Tears, laughter, happiness, sadness, joy, love

WOW what a day of mixed emotions. Today was going to be my last full day in Kenya as tomorrow lunch time I have to leave to start my journey home. I woke up knowing that it was going to be a tough one as it would be the last full day I spend with the 105 wonderful children at the Restart orphanage.
This morning the centre manager and I were tasked with liaising with the local child welfare department in relation to two children, aged 3 and 4, who we were hoping to take in from the safe house in town. Both of these children were recently dumped on the streets by their respective parents. The safe house is only temporary accomodation whilst permanent placements are sought elsewhere.
After meeting the child welfare officer it was agreed that we could take these children in and immediately go to the safe house to collect them. So off Catherine and I went to the safe house. We met the 2 children who were at first reluctant to come. We took them down to  the car and from the moment I pulled away from the safe house they both grinned from ear to ear all the way to Restart. Within five minutes of being in Restart they seemed to have settled in with the other toddlers and were soon playing on the swings. It was as though they had been here years, surely a testament to what a wonderful, loving and happy place Restart is for children. One of the other children gave me a beaded bracelet they had made. 
At 3.30pm I made my way to Restart at the request of Mary the exec director. I walked into the dining hall where all 105 children were sat waiting for me. They then put on a wonderful show of dancing and made sure I got involved, my breakdancing was a source of great amusement to the children, and rivalled anything the Jackson Five  ever did!! Four of the children then got up to each do a speech, their words were so kind, thoughful, and moving and made me sound like a much better person than I actually am. As soon as the first speech started, that was the breaking point for me. In the last two and a half years of working with these children I have always managed to be quite tough and not once shed a tear (came close a few times I admit), but at that moment it all changed and two years worth of tears erupted. After the four children spoke I then had a stream of children coming up to the front to give me a hug and hand me letters they had written. Mary Coulson then got up to say some lovely things about me and presented me with a lovely gift. By now the whole of the front row (the gap students, Mary's friends and even a teacher) had tears rolling down their faces, and I was sobbing my heart out. Mary then sat down and invited me to get up and say a few words. A very difficult thing to do when sobbing ones heart out I assure you. I said/sobbed a few words, I'm not sure if any of it made any sense though. After the official event was over, one of the older boys came over to me and said that he and a few of the others would like to sing me a song, which they did, incidentally it was a song I taught them a few weeks ago which was a twist on the old Thank You Very Much- Roses advert song (unless you are over 40 you probably have no idea what I'm on about!). Another dozen or so children bought me letters they had written and I spent the next hour having photos taken. By the end of it I was emotionally drained. 
I can honestly say that the last two months of my life volunteering with these amazing children have been the best two months I've ever experienced. It has been truly fantastic and I have some wonderful memories to take away with me. 
Not only are the children amazing, but so are all the wonderful staff who work at Restart or work as part of the management team. These people are some of the most dedicated people I've had the pleasure to work with. They work such long hours and go far beyond what is expected of them, and the most dedicated of them all is the founder of the charity Mary Coulson, she should have retired years ago but still works tirelessly every day to make the lives of these abandoned children better.
This evening Mary sat down and told me her life story, something I've wanted to hear since I met her as I just knew it was going to be an interesting tale. I thought she was great before I heard her life story, now I think she is probably the most amazing woman I've ever encountered - apart from my mom of course ;)
So all in all I've had a fab two months volunteering, I've made a promise to the children that I will be back, and hope to be back early next year at some point. 
I'm not sure whether I'll keep up with blip or not as I'm no photographer, I may just use it to document my travels, we'll see.
To all those of you who have read my blog, thank you so much. Please take the time to like our facebook page Restart Africa and follow us on twitter @restartafrica1