Dominican Republic Students July 2021 Day 10
Today started like most days with our morning prayer, quiet time, and devotional. Chloe, Gabrielle, and I went up to the top of the camp for quiet time and looked at the incredible view of the sun coming over the mountains early in the morning. I have been constantly amazed by the beauty of this country and the things God has created here, it is truly incredible! After quiet time, we went to chapel and heard the testimony/lesson from the site leader for the Los Higos Education site, Hector. It was very interactive and captivating and we all really enjoyed it! Then we went to breakfast and spent time together as a team before splitting up and heading out to our ministry sites.
Chloe, Gabrielle, and I's site leader, Yohanna, picked us up and we headed out to the Mata Gorda education site. When we arrived, the students had just finished saying the Dominican pledge and headed inside for a devotional/homeroom sort of thing. We sang the good morning song, Jesus loves me, and a couple of other songs! Then they went through the rest of the school day and Chloe and I helped them do crafts and worksheets with the letter "C". Chloe did a coloring sheet with them, I did a toilet paper + glue craft with them, and Yohanna's aid did a writing worksheet with them! We also had recess with the kids and spent most of the time pushing them on the swings. This is one of our favorite things to do because we will push them and say "Hola Birmania!" and when they come back up, they'll say "Hola profe (teacher)!" or "Hola Kate (my nickname this week)". At the beginning of the trip, our site leaders told us that Gabrielle and I have difficult names to say since they're so long, so the kids have been calling us Kate and Bella!
After the kids left, we played a little bit with the neighborhood kids who like to yell "Hey Americana!" at us to get our attention. The kids come almost every day to play with us and they loved playing "Mal gato (bad cat)" with Chloe and the pre-K kiddos today. Then, we all ate lunch together and then took a siesta (which is scheduled for each day)! It's definitely strange taking siestas every day but it's been a cool way to be immersed in the slow-paced culture here in the Dominican Republic. We didn't do much else today but yesterday after our siesta, we went into town with our other site leader, Marlyn, and ran errands with her and got amazing smoothies! Chloe and I got the chinola and mango (passionfruit + mango) and Gabrielle got the mango, pina, and lime. Both of them were SO good and only about $8 USD for four medium-sized smoothies! We also had to say goodbye to Marlyn yesterday which was really sad, but we are so excited for her since she's getting married on Saturday!
After our sites, we came back to the compound and bought items from the Microfinance ladies. We could buy rings, bracelets, keychains, and all sorts of stuff! We also got out machetes and took a bunch of photos with those! Some of girls (and Josh) got cornrows done by the Microfinance ladies which look really cool! They also offered nail-painting but I don't think that any of our girls got theirs done. Some of us also washed laundry in the bug-filled sinks behind our cabins which is kinda fun honestly!
Overall, today was very relaxing but also good to get to spend a lot of time with the kids before we say goodbye to them tomorrow. The last 10 days have been really fun to play with all of the kids and make connections with them even though we don't speak the same language. It has been incredible to hear everyone's testimonies as well and it's so cool to see how God has moved in each of our lives and how He continues to move in them each day. All of us are very tired and kind of ready to go home, but are looking forward to cherishing every bit of tomorrow before we head out!
- Shelby Kate Christopher