By Enrique Tessieri
I made one of the greatest discoveries of my life in 1998 at the Finnish Seamen’s Church of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Even if such pleasant interior landscapes no longer witness my silence and stance, they are now distant memories that have turned into spacious imaginary cities of the mind where each building has a tale to tell, whispering.
Even if I had visited the Finnish Seamen’s Church on many occasions, the days I spent there as a tenant brought me back to the beginning of a long journey I began around two decades ago when I moved back to Finland.
William Blake (1757-1827) once said that improvements make straight roads but that it was the crooked ones without improvement that are roads of genius. Is yearning and following your heart’s desire a crooked road that can lead you to wonderful places never imagined?
The former Finnish Seamen’s Church is today a cultural center in dire need of money and repair.
Even if my great grandparents, Dante and Jacob only appear occasionally in talk, I can say with total confidence that the yearning and restlessness I feel today is because of them…
…or possibly it’s because I was born in an enormous migrant transit lounge called The Americas.
Like many others, my family has been on the move for generations: from my father’s side, my great grandfather Dante was from Italy, my grandfather Nemo was born in Brazil, my father and I were born in Argentina, and my three children were born in Finland.
Yearning is a powerful force. It is the fuel that turns on our hope; it is so powerful that it rarely dies in a lifetime but lives on for generations.
The world is becoming a very small place as time takes us by the hand to the future. It’s pretty certain that my children and grandchildren will be much luckier than I. They will have the ability to visit and leave cultures and lifestyles at will and be – if they wish – from many places simultaneously. They will travel without the baggage of hatred and prejudice constantly overlooking them.
As long as smaller cultures and not devoured by larger ones, life in the new millennium will resemble vast cities like New York or London, where everyone is from somewhere but few from there.
If we all learned to let go and allow yearning to take us by the hand, maybe the first lesson we’d learn is that we are nothing than temporary migrants on Earth searching for that hill where the grass is greener on the other side.
(1999)
Good morning Enrique,
Good morning world, Good morning darling all,
Life is a journey a wonderful trip for all of us, thats a gift from GOD a sweet gift.
There r many things that we can do in our journey, many thing that we can wish for, Good and bad, right and cruely, positive, negative, we r all have plans, but please let wish best for eachother, happiness, joy, love, lets be useful, active for our society.
When u know more u have more responsibility and so u need be more careful about people around u, please dont care about the colour of their skin, please dont care about what they put on, please dont care about their language, just look at their hearts, we r one , we should, must understand eachother better and better, we all need to grow up, some people are sleepy, its not a bout race, not about age, as age is number and race is what GOD created in u, so we cant be proud about. U was born in Europe, X was born in Africa, B was born in Asia, thats 1 planet, tahts one home, earth love peace, earth doesnot think seperate , R U think ur hands are different than ur legs???? Then for our planet all countries are same, like ur house that has a few rooms, but all rooms are belong to ur house, belongs to one place, thats what we r.
I f i was borning in Finland i been a Finn , if Africa i been an African, if Asia Asian i did not know where i will born and so u too.
Am talking to all, for me all is one, am looking at ur eyes and heart , then am listening to ur minds lets be friend, lets be one family, love uuuu
I wish best for u my dear Finn, Finland
I wish best for u my dear African, Africa
I wish best for u, me and my family, i miss them, i need them, its 7 years am far, so faaar
I wish best for u my pretty earth, world
Hugs to all
Thanks Enrique dear brother
Hi I am and thank you for those inspiring words. We should, as you mentioned, not look at the ethnic background of the person or the color of his skin but his heart or character, as Martin Luther King Jr. said in his “I have a dream speech” in 1963.
Thank you for sharing your story with us I am.
I am, a beautiful words you wrote there, i hope the people who lack moral will buy it, majority of people lack empathy and moral towards their felow human beings, it’s seems as time keep progressing humans are becoming less and less human and more and more animal towards eachother.