Friday, May 18, 2012

Day 7 - Friday, May 18th, 2012

LOTS OF CIAO'S and BIG BUGS

I had a few students write notes.  More wanted to, but we found out that they were going to have to shut off the modem, so more will write tomorrow.  (PS to Will Miller, in Annie's defense: this was the first day since Tuesday that the kids had access to writing the blog themselves!!)

From Mollie:  Hi all! We are now back in the Chilamate Eco Retreat after a day of hard work. We finished the playground to the best of our abilities, put our handprints on a special wall, and painted a sign to commemorate our work. In the afternoon we went zip-lining, which was soooooooooooo much fun. We were all screaming and hollering with joy as we zipped along the delightful wires. We are all ready to take on one more day of this wonderful place until we return home to sleep and sleep and sleep, and maybe tell you all a little bit of what happened. J

From Rachel:  Hola, everyone! We started our day productively by finishing the playground, which now looks amazing. This was followed by a tearful goodbye over lunch between us and our host families. One girl was particularly sad and her sweet, sad hugs brought tears to everyone’s eyes. Glad you managed to figure out how to blog, Mom. Miss you all and see you soon!

From Annie:  HI!!!! We basically finished the playground and we put out handprints on the wall! It was SWEET!!! It was hard to then have to say goodbye to the families who had taken such good care of us for so long! J AND FOR WILL MILLER:

Happy birthday to youuuu! Happy birthday to youuu! Happy birthdayyy dearr Willlll!!! Happy birthday to you!!! J Love you!

From Sara Monterroso:  I tried to load up some really neat videos that I took, but I don't think the connection here is fast enough, so I'll have to try once I get home.  Here are some nice last day photos, though:

Compare to the first day -- now the local kids and our kids are interacting easily:



While some kids work on finishing the net...


Others prepare a decoration sign, and this is the "wall of hands where we would later imprint out hands with the letters C.O.L.O.R.A.D.O. A.C.A.D.E.M.Y. painted into the palms...


The youngest school kids are SO happy!


Bottoms up!!  (screwing the seats onto one of Julio's tire picnic tables)


The community doesn't want their new family members to go...


This is Daniel, one of the community leaders and President of the Organic Farming Assocition, speaking on behalf of the community as we prepare to leave:


Final pictures with the families before we go...



...and now that your kids just have one more night in a hotel before we come home, let me show you some pictures of the bedroom I stayed in from Sunday through Thursday, which is fairly representative of some of the homes where our students stayed...





...this is where the family brushes their teeth...


Me, the two WLS guides (Molly and Randall [in the red visor]) and the family with whom we stayed, which includes Daniel, whom I mentioned above.





4 comments:

Martha Husain said...

Rainy day here. http://t.co/ySDxUu2M Kitties are being cuddly and don't want to go outside. With everyone else gone, Zara slept with me and my billi. Min min had to sleep alone. Poor lonely, starving (lying) kitta has just jumped up on the chair beside me so I can pity her better.

Paige said...

We've loved all the updates and pictures. Can't wait to see you and hear all about it! Love, mom, dad, paige and abigail (and penny)

Martha Husain said...

Oooh! Pictures! They weren't there this AM. Very nice to get to see the tire table and where you stayed.

Try to get some ready before coming home. There were lots of sick kids at the dance rehearsal today. And circus is coming up.

Martha Husain said...

I mean try to get some REST. Darned auto correct.

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