Thursday 10 December 2015

1 Year Living the Island Dream

Sitting in the airport catching the last glimpse of the mountains and ocean before our journey home I have a few moments to reflect on the past year. What a year it has been!!! Celebrating with a mimosa because the students here just checked their grades and everyone passed! Kyle did amazing and I am so proud of him! I was reading through some of my first blog posts and it amazes me how much we have accomplished in a year on Nevis. 

Some fun little stats for you:
 Kyle wrote 58 exams.
 I finished 4 courses.
 I got 1 job. 
Visited over 8 different beaches.
 I have seen 10 shooting stars. 
Driven around the island over 150 times. 
We have had over 500 monkey sightings. 
300 Donkey sightings. 
800 goat sightings.
 3 fabulous rainbows. 
Countless of breathtaking sunsets. 
We haves survived 100 power outages.
Over 200 Mosquito bites between the 2 of us.
 30 days of 40 plus degrees
 1 amazing story to tell. 

This was Kyle's yay I am done exams face!
I think he was just tired...and ready to come home :) 




We have over come so much. Met some amazing people and it's unbelievable that we still have over a year left on this island. 
This week I met a travel blogger who has had some amazing experiences herself. She house sits her way through the world and has ended up on Nevis for a few months. She invited me to the house she was staying at and the view was absolutely breathtaking. Maybe Kyle and I will try it out next year :) 
If you have some time, check out her blog here: https://wanderlusters.com/

The blogger said that Nevis has been one of her favourite places so far. If we were staying at a place like this, I would never leave Nevis!!


I also attended a couple of Christmas presentations for some schools. The one school I support, went to a church downtown and had like a 3 hour long presentation. The kids were so adorable though. Dressed in their best, singing and saying poems. These kiddos were younger so sometimes their parents had to come on stage and help out haha. However I am glad I went to support them. The school I work out, also had some fun events. They did a walk-a-thon, to try and raise money for the school. The kids walked around Nevis for over 5k! It was impressive. I ended up having to do it twice because I first had to mark the trail. I also learned that the way to fund raise is to flag people down in their cars and ask them for money. Their Christmas party was interesting. It was pretty unorganized, and it made me sad that not many parents came out to support their kids. They did have some good moments though. Most of the kids had a good time I think. It has certainly been a busy couple of weeks wrapping up with school for the semester. I had a 6 hour long staff meeting on my last day working there. That was interesting. However, hopefully it was all for good and there will be some big changes in the new year.  

I feel so blessed to have this experience and even though we have dealt with broken down cars, hurricanes and extreme heat, I really don't think I would change any of the experiences I have had thus far. Yes my job has been very stressful and overwhelming and I considered quitting this month, however I managed to take control and it looks like things will be changing in the New Year. I have learned a new form of patience and even learned a new language in a way. I hope that next year we will have even more experiences to share with everyone. 

While travelling back home, we had some time in St. Kitts and went to a knock off Starbucks called Rituals Coffee. I couldn't really tell the difference myself. My drink was delicious! Maybe because I haven't had Starbucks in so long lol. 

Some things to look forward to in the new year: we will be moving to an upstairs apartment. It is slightly bigger and hopefully less bugs. I will be travelling more to St. Kitts for my job to help with a child, and I will be spending more time working on the Special Olympics Committee. Kyle will be taking on the role of co- president of the MUA Chapter American Medical Student Association. He will be beginning Med 2 and I will be starting my 5th masters course. 
So we have a busy year ahead but we are excited. I know it will be hard to come back to the island in January, because we have both been looking forward to spending some time at home with friends and family. We do have a nice 3 week break and Kyle is excited for snow. I am not so sure. 
So as I watch our plane pull in, I raise my glass to all of you who have been supporting us throughout our journey and will continue to believe in us. Cheers to 2016!! See you on the other side!


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