We can withstand much more than we think

If ever I read something that resonated and stayed with me through the roller coaster that has been adult life, it was an essay my friend wrote at the end of our volunteer program in Belize, Central America.?

Bruno and I had been placed in Bella Vista, which, although lacking in basic infrastructure and comfort, did not compare in the least to Blue Creek, where Marina (the author) had lived in a thatched hut among Mayan villagers.?

For Mah, at that time, 'access to running water’ meant bathing and washing her clothes in the river nearby. The bathroom facilities were a long drop on stilts, enclosed by wooden plank walls and floors, and cracks of equal width.?

Privacy entailed sharing a room with Yoshi, the Japanese middle-aged man who joined the program despite not speaking a word of English or Spanish. When they weren’t dining on their hosts’ tamales, included as part of the “gringo” package for boarding with a local family, they would fry the day’s catch, usually little fish, in an old can, on the tiny single burner the project had provided.??

Both volunteers would routinely travel together by bicycle, to-and-from other native communities, pedalling up and down the steepest of dirt paths in 40 degree heat and 90% humidity, pushing foliage out of the way and swatting at the mosquitoes that feasted on their sweaty arms and legs.??

It sounds heavy and intense, but I don’t remember Marina complaining when she’d visit us in ‘urban’ Bella Vista.?

Anyway, I digress. The essay.?

“We can withstand much more than we think”, it was entitled.?

Mah described her experience so candidly, the many challenges she faced during her stay in Blue Creek, like the living conditions and wanting to do more, but being limited by environmental, political and social forces. She recalled the moments that almost made her give up and leave; feeling disillusioned with the project or receiving bad news from Brazil, yet, how she’d pushed through.?

Each time she persevered, she confirmed the statement that later served as the theme of her passage: she could withstand much more than she’d thought.??

In the last few years, through COVID-19, especially, I’ve often reflected on this, repeating those same words to myself.

I’ve felt like I’m swimming upstream, again and again… Exhausted from the energy it takes to keep afloat. Being pounded by wave after wave, as I try to catch a breath of air…?

Work, parenting obligations, distance from my family back home, losing dear ones without a chance to say goodbye, my migration journey - life, in general.

Through it all, I sometimes draw on memories of Mah, standing in an airy living room in San Ignacio for our project debrief session. I reach for that image of her, reading scribbled notes from a loose paper and everyone sitting in a circle, listening attentively to her account. Even then, before “life happened” and her essay took on a whole new context, her words touched me and rang so true. I never imagined that 15 years on, I’d still look to them for that reminder.

We can withstand much more than we think.