Final Day

So, this isn't actually a journal entry - Hospital 8 kind of took it out of me, so what I'm blogging now is from my memory and my photo library.

We had a really great last day of mission work, and it was really hard to leave after such a great day. We started out at Kingasepp, which is sponsored in part by a church in Hastings, the same one that Michael (the one we nicknamed Coach,) goes to. We met a few of the kids, but most of them were at summer camp. The ones we met, though, were ADORABLE. I latched on to a super shy little girl, who wouldn't even look at me, even when I gave her bubbles. This is one of the best pictures I got of her:

I mean, we got a little smile out of her, but not much of one. Not yet, any way. There were two other girls that came in to interact, and they LOVED the bubbles! They played with Michael (the nonCoach one... It gets confusing...) the entire time we were in there. They were all sorts of giggly and happy to accept fruit and gifts from us. 

Eventually, my little friend got involved with them, and then she opened up and smiled to. I found out that the girl in the blue dress is sisters with her, and when the older one pulled the younger one in for pictures, I started to get some smiles, and she even came up and blew bubbles in my face! (By the way, I may have been cleaner when I left that orphanage than when I entered, what with about three containers of bubbles emptied onto my face...) Here's my favorite picture of the sisters:

 As we drove to our last orphanage of the day, it kind of hit me: This was going to be it. This was my final day with my "Russia family," my last interaction with kids in an orphanage, my final moments as a missionary. At this point in the trip and in my life, I wasn't sure if I'd ever be coming back. I was taking so much in every day, that I hadn't really considered the job offer from Priozorsk. I wasn't sure if being a missionary was what I was supposed to do, or if I would ever make it back on even a short term trip. These kids were going to be my final interactions, as far as I knew.

I tried really hard to not let that affect my attitude as we entered our final orphanage, one that we had never visited before. The Bible story, led by Michella, Michael, and Coach, went great. The kids were very polite and very attentive. When we were handing things out, one of the things we handed out was a soccer ball, and we were asked to play with the kids. That's all we did, for a good thirty or forty-five minutes. As we played, a huge thunderstorm started rolling in, but nobody really seemed to care. We had such a great time, even if we did get badly beaten by the Russian kids... Yeah, sorry American soccer players, but we kinda ruined your reputation... We were not good, but we were entertaining, and that was what was important.