Last Day of School

When I walked into the Kindergarten classroom to say good morning to all my little friends for the last time, I was so overwhelmed that I actually had to go outside and collect myself. I’ve had a really great experience here at Chumbageni and am finding it hard to believe that these kids will be a lot more than just a ten minute walk away from my house in a few days.

Anyway, I spent almost the entire morning giving out a huge pack of stickers my mom sent me last month. The kids were so excited to get to choose which one they wanted and where they wanted to put it, and were very sure of their selections even though there were about 100 different options. I was happy to have something somewhat purposeful to be doing, and also to get to say goodbye to each child individually. I went from desk to desk from Kindergarten up to 2nd grade, probably interacting with over 200 different kids.

After sticker time the Kindergarten class invited me to come drink ugi with them. We all sat in a big circle and drank this sweet porridge like food and said goodbye to each other. There was barely enough ugi to go around, so the Kindergarten teacher and I took very small cups for ourselves.

One of the girls in the class saw I had finished very quickly and came over to offer me some of hers. After pouring a bit of her ugi into my cup, other students began following suit. Before I knew it there was a whole line of kids coming to give me ugi. The whole thing was far too cute for me to refuse, although I was a little less than happy about the exchange of so many cooties. I must have been given 3 or 4 full new cups of ugi by the students, but was luckily able to continue the chain by giving my ugi to other kids in the circle. I guess the cooties must have done their job since I am now dreading boarding my plane with a brand new stomach bug. But that might also be due to my stupid decision to eat raw fish at a sushi restaurant the day before travelling home. I don’t know where my brain has gone, but my stomach is certainly displeased with my decision making abilities.

In any case, I spent the rest of the afternoon just talking with people and saying goodbyes. We had a big goodbye party at the end of the day. I spent the rest of the day packing and saying goodbyes to the many visitors who showed up throughout the evening. Even after just 3 months, I apparently met quite a lot of people! And while I am not one for goodbyes, I couldn’t avoid them since it is considered very rude in this culture to leave without saying goodbye to each and every person either in person or on the phone. It was an exhausting but great reminder of all the great people I have met and experiences I have had here.