This is the common (and overused) phrase of the crazy women at the silk and pearl markets of Beijing. When you try and barter with them, they insist that you are bray-kuh their hearts because we go low even though "we friends, we friends!"
Last night however, this phrase took on a new meaning to me. Last night was the our end of semester/Christmas performance with the kids. We knew that when it was over, their parents would take them home for their winter break, and with us leaving tomorrow, it meant that it was our time to say goodbye to them. What we didn't realize when we started the perfermance,was how quickly they were going to disappear as soon as we were done.
For the last song, half of the teachers were on stage singing Jingle Bells with the kids while the other half of us were "elfs" throwing candy to everybody. I was an elf that ran out of candy before the kids were done and I had wanted to give them some. I knew I had a bag of it in my backpack backstage so I ran to grab it really quick. When I came out, I handed some to MAYBE 4 kids. Looking around, I saw a lot of the other teachers already crying and a nearly empty auditorium. We were so confused and everyone asking each other where the kids were. It was so sad and almost a little chaotic at the same time, everyone desperate to find their kids to hurry and say our goodbyes.
Ask any of the 18 and they will probably tell you it was NOTHING like what we had imagined! All week we were dreading having to say goodbye to them FOREVER, because there's no way we'll ever see them again, but the fact that we didn't get ANY closure to it, made it worse than how sad it would be to talk to them.
Some of them really started to get the idea of us leaving this week. Take Kim's class for example: Tuesday she drew a picture of America and a picture of Weihai and then an arrow that showed how we would be leaving Weihai. They started to get mad and cross out the arrow, telling her no. After that they just got depressed about it. I was helping Shelley the same day and Ruth came in to have somebody take a picture for her. When I walked into her room, Colin came BOOKING it across the room screaming "TEACHAAAA!" and just totally threw himself on me! It totally made my week :) I am definetly going to miss that little guy! He has always been my bud and it kills me I didn't the closure I needed.
Thursday night, Allie, Ruth and I went down to tuck the kids in for 1 last time. I'm so glad that we did! I have the most ADORABLE picture of Dave just grinning and so happy! I was able to spin around with Jesse and Emma again. Ben and I had another "kung-fu" off. It was fun to see everybody else too and see how excited they were to see us!
These kids have been AMAZING and ADORABLE and just all around great! I am going to miss them so much! It broke my heart though the way that things ended with them.
I'm off to finish packing! For as excited as I've been, I'm actually really sad now to be leaving tomorrow :( China has been such a huge thing and has changed me so much. It's sad that I won't be with these girls all the time, and it KILLS me I'll never see my kids again! It's been great though and it'll be good to get home. Both of my bags are 10 pounds over right now....BOOO weight limits!
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