Final day in Malaysia. So what do I do? Easy- half of the ship does it too. Scour the country for the closest, cheapest internet. 10 o clock on the dot and Starbucks was packed with SAS kids. For the first 5 minutes it was exciting. After that it went just as fast as it does on the ship.
With my frappachino in hand, AIM going (I forgot who half the screennames belong too), I was pumped to share my pictures. After all, how often do you get to put up albums with locals in South Africa, Malaysia, or India? How about some of the crazy things I have done? I mean- seriously- whose Facebook picture could be on an elephant. Course, it stopped downloading after a grand total of 5 pictures. Zebras. Elephant. Vanessa with elephant. Elephant behind our bus. AND a playground. Cool. To top it off my boyfriend told me that those are the pictures they’d rather see anyway. Thanks.
That afternoon we visited a disability home, Chesire Home. We visited with the people for a while, then went to see what they have made. Most of them are only physically handicapped, so they make a lot of handicrafts to help make a living. I was walking around the store and saw these dolls. Okay, so I’ll admit they were a little scary. They were stark white, with plastic beady eyes, and yarn hair. Not to mention they were in bright neon colors that made absolutely no sense. A pink girl? Really. I nodded politely and thought why would I ever buy that? So I keep walking around and pick up dozens of souvenirs for everyone. I begin overhearing conversations with the women in front of the dolls. She is so happy and proud. They are her work, and it takes her a month to do two or three. So I walk over and begin talking to her myself. She absolutely takes on me and I decide to buy one. She threw up her hands and started laughing. I bought it and left felt so happy with what I had done. Then I sat there for a minute, talking to some of the people, and realized that I wasn’t content with that. I went back and bought another set. She kept saying how happy she was. If I could, I’d buy every one just to see her as happy as she was. It’s funny- at first I thought it was such an awkward thing. Yet they’re by far my favorite thing that I bought that day, and certainly the most meaningful. I took pictures with every person who made everything I bought that day. That way, when I give them to someone as a gift, it’s not really a gift from me. It’s a gift that is a lot more than that. It’s a gift from them that takes hours, if not months to work on.
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