Clean your plate

Saturday the 22nd of May was quite the day. Saturday morning I had to say goodbye to my sweet friend Stella. Stella just graduated last saturday from JHS 3. She will be staying with her Ghanaian sponsor for the next few months before going to high school in the fall. She came to say goodbye and when she layed her head on my shoulder I noticed huge tears rolling down her face. She is scared to go, and sad to leave. I hated saying goodbye to her.



That afternoon I took the third set of students to reach Papayes to Accra. My dear friend Offei was one of those who had completed the reading program. Offei lights up my life. His mannerisms and comments are histerical. He ordered his food, then told me he wanted to get it to-go. I was confused, assuming he must be hungry. However, when his food came he started devouring the rice. As the food on his plate was waning, I told him that if he ate everything on his plate, right down to every last grain of rice and the bones I would buy him ice cream on the way home. I was talking to the kids sitting next to me, and was not watching Offei when I suddenly realized there were no longer chicken bones on his plate. I asked him where they were, and he gave me a closed lip smile and laughed. Jessica Ortman, who was sitting next to him, realized she could hear him chewing on them! I was so shocked I could hardly beleive it! I must admit I was freaking out a bit, which Offei thought was even funnier. I asked all the other kids if it would make him sick and they said no. He then just wanted more of a reaction out of all of us, and started to collect the other kids' bones!! I never dreamed he would take me literally when I joked with him to clean his plate. Oops. Apparently Offei means business when it comes to ice cream. I was going to buy them all some anyways!



Saturday night we showed the film the BIG GREEN, a kids soccer film from the mid-90's. You would have thought they were watching a world cup match the way they were chanting, clapping, jumping, and shouting during the film. It was so much fun. They were so into the film, even chanting "kiss the goat" and "go big green" at various points in the film! They have already been asking me to show it again.