During my final days working at ABC clinic, I’ve been blessed with great interactions with patients I’ve come to know and appreciate. Patients who started out with uncontrolled diabetes, uncontrolled blood pressure, uncontrolled depression, who now have smiles on their faces and hope for the future. It’s been a blessing to be the first doctor to explain things to some of them – patients who for the first time feel like healthcare is a partnership and they can make decisions about how to pursue better health for themselves. It’s so hard to leave these people whom I care for – not only caring for their health concerns, but coming to know them as individuals and caring about their families and life goals. I’m praying that I get a chance to come back soon. It’s different from three years ago when I said goodbye to the patients I saw in San Bernardino. With them, I could send them to any number of my colleagues, and the few that insisted they wanted to stay with me I joked that they could follow me to Africa if they still wanted me to be my patients. But my Lilongwe patients don’t have as many options. There are a few specialty-trained doctors in down and they are either so busy that it is hard to see them or so expensive that most people cannot afford to see them. I know I fill a need here. At my going-away party, one of the clinicians said that he hoped that I returned as a lecturer because I am good at explaining things to people. It’s true, I hope that my next posting allows me to train a future generation of doctors and clinicians so that there won’t be such a huge gap when one primary care provider leaves the city. Oh, that God might give us strength and arrange everything for the next step of our journey.