Moving On

There are some days here in Guatemala that are just hard. My classes are all abysmal. My girls in my section are brats and call me “fresita” ("stuck up" – sorry if I don’t like it when you touch my clean clothes when you have paint/glue/beans/beets on your hands…). My stomach hurts. I’m sick all night. I miss home. I’m ready to be back. These are the days that SUCK and make being here suck equally as much. For the past few weeks I feel like I’ve had a LOT of these days – downtrodden, lazy, downright awful days where all I want to do is curl up in a ball and cry. Tomorrow is my 8 month mark in Guatemala and after all this time I think I’m at the point where I think – I’m NEVER gonna be home. Even though my departure date draws closer and closer, for some reason it’s been getting harder and harder to make it through. I guess sometimes it’s just like that.

But other times, life hands you lemons. These past few days have been some of the most amazing and wonderful days that I’ve had yet at NPH. My classes have been amazing – well-behaved, doing excellently on all their tests and quizzes, kids following instructions, and me feeling like my kids are actually learning. My section has been the most adorable shade of cute and cuddly that I’ve ever seen – we’ve been hair-braiding while doing homework, we’ve really been enjoying reading “Where the Sidewalk Ends” in Spanish together (thanks to my wonderful brother Mike for the amazing find :)), they have been showering me with hugs and kisses, and we’ve been having non-stop dance parties in preparation for Tio Orlando’s despedida tomorrow (SHH don’t tell him – it’s a surprise!) I’ve been visiting lots of other sections, tutoring a lot of my older kids in English outside of class and enjoying all of the little “extras” that I’ve taken on throughout my time here. After a really long couple of desperate weeks of homesickness, these past few days with all my kids have really helped to reinvigorate me and really want to enjoy the time that I still have here in Guatemala. And all the sunshine and warm weather doesn’t hurt either ;-).