Goodbye, continued

A few more farewells to report upon...

We had a lovely morning tea in my honor at Kaka Street School, the special ed school where I've been volunteering and subbing this year. The kids presented me with some lovely photos of the Mount and wonderful cards. That afternoon, the staff threw a little get-together in my honor - complete with a "Who Wants to be a Millionaire"-style game where I was challenged to answer questions about the students and staff of Kaka Street. I'm pleased to report I am a "millionaire"!

The weekend offered even more excitement. We went to a friends' house on Saturday night to watch the All-Blacks rugby match versus France. It was an intense game, with the All Blacks coming up with the victory. Said a few goodbyes there, then headed home to gear up for Sunday.

Dawson, who has helped coordinate Cory's fellowship (answering dozens of emails before our arrival and looking out for us since), organized a fantastic day. In addition to gathering together the staff doctors and the current registrars, he got ahold of the guys that were working here when Cory began, and they were able to come down too. The afternoon started off with a paintball game. The guys came back with stories of Rambo-like-stature, as well as clothes covered in paint and grass stains. They compared welts and bruises before heading off to the showers to get ready for our big dinner that night. The wives of the former registrars came to our place, where we wandered around the Mount and sat in a cafe. Pleasantly, no welts to report from our day.

We went to one of the few and our favorite Mexican restaurant that night, sitting at a long table to seat all 20 of us. At the end of the table where we sat, we could look down the stretch of it and see so many familiar faces. Some we knew we'd keep in touch with and hoped we'd see again; others we hadn't gotten to know as well as we wished. But it was a table filled with smiling faces and another reminder that our time here is almost over.

Cory has just begun his last week of work, and our last visitor, Brownie, is here for the next two weeks. After that we have just a few days to enjoy before hopping on a plane...