Reunion in Thiruvalla

Our group has been apart for about five days. It was last Wednesday that we parted from Achen’s home, where we had begun to feel very comfortable and content, and where we had begun to feel like a family. That day was one we had all been looking forward to. Of course, we were excited for what was ahead – new homes, new jobs, new friends, new stories, new adventures! But it was still difficult to leave each other and the comfort that we had found in our newly-formed friendships.

And that is why we were all so very delighted to reunite today in Thiruvalla. Thiruvalla is the small city where Becca is placed for the year – about two and a half hours on an uncomfortable train from Aluva. And this is the small city where we volunteers will spend the next week together. I’ve been looking forward to this retreat, which is an extension of our previous orientation at Achen’s home, as well as a chance to provide solace and support for each other at a very unsettling, transitional time. It’s good to be here!

We are staying at a Catholic retreat center in the city. It is a pretty nice place; the beds are really hard and the showers are really cold, but the food is good and the tea is excellent (plus, we get it mid-morning and mid-afternoon, while normally we would only get tea in the afternoon). But the best part is that, when we are not enjoying some type of nourishment, we have easily gotten back into our daily habits of singing together, praying together, and sharing together.

We’ve been sharing many stories from our first weeks in our sites – comic stories, touching stories, even horror stories. Everyone has so much to share, and it has been nothing but wonderful to engage in these conversations. It has also been a blessed relief for me to be able to put into words some of my own concerns and to discover that I am not alone in them. We are all facing challenges in our sites.

But, as I keep reminding myself, why are we here if not to be challenged? Of course we are going to be challenged! What did we expect when we packed our bags with a year’s worth of stuff and flew halfway around the world? We left Comfortable, we left Familiar, and we left Easy when we left the United States. Now Challenge is part of our everyday routine; Challenge is what makes up the bulk of our lives here in India. And the reminder we need is that that is exactly what we wanted; that is why we came. Being together again for the week, I believe life has, once again, become easy. But I also believe that being together again for the week will be just what we need to remember exactly why it was that we signed our names on that dotted line so many months ago.