Saying Goodbye

As we stood idle on the bus ready to leave, the children from Open Door banged on the tinted windows and yelled goodbye for the millionth time. Our entire group was lucky enough to spend part of our final afternoon together at Open Door. After playing games, doing gimp, and having a dance party, we walked the children home like we always did. However, this time we spent much longer in the street outside of their homes hugging and saying goodbye. None of us wanted to say our final goodbyes. Some of the children even followed us back to our hotel when we finally mustered up the strength to leave their street. There, the children helped us haul our luggage to the bus, and we had them sign our notebooks for memories’ sake. The inevitable moment came when our group had to board the bus. We still waved out the window, blew kisses, and mouthed the words “te iubesc” (I love you) to the children outside whose eyes were now forming tears. Ours were too. When the bus started to roll away, the children chased after us, still waving. We all watched them until we rounded the corner and couldn’t see them out our windows anymore. Although at that moment we lost sight of them, we will never lose sight of the treasured memories we share with them and the lessons we learned during our time in Romania.

-Leah Stansky