Columban Sr Eileen Rabbitte says goodbye to the people of Peru after 40 years.
A late phone call can sometimes leave me feeling anxious but recently such a call was a very pleasant surprise.
When I heard, "It's me, Luz Marina from Ica" my heart jumped. Luz Marina is one of the very special friends I had parted from when I returned to Ireland after a long missionary journey in Peru. It was so good to hear her and to hear about life in Ica, my home for so many years.
In spite of many thoughts of home in Ireland and the plans for family reunions, the parting was painful and emotionally draining. While I had told my companions that the time had come for me to leave and that I felt at peace with my decision, I was not ready for the impact of what it meant to me and to the loving people I had encountered over my 40 plus years in Peru. "Why are you leaving us? You are still healthy. Stay with us."
So many more painful comments brought tears to my eyes from time to time. A trip up the Andes Mountains to Recuay where I had shared life with the people in the highlands of Peru in the 80s and the farewell celebrations there, prepared me for the more immediate partings awaiting me in the desert town of San Martin, Ica, in the south of Peru.
This was my last mission appointment in that beloved country. They would say, "Madre, we are going to miss you." Trying to keep back the tears and keep calm did not always work; how hard is the parting of friends!
A community Mass celebrated by our bishop followed by a get-together to send me off, proved almost more than I could handle. The Spanish word, "Despedida" is a loaded one especially if you are the one to be sent off. The whole world seemed to be there and now that we are in the age of technology I was not the only one with a camera as was the case in the 70s. They all wanted a photo to remember me. My heart overflowed with love and gratitude when people like Julia Rojas who had never missed a night at the Bible meeting, approached with her beautiful family. 
As we posed together I recalled the last time we had a family picture taken with her was when her new post-earthquake house was being blessed. She has never forgotten the joy and wonder of her solid brick house which was one of the many we Columban Sisters were able to provide after the 2007 earthquake thanks to the generosity of so many great benefactors overseas.
So, you see, there are many reasons to be overwhelmed with joy and gratitude and pain when a missionary comes to the moment of departure from a beloved and grateful people.
The process of leaving the familiar and facing the unfamiliar is no easy task. The unfamiliar being a completely changed culture in the Ireland I had left so many years ago.
A welcome home day for returned missionaries organized by Irish Missionary Union helped me to realize that I am not slow, stupid or mad! Meeting 20 other returned missionaries who like me had been overseas for 40 or 50 years helped me to realize that I am just a normal returned exile needing time to adjust and fit in to a whole new and radically changed Ireland.
This is another beginning but I know that, whatever the future may bring, I will always hold the Peruvian people in my heart.
Columban Sr Eileen Rabbitte spent 40 years in Peru and now lives in the Columban Sisters’ Convent in Magheramore, Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Read more from The Far East, August 2014