week 50: bonding time (may 25-31)

boys will be boys: aside from still being pretty busy in the special needs house trying to get a bunch of stuff in order before i go, i spent a lot of this week just hanging out with my boys in santa rosa. now, they usually do some pretty crazy things... and i give them credit, they are very creative. just about everything we find... from sticks to plastic bags or water bottle caps... can be made into a toy or game. but this week, their stunts started to get a little dangerous. the first one was probably my fault... a couple weeks ago, i showed them the movie "hot rod" (for you bubba!) and every since then, they've been really into bicycle stunts. it has been mostly about what types of things they can jump over, but this week they decided to try to and go down the slide in their backyard on the bicycle. it was actually quite funny, but probably not the best idea ever. and i'm probably not the best volunteer ever for sitting there and watching them do it... but it was pretty funny.... and no one got hurt! we had to re-attach the seat a few times afterwards, but overall it was pretty successful. then they tried to build a ramp and ride the bicycle up the slide... but this endeavor was not quite as successful. the other thing they have been into this week is creating sling shots. now i've seen several ways to create sling shots, but i've never seen this one. (perhaps if i was a boy, i would have learned these things growing up, but this was all new to me). so they have been finding little scrap pieces of pvc pipe and then attaching balloons to the end of them. then they put a rock in the balloon, pull it back and shoot it out. now they asked me to try it in the house (again, not the best idea), but i did and i had no idea what i was doing and i shot it so hard right into the window... which luckily is just this metal thing with no glass, so it just made a really loud noise. i got kinda nervous cuz i thought the tia was going to come yell at me for being a bad example, but the boys just laughed and thought it was hilarious. we then proceeded outside, where they spent the rest of the afternoon trying to shoot eachother with rocks, hiding behind bushes and walls like little soldiers. i tried to say, "you're gonna shoot your eye out" in spanish, but i don't think they understood my christmas story reference. hopefully no one ends up in the hospital!

do the dew: a couple weeks ago, my good friend matt toney, being the nice guy he is, sent me 6 mountain dews in the mail! it was such a nice surprise and i have been waiting for just the right occasion to drink them up! after thinking about it, i decided that i think it is everyone's right to be able to taste this glorious green goodness that is mountain dew at least once in their life. and since they don't sell mountain dew anywhere on this island, i decided to bring them over and share them with my boys in santa rosa. they were pretty excited because i don't think they've ever seen green soda before and it was very interesting trying to explain the word "dew" in spanish. i'm pretty sure they have no idea what i was talking about. but, regardless, i think they enjoyed it. although i don't think they appreciate the amazingness as much as i do... they all seemed more interested in who got to keep the bottles afterwards than the actual drink.... like little kids playing with the boxes on christmas! who knows what fun games we'll be able to come up with with six empty mountain dew bottles!!



"evangelization: one begger telling another begger where the food is." - mother teresa

week 49: flies & starfish (may 18-24)

attack of the flies: about a year and a half ago i went down to the friends of the orphans office in mesa because i was considering volunteering at nph for a year. i went and had a meeting with jim hoyt, regional director, whom i had worked with at st. pats. i had been sponsoring a kid in the dominican through friends of the orphans for about a year, so i kinda had it in the back of my head that that was the home i would want to volunteer at. but, without saying that i sat down with jim just to get his thoughts, opinions and advice on possibly being a volunteer. he told me a lot of what being a volunteer means and that i would have to learn spanish and this and that. and i asked him if he prefers any homes over the others... he talked about mexico and how it was his favorite home because he spends the most time there and about haiti and how it might be hard with the creole. he mentioned a few other homes and their positives/negatives, but never mentioned the dominican... so i said, "what about the dr?". and his first response was... "there are a lot of flies." now it was kinda a joke and he went on to talk a little bit more about the home... but in all my time here i have noticed some flies here and there, but i've never considered them a huge problem.... until now!!! oh my gosh, i don't know what happened this month... but there are soooooo many flies! it is crazy! i finally understand what he was talking about... they are everywhere! and they are super annoying! i know it sounds petty... i mean they are only flies... we have frogs in the bathroom, ants running over the tables, counters and beds, huge cockroaches and tarantulas, mosquitos, and i've even gotten used to the mice that run across the kitchen floor while you are cooking... but i have found none of these as annoying as the flies! i don't know what it is, but there are just hundreds of them everywhere you go and they are like weird flies. they don't just buzz around your head... they like to land on your lips, or go into your ear, or your nose and they are all over all the food we try to eat. and in the special needs house we don't have screens on the windows (because the kids have broken them all) so the fly problem is like times 100 in there. we have these fly catcher things that hang from the ceiling and they seriously fill up like everyday... i don't know where they all come from! i don't know... maybe God is giving me once last test in my patience before i leave... or maybe making sure that i come home and don't decide to stay longer! i don't know, but... ahhhh!

weekend retreat: despite the irritation of the flies, i had a very nice weekend. we had the opportunity to go on a volunteer retreat, where we met up with a couple volunteers from different organizations in the dr and we all spend the weekend talking, reflecting and sharing our experiences with each other. it was very different from any retreat i've ever been on, very quiet and laid back and there were only about 12 of us, but it was very nice. friday night we traveled to this place outside of santo domingo called las alcorizos, where there is a program run by some nuns from the states called "fe y alegría" (faith and happiness) they basically run a school for poor children from the batey. (it's a really cool organization and they also look for year long volunteers from the states... check it out http://fi.feyalegria.org/) the head nun, sr. anita, was just great. she is this little old nun who has been in this country for 14 years and is just hilarious, with this awesome dry, sarcastic humor. she kept us all laughing all weekend. then on saturday morning we got up and took a bus about 2 hours west to a town called villa fundación, where we arrived at another nun's house, where there is also a small retreat center, where we stayed and had our retreat. this place was very cool... it was very different than anywhere i have been in the dr. it is like a very dry area of the dr... very different atmosphere... almost like a desert. there were even cactus! i felt like i was home! and the day was nice... we had good food and got to spend a lot of time talking and reflecting on our time here... which was especially nice considering my time is coming to a close. it was also nice to get to meet people who are volunteering in the dominican in different ways and compare experiences with them. on sunday, we woke up and had a word and communion service (we couldn't have mass because there are no priests) overlooking this beautiful valley. it was really nice. and sr. anita played the guitar for us! then we all headed to this town called las salinas, where there is a beach. it wasn't your typical beautiful, white sand dominican beach, but it was really nice. and the best part was that there were all these amazing starfish! we spent practically the whole afternoon like little kids looking for and taking pictures with starfish... it was really fun!


"be happy in the moment. that's enough. each moment is all we need, not more. be happy now and if you show through your actions that you love others, you'll give them happiness too. the world would be a much better place if everyone smiled more - so smile, be cheerful, be joyous that God loves you." - mother teresa

week 48: busy, busy, busy (may 11-17)

git er done: i don't know what it is about this place... maybe it's just the different pace of life... but i've never been somewhere where i feel like i'm so busy all day and then when i stop to look back on the day, i have to wonder what exactly i've done!! i don't know, it's hard to explain, but it's like everything moves so slow and after 11 months i'm still having problems adjusting! there are tons of things that i am trying to get done before i leave (in less than 6 weeks!). first of all, i'm trying to get a lot of stuff done in the special needs house. i've worked with the kids a lot this year, but i'm trying to do some things that will last after i'm gone. i've been working with the physical therapists and we've been creating information sheets about all the kids that tell about them... their problems and specific ways to work with and help them, etc. we've also been trying to teach the tías more about special needs kids, so they can be more effective working in the house. we are also trying to make schedules for both the tías and the kids, so that there is more structure and routine and that the house can continue in a forward direction. in addition, i've been trying to get a lot of other random projects done. i have been making a brochure type thing, with information about the house and kids so that visitors can look at it while they are here and i've been trying to get the visitor program to have a little more order to it... organizing the visitor house with rules, guidelines, information, etc. but it's just like the simplest things here seem to take forever. like at home, if i want to make a copy it's done in 2 seconds in the office or i jump in my car and run over to kinkos. but here, it's like there's no ink, or there's no electricity or i have to wait for this or that or find someone who is driving into the city who can take me with them. i don't know, it's just seems like all these things shouldn't take so long... but for some reason they do! plus, i've been trying to just spend as much time with the kids as possible, because that is going to be the hardest part of leaving. all in all, this week i feel like i've been running around like a chicken with my head cut off! but anyway, i'm determined to get all these things done in my last couple weeks here... hopefully i don't go crazy in the process!

cooking classes: in addition to all the "work" i've been trying to get done, there are also other random things that i've been trying to do before i leave. one is learn how to cook at least 1 dominican thing. in general, i don't think i will miss the rice and beans too much... but after a year of eating rice and beans for lunch every single day, i will probably feel the desire to add at least a little more rice into my diet back home. plus, when we went to the beach a couple weeks ago, my tías in santa rosa made this really delicious rice and chicken that we brought with us and they told me that they would teach me how to make it. so this tuesday was cooking day. on monday i went to the store and bought all the ingredients and on tuesday morning, my tías gave me my first dominican cooking lesson. it was really fun. my tías are so sweet and they were so surprised when i told them i don't eat rice every day back home! but they made this really delicious rice with carrots and onions and corn and this very tasty chicken to go on top... yum :) in the afternoon i continued the day of cooking, by giving paola an american cooking lesson... we made ants on a log (hormigas en un tronco). apparently celery, peanut butter and raisins is a very weird concept here. paola liked it, because she'll eat just about everything, but everyone else that we tried to give one to gave us a look like, "are you kidding me? i'm supposed to eat that?".... oh well.

primera dama: wednesday was also a crazy day, because on tuesday afternoon we found out that the first lady of the dr was going to stop by the home for a visit. this kinda threw everyone into a frenzy. we all spent all tuesday afternoon and wednesday morning cleaning and getting everything ready. the kids did a bunch of yard work and everyone cleaned up their houses. some kids started preparing and practicing a song of welcome, while others organized a dance to do for her. the day was pretty crazy. we thought she was coming in the morning... then after lunch... then we found out she wasn't coming til 4. then we were all ready, we had the kids lined up at the front gate to greet her as she arrived, but as we waited, the big black clouds rolled in and it started to just pour! we all ran to the school and got re-setup in there. finally all her security guards showed up and about a half an hour later she finally came into the school. the kids and the national director welcomed her and then she spoke for about 10 minutes. it was still pouring though, so she didn't get to see or do anything other than the inside of the school. it ended up being rather anti-climactic in the end. but everyone was excited about it and i suppose its good that the president and his wife know about and show interest in the organization!


"what we are doing may seem insignificant, but it most important that we do it." -ghandi

week 47: a week of rain (may 4-10)

may showers: april didn't bring too much rain, but that is about all we have seen so far this may. i'm not really sure when hurricane season officially starts, but it feels like this is it. we have just had storm after storm... with really intense rain like we did back when i first got here last summer. it's been nice too because it's been keeping the temperature down... it's still pretty humid, but we haven't seen the horribly hot days that we had last summer yet! but everything is so muddy and flooded. as you can see from the picture, it looks like we have a huge lake on our property... but all that is usally just a grassy field. it's been kinda fun, but i think the kids are starting to get a little cabin fever from having to be inside most of the time. most days we've had to cancel all the sports activities and they have had a couple afternoons of classes canceled, plus when they do have school, they can't have recess because of all the mud. i, however, am going to try and enjoy all the rain as much as i can... not too long before i'll be back in the desert!

oh and poor nicolas... he was having such a great week... all week. i thought we were actually going to be able to go to the batey to get that soda this weekend, but friday afternoon he decided to run out of his classroom and going dancing in the rain! oh what am i going to do with him?!

p.s. i finally updated my pics @ http://dominicanrepubliccitypics.shutterfly.com/



"many a man curses the rain that falls upon his head, and knows not that it brings abundance to drive away the hunger." - st. basil

week 46: my problem children (april 27 - may 3)

nico: on a day to day basis, i would say that the majority of my "struggles" come from my time working with paola or the other special needs kids in san pascual. the time i spend in my other house, santa rosa, with my boys, is more of a laid back relaxing time to just goof around and have fun. but we do have a few kids in santa rosa that have their fair share of problems. there are 2 in particular that i have been working a lot with lately, who could really use some prayers. the first is nicolas, or nico for short. there are 14 boys in santa rosa and i love them all, but i do have closer relationships with some of them than others. nico is one of the boys that i haven't really been all that close with until the past couple weeks. (part of this is probably due to the fact that he is never in the house when he is supposed to be... so i haven't spend as much time with him as the other boys!) anyway, i've always known that nico has some behavior problems... he always seems to be in trouble in the house and has been suspended from the school several times. it's hard to describe nicolas because he's not a bad or mean-hearted kid, he just for some reason always finds trouble. and he knows it... he admits it... he's not one of those kids that tries to sneak around and pretend that he's not doing anything wrong. sometimes i just have to laugh at him because he'll be in the midst of doing something, like yelling or saying a bad word, and then he'll realize what he's doing and cover his mouth with his hand and then he'll get this half-smile on his face and look over in my direction because he knows... it's like he almost can't help himself. i don't know why i didn't make more of an effort earlier, but i decided last week that i would make a behavior chart for him and try to do something special with him if he could behave for a whole week. i made a chart for the week, giving him 6 opportunities to earn a sticker each day. now, making him earn all the stickers for each day would be too much to ask at this point, but i thought 75% was fair to start. when i presented the idea to him, he was cute because i could tell he wanted to do it, but he just said, "no, i can't." and i said, "what do you mean, you can't?" and he was just like, "well i just can't behave well." (like i said, he's so hard to describe... he's just really honest and straight forward... he doesn't do anything maliciously, but it's like deep down he knows that sometimes its just beyond his control) i tried my best to tell him that i believed he could and that he had 6 chances every day and even if one of them was bad, that he could try again for the next one. he didn't seem completely convinced, but agreed to try. we agreed that if he did it, we'd take a walk to the nearby batey and buy a soda and possibly a snack at the end of the week. we started out the week pretty well, he was getting about 4-5 stickers a day... but then it all went downhill on wednesday afternoon. i guess he was hungry, because he and a couple other boys decided to ditch class in the afternoon and go looking for mangoes. he ended up getting suspended for the rest of the week. i was so sad! he tried to convince me that even though he wasn't in school, if he behaved well in the house during his suspension, we should still be able to go. i didn't agree. but, we had another good talk and i think he's ready to try again next week. i'm really hoping that at some point in my last 7 weeks, we will get to go!

big fish: yendi is my other "problem child". yendi is a very special kid. the more time i spend with him, the more i love him. in my first couple weeks, as i was still getting to know the boys, the only times that i really ever heard about yendi was when i heard about him getting in trouble... getting in fights, yelling at the tías, causing problems in the summer program. he's a tough kid. he's got this scar under his eye that i think is just so fitting to his personality. he also has an extremely sweet side and although he doesn't show it a lot, it's there. he's also got one of the best smiles i've ever seen... which is so fitting to that side of his personality (i'm determined to get a picture of it before i leave). he's a handful though... i admire the tías' patience with him. he can be extremely rude and disrespectful in the way he talks to the tías and to the other kids. he's almost never where he's supposed to be or doing what he's supposed to be doing. he is, however, great when someone gives him specific work to do. one time the consequence for his bad behavior was that he had to work in the garden and he did a great job. he showed up on time everyday and worked really hard. he is also always tagging along with our mechanic (an ex-pequeño from haiti)... he just loves working with him and would probably do it all day if he was allowed to. i've always felt that yendi just needs his energies channeled in the right direction. but it wasn't until recently that i had some more insight into his character... and developed a new nick name for him. i've been noticing that yendi is drawn to anything that isn't what everyone else is doing. he's the first to volunteer if there is a project that gets him out of the house and you can see him just always looking and searching for something better. and i realized that he's just too big for this place. he's like a big fish in a little pond... and i think he's just frustrated. not that he's any better than the other kids here, or that it excuses his behavior, but i do believe that some people are just too big for the world they're placed in. i really worry about him and pray for him, because i know he's one of those kids that could end up going either way. i just hope he continues to be challenged and use those frustrations he feels in a positive way. he's a great kid and i know God has big plans for him.


"christianity has nothing to say to the person who is completely happy with the way things are. it is a message for those who hunger and thirst - for those who desire life as it was meant to be." - john elderidge

week 45: the end is near (april 20-26)

goodbye kelly: i know i still have 2 months left, but it is starting to feel like my time here is almost over. probably one of the reasons is that my roommate kelly, will be finishing up her service at the end of next week and it’s going to be very weird not having her here. she came only about 2 weeks before me, so all of our time, not only here at the orphanage, but traveling on weekends off, has been together. we come from 2 different sides of the country, with totally different personality and views and opinions, but we’ve really had a great 10½ months together. some of our best memories are the times we spent organizing activities between our two houses of boys at nph. we’ve done baseball games, soccer games, movie and popcorn nights, breakfast, and tons more. we thought it would be fun to do one last thing, so on saturday, we got permission to take both of our houses to the beach for the day. we got our towels and swim suits, packed up our rice and beans, and headed on the bus to juan dolio. it ended up being just an amazing day. the weather was great and the water was beautiful… the bluest and clearest i’ve ever seen it. we spent about six hours on the beach and in the water taking pictures, playing soccer, jumping and diving, learning to float, snorkeling, building sand castles, burying each other, trying to balance on a huge piece of styrofoam, and searching for sea creatures (fish, crabs, round prickly things, and even an octopus, were among some of the things we captured). it was just a really great day, and hopefully a good going away party for kelly!


what am i doing here? while saturday was a really amazing day, the rest of my week was actually pretty tough. i’ve had a lot of frustrations with paola, one of the girls in the special needs home that i’ve worked with very closely these past 10 months. some days she’s really great and i feel like we’ve made a lot of progress. other days, like most of this week, she is really difficult and i wonder what i have been doing with my time here. and then i worry about leaving, because when i left to go home for vacation, the tías told me how horrible paola was and even when i came back it took her a couple weeks to fully forgive me for leaving (even though she knew i was going and that i would be coming back). paola is a good kid, who has had a tough past. her mother (who is schizophrenic) was really terrible to her and always told her what a problem she was and how worthless she was. she definitely has some mental handicaps of her own and a very low self-esteem. but at the same time, she is very intelligent (making her quite manipulative when she wants to be) and she is very capable of many things (both good and bad). the problem is that over her years at nph paola has heard people talk about her "sickness" and its made her even more self-conscious, at the same time, causing her to act out more and more. she can be a very difficult person to deal with (even physical at times), so for the most part, people just let her be, because it's easier than fighting with her. i, however, have been very strict with her over the past 10 months because i believe that she is capable of more than she is showing right now. despite the fact that we have a fight about every other day, i think to some extent it is working. my concern is that when i leave, things will return to the way they were. the tías in her house are nice people, but what paola needs is discipline and it seems for the most part that people here don't want to or don't have the time to put the effort into her that she needs (whether that be a lack of understanding or simply a lack of interest). either way, it's frustrating because i want her to continue to improve. so then again, i wonder what i'm doing here... if she is just going to be the same once i leave, or even worse off, why am i here at all?

i also struggle with the thought of leaving beyond my worries of paola. there are definite excitements with the thoughts of coming home, but at the same time it’s hard. i want to look back and see exactly what i accomplished. i want to feel like i made some sort of difference. but sometimes i look around this country and wonder if there is any hope. not that our country is perfect, but there are so many problems here... and they go way beyond poverty. almost all reverence has been lost for the catholic faith that still is very much a part of the culture. people celebrate the holidays, wear the rosaries and crosses, and even go to mass, but hardly anyone goes to communion, because they themselves know that for most people here the faith doesn't go much deeper than the surface. also, the concept of a family, as we know it, is almost unheard of here. teenage pregnancies are completely normal, as is the fact that most men are involved in several relationships at one time, not to mention that i can probably count on one hand the number of people i know here who are married. on top of that, there is the alcohol, the drugs and the obvious prostitution almost everywhere you go. none of these problems have or will improve in my time here. so then the whole experience i've had here becomes selfish, because it becomes more about me, and the wonderful experience i had, feeling like i did something good for the world, when in reality, what kind of difference can actually be made in only a year?

in the midst of all this wondering and worrying, i think God sent me a sign. i received two different emails from two different people on two different sides of the world… both sending me the exact same poem/prayer. one was from my friend eric who was in germany at the time and the other from my friend katherine in chicago. both of them, for different reasons, sent me the following:

it helps, now and then, to step back and take a long view, the kingdom is not only beyond our efforts, it is even beyond our vision. we accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent enterprise that is God's work. nothing we do is complete, which is a way of saying that the kingdom always lies beyond us. no statement says all that could be said. no prayer fully expresses our faith. no confession brings perfection. no pastoral visit brings wholeness. no program accomplishes the church's mission. no set of goals and objectives includes everything.

this is what we are about. we plant the seeds that one day will grow. we water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise. we lay foundations that will need further development. we provide yeast that produces far beyond our capabilities. we cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. this enables us to do something, and to do it very well. it may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an opportunity for the Lord's grace to enter and do the rest.

we may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker. we are workers, not master builders; ministers, not messiahs. we are prophets of a future not our own. amen.

last week, a lady named gena (who runs the special needs home in haiti) came to try to help us out with developing the special needs home we have here. i spent a couple hours one afternoon talking with her, sharing some of my frustrations and concerns. i mentioned my concerns about paola and my worries about her being worse off when i leave. gena told me about a boy they have living in the special needs home in haiti… his body is completely tense, he can’t talk, walk or even move, but she said every single day he has one hour of therapy. will the therapy help him walk or move one day? probably not. in fact, he will probably spend his whole life in that same condition. but, she said, for that one hour he feels a little relief, a little less pain… and for that, she said, it’s worth it.

i guess that’s what i have to think about in my last 2 months. like the prayer says, we can’t accomplish everything. i may leave here feeling like what i did is incomplete, but i trust that it was a step in the right direction, or at least it was worthwhile for the time in which i was doing it. God asked me to come and be here for this year with paola, so i have to trust that while i don't know what will happen in the future, i at least know that God is in control. and as far as the rest of it... the world is a mess, that much is clear. it's not just here, but everywhere. but there is also a lot of hope. sometimes it's not that easy to see, but it is there. and it's not any of our jobs to fix every problem in the world, but it is all our jobs to seek that hope every day and do the best we can with where we are and what we have been given.

“do not abandon yourself to despair. we are an easter people and hallelujah is our song.” –john paul II