Jordana Weiss' Story
In 2002, I travelled to the Central American country of Nicaragua with Leaders Today. When I got back to Canada, friends and family kept asking me to share the most inspiring thing I saw there.
I wracked my mind to think of an answer, and the best I could come up with was the image of a young boy rubbing a huge bug in his armpit and chasing me around with it.
Need an explanation? That’s OK—I was pretty confused the first time it happened too.
Nicaragua is a country with two seasons—dry and wet. In March 2002, when our group of 10 people arrived in the capital city of Managua, the wet season was in full swing.
Other than rain, the wet season also brought out many chichara bugs—huge, locust-like insects that make a sound like a chainsaw. Not many of us were enthusiastic about the prospect of bunking down with bugs, however harmless, that were the length of our palms. I absolutely hate large bugs, and was probably the least happy about the chicharas.
After spending a few days in Managua, we took off for Waslala. We stayed in Waslala in partnership with the local Catholic parish. Father Nelson and Father Carlos, two priests there, were outgoing, friendly men who thought my fear of bugs was pretty funny.
Another person who got a good laugh at my fear was a local boy named Wilson—the mischevious boy I mentioned at the beginning of this story.
Wilson was around 10 years old, and he liked to hang out near the volleyball and basketball courts that surrounded the parish church.
Wilson was always with our Leaders Today group, and always seemed to think we could understand his rapid-fire Spanish. We all tried to keep up, listening attentively to his long, excited stories that were full of gestures and laughter.
Wilson also loved to play cards—as long as we followed his rules. Not surprisingly, he usually won.
Wilson and I struck up a friendship, probably because we were the closest in age. At 12 years old, I was one of the youngest on the trip. Wilson and I got along well and tried to understand each other despite the language divide.
The only thing Wilson and I didn’t agree on was bugs. He loved to pick them up and hold them, while I couldn’t stand to look at them. He clued in to this early on, and began to chase me around with the huge chichara. Of course, I would always run away and hide.
After a while—as if that wasn’t bad enough!—Wilson started picking up one huge chichara bug at a time, rubbing it under his armpit, and then chasing me with it. He laughed the whole time, and as gross as the bugs were, Wilson and I had a lot of fun together.
As much as I didn’t appreciate Wilson’s love of bugs, I was sad to leave him when I left Waslala. His constant enthusiasm and desire to understand taught me a huge lesson.
When I first arrived in Nicaragua, I was frustrated at not being able to communicate with anyone outside of our small group because of the language barrier. After watching Wilson effectively charm 10 complete strangers, even though only two of them spoke his native language, I learned to be resourceful and started thinking outside the box for ways to communicate with people. By the end of the trip, I had developed friendships with people I never would have if I hadn’t met Wilson and learned some of the secrets of his enthusiastic communication techniques.
One of these techniques was the art of listening. One thing Wilson was very good at, besides talking, was listening. I often watched him as he sat listening to the trip leaders as they tried to explain what was going on with this big group of gringos (foreigners). I’d watch Wilson as he sat there, gazing at the speaker with rapt attention, and I’d wonder how much he could actually understand. But just the act of listening brought him closer to his new friends, even if he couldn’t understand everything they were saying.
Back at home, I kept Wilson with me by always trying to think of him and the ways he learned to understand whenever I was having an especially hard time communicating with people. In a huge high school, it’s hard to see eye-to-eye with everyone and sometimes even speaking the same language doesn’t make much of a difference.
But Wilson taught me that situations don’t always need speech; sometimes they just need understanding.
Wilson knew that, and I’m trying in my day to day life to live what he taught me…only I’m doing it without the huge bugs.
Mailing List