Bed, Bugs, & Beyond

Semana Santa is a wrap, and school is back in full swing.  In Latin American cultures, holy week is a pretty big deal, likely due to all the Catholic influence.  This meant that we got a week long vacation from school during which most of the kids went home. For me, it was una semana media santa--a half-holy week.  It got off to a really terrible start, improved as I took my 48 hours off, and ended quite pleasantly. Sounds a bit like the Easter story right? Going through trials, resting a couple of days, then shaking it off to come back to life (figuratively in my case). The beginning of the week was a break from teaching, but the time I gained not having to prepare for classes was filled by work.  The vacation schedule calls for work in the mornings, and only two meals per day. Because it is vacation, we are only asked to work for a few hours, but there is so much to do, that the volunteers usually end up working all day.  The kids who stayed, however, ...

The past few days have been very significant in that I am now within two months of leaving, and, therefore, have truly started to consider how it will feel to depart.  I miss home, I miss my friends, and I miss the college life, but those are all things that I knew I would return to when I left them. Leaving here is different. I may have future opportunities to visit Familia Feliz with Southern mission groups or independently, but it’s also possible that I will never see this place, or the kids (until heaven that is), again.  With two months remaining, I’ve really started to battle with leaving a project that I’ve put so much time and love into. I’ve poured my heart into my work here with the kids, and in two months I leave all of that behind. It won’t be an easy goodbye. I’ve really started to feel at home here in the outskirts of Rurre.  I’m a regular at some of the market stands in town where I chat with the vendors and sometimes receive “aumentos”--extra prod...