Sylvia's Journal

There was much reminiscing, as some 80 people celebrated my brother’s 60th birthday – some roasts, some toasts, a simple meal in a converted barn somewhere deep in a rural part of eastern Holland. There were siblings we see frequently, those we do not, old classmates, husbands of study friends, cousins and relatives by marriage.

When you live in Afghanistan it is difficult to pick up the thread of where we left of 40, 30, 20 or 10 years ago. I can see people think (and sometimes they even say it), ‘why would a sane person move voluntarily to Afghanistan?’ Others ask, ‘Do you like it there?’ All of the questions are hard to answer, including the one, ‘How much longer?’

Many of the people present at the birthday lunch are either already retired or getting close to being retired. And here we were, not knowing quite what will happen after September 30, 2011. Will there be a job? And if, so, where? Sometimes I was plain jealous of people who know what’s ahead.

We spent a delightful after-party time, first in the barn after the clean up, sitting around a big wood stove, and then later at home, sitting around the big kitchen table, eating snack bar food, blending in with the hustle and bustle of a house full of kids, my nieces and nephews and their significant others, chewing over the day, how wonderful it was and how regretful we didn’t get to talk at length with everyone.

Our time in Holland is nearing its end. Tomorrow we will first celebrate another birthday in this household, then squeeze everything we acquired into our new neon-green suitcase and head out west, in the direction of our next destination, Aalsmeer, then Schiphol and then Delhi.