Time flies, but I still don't

Somehow, at some point, it became February. And somehow, when I let my attention slip for a second, 22 days passed. How did this happened?

The last few weeks in Lebanon have been nothing like the months, almost two years, before. And yet, surprisingly little has actually changed. I still live in the same house across from the same little grocery store where the same four brothers sell fruits and vegetables every day. The same sounds of grounding garlic around ten in the morning comes from my neighbors almost every day (What does a person do with so much garlic? There must be some sort of health risk involved in eating so much of it! I should inform them... If only to stop this bloody annoying grounding-sound!). The sky is still blue (except during the winter-storms when Beirut temporarily reminds me of the Kanaalstraat in Utrecht in the fall). The sea is still around the corner (again: except during storms when I swear I taste the salt of the sea in the horizontal rain). And the taxi drivers are still a mix between annoying and amusing (I learned to let their annoying habits amuse me).

But some things have changed. I am no longer a radar in the big machine called UNHCR. I will not deny that it was an unexpected end of a short career, and that it wasn’t me who ended it (something about a date on a contract and a budget… ;). Fortunately, my former employer had many good things to say about me, which led a small but active NGO to accept me into their family (because when describing the international UNHCR as a machine, I cannot but label this local NGO as a family). It is a new world to explore, the NGO-world. I experienced a bit of it in Cameroon with the GCI, but this is again something completely different. Very refreshing too, after working for the UN. Of course I knew I had much, much more to learn, but I didn’t think I would for instance be discussing how to distribute matrasses among refugee families (Do they come to pick it up and take it with them in the bus/car/walking? Do we bring it to their house? Do we give money so they can buy a matrass?). Or be welcomed in by a Syrian family (11 people) to visit their two rooms in the grey, unheated, building under construction which they had to start to call ‘home’.

There might be chances to do other things… to go to another country… but for some reason Lebanon has a hold on me. I don’t really want to leave. I want to see what happens next. I want to be a part of it. Don’t move on without me! But at the same time… I want all those same things in the Netherlands! I am sure that all of you who travel will know this feeling, this desire, to be at two places at once. To be a part of both worlds because you don’t want either of them to progress in your absence to an extent you might not be able to catch up anymore. However, it is always a choice… and for now, I choose to be here. But if nothing changes: mom, I’ll be at your birthday party on April 13! Because that’s a choice too!

Love,
Marlies