The last day at Rising Star. The hardest day of this entire trip. I had the tutoring rotation and I was very grateful to be able to have spent the entire last day with all of these kids. I can’t even begin to explain how amazing each and every one of these kids are. They have touched me in a way that they will never begin to know. I thought I was going to come here to help them, but of course not. They have helped me so much. I truly love them with all my heart. Later that night after school and playtime we all gathered in the dining hall where the school choir sang a couple of songs for us and life dance did some performing. It was simply awesome. There was one dance in particular that had me bawling like a baby at the end. The director was going to teach them a dance about suffering and pain and how we have angels who help us and lift us. After trying to teach them he realized that these kids had seen so much pain and suffering in their own lives already that he let them decided how to perform this number. These kids… wow. I LOVE them! They are such an amazing inspiration to me. Leaving them was the hardest thing that I ever had to do. Thinking about the day that we would have to leave, I didn’t think that the kids would be too sad about us leaving. What made it so hard was to see these kids that I love, crying and asking me why I had to go and when I was going to come back and if I was going to write them letters. How could I leave them now? I love them. I want the absolute best for them.

 Basha and Go-go got their necklaces at the star store and they couldn't even wait to show me so they came running over to the elephant house as soon as play time started to give me a hug! It made me so happy to see that they loved the gift! When it was time to say goodbye that night and all of us had been crying, Go-go turned to me and kissed his necklace and said, " I will never forget."..... Neither will I Go-go.

On Monday we had another medical day where we traveled out to the leprosy colonies. It was really neat to be able to get there early enough where we had time to walk around the village and talk with some of the people before we had to dive right into the work. I know I've said it before and I'll say it again but these people are truly amazing! We set up our little medical site in this little church building they had at the end of their village and we had about seven people come through. It is so neat to just be able to interact with these wonderful people. I was at the oiling station after they wash the leprosy patient's feet and I put oil around the outside of their ulcers that they have on their feet. So for you who don't really know, leprosy affects the nerves of the body and it causes them to have ulcers that is caused from infection and decay that happens because they can't really feel if they have a cut or are getting an infection which usually ends up having them lose fingers, arms, toes, feet, and legs. So the ulcers form and they can't feeling anything inside the ulcer but the skin around the ulcer is still very tender and they can very much feel it. So my job was to put oil around the sore skin and dead skin that is around the infected ulcer so that it can be soft and ready for the doctor to cut out the ulcer. Now understand we have no medicines or pain killers for these patients when they come through the line so they can feel everything that we are doing to them. I have never seen anything like this before in my life. When they get to the doctor to have their ulcers cut out it is basically the doctor taking a pair of dull scissors and cutting into your skin. Many of the patients go through this and are very strong because I'm sure they have to get this done to them all the time. But there was this one lady in particular that came through that made me realize how hard this is for them.
This cute older lady comes into the church with a big toothless grin and greeted all of us with kisses and hugs with nothing but nubs for hands. She was so loving and welcoming and she had us all smiling. :) She went through all the stations and was just as happy as a clam talking with us even though none of us knew anything that the other person was saying. :) She finally made it to the doctor and the doctor just started right in. After being in India for almost three weeks now I hadn't seen or heard any of the patients in as much pain as I felt this lady was. She threw her head back and started crying as soon as those scissors touched her and I couldn't even begin to think about how much pain she was in. We all watched in agony as she was being worked on and it broke my heart to be standing helplessly on the side and not be able to try and help take this pain away. After she got done though and got all of her new bandages in place she came up to the volunteers and started hugging and kissing like crazy. Even after all of this pain that we could have put her through, she was still thankful to be able to have us there to help. These beautiful people had beautiful souls. I love them so much.
I wish I had gotten more pictures of the people but there are some of the photos from this amazing day.

 
When we got back from the colony a couple of us decided to take a little walk out to the village that is just down the street from the Rising Star campus. It was really neat to be able to walk down these little streets and see what everyday life is like for these impoverished people. A couple of the kids who go to school at Rising Star don’t actually live on the campus and they walk to school everyday from the village. So on our way to the village we ran into a couple of kids on there way home and we told them we would walk them home. I can’t even begin to tell you how amazingly adorable ALL of these little kids are! I love them love them love them so much!!! :)

 
When we got back to the Elephant house later that night I decided to put something together for my three little boys. When we went to Mamallapuram, I bought of couple of little stone necklaces that I thought would be cute to give to my boys. :) So that night I strung them each a little necklace and wrote them a note to tell them how special I thought they were. Like I said before were not allowed to give hand outs so I have to put them in the star store for them and they get to buy it when they have enough stars. I couldn’t wait for them to be able to get to see them.