The End Drawing Near

The end of the outreach in Liberia is drawing to a close. You can tell this most by the amount of people leaving to go back home. I've had to say goodbye to more friends this week than any other. Friends that have been here since I've arrived have gone and I feel slightly disoriented; like at any moment I will pass them in the hall or they will be there on the ward as I go to work. I've met many lovely people during my time here and I think that is one of the highlights here. You meet people with a similar desire or pull to serve those who need it and there seems to be an instant kinship. But one of the things that I don't think I would ever get used to is the constant turn over. I'm used to the mission trips where you arrive at the destination as a group, you go through the phases (honeymoon phase, homesickness, hostility, etc) as a group, and then you leave as a group. But here you arrive on your own and leave before the others do. That's the main reason I decided to extend my stay until the end of the outreach. I feel there's more of a closure. I get to be involved in the cleaning and the start of the packing up the ship. I get to see the patients through to the end.

Anyway, needless to say, there are many "going away parties" happening on the ship. The most recent one was a night of pizza and a movie. The common past time here on the ship. It was fun to order pizza, sit in the lecture room in our socks and blankets, and watch a DVD on the projector.