Some pictures and such

Chateau d'If excursion

Inside the hole through which Dantes and the Friar communicated (hypothetically of course)

I've been taking hundreds of pictures...but have super limited internet time and so only had time to upload these few.  I"ll do my best to keep adding as many as I can!

And just so you understand that I'm not just playing the whole time...here is something I wrote to let out all of the emotion that is involved with doing this internship.  Sometimes it'd be easier to not have to feel these things, but these beautiful emotions and the ability to express them like we do is what defines our species as human beings. Don't worry, I'm not depressed all the time like this passage sounds like I am.  It just helps to work through these things by expressing them and then I can move on to happier places.  Life is good here!

July 10:

Sometimes I just feel exhausted.  I see so many people that are all alone and sad.  They have few living relatives or friends.  They are slowly regressing out of life.  Their life has come full circle and they again must be spoon fed or must a hold a hand to walk steadily and to decrease their fear of falling.  They depend on others to tell them where their house is located or to unbuckle their seatbelt.  My heart is just so heavy because I want to fix it all and heal all their lonely hearts or physical ailments.  I want Danielle to not be blind anymore so she can see her fork in order to put it into her mouth rather than having to use her hands.  I want Madame Dernaucourt to not be paralyzed on her left side so that she can take the cap off of her lipstick tube.  I want Francois’ muscles to heal so he doesn’t have to be at his home all day every day by himself with only someone to talk to when the Petits Freres call him once a week.  I want Madame Elena’s head to be healed so that she can remember what she had for breakfast that morning.  I want Madame Colonna to feel like someone in the world cares about her.  Who am I to complain about my problems of loneliness when I have so so much.  I am so selfish.  I am there helping these people and I start thinking about how it’d be nice to get off work a few hours early so that I could do some sightseeing when I should be focusing on how I could be making someone’s day and giving someone hope by talking to them or by smiling at them.  Francois thanked me today for my smile that reminds him of when the Americans came and liberated him in North Africa when they had been out of adequate food, water, and medicine for 6 months.  I asked one man Ca va and he told me in his isolated corner Ca va pas bien.  I ask other people that can’t even walk Ca va and they smile at me and say Ca va.  Sometimes it seems like too much for my heart to bear inside that small palm sized thing.  The ones that won’t fit there come leaking out through my eyes.  Makes me want to wipe out these memories and run away back to home.  But I know I could never forget and so I must press forward and find satisfaction and salvation from these thoughts and feelings by doing my best every day to help someone’s day be a little better.