“I have some really bad news from home that I should tell you about” are words you never want to hear. Somehow the fact that I found out at a rest stop in the outskirts of Cienfuegos made it worse, because there’s nothing I could do about it, couldn’t contact my friends and find out more, and left confused and sad. I was just left with this awful information, helpless and desperate to talk to the members of my close knit crew at home. I thought about it as I forced lunch down my throat, I thought about it in the ovenlike minivan we took back to Havana, I thought about it until I couldn’t think about it anymore.
The news was that one of my most cherished friends from Chicago (although this did not take place in Chicago) last Friday had an accident and suffered major head trauma. I’m not going to write about any details here, this is not a venue for that sort of thing. Thankfully, she’s doing incredibly well and recovering faster than anyone thought she would.
Hearing news from home while abroad is hard. There’s nothing you can do to help, it’s difficult to reach out (you can’t call due to costs), and if you want to send a supportive email, there’s a large possibility that the internet won’t be working. You’re left in this strange place where the news is affecting you emotionally. I’m not traveling with anyone from my home community, so I felt especially isolated for a time.
Recently, other unimaginably terrible news reached a member of our group via Facebook. Without going into just how terrible it is that the Overseas office didn’t call our professor on his cell phone and instead elected to send him an email, knowing full well that the internet in Cuba is an unreliable entity, it’s worth mentioning how difficult it is to receive any bad news here via something as impersonal social media. Anyway, what I want to focus on in this post is the response that both I and this other group member received when the rest of the LC students learned about each of the things that happened.
The support system here is unbelievable. Although I can truly only speak to my own experience, watching the group mobilize around the tragedy that befell the other group member was both surprising and inspirational. As soon as we knew something was wrong, everyone offered unconditional support, not only materially but emotionally. Everyone was very aware and cautious to not interfere where interference wasn’t needed, and very respectful as well. And in both my situation and his, the community love that came out of misfortune was great.