Irini started pre-school on Thursday, September 2nd. After a run of visits to several pre-schools, Natalia decided that this was probably the best fit for our little one. It helped that this place had an outdoor trampoline that Irini loves to play on!
On the first day of school, Laurence was up before Irini was and he took a close look at his daughter, wished her well on the beginning of her journey to independence, pushed aside a mad rush to keep her home under the protection of the family, glanced at her once more, and slowly made his way out the door and off to work.
Later that morning Irini would wake up, take a shower with mommy, have breakfast and ask, time after time, if this was the day to go to Buzzy Bee. Natalia would smile and say "yes" and deal as constructively with her daughter's energy and inability to be patient. Finally the moment came and Natalia, as her mother before her, took pictures of her daughter's first departure to school. The surroundings were new (as Natalia and her sister and brother left from their Bogotá house), but the routine was essentially the same. Put on her clothing. Fill the backpack with little things to make the day better. Walk outside, where Irini would reach the button and summon the elevator to the sixth floor. On the ground floor she looked both to the right and the left to make sure no cars were coming, and walked out and onto the car with mommy's help.
Once at Buzzy Bee it was slow at first - the Greek-Colombians having arrived early! - and Natalia was allowed to mosey around and take pictures of her daughter with the few people that were there. Irini immediately went to play with a puzzle and a doll ('Baby') which she had played with the day before when they had come for the final pre-enrollment visit. Putting it to bed and roaming around happily was cue for the pre-school's director to patiently announce that, "when you're ready you can feel free to go". Natalia stayed a little longer, and then finally backed out, stealing one last sight of her happy daughter in her new environment.
Within minutes Irini was starting her new class, in her new group of classmates. She is happy there, it seems, and despite some moments of crying when she is being dropped off (not that first day, but the subsequent ones have been a little harder to say goodbye to mommy) she is happily involved in everything the pre-school has to offer. The director says she has become very comfortable very quickly. Now, when Natalia arrives to pick her up she has the same response as when she arrives: She cries and says she doesn't want to go home. How wonderful to be so happy with every aspect of your life that you don't want it to end. Of course, within minutes, she is happily chatting with Natalia and showing all the dance moves she learned that day.
We hope that this is the beginning of an education that will fill her with a love for life and a life of love. We hope it gives her the tools to be what she wants to be, to find something she loves, and to deal positively with those around her. We hope it equips her with imagination and dreams. We hope so much for our little Irini. She just wants to go and play and dance.... and so it begins.
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