After activity hour ending at 6 pm we are heading to Rajkot for a day to take care of some work. One day, that's all we'll be away and already driving away my heart is wrenching. I don't want to leave, I don't want to miss a moment, I don't want to leave the people. On the way out some of the girls I've gotten closer with are in charge of doing prayers tonight asked to make sure with smiling and eager faces that I'll be there and I had to say I won't be able to be there tonight and I'm telling you it hurt. It hurt that I was missing it and it made me realize how much I already love this place and the kids and staff.
I am head over heels in love with this place, and when I say this place, the structure and setting is beautiful and all but it's the teachers and kids that hold the strings to my heart.
After I was played volleyball with the boys, I was walking by some of the younger kids playing cricket and one of them ran over (forgive me, I am absolutely horrible with names but I'm managing to pick up a few, but I remember their faces), and said, "Didi, we're doing the skit we practiced last night tomorrow morning!" (I was there with them when they were practicing as a group and I have to say Masta Che!) And I had to disappoint them and say I won't be there unfortunately, and four hours later here I am still thinking about how I missed the girls turn tonight and I'll miss the boys skit tomorrow. But I know they will do great! I told them both to do an extra good job, and I'm already waiting to ask them how it went when I get back.
It makes my heart melt when they tug at my arms and call me Didi or when the boys follow me around to the field cause they want to watch me play or want to me to play with them. It makes me melt when they fight over what class I need to go to or where I need to sit. When they find me they always ask something about the US and learn a word they were wondering about and when they follow me wherever I walk on the soccer field even though the older kids are playing and they can't, but they want to learn about soccer and the rules I'm teaching. How can you not love this place?
In the morning when you are tired from the day before or not a morning person (I am most definitely not a morning person), and walk into school for prayer time and everyone is there smiling, no matter how cold or how early they've been up, it is mood changing immediately. Teachers who do everything there and play multiple roles, always working in most cases over 16 hours a day when you add it all up, are always smiling despite their own troubles and worries. They smile for these kids, they are genuinely happy to see them and are passionate about what they do. They sacrifice so much and yet you always see them with a smile. Dr. Padhiyar is so dedicated that he works for 20 hours each day and you might think I'm exaggerating but I'm am not even in the slightest. The staff goes above and beyond to make this place what it is, somewhere the kids enjoy being, are loved, are taught, are taken care of, and educated.
So when I tell you I am in love with this place, don't get mistaken, this place is pretty great but it's the people here that I love, the teachers, the staff and the kids, every single one of them.
- Aekta
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