My last 2 weeks have been absolutely wonderful...events at the center and around town I have decided have been perfectly coordinated with my leaving. For example, Mancora is gearing up to host the international women's surfing competition at the end of October, and I have concluded that it's probably a good thing I won't be around for it to steal the title away from the current champion :)
As for the center, I was able to help celebrate a rather important birthday during my last full week there. I have never seen a party so big as the center turned 5 years old, complete with a parade! The big day arrived and started out with a march through town...all of the kids wearing their uniforms or t-shirts with the center logo on it, holding signs with messages of 'ability' and not disability, waving balloons, carrying banners...we even had a band from one of the local schools! It was great to see the community respond to our procession, as the police blocked off streets, residents would come 
out of their stores or homes and wave as we passed by. And even though there is a great deal of street repairs going on, it was interesting to see how inaccessible the community is for these children that don't get around as easily, as the uneven sidewalks, curbs, and steps provided an extra challenge for some of those in wheelchairs and their families. It was quite warm that morning, so the shady spot we found after the parade was over was most welcomed! Then it was back to the center for the big fiesta! The kids had been practicing for the past couple of days, so I had a feeling this was going to be a pretty 
grand occasion. The little ones started off the party with a couple of songs, complete with costumes! Then the kids presented the woman that founded the center with a gift that I helped them make, and she was so pleased with the bag that had each child's name on individual fabric hearts that were sewn on both sides of the bag. The big guys were next, singing one song that they had been practicing for the past week, and then it was time for the dancing. Of the older kids, 6 of them are very good dancers, and had been working hard on learning the marinera, which is a traditional Peruano dance that most closely 
resembles the waltz, but with a Spanish flair. The girls were absolutely beautiful in their ruffled skirts as they waved their handkerchiefs and the boys stepped around them in sweeping motions as they waltzed across the dance floor! I was so proud of them...they had worked so hard and the smiles on their faces were absolutely glowing! More dancing followed, as there was a DJ, and we even had the kids in wheelchairs out boogieing on the dance floor! No party would be complete without a cake, and boy did that disappear quickly! I even ended up with the remnants of the cake all over me as the kids wrestled for who got the last lick of the icing and accidentally bumped into me with the platter! It was a great day and definitely a celebration equal to all that 
the center stands for and is working to accomplish in the coming years. Speaking of the future, I also got to help out with clearing ground and prepping the space that will hold the new center they have been planning and fundraising for. The kids loved the work gloves they got to put on, and as we cleared brush and trash, placed and painted marker posts, you could sense everyone´s excitement at the possibility of this brand new future, a grand expansion of what the current center is and does. I also had my first Peruano cooking experience...that weekend I headed over to the woman that runs the center's house to cook with her and her 2 daughters. I was originally going to make sloppy joes with them, which is my special favorite back home. However, I found it impossible to acquire 2 of the main ingredients, and was not keen on going all over town asking where I might buy them, as some of you will remember the brown sugar incident of India. Anyway, we opted instead for coconut fried shrimp, and when I say the ingredients couldn't have been fresher, I am in no way 
exaggerating. Earlier in the morning we had gone 'grocery shopping,' first to the home of a local fisherman for the 'langostinos' or shrimp, and second to the local market where we wandered up and down the stalls of the most beautiful fruits and vegetables, collecting the rest of our ingredients. See attached picture of us grating pieces of a fresh coconut, after tapping into it and draining the milk, followed by smashing it open Gilligan´s Island-style. Now, in my defense, I will say that this was the first time I had cooked in a Peruvian kitchen, and when those delicate shrimp coated in the feathered coconut dropped into the scalding hot oil, I was not prepared when they burned almost instantaneously! The smell of scorched coconut wafted in the air as the family most graciously ate my culinary disaster and complimented me on how really good it was, really. Thankfully, an aunt was also present that day that is a pastry goddess, and saved the day with her specialty, arroz con leche, or rice pudding.
exaggerating. Earlier in the morning we had gone 'grocery shopping,' first to the home of a local fisherman for the 'langostinos' or shrimp, and second to the local market where we wandered up and down the stalls of the most beautiful fruits and vegetables, collecting the rest of our ingredients. See attached picture of us grating pieces of a fresh coconut, after tapping into it and draining the milk, followed by smashing it open Gilligan´s Island-style. Now, in my defense, I will say that this was the first time I had cooked in a Peruvian kitchen, and when those delicate shrimp coated in the feathered coconut dropped into the scalding hot oil, I was not prepared when they burned almost instantaneously! The smell of scorched coconut wafted in the air as the family most graciously ate my culinary disaster and complimented me on how really good it was, really. Thankfully, an aunt was also present that day that is a pastry goddess, and saved the day with her specialty, arroz con leche, or rice pudding.The new volunteer also arrived my last full week, who I would be passing everything to when I left, so orienting her was priority during my last 2 weeks. Now every person that has to orient a newbie hopes and prays that everything goes smoothly, but there always seems to be minor glitches in how things usually get done...Murphy's law right? So on her first day of home visits, as we're in the collectivo (shared taxi) on our way, I had just finished telling her that I had never had a problem with the customs checkpoint between Mancora and Cancas, which is there due to the close proximity of the border with Ecuador. I normally just sail right on through, but as we approached I noticed about 20 more officials than usual milling around, and it wasn't so much the increased number that made me take notice, it was the semiautomatic weapons they were all carrying down at their sides that made me sit up a little straighter in my cramped seat on the combi. Our driver slowed to a stop and they made a cursory search of the vehicle, instructing everyone to step out of the car. It wasn't until they asked for identification that I froze in my apathetic stance right next to the vehicle, as I realized I didn't even have a copy of my passport with me...absolutely nothing except my word that I was who I claimed to be. The other volunteer thankfully had a copy of her passport on her. Now, I knew that my Spanish got a little rough when I was tired or sick, but I soon added nervous to this list. As I fumbled over words that I usually spoke without a problem, trying to explain that this was just a short journey that I didn't think I needed my passport for, and that I always have my passport with me for big trips, that I was simply a tourist on a day trip (since if they found out I was volunteering I would have had a whole lot more explaining to do and work permits to show, etc.). This did not please the customs agent as he then told me that it was illegal to be travelling without a passport. The combi driver, bless him, was trying to help me out, interjecting that my passport was safe in my hostel, cueing me to say yes and another excuse as to why I didn't have it with me, since it's more likely to be stolen when one is out and about. There were a few sentences I truly didn't understand, so if he was guaging to see if I would offer up some money, I'm not entirely certain, but I really don't think that was the case. After what seemed like an hour of questioning, but was probably only more like 5 minutes, he warned me to always carry my passport with me and wished me a nice day, to which I think I expired all the breath out of my lungs that I had been holding in, scurried back into the car, and we continued on our way. As we drove along, my mind started to think about the 'what ifs'...I could have been detained, made to pay a fine, what if the other volunteer hadn't been there to offer some credence to my presence there...so I was pretty jacked up by the time I got back to the hostel. I spilled the whole story to my host family, who assured me that I really only needed a copy of my passport for trips like that, and after I was a little calmer, we had a good laugh about the whole thing, and I received some razzing from them over the course of the next few days, most often gesturing their arms like they had handcuffs on whenever I entered the room!
My last day of basketball was also this same week...as you can see from the attached picture, I usually have to defend against a whole host of fouls, laughing the whole time at the kids' methods of getting the ball, no matter how illegal they might be! But no matter what the score is, they have a blast and we still end the game as friends.
OK, so I know I´ve been saying that the home visits have been my absolute favorite part of this project from the very first week, and it´s only gotten better over the 3 months that I´ve been here. As I often tell my patients, it´s all about the little things...and the last 2 weeks with my home visit kiddos were definitely about celebrating their little achievements that we had been working on for a while. I´ll start with the 2 children I visit in Cancas, another fishing village about 30 minutes by car north of Màncora. She survived a bout with meningitis when she was 4, and now at the age of 7 presents with cerebral palsy-like symptoms. I know I´m not supposed to have favorites, but I have to say that she was. I was working a lot on 
spontaneous movement with her, basic developmental-appropriate milestones, and one of the toys I brought with me was a bumble ball, or a battery-powered vibrating ball with soft nubs on it. She absolutely loved it, and whenever I put it on her back or stomach or other ticklish spot, she would let out the greatest belly laugh I have ever heard...one that started in her toes and rumbled up out of her! Sometimes I think I selfishly did it to the point of exhausting her because I loved hearing it so much!! But it was so great to get her moving spontaneously and using her muscles reflexively. In one of her last sessions, I placed her on her stomach, and then looked up to answer a question from her mom, and when I looked back down at her, she was staring back up at me with the biggest smile on her face...she had rolled over completely on her own! My mouth dropped open, followed by the most beaming smile back at her, and I don`t think I´ve ever said "muy bien" so many consecutive times or with as much enthusiasm as I did that day! The other child I have been visiting in Cancas has autism and is 15 years old, although developmentally he looks closer to 9 or 10. He took quite a while to get accustomed to me, and the past 3 months we have been working on increasing his socialization opportunities, the biggest undertaking being to bring him to the center one afternoon a week to be around and interact with kids his age. It has been truly amazing to watch him transform, as he has visibly decreased his oral fixations, increased his eye contact with people, and generally is more social if even a little bit. My last 2 visits with him were with the new volunteer, and with the 2 extra hands just in case they were needed to chase after him if he escaped, we took him to the beach and played with him in the sand, picking up shells and rocks, watching the waves, even though he was a little overwhelmed with all the sensory experiences at first, he was reluctant to leave when we started back to his 
house! My last visit I decided he was going to get a special treat, so we walked all the way to the town center, skipping and swinging him between us, wandered through the market stalls, looking at all the fruits and vegetables for sale that he loved smelling, then having him select a soda and making him give the money to the vender...it was the highlight of my 3 months in working with him as we sat outside the market, him slurping away and then looking down to see his hand in the gravel behind us, seeking out the texture that 2 days before he was freaking out over! He was the most content and happy boy as we returned to his house...huge progress from when I first started with a child that was so scared and aggressive.So the other town the center makes home visits to is El Alto, about a 45-minute bus ride south of Màncora, a journey and project I believe I have blogged about previously, particularly the sewing project I worked on with one of the older girls. I started out seeing only 2 children there, and my last visit we had a total of about 7 kiddos! The new therapy room in the home of one of the kids we visit has helped tremendously, as it is a central location and the moms can just drop by whenever they get a chance 
during the morning or early afternoon. I must say that I`ve become most attached to the littlest one that we visit, who is only 3 and has a degenerative disease called leukodystrophy. Her mom is one of the toughest women I know, devoting so much to her only child, and doing it all by herself as the father skipped out as soon as she was diagnosed. She has lost all voluntary movement, vision, the ability to swallow, speak, and hearing in one ear. She was hospitalized with double pneumonia for 2 weeks in August, and has a feeding tube in her stomach. There is no cure, and the last thing the disease affects is the respiratory system, so she will die from not being able to breathe. My last session with her I think I cried the whole time, gently massaging her delicate limbs, trying to soak up all of her sweetness and innocence 
despite what this disease has done to her body. Another little girl who I have visited since the beginning is another child who had a fever at a very young age, and now presents with cerebral-palsy typed symptoms. I have been working most with her on sensory stimulation and getting her to interact with her environment with switch-type devices. We´ve also been working on basic developmental milestones with her as well, and on her last session, as you can see from the picture, she is propping up on her elbows and lifting her head simultaneously for the very first time! Lots of hard work, but she loves to be silly too, and I always had time for that, especially when I get the best smile and laugh from her in return! My last visits to all of them I was inconsolable basically, but it was so comforting to be sharing tears with all the moms too, and realizing that I was just as grateful for the opportunity to know them and work with their children as they were for the progress we had made. In a country where the culture hides away those with disabilities, it´s so easy to do the simplest things to make these kids feel like all-stars, and I have loved every minute of it!
during the morning or early afternoon. I must say that I`ve become most attached to the littlest one that we visit, who is only 3 and has a degenerative disease called leukodystrophy. Her mom is one of the toughest women I know, devoting so much to her only child, and doing it all by herself as the father skipped out as soon as she was diagnosed. She has lost all voluntary movement, vision, the ability to swallow, speak, and hearing in one ear. She was hospitalized with double pneumonia for 2 weeks in August, and has a feeding tube in her stomach. There is no cure, and the last thing the disease affects is the respiratory system, so she will die from not being able to breathe. My last session with her I think I cried the whole time, gently massaging her delicate limbs, trying to soak up all of her sweetness and innocence 
despite what this disease has done to her body. Another little girl who I have visited since the beginning is another child who had a fever at a very young age, and now presents with cerebral-palsy typed symptoms. I have been working most with her on sensory stimulation and getting her to interact with her environment with switch-type devices. We´ve also been working on basic developmental milestones with her as well, and on her last session, as you can see from the picture, she is propping up on her elbows and lifting her head simultaneously for the very first time! Lots of hard work, but she loves to be silly too, and I always had time for that, especially when I get the best smile and laugh from her in return! My last visits to all of them I was inconsolable basically, but it was so comforting to be sharing tears with all the moms too, and realizing that I was just as grateful for the opportunity to know them and work with their children as they were for the progress we had made. In a country where the culture hides away those with disabilities, it´s so easy to do the simplest things to make these kids feel like all-stars, and I have loved every minute of it!
My last weekend in Màncora I wanted to surf as much as I could! I headed out on Saturday with another volunteer, and the waves were a good size, so it was pretty crowded and a fight for each wave. I caught a few good ones, ran into someone, and also got run into, but it was the perfect last outing running the waves of Màncora! The sunset that day was I think the most beautiful I had seen as it sank down behind all the fishing boats lined up at 
the end of the day. My last week was also filled with gorging myself on the desserts or "postres" that I have come to love about Màncora! I had my whole week scheduled as far as which restaurant and which baked goodness I would be imbibing meal by meal and day by day. 
Attached is a picture of the chocolate fudge explosion perfected by vanilla ice cream that is called the TNT by the restaurant that creates this magnificence of dessert, just one of the gloriously rich decadences I re-experienced my last week in Màncora. OK, so now to the hardest thing I´ve had to write so far...my last day at the center. I arrived that afternoon to all the kids with big hugs and them leading me inside for a surprise ceremony instead of their lesson that day. Now, I knew I was going to cry and had been steeling myself for it, getting a little out of my system I thought with each home visit that I said goodbye that week, but I had no idea the waterworks that would occur this day. I was presented with gifts: a metal cross one of the volunteers had welded together and the chain being crocheted by another of the teachers, and also a red seed that is a symbol of luck in Perù. There were songs, and some of the kids even got up and gave little speeches...my pride at their courage beamed through my tears. As I´ve written before, the kids are very sensitive to any expression of emotion, so at all times, I was surrounded by a minimum of 2 or 3 or them, at most was about 6, all wiping away my tears and putting their arms around my shoulders in order to comfort me, which of course made me cry even harder. The woman that founded the center, who has become a huge role model for me, got up to say a message of goodbye for this time, but not forever, and as she was holding back tears, I couldn´t seem to hold back mine as she enveloped me in a hug that I not only received as a volunteer but also as her friend and family. I got a hug from each one of 
the kids, as I wet their shoulders and squeezed each of them as hard as I could. Thankfully, we headed outside to play one last game of Kiwi and I could focus on something else besides saying goodbye, as my face and all of my insides seemed to be burning by this point. Not sure if I have ever described the game of Kiwi before, but it is one of the kids´favorites, and now one of mine too! Two teams...chicos versus chicas...girls go first and try to knock down a pyramid of tin cans by throwing a soccer ball...if they are successful, the girls scatter as the last can goes down, and then the boys have to tag each one out with the ball before the girls can rebuild the pyramid. So there is a whole lot of running, sneaking, and mostly dashing for your life before you get beaned with the ball! If the boys manage to get every one of the girls out before they rebuild it, it`s their turn to knock down the pyramid. If the girls manage to rebuild it before all of them get knocked out, they get another chance to knock it down, which is usually what happens, but I think all of them, boys and girls, like the latter arrangement, as the girls love to run and evade, while the boys love to 
be the seekers and destroyers! As we neared the end of the game, I could sense that something was up, as the kids kept trying to keep me away from the center, telling me it wasn`t time to go in yet, even though I was really excited to do the activity with them that I had planned...face painting! Well, we never got around to it, as I was blindfolded and led back into the center, where all the moms, families and basically everyone that I had encountered while volunteering for 3 months in Màncora was there! In my shock I managed to say hello to most everyone I think, and there were more hugs, goodbye speeches, even a cake and dancing! I had gifts for all of the kids...a picture of each of them with me (taken over the course of the past 11 weeks) in a popsicle stick frame I had each of them decorate the previous week. And then I gave the photo album of the highlights of my time with them to the woman that founded the center and all the teachers. Of course I was crying through all of this, as you can imagine, but I was not at all prepared for what came next. As I realized what time it was and that I basically had a half hour til my bus took me from Màncora, I started frantically hugging and saying goodbye to everyone present, when one of the older girls came up to me, unhooked the crucifix from around her neck and pressed it into my hands, saying it was gift to remember her by. I was speechless at first, and then just started sobbing as I pulled her close and enclosed her in a hug that said only a shred of the gratitude and humility I felt at that very moment. As I sped away in a mototaxi back to my hostel, showered, and finished packing, I kept revisiting that exchange in my head, a necklace I had seen her wear every day, that was most likely her first communion or baptism gift, and each time coming unglued just thinking about the extraordinary memento she had given me and the message that came with it. As I came down the stairs of the hostel when my bus pulled up, since my hostel is also the bus station for the company I was travelling with, I think I was running on fumes, and at the sight of everyone gathered to see me off at the bus station, those from the center, from my hostel, other volunteers, and friends and family I had gotten to know...it was all a blur as I gave more hugs, speaking but not remembering of what through my tears, waving goodbye from my window seat, and slowly rolling out of town, towards Lima, and away from my home for the past 3 months.
the kids, as I wet their shoulders and squeezed each of them as hard as I could. Thankfully, we headed outside to play one last game of Kiwi and I could focus on something else besides saying goodbye, as my face and all of my insides seemed to be burning by this point. Not sure if I have ever described the game of Kiwi before, but it is one of the kids´favorites, and now one of mine too! Two teams...chicos versus chicas...girls go first and try to knock down a pyramid of tin cans by throwing a soccer ball...if they are successful, the girls scatter as the last can goes down, and then the boys have to tag each one out with the ball before the girls can rebuild the pyramid. So there is a whole lot of running, sneaking, and mostly dashing for your life before you get beaned with the ball! If the boys manage to get every one of the girls out before they rebuild it, it`s their turn to knock down the pyramid. If the girls manage to rebuild it before all of them get knocked out, they get another chance to knock it down, which is usually what happens, but I think all of them, boys and girls, like the latter arrangement, as the girls love to run and evade, while the boys love to 
be the seekers and destroyers! As we neared the end of the game, I could sense that something was up, as the kids kept trying to keep me away from the center, telling me it wasn`t time to go in yet, even though I was really excited to do the activity with them that I had planned...face painting! Well, we never got around to it, as I was blindfolded and led back into the center, where all the moms, families and basically everyone that I had encountered while volunteering for 3 months in Màncora was there! In my shock I managed to say hello to most everyone I think, and there were more hugs, goodbye speeches, even a cake and dancing! I had gifts for all of the kids...a picture of each of them with me (taken over the course of the past 11 weeks) in a popsicle stick frame I had each of them decorate the previous week. And then I gave the photo album of the highlights of my time with them to the woman that founded the center and all the teachers. Of course I was crying through all of this, as you can imagine, but I was not at all prepared for what came next. As I realized what time it was and that I basically had a half hour til my bus took me from Màncora, I started frantically hugging and saying goodbye to everyone present, when one of the older girls came up to me, unhooked the crucifix from around her neck and pressed it into my hands, saying it was gift to remember her by. I was speechless at first, and then just started sobbing as I pulled her close and enclosed her in a hug that said only a shred of the gratitude and humility I felt at that very moment. As I sped away in a mototaxi back to my hostel, showered, and finished packing, I kept revisiting that exchange in my head, a necklace I had seen her wear every day, that was most likely her first communion or baptism gift, and each time coming unglued just thinking about the extraordinary memento she had given me and the message that came with it. As I came down the stairs of the hostel when my bus pulled up, since my hostel is also the bus station for the company I was travelling with, I think I was running on fumes, and at the sight of everyone gathered to see me off at the bus station, those from the center, from my hostel, other volunteers, and friends and family I had gotten to know...it was all a blur as I gave more hugs, speaking but not remembering of what through my tears, waving goodbye from my window seat, and slowly rolling out of town, towards Lima, and away from my home for the past 3 months.This year has definitely been life changing for me with all the experiences I have had, but this project has been my favorite and I will never forget the center, the children that are it`s heart and soul, and the people at it`s core that make it run every day. I consider myself so blessed to be a part of that family for a short period, and hope that will always be the case. 
