Sorry for the delay in between posts, we've been trying to wrap up our homeschool year as well as dealing with a couple of surgeries in the family. End of the school year is a busy time for all!
The great news is that we have arrival and departure information for our host child this summer! S will be here for a full 5 weeks from the beginning of July through the beginning of August. The host children fly in to JFK, go through customs, and then spread out to connecting flights with their chaperones across the country from there. We'll pick up S in Atlanta which is about a 6 hour drive from home.
Arrivals is apparently like one big party...posters, balloons, welcome gifts, photos. It's clear to see how the children could get overwhelmed. We'll be trying to keep in mind the time difference (the children will be 8 hours ahead) as well as the travel they've needed to go through just in order to get on the airplane. They have chaperones who accompany them on the flights and stay in the local cities during the 5 week visit. The chaperones are available to us if we run into translation issues, but previous host families have stated that language is less of a barrier than you'd think it would be. I'm sure we'll all be very good at charades by the end of the visit. In the meantime, we've taken up the hobby of learning some of his language through a great app that starts out slowly and builds to some fun games. I'm sure S will have fun laughing at our pronounciation!
Departures is another story all together. It's the date no one wants to see on the calendar! After several weeks the children feel like family and it's hard to see them leave. For the children it can be ther first time they've had a family experience and I can only imagine how hard it is for them to say good-bye. Since S is young, it will be nearly impossible to maintain contact with him after our visit. Some of the older children do stay in contact with host families through email and their home country's equivalent of Facebook (soon to go public, buy stock now! LOL).
All good things must come to an end and a departure date on the calendar is a reminder of that phrase. Does that mean one shouldn't start a good thing to begin with? No, I'm betting that the experience will be worth the pain and heartbreak that will come after our 5 weeks are finished. S has also chosen this experience and our responsibility is to make the 5 weeks worth his heartbreak at the end as well.
No comments:
Post a Comment