Bittersweet.

My last day at Sheengate Publishing was rather bitter sweet. Sheengate supports a few local charities and one of them is the Shooting Star Children's Hospice. To be honest when Richard told me we were going to go visit the hospice I had no clue what it was, what he was talking about. Seriously I had to ask my mom.

I do not handle hospitals well, not even if I am just visiting someone so I was a little worried about visiting the Shooting Star. We arrived there and were greeted by Emily, a past co-worker at Sheengate. She is in charge of the PR since the Shooting Star is mainly funded by public donations and this place needs a lot. Emily said it costs about 19,000£ a day, DAY, to run the facility.
The hospice welcomes patients ages newborn to 18 as well as the families of the patients. Upstairs are the rooms for families, so for parents who may not feel comfortable with leaving their child and there are attached rooms that have two twin beds in case siblings come as well. Downstairs, all the patients have their own room and their own glass door that leads out to the back garden (all plants are sensory). There is also a pool which is set to 34 degrees Celsius to help relax the muscles, a bathing room, arts and crafts room and Sparkle Child Care. There is also an art therapy room and a music therapy room. I got this quote from the music therapy room: Music is what feelings sound like. There is also a sensory room that is equipped with a water bed, ball pin and lava lamp-esk columns.

The saddest part of the tour was when we went in the Tranquility room. One of the rooms serves as a chapel almost. It has books and such that pertains to different religions. Outside of the tranquil room is a small private garden. In the garden they have created a "Memory tree." The memory tree has a star for each person who has pasted away. One of the children was 7 days old. Newly elected Prime Minister David Cameron's son went to the Shooting Star. He was 6 years, 10 months when he passed away. Emily also mentioned that a child on their death bed were coming in this evening. It reminded me that children actually do go to the hospice to die, we were there during the open house so we didn't see any children. At the time it just seemed like a fun place for kids and their family to come to and not a place of death.
The experience was very eye opening. We really cannot take life for granted.

After the hospice Richard and Francoise took me to their favorite local pub, the Railways Bells. It was a nice ending to my internship. We sat outside and enjoyed the nice weather, a good drink and chips!

At 7pm the majority of the house made their way down to Embankment Pier. We had a boat party that took us along the Thames towards Greenwich and then down again towards Parliament to celebrate the end of the program. I did not have a lot of fun. I wish that I went out and did my own thing instead. The boat ride was really pretty because we got to see the city in the light and the dark, but 4 hours was a little unnecessary. Plus it was cold and windy which I was not prepared for.