Afternoon tea at the Australian Embassy and finally "Farewell!"

Please note to view all of the entries from January, go to archives and click on January.
Still January 23rd: We didn't have time to go back to Torra Rossa Park Hotel to get changed for the embassy so we tidied ourselves on the bus. Rosemary was very composed after fighting off a young thief who had unzipped her bag and sneaked his hand in like a spider. The afternoon tea they had laid out for us at the embassy was fabulous, savouries, pasteries, and a selection of champagnes and wines. We all took lots of group photos in front of the Australian Coat-of-arms.

We finished off the day at the restaurant with a five course farewell tea. Francesca and Paula ran a quiz which was closely contested by Belinda, Goretti and Cecilia(who was most impressed by her spoon). This was followed by some witty awards presented by Cecilia and Belinda. Everyone said a little something about what they learned or enjoyed during the trip. Back at the hotel a few of us had some dancing lessons with Domenica in the foyer whilst enjoying a drink...probably the liveliest that foyer has ever been!

January 24th: The following day it was a nine o'clock start. Goretti gathered up left over presents and gave them to Flavio (the bus driver) for his two children. He had been most helpfuland and excellent company over the last few days. Then we headed for the airport in Rome. After long queues to get our tickets and check in luggage we managed to get through security with only a little time to spend before boarding the flight to Singapore. The luggage which had been an ongoing topic of conversation for the whole group weighed in at between 21 and 33 kilos. Well done Liz... prize for the lightest luggage. Well done Adriana, yours actually wasn't the heaviest! Twelve hours and many plastic cups of water and "on demand" movies later we all arrived in Singapore and said our last farewells and took our respective flights home to some of the hottest weather Australia has experienced for a while. Thank you to all members of the group, I really had a fantastic time full of many memorable moments and lots of laughter. I will always be able to relive this fantastic time as I leaf through my many photos and look at my fellowship friends. I hope we can stay in touch. Thank you also to Sophie and Kate and the Endeavour Language Fellowship Foundation for giving me the chance to have this amazing adventure in Italy. Here endeth the blog.