Rift Valley Children's Village, Tanzania: Good Bye!

My long journey home started 6 hours ago. I was picked up about 10:00. Now I'm at a lodge close to the airport. I got a day room for 4 hours so that I could relax and shower before leaving. My plane leaves at 8:40 pm Tanzanian time (1:40 Ohio time). I fly to Dar es salaam, then to Amsterdam, then to Detroit, then to Columbus. If all goes according to plan, Bryan will pick me up about 5:00 on Monday (which is midnight here). We'll have dinner with my mom and then finally head home to Cleveland. I'll most likely get home about 10:00 pm on Monday. So basically, I would have been traveling for over 40 hours!

Last night was sad! I've grown so attached the the girls in my house. I made a Power Point slide show and showed it last night (before dinner) on my lap top. There was a slide fore each girl and each Tanzanian momma in Manyara. Each slide had a picture of the two of us and also included my favorite memory. I wrote each person a hand-written card and glued a picture form the Power Point slide show to the card. It was emotional, yet very rewarding. (Once I explained to the volunteer coordinator why I wanted to print 14 pictures, she was all for it!) All day yesterday I was receiving hugs and very nice cards. In the evening we watched most of Mirror Mirror. About 20 minutes before the movie ended the solar power ran out. So I'll have to catch the ending at home. I didn't finish packing until 11:00 pm, and I had a restless sleep. I'm sure I'll sleep for 2 days when I finally get home.