Beginning of the End

Last week schools finished for their long holiday – I keep calling it summer holidays but as this is effectively winter, that’s definately not the case (I even need a big blanket at night at the moment).  The close of school involved all the kids from kindergarten up, undertaking a serious clean-up operation of the whole school and grounds.  They did this with great cheer and enthusiasm, standard 6 boys skidding and sliding round the classroom and they ‘washed the floor’ – teachers nowhere in sight. 

Once the clean up was complete it was time for prize giving and presentations.   Erin and I are leaving as the school opens again, so it was also our goodbye.  The kids were incredibly sweet, loads of hugs, tears, letters, gifts and I even had a song written for me.  Teaching these children really has been a joy and it was hard to leave them, harder still to say goodbye to my little classes at the orphanage and the toddler hangers-on who regularly put in appearances...   Many of the children there are headed back to their original villages during the holidays, so my time formal time there is over too.   The goodbyes really are starting and I don’t like it one bit!