So much happened in a short period of time it is
difficult to put into words. Leaving for O’Hare airport brought excitement,
wonder, and a little anxiety. While waiting to board our plane a gentleman
asked about our group, our plans, our matching shirts, and said and amazing
prayer over us to start our journey off. This moment truly showed me that God
was in charge and my job was to simply follow the instructions He laid before
me. In Miami we met a team going into the mountains a short ways from where we
would be along with the team that was accidentally double-booked for the week we
were to be in Jarabacoa. Hundreds of thoughts raced through my head about how
God is using all these people and our small team of eight to show off His amazing love. Finally; arrival in
Santiago, Dominican Republic, an interesting trip through customs, and out the
door to be greeted by our favorite Katie Green, who’s smile was also an amazing
symbol of His love.
After our first night’s rest in our week long
accommodations we got up and went to church, the first real interaction with
the Dominican people. Church was exciting and full of joy and praise, partially
translated for us foreigners, and surround in love even if there were no walls
around us. After the service we had a quick lunch (beans and rice) and then
went to the Ark to play with the children. Here I found myself at a complete
loss for words. They were all so beautiful, happy, loving, and full of joy, and
many of them had come from nothing, the worst conditions imaginable in our
society didn’t even compare to some of the stories of these earthly angels. We
played trucks and with balls, some of our team went off to have coffee in one
of the houses, and we all met back together with smiles and laughter as we
played. The Ark is unique in the fact that, while an orphanage, they do not do
any adoption of the children. Children are brought in from families who know
they cannot provide for them, those who were abandoned, and those who were
abused, broken, and even sold to live in one of nine homes with Dominican
parents. There is usually between three to eight children in each home along
with the house parents and their biological children. The design is simple in
the fact that it simulates growing up with a stable family environment. We
finished our first full day with dinner and ice cream with the team, Katie, Q,
and Derrek and his family as they explained life in the D.R.
Q or Quentin was our personal translator for the
week, he was on his last week of a several week internship in the D.R. and we
were lucky enough to have him as part of our team. Monday morning is when our
work started, digging ditches, tearing down a small building, lots of painting,
and hand mixing concrete. As I looked around I could see our appreciation and
joy for just being able to experience this kept us from really thinking about
how difficult the work we were doing was. By noon we were exhausted but looking
forward to the afternoon reward of lunch at the Ark and swimming in a waterfall
high in the mountains. Lunch at the Ark was among the ultimate highlights of my
trip. We finally got to see how our small monthly sacrifice was affecting
Yasue, our sponsor child at the Ark. We got to have lunch in his home, with his
family, including his biological brother and sister. We heard his story from
the house mom, gave him Hot Wheels (his favorite toy) and then got to spend
time playing with him. It did not matter that I could not understand him nor
him understand me, our smiles and laughter were the communication God intended
for us to share that day, and there was an abundance of it. The waterfall was
amazing, we all experienced great joy while swimming there but the smile on my
face was all about lunch, also watching my daughter and my wife jumping off the
rocks behind the falls but mostly from our amazing lunch experience. Dinner and
a recap of the day with the team finished our first workday and sent us all,
even if the beds were sub-par, to a restful night’s sleep.
Tuesday brought on the next morning of work at
Anija, the school we were scheduled to work at for the week. With more
painting, some rough construction work, and preparing the ditch with cement
framework to make a small wall we all continued with our hard but rewarding
morning. On this morning I began to notice the team moving a little slower but
still in awe of all that was going on. This morning also brought forth the
first appearance of Presto the clown, as Jed put on his gear to entertain the
children. With a great soup for lunch at Anija we then went to a small
home/church for afternoon Vacation Bible School. Carmen our host was an amazing
leader in this community and shares an exploding love for the Lord. We sang
songs, learned a little Spanish and then broke into three small groups, one led
by Carmen for bible stories, one for games, and one for crafts. The community
children behaved a little different in comparison to the Anija and Ark
children. These children come from off the streets around the church and some
reflected the behaviors of the stories we had heard the day before of the
children now living at the Ark. The craft section took place in the parking
area of a cock fighting arena and games took place in a dirt field covered in
broken glass and animal bones. This was a true culture shock for our team and
each one processed it a little differently, adding in the fact that on the
first day there were 48 children and only 2 translators. It was amazing for my
daughter to see how these children live in comparison to her life here at home.
The sun was hot, the children were more difficult to keep under foot, and the
two men sleeping on the ground under a canopy at the fight arena made the
afternoon that much more interesting. We were able to swim at our villa that
evening before bed and process our day, feeling stressed but still
blessed.
Wednesday I was greeted with the pain of too much
sun the previous days leaving me feeling ill and somewhat useless, I continued
to work but at a much slower pace. VBS saw 15 more children than the previous
day and a large group of men eerily gambling at the arena next door. Thursday
we again put in more hard work, the second day in a row of making concrete by
moving 10 wheel barrels of sand, 7 of gravel, and 5 and a half bags of concrete
mix, hand mixed with shovels and moved to the wall form via assembly line and
buckets. We had a total of 72 at VBS that day and this was the first time that
I saw most if not all the members of the team worn out, beat up, and looking
forward to going home. Even with these thoughts of exhaustion and stress all it
took was one little thing to bring back our joy and excitement to be there,
that night it was dinner and swimming with Katie and talking about how we have
all grown so far. We also talked about how great it was to see the children at
Anija so excited about water day, activities that children here stateside would
consider boring like shampoo and water on a tarp to slide, a playground slide
wet by a hose and filled with paint to slide down, and a tire obstacle course
followed by a visit from the firemen and a large fire hose. It is about $40 per
person to go to the water park here, maybe more and I have never seen anyone at
Mt. Olympus have the fun that these children did. Tired, homesick, and feeling
selfish, sometimes God answers prayers to show us what we need to work on
tomorrow.
Friday brought forth our final day of work at Anija.
We tore the form off to expose our new concrete wall, we did some rough framing
and siding work on the shack we tore down to rebuild earlier in the week and we
continued painting. Sayje ended up with more paint on her than on her project,
which was followed by paint thinner to remove it, followed by tears because of
the burning from the paint thinner, and ending with a laugh because Sayje was
still a little red in places. We spent the afternoon at the river swimming and
rock diving with Katie and all her summer interns. Jed and I panned for gold
and found about 16 pesos worth maybe a little more, and we just enjoyed the
afternoon. While it was not a really long stressful day as the days past many
of us were back to that urgency to just go home. It was then, in my opinion,
the grandest part of the trip happened. We were invited back to the Ark to
watch Gran Circulo, a talent contest put on every Friday by the children of the
Ark during the summer, and this was the last one of the year. There were
dancers, and singers, and lip-syncing, and joy, love, and celebration like I
had never experienced. This is already a long post and I could easily double it
by telling you about Gran Circulo so I will just leave it with saying that God
showed us our true blessings for doing His work all week and that He loves us
so much to let us be part of this experience. If you want to hear more I would
consider sharing all about it when you buy me coffee and Coffee Bean. That
night we went to bed excited about our trip, still missing home but overjoyed
to be there during all these moments.
Saturday we headed to the beach for a final day at
an all-inclusive resort. We ate, and swam in the ocean, and went snorkeling
around the reefs with hundreds of fish, and ate some more, and finished the
evening watching a perfect ocean sunset. We were up at 3 to travel to the
airport, ready for our trip to conclude, home in our own beds, and with our
families. Fifteen hours later and we were there. I wish I could say this is
where the journey ended but I truly believe this is where the journey began.
Now that I am home I am thinking more about God’s plan for me, how so many
around the world live on so little while I worry about how to pay for so much,
how much I miss seeing all those children smiling, hearing them talk in a
language I may never fully understand, and the deep relationships that were
cultivated in such a short time that I know will last forever in His kingdom. I
realize this post is longer than any others before and as stated above this is
just a snippet of our 9 day journey. I hope that all of you who read this get
the chance to sit down with one of us from this trip, with a friend who has
been on one similar, or even go on one yourself because it truly transforms
your life. Blessings my friends.
No comments:
Post a Comment