How big is Ugera?

How many people are in here? Five hundred? More? And how much land do you have in here? How many hectares? And how much air? And how much movement in the leaves, in the water, in the walking, in the hugging? And how many people left this place? There are those who left Ugera, they are in the villages around here. Some got married and others didn’t. But they are all there, living their stories. There are those who left for the bigger cities to study, to work, to try something else. And there are those who left the country, left behind these lands; they are people of Ugera who are in the large world, in countries we know or those we do not know. There are people who were not born here but now come here to share their goods with this community. There are those people that you invite to come and provide various amenities to this community. Others come here for various activities, not forgetting people from other villages, from other cities, from other countries. There are people who did not come here but they gave something; they maybe gave a book or a chair for the school. Some of these people you do not know, but they invested their resources into something that was built for and in Ugera. And, of course, there are those who came and found their significant other here in Ugera, and are now living and building their lives here. Some people return, others don’t.

There are those you can call by their names, and those you only recognize when you see their faces. And there are the people you have already forgotten. There are people who wrote books or articles about this area and mentioned Ugera. Some are from institutions that inserted data on Ugera into official documents. There are those who drew maps of this place. There are the kids outside Ugera who mention this place while they are talking with other kids, or with their parents, and there are also adults who have memories from some time ago when they passed the area. Then there are friends of those who left, who got stories from here. And there are all the people who heard about Ugera, from me. Because I am constantly telling the story of Ugera.

There are the politicians who got your votes, the teachers from other schools with whom you, the local teachers, are interacting. There are those to whom you are selling your goods, what you produce here, vegetables, fruits, and all the rest. And please excuse me for being so straightforward but there are also the seeds that were taken by air from Ugera and got far away, or maybe only there, beyond that hill. And there are the animals that are wandering on your lands, the birds that we hear now, or those that are on their way, returning to these lands of yours, or just discovering it.

There are the bugs and the ants, the butterflies and the water molecules, the atoms from the soil, from your bones, the electrons that are now moving. And there are the dogs that greet you, always happy to see you back home. There are the babies in the womb, and right now those that are about to be conceived, or that are already embryos. There are the fathers; there are the mothers, the aunts, the nieces, the short ones and tall ones; the ones who are happy, those who go to sleep late, the ones who are good at what they do, and also those who never left Ugera, yet. There are those who speak other languages. There are those who wrote at least one poem in their lifetime.

Now let’s imagine this. Let’s recall all these beings, all this movement and energy in here, in the surrounding areas, in the cities, in the other countries, on all the continents. Let’s think of all those being here, from here, or somehow connected to this place. And let’s give it a moment for this image to work within us. While we start to breath their presence, closer or farther from us, light their movement in your imagination. Turn their lights on. The white, soft lights that are permanently moving. One person in that country is taking a plane to another place; that leaf is carried by the wind to some unknown place; those kids are having their noses glued to the candy shop window in that city; a boy is having his first kiss somewhere in the other village; a ladybug is watching us right now while flying her way to some place. Now turn off all the lights on the planet. All. Make it dark. And keep the button ready. Push it now and let the soft, white lights from those in Ugera or connected to Ugera, let those lights on. And look around the planet, look on the borders, with the constant movement of these lights. Look from the far east to your right, from the far north to the closest person to you.

Your eyes are now wandering around our hills here, our mountains and savannas, the far seas and high mountains, the glaciers and the forests, the tall buildings of the cities and the sand of the deserts. And all that you can see are the lights of Ugera, the borders of Ugera, the meaning of this place, and stories that have happened or those yet to happen.

This is how big Ugera is. Not one millimeter smaller, not one millimeter larger than the constant movement of the lights, the soft lights, around this planet. This is Ugera. Our community.