Day 6

Posted by Jeff Many

The word of the day is heartbroken. This is the feeling we all had after leaving Nutre Hogar this morning. Although it was an amazing experience holding and playing with the babies, it was sad seeing how malnourished they were. I was personally amazed to see how attached the babies were to my classmates after only a couple of days. It really goes to show how little attention they regularly receive. I was also sad to have to leave the children of Casa Esperanza, especially without saying goodbye. However, I feel that I had an equally fulfilling experience at Nutre Hogar and it was interesting to notice the differences between them. For example, it seemed that Nutre Hogar was much larger and had many more resources, which may be due to people being more willing to donate to babies.

After we left, we had an amazing lunch at a local restaurant. I ordered a fish, which I assumed would come in a filet. However, I was surprised to receive the entire fish, plus rice and beans and a sweet plantain (all for only $6.75 - the most expensive thing on the menu!). Next we visited the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. It was amazing to see how far reaching the Smithsonian Institution is throughout the world. Not only are there museums and research institutes in the United States, but they have established campuses all over the world, including several in Panama.

Overall, I have a great feeling of pride for my classmates today. I noticed many heavy hearts as we left the service sites today and I could tell that we all truly cared about the children. Before we left the US, we worked hard to fundraise for our volunteer sites and I'm so glad we did and we were able to help these wonderful kids.