Sunday, April 30, 2006 - End of My Internship

As I said last entry, I was going to have a braai at my internship to say goodbye to everyone. However, I didn't realize how intense the whole thing would be. First, I had my final discussion with my professor and Pascal about how the semester went overall and what changes could be made so things go more smoothly next semester. After this, I went down for a program that the children had made for me, and it was so wonderful! The kids had made cards for me which they read, the Children's Representative Council wrote a speech to read for me, and Pascal even wrote a song about me, taught it to the kids, and they all sang it for me. Oh, they also gave me a huge metal elephant, which will have to be a carry-on item of its own ( I may be leaving more of my stuff here in Africa than I originally thought) Honestly, it was incredibly overwhelming to have all of this for me. Especially when I feel like compared to what these kids need I did so little.

A lot of us with internships were talking one day about how our time here in Namibia would not have been anywhere near as meaningful if we had not taken part in internships, and I definitely feel the same way. I'm also finding that it is just in the past two weeks that I have really been developing relationships with people outside the house that are meaningful, and now I have to leave. I have been struggling with this. Take for instance, my host family here in the city. Looking back, I wish I had seen them every week instead of just 3 times after the homestay was done. However, it is hard to do this when our program is broken up in the middle by a three week travel seminar. I guess the next time I live abroad, if I do(and I can tell you in all certainty that I hope to) I'll have to make sure it is for a really extended period of time so I can get to know the people and develop a much stronger relationship.

Then today I had another braai with most all of the other students at my host family's house. It was really great! My friend Kristin is a wonderful chef (her mom owns three restaurants in Berkley, CA) and made a couple of salads for us to take to compliment the immense amount of meat my host father (who I will remind you is a butcher) had for us. Just like our last braai for my birthday, we all ate enough for three meals, and left feeling miserable and vowing not to eat for the rest of the day. Take a guess as to if we accomplished this or not...