Sunday  Feb 7th, 2010  We attended the Farewell Ceremony at Hsa Thoo Lei this evening. The students greeted us with warm hugs and huge smiles.  There was no mistaking that they were as excited to see us as we were to see them.   An emotional roller coaster of joy and sadness carried on throughout the evening.   There was anxious anticipation in the air as each of us knew we must say good bye that evening.   These children spent many hours practicing to perfect their songs and dance for us.  They were so proud and had every right to be, as they performed beautifully, putting all their hearts and souls into every movement.  We sat listening to their beautiful voices in awe and admired how beautiful each and everyone of them performed.

For some of us, this day is truly good bye forever, for others, there will be a whole year until we see these beautiful faces again.  The bonds had formed in only a short time, which made this extremely hard to tear ourselves away from them.  There will be 7 students graduating this year, which makes us happy for these students accomplishments, but sad that they may not be here next time we come.  So many of these students have such great potential , but we all fear for them, will they have the opportunity to explore their great talents? A few will be fortunate enough to have sponsorship to carry on to obtain secondary education.  We are so greatful Global Neighbors has provided this opportunity of education as this will be the key to their success.  Email addresses have been exchanged so the hope of keeping in contact is real and the thousands of pictures full of memories will be cherished forever.  As this work tour flew bye, many of us hope the year between our next visit does the same.