It has always been a humbling experience to witness and become one part of a person’s life story. What a gift it is to listen with an attentive ear to the stories of people from all different walks of life. To share with them for a moment a feeling of novelty, uniqueness, and beauty that encompasses the very essence of who they are and what makes them tick. I’ve always been fascinated by other people: what they choose to be passionate about, who their friends are, their purpose for rising every morning to a start a new day, what they like to eat, who they love, and how they suffer. This summer my curious mind and adventurous heart led me to Southeast Asia where I explored the intricate beauty and warming culture of Thailand. I was invited to fall in love with a new place but most importantly to fall in love with the stories of strangers that soon became my friends. Language barriers were abrogated and dialogue was never closed off despite these language differences, instead what I was able to witness, was that at the core of every human heart we are all the same-created to love and be loved.
I spent several days in the outskirts of Northern Thailand, in a rural village nestled among tropical rainforests and millions of rice fields. One evening after riding our bicycles through the village I sat on the tiled floor of my host families' living space where a small television was playing Muay Thai Boxing. There was a fruit basket in front of me filled with all assortments of tropical fruit. My host parents sat next to me, and watched me struggle as I tried to figure out how to eat the strange looking objects. Amused by my ineptness of not knowing how to peel what looked like a strawberry with thorns they began speaking to me in Thai and teaching me the names of every fruit in the basket. Since Thai is a tonal language I had great difficulty in deciphering what they were trying to say to me but nonetheless I sat on the floor with a lychee in one hand and a durian in the other and continued our conversation through pointed gestures and head nods. I’ve realized in that moment that communication is universal and as the evening passed we watched Thai boxing and I learned more about who they were, their hardships and struggles of loosing their twenty one year old daughter in a motor vehicle accident the year before. They cried. I cried. I looked around their home and saw unoccupied spaces except for a small wooden table, a squat toilet, and a sewing machine in the corner. Despite not having much they still offered me fruit, a heartfelt conversation, and a warm embrace. Glancing at their tear stained faces their smiles projected some semblance of happiness and humility. Minutes later after my Thai roommate had arrived to translate I was told how much they wished for me to stay longer, how happy they were that I was there, and how much they had come to love me. Truly, love can be be found in every crevice of the world.
In honor of Mother Teresa of Calcutta becoming a saint this week I have deeply reflected on her own life story. She never grew tired of loving others and serving the poorest of the poor. What I witnessed in my host parents, despite the loss of their daughter and the little they owned was the joy they carried in their hearts. A joy to serve and love others even through their grief. I was a stranger in their home but they offered me a welcoming smile, the love of neighbor, and a simple act of love by sharing their exotic fruits with me. My humblest experience was to share in their suffering and in their openness of sharing it with me. As individuals we were created to be compatible with others and even though I spoke a different tongue, I felt loved. “Compati" means to suffer with. In the words of Mother Teresa, suffering will never be absent from our lives, through it, we are given the chance to share the joy of loving Jesus in his passion. Offer your suffering for peace in the world and thus true love is love that causes us pain, that hurts, and yet brings joy. That is why we must pray to God and ask him to give us the courage to love. Mother Teresa, in the last fifty years of her life endured a great spiritual dryness but she came to love the darkness. She took up her cross and shared in the life of Christ in his suffering. My friends as you go through your daily struggles and carry your own crosses I pray that you may walk humbly, live simply, and experience the joy of loving others just like Mother Teresa did, just like my host parents did. Let us actively pursue and act upon this great gift that is love by having a merciful heart: a heart for those who are hurting. Whoever you are and wherever you go turn towards your neighbor, the people that surround you each and everyday, the suffering poor and find the joy in loving them.
“The fire will not burn you and the water will not drown you.” -St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta
This post was written by guest writer Valeria Garcia.
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