Entry Eight: A Setting Sun

Lizzie Revay
Feb 3, 2019
4 min read

You know that feeling

When in your heart you always knew something was gonna end, you always knew the time table

But then it hits you

That it's actually coming to an end

It hits you like a ton of bricks even though you knew it was always going to come

This is the feeling that settled over me upon returning from holiday break and America.

I don't know if it was because coming back we only have three months left or if returning to America was a glimpse of the future or some combination of both.

Almost like the hairpin turns of Indian roadways, conversations stopped being "oh your here for awhile" and "you have so much to see and experience while you are here" to "your only here for a short time" "why would you buy a churida now you only have a few months left" "Ma'm when are you returning to America"

You always think that you have so much time

Suddenly questions about the future are a lot more real... I always imagined that February was going to be this grand planning month. I do love to plan :) Trey and I were going to book everything for our upcoming month of travel in India, I was going to start editing my resume again and upload information onto teacher hiring sites... this was all planned to occur in February...

well its February

now these things are beginning to happen, we even have started communicating with the future graduates who might be doing the program next year, which really puts you in your place,

It all became very real over the course of the past month

Checks and Balances

A central theme to my experience in India has been learning the art of living a balanced life. With out meaning to sound like a self-help book, from my own experience I can say that: Living life in the extremes can be a lot of fun but it can also be quite detrimental and physically, mentally, socially exhausting.

So heres how I plan to keep a balanced mindset through out my time here

Prepare for the future with out forgetting to live in the moment

As we proceed, it is important for me to remember that when I do go home, I do have to start my life, find a job, then an apartment, a social life would be nice to have... but I also can't spend the next 3 months worrying about the future. Because I only have so much more time here, it just as important if not more important to engage and live in the community, the culture, and the country.

One small anecdote that makes me laugh when I reflect on this aspect. There was one particular "professional development" type day, all the teachers were in school but the students were not. A situation that breads idleness (is that a word?, I find myself more and more questioning my own English which is a experience I can't quite explain). The teachers were busy correcting students work, as my work is more conversational, I finished this task quickly and then had very little to do, so I managed to find myself in the rabbit hole of future thinking, I was engrossed in pacing and playing with my hair when I experienced two different interactions with teachers, both of which I find sum up my experience here well. The first was: You do not need to think about this now, you still have plenty of time to figure it all out, The second was: well what are your future husband's plans.

I digress

Reflect but don't criticize/ Acknowledge but make like Elsa (Frozen Barbie) and Let It Go

Time flies when your having fun, and because of this I have recently realized that I haven't actually had time to really reflect on living here in awhile, too busy too tired, same old same old, nothing to see here. That is until I had the opportunity to sit down and really think as I filled out our half-year reflection guide by the program director. Filling that out it was so easy to see where I could have lived my time here more meaningfully. Yet that is not what reflection is about... is it? Its about realizing where you can grow for the future, being hard on yourself because of the past does little to aid you in the future.

*PS I recommend journaling, even if its just snippets from your day, even if your writing is terrible because your so tired. It really helps to improve moving forward.

The same could be said on future reactions to culture differences. I think sometimes it is really easy to let certain cultural differences get to you and ruin your mood, your day, your week. But I simply no longer have time to let these bother me. I think there are important to acknowledge and discuss but not to hold onto and mull over again and again, its equally as important to let it go....

Never a dull month in India

So many celebrations, ceremonies and functions.

Tessie Auntie's Son's Marriage

- the first Christian marriage we attended while here

- occurred two days after we had gotten back from Christmas holiday

- the first and only time Lizzie Mam will ever wear so much bright pink