«Not a dream anymore ...»

The Act Now-ers are arriving at their practice places, Svenn shares about his journey:

Imagine yourself in this position: You use the whole weekend to pack and say goodbye to your family and friends. It’s a lot of work, but you have to do it. You have never been in this situation before. Everything is totally new. The fact that you are going to leave everything for seven months scares you a bit, but you can’t really understand it. It’s so strange. You feel like you are going on a normal two week vacation, but you’re not. This is real.You try to tell yourself that this is real. No dream. It’s not a dream! Still it is a dream. You have been waiting for this so long. For the last six months. You have been walking around thinking. How is it going to be. Will I learn to speak spanish? Will I be a good volunteer at Alalay? You can never find the answer. You realize that the answer is that you can not know. You have to live your life day by day and see. You just have to do your best. No one can demand anything more from you. You can only be your best.

You arrive in Lima around 16.30 local time. You are tired. Extremely tired. You have been more or less awake for the last 36 hours. You have been traveling for a total of 22 hours, and the excitement of finally being in Lima makes you feel a false refreshing energy in your body. You meet the staff from the Stromme foundations office in Lima. They are so nice to you. Smiling. Greeting you in the Peruian way. You really fight your heavy eyebrows to try to be nice back. It works in a way. Luckily. Then you get into a car and drive to your host family. You meet Lima for the first time. Looking out of the tinted windows of the car you see a new world. You can’t really figure out what it is, but it is okay for now. After a 40 minute drive you are finally there. You are ready to meet the family you are going to spend three weeks with. You don’t have words for how nice they are. They show you the house. It is nice too. They make you a meal and you sit and talk. Some in english, some in spanish. You go to bed and you think to yourself; What an amazing day. So lucky I am to be here. Thank you so much for everything God. You are just amazing!

Then you fall to sleep with peace in your mind, and a big smile on your face.

From: Thoughts from Bolivia