week 28: it's the most busiest time of the year (december 22-28)

i'm so tired: i learned a whole different way that you can be "stressed" during the christmas season this year. our time wasn't spent in check-out lines or baking or going to christmas parties... but we definitely kept ourselves busy. las mañanitas continued this week... on the 23rd the volunteer house and staff was in charge of dressing up, so i got to be one of the three kings, but it meant we had to get up at 4:00 to prepare. then on the 24th we woke up early as well because we did las mañanitas in the nearby batey (small village). the volunteers also organized a talent show to do on christmas eve, so each house prepared a presentation (song, skit, dance, etc). we were all in charge of helping three houses prepare, so much of the week was spent practicing and making costumes, etc. we also had gift donations and various other activities. looking back on the past week, it was a lot of work with little sleep, but i think all the kids had a good time, so it was worth it.

noche buena: noche buena, or christmas eve, was probably the longest day we had. like i said it started at about 4:00 am when we got up to prepare for walking to the batey to do las mañanitas. the afternoon was spent setting up the school and preparing the kids for the talent show. we had mass at 5:00, where 8 kids received their first communion. it was a really nice mass and they actually sang some traditional sounding christmas carols, so i felt a little more like it was christmas. after mass we all had dinner in the school. (we were supposed to have dinner and the talent show out on the basketball court, but it rained all day so everything got moved inside). after dinner, we began the talent show. before the houses presented, there was a play by some of the older kids. it was a cute story, written by one of our high school girls, about jesus when he was about 12, getting ready for his birthday party. mary and joseph were at home preparing for the party, but jesus was sad because people weren't coming... so he went out and encountered all these different people who weren't getting into the christmas spirit and invited them to his birthday party... it was really cute. then, each house presented what they had prepared. i prepared a really short thing with casa san pascual where paola was dressed up as santa claus; kaki, genesis and jackelin as reindeer; and rosali as an elf and then they "danced" around to "here comes santa claus". then casa santa rosa prepared a skit and the other house i was in charge of prepared a dance to "feliz navidad". we had a group of people judging the performances because the top 6 out of 12 were going to perform again the following night, in a final round to pick the top 3 winners. none of my houses made it to the second round, but no one was too upset about it. the night ended (after cleaning and setting up for mass in the morning) around 11:30, so we were all pretty tired and ready for bed.

christmas: christmas began with mass at 9:00 am and then all the volunteers came back to the house to make popcorn and stuff piñatas with candy. then a local group came to pass out gifts to the kids so we helped with that. later, we passed out more gifts for the kids from the house (clothes and other stuff that had been donated at various times throughout the year). we then prepared for round 2 of the talent show in the school. (there were a couple hours break in the middle of the day and i got to listen to the second half of the suns/spurs game online... and as al mccoy would say... heartbreak hotel!! so sad!) then it was time to head to the school for the final round of the talent show. we began this show with a bilingual singing of "white christmas", first by the high school kids in english and then some of the other kids in spanish. it was really cute and they showered us with "snow" (crushed up styrofoam) when the song ended. we then continued with the show. the night was a lot of fun and the houses that won were really excited... they recieved a trip to the beach, a trip to the movie theaters and a trip to the ice cream store.

piñatas: piñatas are a tradition that has been brought over from mexico. during the week, each house was responsible for making a piñata out of paper mache. they then brought them to the house of the volunteers, so we could stuff them with candy and confetti. we were supposed to do the piñatas in the afternoon on christmas, but it rained pretty much all day, so it got postponed until friday. the tradition is that each house comes forward one at a time and gathers in a circle around the piñata. then they move around in the cirlce, singing the piñata song (which i have no idea what the words are), while taking turns hitting the piñata. it started raining again while we were doing the piñatas, but we just continued anyway. from what everyone says, the rainy season ends in november and it hasn't rained on christmas in years, so it was really unusual weather. but we carried on and the kids loved it... although i'm really surprised no one got hurt... they were swinging this stick around as hard as they could and not doing a very good job of staying in the circle, and then when the candy fell it was big dives into the concrete, leaving huge dogpiles of kids struggling to get a lollypop... it was quite a sight!


"and it is in the life of Jesus that God puts skin on to show us what love looks like." - shaine claiborne