Currently Listening Wake Me Up When September Ends By Green Day see related

Top 6 of Summer '06: NeVeR FoRgOtTeN

    

Currently Listening From Under the Cork Tree By Fall Out Boy see related

My Adventures in the Dominican Republic

He hugged me long and hard, and I think we both had misted eyes as I finally drew apart in order to make my bus on time. He asked, “Will you come back?” I answered in his native tongue, “I don’t know. I hope that I will be able to, but I don’t know.” He sighed, but smiled hopefully. “Si Dios quiere,” he said. “Claro que sí, Christopher!” I responded with a grin. “Yes of course. If God wants…”

I have spent the majority of my summer in Latin America. It's been great! In the D.R., when my teammates were suffering indigestion from the daily rice-and-beans fare, I happily filled my plate each mealtime and then, to my friends’ dismay, was immediately ready to go exploring the town! (And go clubbing).  The language I had practiced and learned in Costa Rica was also a huge asset as I was often in demand to help translate our Dominican work foreman’s instructions, do the talking when we went shopping, and talk to the kids at the orphanage every day as we worked and played with them. Everyone thought I was Dominican. I think it must have been the tan and dark hair/eyes, even though I'm not even as tan as usual this summer. I mean, you should be able to tell I'm not Dommie as soon as I open my mouth! But I did get that question a lot in the Dominican. I felt quite special. I don’t even pretend to be fluent, but even my attempts were very useful.  Knowing the language makes one muy popular!

We started out working at a Christian school, doing lots of painting and scrubbing. Painting sounds easy, until one has to use extenders, perch atop ancient ladders, and spend hours bent over backwards as one attempts to paint ceilings with minimal dripping which has to be scrubbed off later. We also painted lines on the basketball court, hopscotch lines, soccer goal posts, and other fun things like that. One afternoon the children’s VBS in the next door church was singing lots of familiar songs we knew in Spanish. It was sweet to be able to sing along in our own language. Then we moved operations to the orphanage. We scraped paint off a house, re-primed and re-painted it. We scraped paint of the roof—the longest job ever—and it was hot up there! We sanded, using bricks, the concrete walls of a new house, which gave me a new empathy for the ancient Hebrew slaves building pyramids by hand. I also helped sort tons of donated clothes, school supplies, and gifts, and thousands of soccer uniforms and cleats. Those two weeks were packed with work! Often, some of the kids would help us, or at least entertain us and talk our heads off while we worked. Sometimes in the afternoons before we left for the day, we would play a game of basketball, or just hang out and run around with them, and that was a lot of fun. One highlight was the morning we got to take off work and cram in a tiny bus with 50+ kids and a couple of adults to go to a waterfall and swim. It was a great time to just be able to cool off and get to hang out and speak Spanish. Of course, the last day we all got to participate in a fútbol (soccer) tournament, which was a blast. Only during the game, I got eaten alive by mosquitos and no-see-‘ems, and my leg was a bloody, muddy mess by the time we were through! Leprousy again!

Back to the opener. My little friend Christopher. We were teased about each other by both Dominicans and Americans, and we hung out alot. I was thinking, though. My Tico novio (Costa Rican bf) was too old, and this one is too young. However, if I average the ages, it gives me a bf a couple months older than me! Perfecto. Oh well, Eva says next trip I will find the perfect soul mate.

In conclusion: No, I didn't get to see Sammy Sosa's home (I tried) or go clubbing (I also tried) or do anything terribly or abnormally peligroso. (Remember that vocab word from past posts?) I did have a sweet time with my teammates, playing NERTZ, dancing to dulce music (name my new header line, peeps!), and white-water rafting. We also saw 13 river-side baptisms, which was awesome. It was a great trip, and I'm thrilled by the way God worked throughout in my life, particularly. It was amazing, and I am grateful.

Currently Reading The Boy Who Loved Anne Frank: A Novel By Ellen Feldman see related

So basically, all the computers in the world are being so retarded slow right now I can't do anything...including upload pictures from Costa Rica. So I'll put those in a photoblog album later. But I really need an update because at 3:30 tomorrow morning I will be leaving for the Dominican Republic, to spend two weeks working on an orphanage with a group from my church. Looking forward to continuing practicing that spanish...

So Costa Rica was basically amazing. We went to school every day from 8:15 to 12, and classes were taught only in spanish. Then in the afternoons we often had field trips to places which we then had to write reports on (in spanish, usually). Other afternoons we had free time to roam around the city or sleep or do whatever. Generally, I wandered around the city and ate amazing empanadas and wondered why I had't died yet from all the dangerous scrapes I found myself in.

Some of the highlights of the required field trips were: seeing Volcán Arenal (Arenal Volcano) erupt at night, and swimming in the hot springs, and swimming near the waterfalls, and seeing the National Theater, and getting soaked La Paz Waterfall gardens, and hanging out on the beach and in bars at Jaco Beach, and spending our free weekend (not required) at the very rasta Limon, which was pretty darn amazing. Some not so highlight-ish field trips were the Gold, Jade, and National museums, but still I'm glad we went because I never would have gone otherwise. Unfortunately, the pre-Columbian gold artifacts I stole from El Museo de Oro were unable to enter customs, so I ended up hawking them on the street in order to pay my way (and several irresponsible friends' ways) back into this coutry. Alas. I thought they were pretty nifty souveniers, myself .

So basically, that was the gist of my trip. I have lots more adventures to tell and all but I hate long posts and this is pretty long. I'll save them up and bring them out every so often to spice up this blog...oh and for my faithful dogged fans, this has turned into too much of a diary, I agree, so it's back to the Editor's Column very shortly.

Also, I have succumbed to pressure and gotten a new Myspace. I don't really like it, but I am unable to get Facebook about which I am so ticked so I got Myspace instead. Look me up.

Currently Listening If I Had One Chance to Tell You Something By Rebecca St. James see related

On Protests, Rape, Leprousy, Pirate Cabs, and Totalmente Dulce: Costa Rica pt. 1

Excerps from Emails and Journal entries:  One day, my amazing friend Meredith and I were wandering around killing some time before we had to go to el Museo Nacional. So we saw a protest with loud music and yelling and tons of ppl...protesting TLC (some trade agreement pending between CR and the States). Of course at Orientation our leaders had made a big deal about not going to protests or getting involved bc we could get into such big trouble. And what do we do but walk right into one. But we were sure it was safe because they were all peacefully singing, and there were tons of policia solemnly lined up. We got as close as we could, although we got a few stares b/c what the heck were total Americans doing at that kind of protest?!?! haha. We stood around and watched for a while and then it broke up so we left. At the museum, then, we sat on some cannons and took sweet pix.

So I totally stole a few pix from Gayle to tide you over till this lazy chick gets her own up.

We had a Clase de Frutas, or Fruit class, one day at school. That's, from L-R, me, Meredith, Chaz, and Brian getting ready!

My roommate Lousia, me, Meghan, and Gayle herself in the mountains for our farewell dinner the last week.