Finding words

I've been state side for a little over a week now. Since I got off the plane last week, I've been attempting to put into words my thoughts and feelings about my experiences in Central America. It's never easy for me to fully articulate an experience like this. Words don't seem to be sufficient to communicate all that I experienced.

I compare it to speaking another language imperfectly. There are always things that I cannot fully communicate in Spanish. During my semester abroad one of my friends and I used to talk about the frustration of having tons to say, but not knowing how to say it. For example, at LASP we learned about a lot of injustices that were very difficult to deal with.

We would want to say something like "I'm upset about the discrepancies of wealth and the unfairness of life for people who are stuck in poverty." But all we'd say was "I'm sad (Estoy triste)."

The phrase "I'm sad" didn't even begin to describe how we were feeling, but it was something we could say without too much effort.

Even though I'm now speaking English, I feel like when I try to find words for the last four months of life it's similarly inadequate.

It's frustrating and tiring to imperfectly articulate things, but I'm grateful for my friends and family and the opportunities I've had in the last 8 days to at least try and put things into words.