Es ist eine kleine Welt

This week on the boat, a group of Americans are volunteering. They came together from California, near San Francisco, with their church, which is affiliated to a church here in Berlin. I met them briefly last Thursday while I was working, but Kerstin was showing them all around and I didn't really get to talk to any of them. When I went to the boat today, I got to work side by side with all of them. There are about 8 of them; four men, three teenage boys and a woman. Right off the bat the woman was as friendly as can be. She was very, very sweet, which came off as a little condescending at first, but she is very good intentioned. (Condescending may seem like a harsh word, but when a woman calls you sweetheart in the first conversation you've ever had, it's accurate. Turns out she just calls everyone that, no matter who you are.) She inquired all about why I was there, admitted that she might not remember my name although she picked it up really quickly, offered me food, and checked in on how I was doing every now and then. But it wasn't just me, she did this to everyone. It seemed like it was almost part of her work. 

I noticed that she didn't seem to do much physically. Don't get me wrong, she did work, but I was questioning what type of worker she was. Whether she was solely the mom or whether she simultaneously would get down and dirty. Granted there were so many people, there was always one person who wasn't doing anything. While I was waiting for Helge, the master shipbuilder, to tell me what to do, her and I continued on talking. We were finally instructed to paint some wooden boards that would eventually become part of the ceiling. Together with her husband we moved the boards. Her husband asked if i wanted to paint. I told him I could do it if he had something else to do, otherwise it made no difference to me. He insisted on painting so he could watch what the boys, one of which was using an electric saw, were doing. Three minutes later, Helge thought of another task. It was to paint the outer ledge of the boat. (It is the black part that the tires are protecting from the other boat in the picture below.) This ledge had been scrubbed with wire brushes by the boys earlier and now needed paint. The woman's husband insisted he do that, so I took up painting the wood boards. This left the woman as the one who was standing around. She soon ended up leaving to accompany the boys to the store to get snacks, of course asking if i needed anything. 

When she came back she gave everyone an ice cream bar because she had bought a pack and forgot that there was no freezer. After this, she went to check in on her husband. She asked him a handful of times if he wanted her to help him, after about the fourth time, he accepted. She got down between the boats hesitantly. She seemed rather nervous, asking her husband whether or not he thought the two boats could crush her. She insisted he watch her closely. (I was painting 2 yard away from them, I wasn't listening from afar)

If anyone has any experience with boats, you know that when a boat is tied up, it is in constant motion moving towards and against whatever it is attached to. Since this boat is attached to another boat, this motion is more intense. I was aware of all motion the boat was making in what she was saying. She was very nervous about it all, at least that's what I thought until she asked her husband to take a picture. He ended up calling one of the boys over to take a picture. She said, "I don't usually do things like this." This left me really confused as to what she meant by 'things like this.' The nerves settled and her and her husband worked together for the the next hour. I was still watching them trying to figure out this woman.

I believe this woman's name is Yolanda, but I am not sure. It is very unique and a name that I rarely hear, so it was hard for me to remember, but I think i'm right. I feel that it's important to use people's names although I struggle to remember names myself. (I left her nameless until now purposefully.)

After awhile the boys called for a lunch break. While we were eating lunch, Yolanda confessed that she was afraid of confined spaces, but not claustrophobia in the normal sense. She is specifically afraid of being confined between two things, not necessarily surrounded. She gave the example of when you are riding a bike and have to weave between two things. She said it took her a long time to learn how to do that. She continued to talk about how she felt between the boats while painting. How she was afraid of doing it, but she did it. The words she was saying were facts, but she was supplying them pridefully, and justly so. 

When we went back to work after lunch, her and her husband continued painting between the boats. I now knew the fear of being confined between two things was the 'thing she doesn't usually do.'

Yolanda is not just a mother figure or a nice person. She is a person who pushes her limits and take pride in her accomplishments. Not only was it was the only act of courage I witnessed all day, it was a defining moment of character. Out of all the people I worked with today, I feel that I know Yolanda the best not because she welcomed me or was the nicest to me or the one i talked to the most, but because I witnessed her showing the world who she is. 

What a great person life threw my way. 

Abbey 

P.s. I was originally going to write this post about how one of the men came up to me and asked, "Did you say you went to school at Bard? In Annandale?" And how he continued to tell me how his sister in law went there and how one of his father in law worked there and how he had family that lives in the town neighboring campus. We both were astonished at how small the world is. I love Bard and I love that this happened but my heart's need to express the story about Yolanda overrode Bob and my connection revelation. Funny how sometimes we don't notice the things that impact us the most until we give them the space.