Dinner at the Mosaic Restaurant

Because it is still raining outside, we decided to have dinner at the Mosaic Restaurant on the second level of our hotel. Randy and I had a delicious chicken-chili quesadilla, but more important than the dinner was the conversation we had with our server. I’ll call her Sophia to protect her privacy. She is from Greece, but because jobs are so scarce there, she came to Canada to work. She gets back home to Athens about four times a year. She has three children and a husband, but for the last four-and-a-half years she has been away from home. Her oldest girl is about to enter first grade, and Sophia is fighting to get her second child into pre-school. Her youngest daughter is only a year old, and she has already been rejected for preschool. The government policies relating to preschool education are tough in Canada. Sophia hopes to return to Greece to be reunited with her family soon.

As beautiful as the natural wonders of Alaska may be, the things we love and remember about our travels are the wonderful people we meet--a Greek waitress in Canada struggling to support her family back home; a parent whose son was cured of a tragic disease. These are the things we remember.
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