Where the wild things are

There are moments out there in the bush where small conversations carry a universal feeling. As the last of the lights flicker in the horizon, you allow yourself to wonder at the world, at humanity, at the future. Sometimes the silent whispers and the hushed conversations you share in the wilderness are all that it takes to understand life in all its beauty, in all its cruelty, but also in all its hope.

“One day, we will have a better country. It can’t last long now. He’s getting old.”

“That’s what we thought. But ours died and then it got worse. But how does he do it? How is he still here?”

“He kills them”

It’s not exaggeration, it’s not him looking for sympathy. It’s the plain truth of everyday life, the tacit rule that a nation lives by.

I understand all too well, a nod in the horizon is all we need to share our universal feeling: complete isolation, resignation, fierce hope that it will not last forever. In the hardships of life, in a foreign land across the Ocean, that’s where we find comfort; that’s where our silent burden becomes lighter, someone understands that sometimes the beasts that roam amongst the human kind can overcome all humanity. Some days though, during the random conversations the Universe gifts you, part of this weight is lifted off your shoulders because someone else knows, someone else understands what it’s like to carry it.

In these moments, just before the sun goes down we pray for our fierce hope to stay alive, casting our wishes to the sky, giving each other comfort without whispering another word.