Happy Advent!

Prepare the way :)

What does Christmas mean to you? I've spent some times thinking about this question today and eventually will write something with a little more detail. Feel free to write responses!

What does Christmas mean to you?


Love,
Laura

Rest & a little bit of homecoming news...

0o0o0o0o0ohhhhhh the power of a day off! Today I had a day off and it was wonderful. Of course, I am still working but I do not have my regular schedule and it is nice to be able to catch up on e-mails and relax. I woke up at 9am (it was just too hot to sleep any later) and wrote letters for ten of my teen girls who are going on a retreat in the capital this weekend. Retreats are absolutely amazing and I hope that they get a lot out of it! They headed out at noon so I delivered the letter and headed to lunch with Fr. O'Hare and the group (Cal - an older American volunteer who is retired and lives an hour away and is out handy man, Tom - an American who runs The Center for groups who come through Banica on service trips and the USAID soup program, Levis - who is pretty much our Deacon haha, and yours truly). After lunch I baked chocolatechip cookies which were sent to me in a mix in September from Max and The Bennetts. I am the luckiest girl in the world to have such an amazing boyfriend (and his family)! I told myself that I would save the cookies for a rough day and Thanksgiving was that day haha. So after lunch I baked the cookies for "Black Friday" and then walked to The Center to deliver some to Tom and Cal as well as to Fr. O'Hare at his office.

While at the center I was able to walk around and remember ALL of the amazing memories from 3 years of ASB trips. The sea containers we climbed up on while playing flashlight tag, the big blue bus that picked us up at the airport, where the old tree house was, the dorm rooms I had stayed in, the outdoor dining room, everything. It was great to reflect back on that time and send up prayers for the amazing people who served with me. Hopefully one day I will be able to come back and visit with a youth group one day...how crazy would that be? Now I am back working on details for the trip I am taking with my teenage girls youth group - Magdalenas. On Saturday Dec. 3rd we are going to San Juan to have mass at the beautiful cathedral there, to  have a "charla" with a sister coming in from the Capital, to have lunch together, and to tour the beautiful university (and to understand the importance of education). I am putting rosaries together for the girls as well as necklaces that they will each get. There are about 50 girls going on the trip! After I will be working on cards I am leaving for each group of girls for when I leave which leads me to important point #2.

Many of you probably already know by the time you read this BUT I have no been speaking about it on my blog. First, God is absolutely amazing and has taught me more here than I have been taught about my faith and trust in Him in 22 years of life haha! Banica is an important part of my life but I am going to be coming home in December of 2011 instead of June of 2012. God calls us each to new and beautiful things and Banica was part of that journey for me. I have been SO blessed to have a great spiritual director and friend here in Fr. O'Hare and coming back in December really is the right choice for me. The people here are absolutely amazing and so full of love but because of my health and personal reasons I will be coming home in December and am so proud of the work I have been given the opportunity to do here. Some of you may know that I am diabetic and my medicine here has been a real struggle. For over a month now I have been off of my medicine because of the problems it was causing me each day and the long-term risks of that is just too much to sacrifice. I know that with the help of my doctors back home I will get everything back in line come December but it was a choice I needed to make. Thanks be to God, all of my programs are going to be continued with the help of wonderful Dominican college students even after I leave. That is the way it is supposed to be too! Dominicans helping Dominicans with the help of a little "hot sauce" called American volunteers! Everyone knows here and wonderful goodbye dinners and parties have been planned and I look forward to seeing my loved ones back home in December! I know the God's got a great plan for me when I get home :) and I know and trust that everything will work out! I cannot thank you all enough for your support and love :) and I will forever hold Banica in a VERY special place in my heart. My dream is to come back one day with a youth group and visit the people who so beautifully opened their hearts to me. And even from home I will be working for the people of Banica through fundraising efforts or service projects. For example, I am already looking into different ways to get shoes down to Banica for all of the children here who go without. I cannot wait to see what comes from it :)!

Thanksgiving

Warning: not a super duper happy post!

I have  a whole lot in the world to be thankful for but WOW holidays alone are rough. I know in the past the American group down here has done Thanksgiving together but with the recent trip to the US and crazy schedules it did not work out. It is fine because I was teaching all day until 2:45 and then had volleyball practice from 3pm until just right now (5pm). I am sitting here in my gym clothes typing this as I chat with family back home. I miss you all so much. I know that being apart will make Christmas together THAT much better so I need to stay strong. After all, I have a whole heck of a lot to be thankful for.

I am thankful for my family :) for all of their love and support throughout my life and especially of my time here in Banica.

I am thankful for Max and all of his love and strength and faithfulness. I can't wait to call you when I land and actually talk on the phone and then see you in person when you come on Christmas eve. Best Christmas gift ever!

I am thankful for my friends! You all are so amazing and the cards, postcards, e-mails and love have meant so much to me. Erin, if you are reading this, your solidarity with me as you are abroad as well has been a huge source of strength for me. I can't wait to land on the same day and go to mass and Northside Social the following Sunday!

I am thankful for my WoYA community. You are such a blessing to me! Today, on Thanksgiving, a stack of cards was delivered to me by one of the Americans who was on the trip back to the US for the 20th anniversary of Banica. I took one look at the handwriting and knew exactly where these cards had come from. When the word "Meg gave you these, didn't she?" came out of my mouth I immediately started to tear up and had to stop and go to lunch. After lunch I ran and sat in the church and read them  and just let myself cry haha...sometimes we need it. Your love and support has been so wonderful and I cannot wait to see you all in December!

I am thankful for this experience and all that God has been teaching me here in Banica. And how could I forget all of the wonderful people he has introduced me to here?!

I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving! Eat a little extra for me and save me a piece of pumpkin pie!

The Spirit of Christmas

Yes! Christmas! Because in 24 days I head home to celebrateeeeeeeeeeee it with my family!

Every week a group of college students on scholarships from the church (they all live in or near Banica) stay here for three days (Sunday-Tuesday) and help out... A LOT! Every Monday afternoon they have formation with me. I try to keep the activities fun and entertaining so this Monday we talked about our mission -> service. So we decided that for Christmas we should (1) make a sacrifice by offering something up and (2) do something special for others. I had the college students read four different Bible verses about Christmas to start off and we got the ball rolling from there. Long story short, we are doing a clothing drive. Each student will bring in a piece of clothing or shoes that no long fits them but will still work for someone else. They are going to talk to their families and neighbors to collect more articles of clothing as well. Then, on December 13th, we are heading up to the campo of Hato Viejo to distribute the clothes along with Christmas cards based of the Bible passages we read at the beginning of our meeting.

This campo is poor, poor, poor, poor, POOR. I work there every Tuesday in their school and run sports programs afterwards for the kids in town and the poverty is something I can never get used to. Kids come to the sports hour in their underwear, in just shorts, in just a shirt, in clothing that has been worn down to threads, and not a single child has a pair of shoes. It breaks my heart! My hope it that this clothing drive will help that problem a little bit. I was able to take a ton of pictures at today's camp and cannot wait to make something out of them. You all know how much I LOVE photography so I plan on printing out all of the photos and sending them down here to be distributed. These kids do not have underwear...I highly doubt they have a photo of themselves.

If anyone would like a CD of photos or anything feel free to e-mail me at laura.schaefer1@gmail.com and I will be sure to send one out to you this Christmas.

Solidarity

Solidarity is a beautiful virtue and I am so luck to be able to have seen the beauty of it this weekend. Every Sunday after two of the masses in two different towns I have two different girls youth groups for teenage girls called “Magdalenas”. The first group is in a town called Sabana Cruz. One of the girls (Berna) pulled me aside to let me know that the grandfather of another girl (Jeli) has passed away and the wake was today. The girls decided together that instead of meeting like usual we would walk to the families house and spend time with them and pray with her. She cried as soon as we walked into the house and hugged everyone. The big group hug kind of hug. It was so great to just BE there with her and for her. Her grandma sobbed when she saw us all and my heart just fell apart in pain for her. It made me think a lot about my grandparents, particularly about my grandma on my dads side, Grandma Schaefer. Thoughts about her at my grandpas funeral came back and thoughts about her own passing flooded my head. It took everything in me not to cry all of Sunday. I am tearing up writing this so I am going to keep it short. But grandma, I know that you would be proud of me and that you are looking down on me from heaven. I love you and I miss you every day! Your strong faith in God and all of the prayers that you left behind are still in my Bible at home. One day I will get to see you again : ) so keep praying for me like you always did. 

God is Good!

I may be in a third world country taking bucket showers...but you know I found a a station airing Navy games online :) woohoo! Go Navy! Beat San Jose! They need to win this game and their game against Army on the 10th because this girl has 4th row tickets to their bowl game. If not...I will probably sell the tickets haha. Go Navy!

Drive-In Movie

...without the cars! Every so often we use the churches projector to play movies and people LOVE it. The taste in movies here is a little odd (think bad Disney movies that did not take off in the US haha) but it makes for a good time. Tonight we are showing a movie in Banica and what we do is project it either (1) against a white sheet hung over one of our larger trucks or (2) project it onto a wall at the park. We do the same in the campos and people sit on the ground or bring chairs from home. It's pretty cute. I am missing tonights movie becuase I am cooking dinner for the college kids who help out here three days a week. They are each on scholarships from the church, and I have all the time in the world to watch movies when I go home in December at nights at home with my loves, so I wanted them to be able to watch the movie. So the whirldwind that is Sunday - Tuesday begins and I must say my highlight of the week is going to be Wednesday. On Wednesday the Peace Corp volunteer, Keeton, and I are taking a group of teens out of the campos of Pedro Santana. We are going to read the kids at the one room school houses up there the story of Christmas! Afterwards we are going give out some of the donations we recently received (about 200 stuffed bears)!! These bears may very well be the only Christmas gifts these children will ever receive as a child and I bet there will be a lot of beautiful photo opportunities. We are hoping to go to two different schools on Wednesday in the campos and we are going to run games and activities with them as well :) it'll be great. Now I know some of you might be saying "it is early for Christmas" but it is not too bad haha! Keeton will be in the capital for Thanksgiving next week and I leave two and a half weeks after she gets back so it really is the only time. It should be a lot of fun!

The Price of Shoes

A little sad story for you today. I am going to keep this one short because it breaks my heart and I am too sleepy for tears right now. A boy in the reading program who is about 8 years old named Francisco did not show up for class the other day. Today, Keeton asked him why. His response...his shoes were broken. This poor dear child did not go to school because his shoes were falling apart and he did not have anything else to wear. Wow. I understand that he cannot go barefoot and Keeton and we are trying to find him a pair, but wow. Wow. It just breaks my heart. He lives alone with his dad and has very little money and could not go to class because he did not have shoes to wear. Suddenly, the day where I could not go outside for recess because my sister stole (yes, stole) my earmuffs (don't worry hehe she still feels guilty about it) seems so small. It just broke my heart to hear and very simply paints the picture of the lives of SO many of the kids I am privileged to teach.

Volleyball

Sports are pretty big here in Banica. Take a look at any GOOD MLB team in the US and they have a Dominican starting for them sooooooo baseball is huge. Soccer is pretty big too but the Haitians are better at soccer so the Dominicans tend to stay away from it (call it pride on their part...I do not like their division). Basketball is played by teenage boys no matter what country you are in. But volleyball...volleyball is where my heart is at! I was told that the local high school has a team and does not have anyone to train them sooooooo I told the girls to spread the word (because that  is what you do here) and let everyone know that I will coach at the "cancha" or court at 4pm. We met, went over the basics, and got to playing. So many of the girls picked up so many new skills quite quickyly and I was so happy. For the last 40 minutes we played a game 6 on 6. A bunch of locals had begun to watch the practice and joined in sooooo the game ended up being me and a couple of girls against local young guys (some of them..most of them.."tigeres" or young guys who think they are all that and do nothing but stare a girls and drink beer). Volleyball has always been one of my favorite sports and I played through high school. Heck, I went to MU to play volleyball originally haha! So being able to play (and to block the spikes and kills of the local tigeres) made me proud! What a fun afternoon in the sun!

Now...drinking lots of water because MAN it was hot out!

The Website is HERE!

Woohoo! The http://www.banicamission.com/ website is up and running. After December 12th (I think) the documentary should be posted. I have cried every time I have watched it so keep an eye out! Also my blog is linked to it under "stories" woohoo! I feel very special haha!

But really - spread the word! Banica needs love and help :)

Thankful Thanksgiving…A Little Early...

Hello blog world! I was thinking about what to blog about lately and after being here for four months now I decided that I need to blog about the things I am thankful for. Well…the things that my eyes have been opened too since being here. In my journal I keep a couple of lists: (1) the things I can’t wait to do when I get back and (2) the things I will never again take for granted once I come home. This blog post is neither of those lists because a lot of those things are just emotional things that are close to my heart but I wanted to share a variation of that here.

First, the importance of family and loved ones. Family is so important here and everyone takes care of everyone – regardless how big, small, poor, or REALLY poor your family is. I absolutely adore my family and love them with all of my heart. Now when I say family I mean my immediate family, my extended family, Max, his family, my best friends, my community. My family is big and I love it! Never again will I take a single moment that I get to spend with family for granted again. In the past I would get aggravated with my parents for wanting me to complete simple tasks or for not being home enough but now I understand. Savor every moment you get to spend with the ones you love because one day you might not have that moment. I also will not take for granted how easy it is to BE with them…just BE with someone back home. It is so easy to sit down and have dinner with my sister, to drive up the road and play tennis with my TNT crew, to sit with Max as we read or watch TV,  to pick up the phone and let someone know that you love them. But why do we not do it more often?

Second, the power of the words “I love you”. On multiple occasions, sometimes on multiple times a day, those three little words have brought me to tears. My mom always told me to tell the people that I loved them as much as possible because you never know when you will be able to tell them again. I always agreed with it but I never really understood it until spending this time a part in a really radical way. Thank you for that lesson mama! Not being able to call or see a family member when they are in the hospital is a painful and helpless feeling. Not being able to tell that person that you love them, which you know they are suffering and in a very scary state, is downright terrifying. Not being able to say goodnight to someone you love is just as hard enough on its own and is something that I will never take for granted again. Never again will I take for granted the ability to tell Max, or my friends, or my family that I love them in person J being able to look into their eyes J being able to see that they feel the same way. I know it in my heart and I know that I always have those special people with me. Just like when I leave here, I will carry the people I have met here with me, forever.

Third, the value of our education and our educators. The kids here have odd school schedules. Because of the lack of resources and staff in the campos or la frontera, kids go to school in the morning or the afternoon. Back in the states we are in school for an entire day but kids here have half days every day. Sure, I used to think of a half day as such an awesome gift but it is not…think about how much that affects your ability to learn. These kids are going to need twice the amout of time to learn the same material as American kids. Our Peace Corps volunteer here once gave me an alarming statistic that said something along the lines of, “it takes someone in the Dominican school system 40 years to reach an American standard high school diploma.” WOW! It is wrong! And to think that I was fortunate enough to go to great schools my entire life and a wonderful college…wow. What a gift! It might not seem like a big deal on a US scale where so many people now have the chance to go to college…but think about it on a global level…it is huge. And being able to really TEACH here has been an eye opening experience on it’s own. I have been given a whole new respect for teachers because of the work and passion that goes into their job. It is not easy to lesson plan, it is not easy to have patience every day, and it is not easy to be guiding so many kids. Sadly, you also see bad teachers and the harm that they can do to a child’s futures. But, you get to see some really great ones as well! It is sad that teachers in the US make a small fraction of what an athlete or actor would…but keep loving your teachers friends because they are the gatekeepers to the future! Thank you to all of my friends (and lovely twin) who are/will-be teachers.  Especially Struks! God bless you!

Fourth, my health and safety. Some of you may know this about me and some of you may not, but last year I was diagnosed with a dumb sickness called PCOS. Coming here meant taking a couple of risks and my health was one of them (I am ok haha I am alive). Back in the US I have regular checkups each month to make sure that the cysts in my ovaries are not cancerous or dangerously big and I get my glucose and insulin checked. One of the strange side effects of PCOS (still just a really odd thing that we do not know too much about or the cause) is that you become diabetic. Soooo for some time now I have been on medicine that regulates that. My diet here and my medicine has clashed and wow…being sick only begins to explain it. I won’t go into the details but it has been very hard. Being able to eat certain types of food in the US (like gluten free) and things like that is something that I will not take for granted again. I won’t be at the mercy of the bi-weekly market! The human body is so amazing but we need to take care of it. It breaks my heart when people are sick here in Banica. People come to the church for all kinds of support and one of the biggest things is medical support. The hospital here is absolutely horrible and you would probably get more sick just visiting than when you arrived. They do not have bleach to clean the germs or floor with, they often times to not have medicine, women give birth by candle light because there is no electricity, and they do not have food to feed their patients. Some say it is the governments fault…other say it is the new hospital directors fault…who knows…I am in no place to pass judgment. When people are sick, and really know where to get help, they come to the church and we drive them an hour or so away to the town of San Juan. The hospital in San Juan is in better condition and can handle more emergencies. However, I would not use either and if I got REALLY sick I would come back home or go to the capital to get help. But what a blessing I have back in the US that if I am sick I can go to a hospital and know that it will be clean and that the doctors will be able to help me. Everyone should have that “luxury” in every part of the world. Thankfully, a group of Medical Missionaries is on their way through here and Haiti to their clinic in Haiti and will hopefully be able to look into the problem.

Fifth, my ability to communicate. Being a fish out of water is not the right term because I am pretty much fluent in Spanish. I am also very grateful for the how much my Spanish has improved here and how fearless I have become with it. Immersion is the key! However, being away from your native language is an odd feeling. I think the place that I feel it the most is at church. It is no secret that I am a very religious person, and I love my faith, but not being able to worship in my own language is kind of heart breaking. Sure, it is nice to see the universality of the Church, but it can still be hard. It goes beyond forgetting parts of the mass in English…I forget certain words in English now…and I think I am ready to be immersed in English again haha! There is also the other side of communication…cellphones and internet and crackberrys, and iPhones. I am so thankful that I can pick up my cell phone (in the US) whenever I want and call whoever I need to call in that exact moment.

Sixth, for great guidance. I am SO incredibly lucky to know an incredibly humble and straight up awesome priest named Fr. O’Hare. We met four years ago when we was exploring the possibility of serving in Banica as the mission priest and stayed in touch. Four years later, I am working for him! Though all of my highs and lows he has been there for me and I know that he always will. He has a love for people, especially the poorest of poor, that is contagious and heartwarming. We see wonderful people in our lives each day but I am 110% sure that this man will be a saint one day! He gives the greatest advice and it the best listener. I could not have been more blessed with a better guide down here and I know that he is going to continue to do amazing things for the many years he has left. I can only hope that I will have such great guiders throughout my entire life!

Seventh, the importance of the virtue of patience. I wish I was a more patient person and I really hope/thank that Banica has helped me accomplish that. The pace of life down here is just so “tranquillo” and you have to roll with it. We cannot get mad if a meeting that was planned for 3:30pm starts at 4:30pm. We cannot get upset with a friend who runs late for personal reasons. We cannot get upset with children who are simply being children. We’ve got to savor the little moments. Patience also comes with a lot of trust. I do not know what my “future plans” are and I do not know what job I am supposed to have when I get back but I have to trust and be patient. I have to trust that God has a plan in all of this. I have to be patient and know that a job just does not fly down and land in your lap…you’ve got to work for it! Banica has helped me see that I too need to grow in the virtue of patience.

So that is how my eyes have been opened here and I cannot wait to return home and live out that love from Virginia. I miss you all so much and cannot wait to spend an amazing Christmas with my family!