GWA reunion - seeing 4-year-olds who have suddenly become 16!

12 years ago, I taught preschool for a year in Casablanca. It was such an amazing year and each and every one of my colleagues and students was a huge part of it. So I started counting and realized that those little 4 year olds are now in high school and that I could have the chance to see them again! Since we arrived back in Morocco, I have been so excited to get back to see them and ...

Today was the day! 

It was a couple of hours to arrive there, first by train and then in our friends Tim and Katie's car (thank you guys!)

When I was a teacher, the school met in a Casablanca neighborhood with houses across the street from each other. Now they have built a huge sprawling campus about 10 miles south of the city on the beach. When I was there, they had just bought the land, so it was pretty amazing to see how it's new site has taken shape. It's gorgeous!

    GWA stands for George Washington Academy, an international, trilingual, American-style school.

   The basketball courts, put in by our Oxford friends Ken Baker and his team, are still going strong.

   Those are the on-site staff apartments in the background. Foreground are the Moroccan, GWA, and American flags.

I started with a stop to the kindergarten team where I got to see my kindergarten colleagues Gael and Amal!

    Such amazing ladies and it was so wonderful to see them again!

Then Cory, Katie, and I stopped by to see a few other staff members who are still going strong 12 years later! And also got to meet some of the new team. Such a joy :)

Then it was time for lunch with the high schoolers to see if I could find any of my old students. Cory and I bought lunch and sat down at random lunch tables and started watching. We started seeing them. I'm like 'Oh my gosh, Hachem just passed us! He looks exactly the same! And there's Mehdi!' So wild being in a time warp and seeing all these 4 year old eyes and faces now in 16 year old bodies.

We finished lunch and then started to make the rounds to introduce myself as their preschool teacher :)

   Looking at their class pic from the 2002 yearbook

They helped me track almost everyone down for a preschool reunion - it was so much fun! I had a great time hearing little bits of what they are up to now and what they're hoping to do after graduation. 

Such delightful people to reconnect with, and I hope to see them all again soon!