When I accepted this mission, I wondered when the reality of the devastation would hit. I was, surprisingly, still wondering about this when  our first patient arrived to the OR, a child with acute appendicitis who had lost almost everything-people who he had loved, his home and his community. He was within hours of losing his own life and his Dad of losing the only connection that he had left.

I noticed the foreigness of the faces-faces that we, as Americans, were being enculturated to hate and fear as we saw footage after footage of Osama Bin Laden and Fundamentalist Muslims. My veil of denial lifted for several seconds as I connected with the vulnerability and the loss that this small child had encountered as well as the severity of his condition. The veil lifted again, momentarialy, when I saw this team in action. We, the shipmates, were in action-doing what we do. The anesthesiologist and nurse anesthesist were administering anesthesia, the scrub technologist was handing instruments, the circulating nurse was overseening the needs of the patient, anesthesiologists, and surgeons. Translaters had translated for father and son. The patient and father were transported by an experienced Navy pilot and crew of people who cared for him during his trip from Banda Aceh. Skilled nurses at Casualty Receiving cared for father and son while the diagonsis was confirmed. And after the surgery, the boy would be cared for by the team of nurses in Intensive Care and later in the Ward. The recognition of the immensity of the mission hit momentarialy as all of the planning and waiting and training came together.

One of the next patients would be a young teenage girl who arrived with an excruciating painful osteosarcoma on her wrist. The cancer had consumed the bone that connected her arm to her hand. My veil of denial lifted, again for a short time, as the humaness of this situation came into focus-the pain of her suffering and loss and the connection that she had with her family-all exponentially expanded by the still incomprehensibe tsunami disaster. I would be with this young girl as we amputated her lower arm and I would follow her and her family for several weeks afterwards as she came for continued procedures to close her wound. The "foreign" faces quickly shapeshipted into a feeling of deep connection, compassion and love for these people. I have never  before felt the fullness of these relationships-the depths of knowing that the hearts of us are the same.

I experienced a yearning to live fully on this mission-to fully experience the richness and texture and to work with or understand my inability to comprehend the devastation to the people and the land of Banda Aceh. I wanted to be with the people and to experience a connection with them that I still find so deep that it is inexplicable.

There became an acknowledgement of extremes, of the polarities of pain and joy, of fear and trust, of lost communities and loved ones and new found trust and friendships. There was the extreme polarity of the devastation of the land-utter and indescribable devastation which contrasted so completely with the beauty of the ocean, and sky and the constancy of the sun, stars and moon.

Communication shapeshifted from a dependance on the Translators to a trust of the the heart centered language of love and expressions. I was, to the people of Banda Aceh, a huge American-a huge woman. We played with this in photographs.

The artwork in the drawing room shapeshifted my incomprehension into a knowing of what had happened. The drawing room was full of Arutam, of the power of the truth, of the power of love and recognition of two different worlds merging into one. It was in the drawing room that I had a discussion with several women form Banda Aceh in which we talked about the Grace of the tsunami-the Grace of many people coming together to a world that felt virtually unseen- of the Grace of many different nations coming to offer their love and their help during this time of the incomprehensible.