Last night I shared  a room with four older men and one very nice woman, Amanda. All night long I was coughing and blowing my nose, this morning Talli, one of the man, made sure I was doing fine and he said "in South Africa we say that u need to cover yourself up and sweat the cold out" and then I tried to re do the covers and he said "wait, I'll take care of you" and he put the blankets on me and said "you are the yellow rose of Texas"... I had no idea what he meant by that, and then he said "You are so kind, so nice and beautiful, you are unique." Those words reminded me of the importance of being kind and genuine with everybody. The fact that I smiled at him when he got in the room and I made small talk made all the difference. 

I am not very good with words and sharing what I feel towards people and many times I even consider myself shy, but one thing that I can guarantee is that I will give people a nice warm smile, treat them politely and most importantly treat them as equal. Treating people equally has made such huge difference in this trip! Every time I get into a cab (after negotiating the price, of course) I sit in the front, I ask their name, shake their hand, ask them about their day and try to be that person that makes their day at least a little bit better. My mom gave me a cd that talks about "el valor agregado" (. the added value) it's about adding a little extra kindness to your conversations, to use friendly statements... I really believe that there are those little things that make a big difference.

For example, when camping in Sossusvlei Joseph, the camp helper, was cooking and I said to him "thanks for cooking, I admire a man who can cook" of course we all laughed but I bet that what I said made a difference. The next day I was going for ice cream and I made sure to ask Gabriel and Joseph if they needed anything from the store and brought each of them a coke. This morning while having breakfast I made sure to touch the waitress' shoulder and asked her name, from then on I called her by her name and thanked her for her service... It does not hurt to be kind...  I always remember: treat others as you would like to be treated... i love this phrase from that same cd my mom gave me "Lo que uno siembra, uno cosecha, si usted siembra limon, atengase a chupar limon y no piña dulce" (whatever you plant you will harvest, if you plant lime then be ready to suck on lime and don't expect to eat sweet pineapple)... To every action, a reaction.... Everything that goes up must come down...

I will go the extra mile for all my friends and people I care about. My friends used to call me "mama Andrea" because i'm always looking out for others. I show love and appreciation through actions, that being taking care of somebody when sick, driving an hour to give a friend in crisis a hug, helping with school stuff, painting a rock for them etc.

Of course I don't want to say I'm an angel, there are people that rub me the wrong way and they can get the ugly side of me, the Andrea that does not smile, ignores you and sometimes unconsciously can make ugly faces but I see this reaction as a teaching moment...  As my mom says: "SOY ESPEJO Y ME REFLEJO" (I'm a mirror and I reflect myself) and when I have a hard time with people I try to evaluate myself and see what reflection I'm seeing that is getting to me and try to work on it.

Wow... How did I go off on that tangent?!?! Jajajajaja 

Anyway... Back to my relaxing day...

At around 9 I woke up and Amanda asked me how I was doing, she gave me some cough medicine and I asked her if she had any plans and decided to go back to Penduka. I had some money left and couldn't think of a better organization to support with my last couple Namibian dollars.

Once at Penduka, while looking around I found the PERFECT Andrea doll!!!