I apologize for the delay in my blogs. I have not had the ganas (desire) or time to sit down and write a blog without an interruption or distraction. The majority of my time has been spent at Nuevo Mundo between planning, grading, writing worksheets and tests, oh and teaching. My days have grown very long again. I leave the house around 7am for the guarderia in Arbolito and then leave there at 12 to head to Mundo without a break or rest in between worksites. Some days I don't get home until 7pm and then still have obligations to fulfill within community. You could imagine that by the time I'm "free" the only thing I want to do is go to sleep!

I have been feeling very drained with all my obligations and work. I'm split between Mundo, my community life and my Ecuadorian friends who I barely spend time with anymore. I struggle with balancing it all and still making time for myself so that I don't go crazy. To be honest I'm at the point where sleeping in on the weekends can feel like a waste of time because I know I could be spending that time with a family. And although I know I am wearing myself thin, I feel like it's worth it because I need to take advantage of every moment I have left.

We have 3 full months and some weeks left. I continue to remind my community mates because it is on the forefront of my mind. There aren't enough hours in the day to do everything that I want to do / need to do and I struggle with how busy Rostro keeps us with meetings and other requirements we have to fulfill. I just wish I could live here without the restrictions and see how different the experience would be. I'm sure my Spanish would be a million times better if I lived with Ecuas. But there is no point in playing the "what if" game.

The new volunteers have been picked for next year, it's a very sureal feeling. I think part of me is denying the fact that another group is going to come in after us, out of selfishness of course. I think about the fact that these friendships I have built are now going to somehow transfer onto the new volunteers. I cannot help but thinking about it as a kind of "replacement" even though I know it's nothing like that. Sometimes I think "Mary, you knew coming into this program that you were going to leave in a year. You knew you were only temporary." And then I think about the hundreds of volunteers that have come and gone and how they are just as much apart of Rostro as I am. I'm not the first volunteer to experience this and nor will I be the last, and that's the beauty of this program. Although I am temporary Rostro is permanent, for the most part.

But I have finally reached a place where I can sit here and say to the new volunteers, "Here, take this experience and grow from it. Allow these people to change your lives. Allow yourself to be open and vulnerable with strangers. Learn to find God in ugliness." I feel ready to hand over the volunteer experience. I never thought I would get there. It feels amazing!