we keep each other sharp. When we fight, it’s epic, but we always smooth it out. He’s developed a dry sense of humor that makes me laugh, and even though I may not be as emotionally responsive as some, he has at times moved me to tears with his singing. A particular moment comes to mind when I saw him perform Sondheim’s ”Not while I’m around” many years ago. I realized then that he wasn’t just my little brother anymore. 

I still forget sometimes to not treat him as such. It’s not easy making the transition from the big sister/little brother hierarchy to being adults on equal terms. I’m still adjusting to the idea that he’s a grown-up now - more grown up than me in many regards. I mean my goodness, he owns a car and pays insurance! And he’s got a smartphone! And a gym membership!

We’ve spent most of our adult lives living in separate states and/or countries, so this transition hasn’t been a subtle or progressive one for me. Each time I see him is a glaring reminder that I can’t boss him around anymore. I can’t tease him in the same way I used to. He’s got his own way of reasoning, his own values and his own relationships. 

He’s recently taken a huge step and moved to the Big Apple to attend grad school and make his way in the world of musical theater. That takes guts and just the right amount of recklessness. I admire and look up to him (and I mean that also literally as he’s a head taller than me). He’s super charming, smart, talented and charismatic. And for reasons I have yet to figure out, he holds me in high regard. I hope I’ll always be that person.   

Daniel, I’m proud of and excited for you. All I gotta say is that I better be your date to the Tony’s. Eventual girlfriend or wife is irrelevant. I am the star’s sister. ;) 

mucho love-o

A try at grief

One year ago today, my complex and very much loved grandmother died. My first try at grief, and I don’t think I handled it well. 

I didn’t have an emotional breakdown, I didn’t get depressed, and I didn’t project my anger and sadness onto anything or anyone else. Instead, I spent a great deal of time feeling numb and in a hurry.  

I was preparing to leave for Sarajevo when I found out she had cancer. The pancreatic kind. Even though she was in late stages, the general consensus was that she had a few months left to live. But while I was in Sarajevo, her condition worsened drastically and no one seemed to know if she’d even make it through the week. Which put me in a state of panic that I wouldn’t get there in time. I was in constant communication with my dad who had flown from Spain to NY the week before. He said she was in a really bad state, but that she seemed to be hanging on, waiting for me. 

All of her grandchildren had been to see her. I was the only one left. 

As soon as I got home from Sarajevo, I booked a trip to the States and a week later I was on a plane again. My poor students were left to fend for themselves, but my co-workers were a great support and told me not to worry about a thing. They’d take care of it. 

My uncle picked me up from the airport in Boston and drove me down to Utica where my grandmother was checked into a hospice. I walked in the door and saw my dad, aunt and grandpa sitting in the living room, awaiting my arrival. My dad started crying as he pulled me into an embrace. I expected to start crying too, but I didn’t. I made the rounds, then I went in to see her. 

There she was, much altered, yellow from jaundice, and struggling for breath. Much of our relationship had been marked by drama, so I guess I had expected, hoped, to have one last dramatic moment with her like the others had had. But she was already too far gone. 

She did know it was me though. 

I’d rehearsed this scene in my mind for days. I took her hand and sang ”You can close your eyes” by James Taylor, the song I’d been singing to her from across the ocean. Then I sat there and waited for the rest of the movie to unfold. But it didn’t. Not my version of it anyway. 

The weeks of worry, the dramatic rush to get there, the big entrance with the tears and hugs and all the rest of it, all building up to what I imagined would be the climax: my holding her hand as she draws her last breath; the subsequent release into the sad but peaceful aftermath of a funeral, and then the melancholy yet strangely settling journey home to Sweden. But that movie never got made. Because she didn’t die the night of my arrival as everyone had thought she would. She didn’t die the next day either. Or the next. In fact, she hung on the entire week until 30 minutes before I had to leave for the train station. So I didn’t get to attend the funeral, I didn’t get to have the big dramatic family reunion, and I didn’t get to live the romanticized piece of cinema I’d conjured up in my mind. 

Instead I spent the week feeling numb and in a hurry. I’m ashamed to say it, but every day I prayed that it would be her last. That she would breath that last sigh of relief and let God take her. So that I could go to the funeral and then go home. Don’t misunderstand me; I wasn’t in a hurry to get home, but I didn’t have the flexibility of time or money to change the return date on my ticket. And I really wanted to experience the closure of attending the funeral. It would have been my first. 

Numbness and hurry. Those were the two emotions I felt. And to this day I still haven’t had a good cry. I shed a few tears when I first received the news and talked to her on Skype. And then again at the moment she died. But the rest of the time, I was a wall. 

And I don’t understand why. Because I loved her very very much. And I miss her. So so much. 

So what have I learned about grief? Well, nothing. Just that I’m not sure I’ve experienced it yet. And that feels like a horrible thing for me to say.