But I won't be cutting ties completely. It's official, I'm now the happy godparent of three NPH kids, Julian, his sister Aylin and Maria! We'll write back and forth and I'll be able to keep track of them as they grow up. I'm really excited to be their penpal and after seeing how important this relationship can be for the kids, I fully plan on coming back to visit them soon.
I will be saying goodbye to my life here though. This last week has kept me busy with work for the volunteer coordinator, so i haven't been in the clinic much, but I'll miss the nurses a lot, especially Tia Rosa who was like my Guatemalan mother here. They threw a going away party for us this week. Here's the clinic all decorated
I'll also be saying goodbye to the volunteers who have filled the roles of my coworkers, my friends and also my family for the last year. We spend every minute together and while I'm not super close to all of them, they all play a part in my everyday life and it'll be hard to not have them anymore. Last weekend I put some time aside to say goodbye to my best friends here, Charlotte and Stephanie. We went to El Tennedor, the fancy restaurant/art gallery in Antigua. We've been there before and the food is wonderful. It's expensive, but we treated ourselves as our final outing together. I know I'll visit them in Chicago soon, but it'll be hard not having them to talk to everyday.
My delicious lunch
And of course I had to have a Gallo as a shout out to Guatemala
Enjoying my fancy lunch
The girls waiting for their gourmet pizza
My last chicken bus ride! It actually turned out not to be, but it was my next to last, so we'll count it.
Holger was the first volunteer to leave, he's already in the United States having a nice vacation before heading back to Germany. It was hard to watch him go, it was the first break in our family. Before he left, all the volunteers went to the capital to watch him give mass at his church. His whole section of boys came to support him, it was really sweet.
I had a chance to say goodbye to my kids too. First I had a going away party with my older boys in San Gabriel. A few of them came to the clinic and helped me cook enough baked ziti for 40 people. In true Guatemalan form, we chopped up hot dogs and put them inside. When we got down to the section it turned out a large part of the kids had already left to the house for the high school kids, so everyone got double portions. They were quite happy with that ;) I borrowed a projector and we watched a few movies on the big screen. It was a lot of fun with them and they all came up one by one to thank me. It was very sweet.
With the especiales, Steph, Vroni and I are all leaving so we took them together to a park and did a bonfire. Katie was nice to come and help us out. The kids loved it, but who doesn't love hotdogs and marshmallows over the fire?
Me and my buddy Juan Carlos
Leo cooking his salchicha
Emmerson with Vroni
Who needs to wait for food? Here's Carlitos cooking a salchicha and two marshmallows at the same time. It didn't work out so well.
Me and Juan cooking
Group shot! I'll miss these guys.
When it was time to leave, the house sent a pick-up truck for us instead of the minivan. No one had any energy to walk the two miles home, so we piled all 20 of us into the pickup. Dangerous? Definitely. But also memorable. We laughed like crazy.
It's been hard saying goodbye, but tomorrow will be the hardest. Tomorrow all the kids will put on dances for each of their volunteers and give us cards to say goodbye. I almost cried watching the older groups of volunteers go through this so the chances of me getting through it without crying are looking slim. After that we're heading to Ratatouille for a final dinner, and then to La Familia for drinks and music to say goodbye to each other. I'll be posting my final blog post sometime in the next few days!!
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