A Very Dominican Day

Sunday - Tuesday at about 5:30pm are the craziest days in Banica. I feel like I am up super duper early and get to bed super duper late and it is filled with running around, work, beautiful things, wonderful people, and a whole lot of noise and heart. Wowzers! Today was no different. This is the first time that I have really been able to sit down since 6am on Sunday morning so this really is a gift. The days are just because because of the masses, formation, classes, youth groups, and meetings that are scheduled in those three days. Crazy! Crazy!

Today was a great example of how that craziness becomes "Dominican" in the most loving way possible haha. So let's start off in Hato Viejo. I teach classes these every Tuesday from 9am until noon. It's hot and sticky and the classes are big so I have to use my "loud voice" sometimes. After the classes in Hato Viejo we (the college students who help out and I) plan games or activities with the kids because they do not have PE or any kind of physical activities for the students. It's not that they do not want to...but they just do not have the money or resources for it. Four of us decided to go to a different community to visit the kids who lived there and could not go to school. The road was so horrible that we could not use the pick up truck to make it up the hill. We did not know exactly where we were going but we had a general idea. In flip flops and my teaching clothes I trekked down a big dirt hill, crossed two rivers, and trekked up another dirt hill before reaching this little community. Cars cannot even get to them! We brought soccer balls and jump ropes and lollipops for the little kids to play with in the community and they loved it. One of the most beautiful moments for me was meeting a little girl named Maria. When we were playing with the little kids, some of them mentioned that their friend Maria could not come out and play because she could not walk. I did not quite understand what they meant by that so I found out where her house was and stopped by before leaving the community to head back down to Hato Viejo. Maria is a beautiful girl was a gorgeous smile and lots of love who has braces on her legs and is confined to a wheel chair for the rest of her life. The other day I met a boy in who is paralyzed from the neck down, named Miguel Angel (Michael the Angel hehehe like the Archangel), and was really moved by his happiness and love. Father O'Hare reminded me that it's people like Maria and Miguel that show love in its purest form and the human capacity to "look down" on people who are disabled is a spiritual incapacity (it sounds better in Spanish haha). I told Maria that the next time we come up to play with the community in two weeks, that I would bring her in her wheelchair to play too, and her mom loved the idea. At the end of the visit we trekked back own that hill, across two rivers (and encountered 4 cows blocking our way) and back up another dirt hill. Ohh the life in the Dominican Republic!

Football

I miss football! I am working on lesson plans for this week right now and realized that tonight the Redskins play the Cowboys...LETS GO WASHINGTON!!!!! I miss my Navy football and I miss my Redskins football and really just all football.  I hope I get to catch a game in December!

Hail to the Redkins! Hail Victory!

Haiti v. DR

You think that the DR is poor and then you take a gander across the river. Literally.

One of the things that is very common here in Banica is for families to have a young Haitian girl living with them to help them with cleaning and cooking. I do not want to call it a maid because that just sounds bad...but they are maids. And these families are poor themselves! There really isn't anything I can compare it to in the US but just stick with me here. Simona (my homestay mom) recently "hired" one of these girls to live with her and help her clean. Simona has a lot of medical problems so cleaning is a little painful for her. She actually takes really good care of the young girl, she bought her clothes, a bedroom set, feeds her soooooo much food, and is trying to help her learn Spanish (she only speak Kreyol) so that she can study in the high school here. The young girl, Jocelyn, come from an incredibly poor part of Haiti. Last night I tried to speak with her but she does not speak Spanish and I do not speak Kreyol so a lot of it was guessing. It is so sad though because she is a TINY little thing and I know that in her entire life she has probably never known what it felt like to be "full" from food. It's just sad. At dinner last night I had a piece of chicken, some batata, and a tiny bit of soup. Simona always says that I do not eat a lot haha but the food here just does not agree with my tummy! I try! Anyway, Jocelyn amazed me at how much she ate. She had a huge bowl of soup, an entire plate of rice, batatas, and an entire avocado...and ate every bite of it. AND she should!  She needs to eat as much as she can and regain the strength she was unable to gain these past 13 or 14 years of her life. My heart just really hurts for her. I have no idea what hunger like that must feels like. That is 13 years of hungry! It's not skipping a meal or wishing you hard a second piece of cake...that's a lifetime. It breaks my heart - I don't want a single soul to go without food!

Mail

WOOHOO! I got a package today! I woke up yesterday with a cold and have not been feeling so great. The world is just not giving me a break haha! I think it is the combo of (1) it is really cold in the morning but super duper hot in the days and the huge change takes its toll on your body and (2) I work with little kids all day and they are cute but have all kinds of germs and they always want to hug you haha. Being sick is never fun. Being sick when you are along is even worse and being sick in a third world country is just straight up scary. I took come Dayquil and grabbed a bag of throat lozenges out of my medicine bag and am trying my best to stay healthy people so no worries about me. It will pass! But being able to go to the parish and see that package waiting for me...BEST. GIFT. EVER. Apparently there is a card too but I have not seen it yet...but I think it is just my insurance card from my sister that I got mailed to our house haha! Maxwell (and his mom) sent me a great package with a water bottle with a filter (I forgot mine in VA), medicine, enough crystal light packages to get me through to December, batteries for my Kindle light, and cookie mixes! The best part of the package was the card inside :) it was a card for our anniversary (the 1st of each month) and has a beautiful quote inside.
 "May God light the way with His wisdom, calm the way with His peace, and make a way with his LOVE"
This package form my incredibly wonderful and loving boyfriend was one way that God was showing his love through my boyfriend today. I am the luckiest girl in the world! Thank you Maxwell!

So now that my morning classes have finished, I am off to lunch, and then to my afternoon classes. Tonight we  will probably take a look at the documentary that just came in. Two years ago a team of photographers and video peeps gave up their time to make a documentary about Banica and I cannot wait to see it. I bet it is great!

The only bad thing...mail is SUPER slow here and I love getting it but seriously it is so slow that I probably won't get it until Christmas sooo e-mails are great haha! I love getting e-mails!

laura.schaefer1@gmail.com

Rain

Rain pops out of no where in the afternoons here! It was a bright sunshine day and then BAM rain. I was in the truck on my way to one of the neighboring towns called Sabana Cruz for Magdalenas (high school girls youth group) and it just started to pour. The people in the back got SOAKED. I noticed something different about rain here. As kids in the US, we either run outside to play in the rain with our boots and coats on or we get yelled at by our parents to stay inside. Here, rain = a shower. For people in the campos, and even in Banica, who do not have a shower (bucket showers) the rain means a chance to shower. You pass so many kids out in the streets in flip flops and tee shirts and shorts using the rain as a shower. It cracks me up! And they love it!

Sadly, the rain means that fewer girls make it to the youth group because it is hard to travel the dirt roads when they become mud. On a brighter note it was a sun filled day in Hato Viejo and teaching there this morning went so well. I will try and add a photo to this blog post so that you can see some of my students in my older classes. If Jimena and Issac are reading this - I have some of your old students and they are brilliant and so helpful!

Off to finish up tomorrows lesson plans for the Colegio :) hang in there everyone and keep smiling!

Prayer Request

The picture above is of two of the most amazing men that I know. My dad (on the bed) and my uncle Jim (next to him). My uncle has cancer and has beaten it before...he is a fighter! My mom and dad flew back from the Philippines to be with him and to undergo a stem cell transplant (I think that is what it is haha). This summer all of the brothers and sisters on the Schaefer tested to see who has the closest DNA to uncle Jim and the winner gets to help him out! It was pretty neat and a huge blessing that almost our entire family was together this summer in South Dakota. 75% of cancer patients do not have a donor match in their family that is close enough to them and have to get added to a national registry an wait...we got lucky! My uncle has been going through chemo treatments and this transplant is what our family hopes will be able to save him. For a week the poked by dad with different needles and going through a ton of different tests to make sure he is 100% healthy. Today he will spend 6 hours in that bed getting stem cells drawn. The hope is that these stem cells replace all of my uncles bad stem cells when they get put into him. At then end of the procedure my uncle will have my dads DNA - crazy! I know I am bad at explaining all of these scientific things but I really just hope it works out.

Being away from my family in their time of need is one of the most painful things ever but I know that I can pray for them both and pray that this works! Please join me in that :)

El Reinado

Tonight is a big night in Banica - El Reinado! As part of the Fiestas Patronales (which I will be explaining in a later blog post) the town has a beauty pageant. Do not worry  -  I am not entering hahaha I would not make it down a runway without tripping!  A couple of the girls in my youth groups are participating so the Peace Corps volunteer (Keeton) and I are going to watch.  The girls have to have a talent and tonight is the talent night...this should be interesting! We are helping one girl with her make up right now and her talent is bracelet making. This should be fun! She is pretty much our best friend here and she is 16...the life in Banica! It starts at 8pm but I know that this is a Dominican event so it will really end up starting at 9pm. We are getting "dolled up" to go...which really just means that Keeton and I are going to do more with our hair than put it up into pony tails and maybe put some mascara on. Big times in Banica!

Fun!

The public school system in the Dominican Republic is completely political - and ridiculous! Today none of the schools in the area, except for the parish school, had classes because they teachers are striking. The school in Pedro Santana, the next town over, has been striking for a month and the kids have not had the chance to even start school. If they do not get their act together those poor kids will be a year behind all of the other towns. So sad...

OK enough about my vent!

So today, with this strike in the campo I usually teach in on Tuesdays, I got to spend time with the kids outside of the school room. Five college students came with me (the ones I spoke of that are on a scholarship with the church to go to school two days a week and work the others) and we held a morning sports camp with the kids. Very impromptu! We brought footballs (yes - America!), soccer balls, baseballs and bats, and jump ropes and played games with the kids and passed out candy. The campo of Hato Viejo is incredibly poor and a lot of the kids we worked with were Hatian and only spoke Creole but we had a great time. I may have gotten a little tan, but it was all worth it. There was one girl in particular that I just adored. We went door to door inviting the kids to come out to the field and play with us and she was on the street walking with a box of empanadas that she was trying to sell. No one was buying. She kept watching the kids play as she stood on the sidelines with her little box of empanadas and kept smiling at the other kids. I asked her to join us and she said that she could not because she had to work. My heart was so filled with joy when she put the box down twenty minutes later and joined in! She could not have been older than 9 years old. She did not go to school because she "worked" and she did not even have a pair of shoes to walk in. The poverty here is beyond belief!

Just something I was thinking about. I hope everyone in the US is doing well and I hope that I get to see you all or hear from you soon - I miss you all dearly.

Prayer Request:  My uncle Jim has been fighting cancer and this week my mom and dad have been driving up to South Dakota to see him. My dad and my uncle have almost the exact same DNA and are going to do a transplant or something that is above and beyond my understanding. Please pray that it all works out! Thank you!

Sick-y

Want to know what is not fun? Being sick! What is worse? Being sick on your own: no mom, no sissy, no Maxwell, no home-stay mom (she is in the capital this week visiting her kids), so no one to take care of you. Yesterday I woke up with a fever and the worst stomach ache - it was killer. I could not eat anything all day and I still taught my classes and had my new high school girls youth group (freshmen) at night. They knew I did not eat all day and made me a soup. Now I was a little skeptical...what were they going to make?! Was this some kind of Dominican myth or urban legend? The anser: chicken noodle soup! Some things never change :) haha. Now as much as I want my loved ones next to me taking care of me, it was nice to have someone make soup for me, even if I was only able to eat a few bites. The girls stayed with me until I ate the soup and brought me back to my house and got the neighbors to check in on me. Today was a full day of teaching but I took a fever reducer and woke up feeling better today and have been able to eat. I am feeling much better and will be taking tomorrow easy! I promise!

Prayer Request: no more getting sick! It is scary! Third world country with little to no near by health care! Gracias!

Food for Thought

A good friend of mine, we will call her B, sent me an e-mail today with this quote at the bottom of it. The quote came from a book I gave her two years ago. It might not have anything to do with your life or anything right now but I really loved it! Forge your own path friends :)

"My Princess,

You are not called to follow others, My beloved Warrior. I have appointed you to lead them to Me. Life will become a great adventure if you will step out to the front lines and fight for those that are too weak  to fight for themselves. Don't look back on what you have lost; look forward to the great victories that are in front of you.  You don't have to hide behind your fears  and insecurities any longer.  I can and will turn your pain into passion to change the world around you. As you find your way to the front line, hide this truth in your heart: "This fight is not just for you, it is for all those you truly love." " He will say to them, " Listen to me, all you men of Israel! Do not be afraid as you go out to fight your enemies today! Do not lose heart or panic or tremble before them." ( Deutronomy 20: 3)  

Mosquito Nets

I am working on lesson plans right now and though that I would take a break to blog. What to blog about...hmmm... my mosquito net!First it makes me feel like a princess because it is pink and I sleep under it but more importantly it keep the bugs away at night! My arms and legs were eaten up my first week here but it is getting better and I have tons of bug spray and itch cream so I will live. 

Now for the real update: work is good! There is a lot to be done here and a new team of 10 very dedicated young college students are here to help us out. The church is sponsoring these 10 youth by providing them with fully paid college scholarships to go to college in the next big town (San Juan) while working for the church here as teaching aids or youth ministers or writers. It is really beautiful to watch. They are an incredibly dynamic group and each person has a very different personality. We have the wild and loud ones and the patient and slow ones...it makes for an interesting group! They go to school and have all of their classes two days a week and work the rest. It is a good set up and I am really proud of each of them.

The weeks are getting easier here and my homesickness is getting better but being away from family and loves ones is very hard. Be sure to tell the ones you love just how much you love them when you are with them and I honestly mean it when I say that I will never take a moment with my loved ones for granted again. Distance makes the heart grow fonder, right? 

That is all for now! Thanks for following everyone!

CORRECT mailing address

Laura Schaefer
Parroquia San Francisco de Assis
BM #7038
8400 NW 25th St., Suite 110
Doral, Florida 33122

9 Months

So you might be reading this wondering "what does this have to do with Banica?" Hmmm...a lot! Just kidding! Today marks the ninth month that Max and I have been dating and the first one that we have spent apart like this. It's rough! The homesickness gets a little bit better with each passing day but your heart will always feel like it is missing it's better half. I know that mine is all the way in Washington! The next three of these anniversary's will be apart too but we can do it :) I know we can. I  know that not every girlfriend is lucky enough to have a boyfriend that supports them no matter how crazy their ideas are...eve if those ideas send them to a third world country! So thank you Maxwell for everything you do for me and thank you for the best nine months a girl could have ever asked for. I love you! I can't wait to be able to have a Skype date so I can see you! Pick me up at 8pm? :)

Happy Anniversary Maxwell :)