Most incredible day

Today, started more oddly than usual. The teachers were whispering and running around with worried looks all morning. I ignored the unusual activity, howver, as I rarely understand what they say, despite my unending attempt to learn the language.

At 9 o'clock, a driver, sent by my parent's old tour guide U Zaw Win Cho came to take me to Mt. Popa. Resenting spending one of my final days hiking a far away mountain, away from my students, I slowly followed him out of my class with tears welling.

Thandar, U Zaw, and I hiked the bigger of the mt Popa mountains and then went to lunch at Popa restaurant. 

We drove back to school at 4 o'clock and along the way, U Zaw was getting repeated calls from the monks wondering when I would be home (acting more protective than their usual incessant text messages when I take day trips away from the school). When we finally arrived, even though school usually closed at 3:30, the kids were still there. Something was up. 

When I asked my friends at the school, they said it was my surprise farewell party! 

What do I like even more than huge, unexpected surprises celebrating my leaving a place that I love to call home? Huge surprises where I am at the center of attention, 400 children are staring up blankly at me from a safe distance, and monks are talking about me over loud speakers in a language I don't understand.

The teachers had organized a surprise festival for my farewell (sitting in front of the student body, I was told that the day I resentfully spent at Mt Popa was my very last day to teach, as my last two days in Bagan were holidays for the school...the Burmese are known for their advanced notice).

Gripping Thandar's hand as if the mass of children and their onlooking parents were about to massacre us both, I watched as my eighth grade class sang (chanted) English songs. When they were finished, three hired dancers, adorned in golden, hand-painted costumes performed a traditional Myanmar dance. After them, more dancers were called in.

At the end of the show, the teachers still weren't finished with my embarrassment. Cheers resounded, as the head monk, U Ar Deik Sa, asked me preform my own dance. What followed was a gesticulating attempt from a girl with the coordination of a three-legged baby giraffe.

I invited U Sai - an English speaking man with a great sense of humor who I have come to admire as my mentor for the past month - up on stage to dance with me. He started in a shameless, alternative square dance, while I attempted a Burmese traditional style.

During the performance, we gathered other teachers from the audience: Daw Ba Ba, Daw Pak Pak, and Daw Aung Gyi (a wonderfully hilarious, 70-year-old woman). Before long, my students joined me and the entire village ran to see what had caused such a loud commotion of music and laughter.

The party ended with my short, roughly translated speech and my promise that, "we will play football after." 

After a few hours of playing, it was dinner time for the monastery boys, so the girls and I went out to ice cream at the nearby Thande Hotel. We talked about boys, studying, boys, America, boys, how we would communicate when I left, getting them into an American university, and boys.

Like every other night, they walked me back to my guest house, but this time, they wanted to see the kind of place I lived in. As I opened the door into my icy room, with its blowing air-con, glossy floors, and personal bathroom, their eyes went wide. They ran into the shower, playing with the hot water, shivering in front of the blowing air conditioner, and giggling uncontrollably as they jumped on my elevated mattress. When their investigation ended, we went out onto the roof to take pictures, look at the view below, and talk as they played with my hair. It was strange to think how similar our personalities were, despite living in completely different environments.

Although my heart broke with this first goodbye, it was another incredible day.

Kate McDonough

University of Virginia (UVA '18)