This is my life

‘The only thing constant in the world is change. That’s why today I take life as it comes.’

-India.Arie

I was listening to some music the other day and I found this opening line to a song rather inspiring. Change seems to be one of the most common themes present in my life as I am living it right now - just about nothing is the same as it was a month ago. Every day brings new challenges (as well as some challenges that never seem to go away) as well as surprising and exciting new things. My mood is constantly changing, life is like a rollercoaster, always shifting. So to take life as it comes, dealing with each issue and excitement as they arrive seems like some of the best advice I could receive here.

All of that said, I thought I would start with a bit about what my life looks like now that im a little settled into a routine. Of course no day is the same but there is a bit of order. I get up in the morning around 7 and have a breakfast of fruit (we go shopping every Monday and I buy almost nothing but mounds of delicious cheap mangos) and sometimes bread and coffee with the others who live in my house (there are 7 volunteers in this house). We then work from 8am to 12:30pm, which consists of countless numbers of things. Lots of brainstorming and meeting with people to talk about future plans as well as teaching 5 hours a week on a regular schedule (more about that later) and planning for the classes and excursions. From 12:30 to 2pm we break for lunch. I usually go straight to Santa Rosa (the house I eat with) and spend most of the time there playing things such as a hand slapping game similar to ‘down by the banks’. I love the ability of boys between the ages of 6 and 11 to play this game. They would be content to do it all day long. The work day then continues from 2-4, though often we end up working until closer to 5 depending on the day and what we have going on. After work, it is a bit of a free for all usually taking a little bit of time to myself and spending most of the time playing with the kiddies. After dinner at around 7, the kids in my house go straight to bed so I have the rest of the night to hang out with the volunteers and do whatever else needs to be done. It sounds pretty relaxed but I usually end up being pretty hectically busy from 8am to 7:30pm.

As for the classes, Ingrid and I began teaching this week and have taught a lesson in 3 of our 5 classes so far. We go into the school and teach for an hour when the classes would normally be having their science like class. First of all, what the heck are we teaching about? In true Dominican fashion, we’re honestly planning it week by week aside from having selected a number of themes we want to cover. We’ve named our class “Naturalismo y el Medio Ambiente” (naturalism and the environment) and hope to accomplish three main things throughout the year. For the kids to understand the process of food growing from seed to table, for the kids to gain a greater appreciation of the natural world, and for them to understand a bit of the interconnections between the human and natural world. It might be a bit of high hopes, especially for the last goal, but why not aim a little high? Our first week, as with so many things here, has been up and down. We taught the second graders first, and although it was hectic, we felt somewhat accomplished afterwards. Today on the other hand left us feeling rather defeated. We had our second to youngest group, pre-primario, who we’ve realized we can only do really really really basic things with and who had some trouble participating in class. This afternoon we taught the third graders, who we were warned are the worst class in the school… and well – the warnings couldn’t even prepare us for the class. We spent most of the hour trying to get them to sit in their seats and stop yelling and fighting… and despite all of our efforts, there wasn’t a single time when every student was in their seat or when no one was talking over us. We could barely get through one part of our lesson plan and left wondering how we will ever be able to teach them anything. Marijo insists it gets better as they gain respect for us as teachers, but it is still very very disheartening. I don’t think words could really describe the atmosphere, we were both completely amazed when we left.

In other exciting news, we’ve been planning a beach clean up for this Saturday as a part of an international day to clean up the shorelines! I’m pretty excited to bring the kids to do that as it will be sort of a fun excursion, yet also showing them the extent to which littering is polluting their country. Ingrid and I are really hoping to focus on taking the kids off of the terreno and using excursions as a teaching method… although planning requires a lot I think it will be very valuable for them!

I feel like I could write forever, and each time I sit down to write, the things I am lacking are so much greater than the things that I have included. But I don’t want to overbear y’all with too many words. In a perfect world, I would write shorter things a little more frequently… but business doesn’t quite allow for that. We shall see!

Looking Up

Hello All! I havent got much time to write, but I wanted to just mention something really quickly! I know my last post was quite a downer, and have been feeling a lot more content lately. I guess I just wanted you to know that things are looking up! Frustrations still exist, and I know they will all year but I'm learning to believe in myself a bit more and think i will be able to persevere!

I had a busy week, full of lots of exciting planning and preparations. Ingrid and I will be starting classes on Monday with the little ones. I'm going to the beach tomorrow with the boys in my house. all good things! I plan to write in depth something this coming week about all that is actually going on!

peace and love
C

A few frustrations

In preparing to come here, I read a few places about the processes people tend to go through when moving into a foreign culture – especially in relation to doing volunteer type work. I was never sure of how much truth they held… but now I am starting to notice one of the things mentioned in my own experiences. I had read of the ‘honeymoon period’ in which when you first arrive in a new culture/place/etc everything is exciting and new, so you tend to notice only the good parts of your experiences and overlook the things that might be more difficult/frustrating/troubling. Looking back, I can see that period… and now I can see that it has ended! I think I have reached what might be one of the harder points of my experience.

I am settled enough that the place is no longer new and most of the people I have at least a little knowledge of, but not settled enough to feel completely comfortable with my surroundings. I’ve started to notice a lot of trends in the way things work here, many of which are so different from anything I am used to, making day-to-day life at times a little troubling. For example, nothing here is planned until the very last minute or not at all. Something that usually I am pretty comfortable with, I enjoy types of spontaneity. But when it means that a meeting doesn’t have any sort of agenda and they people there don’t know much about why they are there, then the meeting just starts with no explanation and everyone is talking about completely unrelated things for a few hours, moving us backwards instead of forwards… it makes me feel as though nothing will every be accomplished sometimes.

Although I really do like a lot of the boys in my house, they can be little snots quite often as well. I know I mentioned the constant hitting and yelling. This week especially, it seems to have erupted to a whole new level. Kids are fighting to a point that one will get hurt, and from what I can see there isn’t always much consequence from the Tias. To make it worse, whenever they are allowed to watch TV and there is WWF style wrestling on, they are watching it. Some of them are as young as 5 years old, and to be allowed to watch such violent TV… its no wonder they are always fighting! I’m at a loss for what to do, as I don’t feel I am established enough to suggest to the Tias how to take care of their kids and most of the kids don’t listen to white people as a rule – so just laugh when I scold them.


As for my work, it is moving really really slowly. On a day to day basis, I keep myself busy but often it is with little things that don’t necessarily relate to the reasons I came here. Ingrid and I both understood that we were coming for a big reason to work in the garden and teach the kids about gardening, helping to set up a program in which they each have their own space. Well since we were hired, a couple from Spain has come and taken over the farm, doing exactly that with the kids. We’re now left with the little ones who they began working with but said they couldn’t handle because they were too badly behaved. I am very excited for our project with them! We will be teaching during school, partially in the classroom and partially in a new little garden we are just starting to prepare. We both have some great ideas as far as bringing other environmental issues into the class and hopefully it will go somewhat smoothly! We've had a meeting with the teachers we'll be working with and they were all very inviting of our ideas. I think that meeting has been one of the most hopeful experiences I've had as far as work is concerned since getting here!

I hate to sound like such a downer in a lot of this post, but I have definitely hit a point where I know it is going to be sort of rough going for the next month or more. From what all the volunteers who have been here for a while say, everyone goes through this for a while... and no one ever feels content or like they are actually accomplishing something until being here for a few months. Although that is a hard way to look at it, it gives me a lot of hope for the year!

Last of all, thanks so much to those of you who have been emailing and who have sent mail, although sometimes it takes me a bit to get back to you, know that I really appreciate it. As for everyone else, I would love to hear how things are going wherever you might be in life! Emails and letters are greatly appreciated :)

A Few Photos

I´ll be writing again soon, but just thought I would put up a few photos of my new home and the kids who are quickly becoming my own :) Of course this is just a taste, and now that I´ve found a computer capable of uploading my photos, there will surely be more to come!

A few of the kids homes. There are 12 all together for the kids along with 3 more that look the same and are used for the volunteers and visitors, all painted in similar bright colors!

One of the boys in my house, Angel. He acts pretty tough sometimes, but he is a total sweetheart, lives up to his name, and wants to be ¨Papa Dios¨ (God) when he grows up!

Sebastian, one of my absolute favorites. Such Such Such a wonderful kid

Some of the ¨Babies¨although they aren´t really. They love to make this face every time I see them. Adorable.

Another one of the kiddies in the baby house :)