Hey everyone ! We had such a fun & eye opening day. Jesse and I gathered everyone in the morning so we can have breakfast, we started “living like a local day” yesterday night. We challenged ourselves by turning off all lights because the majority of people here don’t have access to electricity, which left us in a bad mood with flashlights out in the dark. We woke up to a simple breakfast which was “Gallo pinto” (Rice and beans), to follow the idea of living like a local. After, we headed down to the “Tejerina” which is a very poor neighborhood. Keep in mind these families live on 2 dollars a day for their whole family which is about 8 people per house. We were broken up into 4 small groups & each group went to a different host family. When we first got there, we were really devastated seeing the animals & then seeing how beat down the homes were. The houses were made out of leftover metal, plastic & wood. The families headed down to the school we were waiting at, they seemed excited by showing those radiant smiles. I, Bryan, was placed in a home of 5. There was the mom (Doña Rosa), daughter, son, brother, and grandmother. Doña Rosa was so humble and kindhearted, she was so welcoming and treated us like her own children. We had to go down to the well to bring back some water back to the houses (It was not easy). Later, we were expected to pick out all the bad beans from a bowl which was something I was actually able to do. Other families started making tortillas from scratch and from what I heard, it wasn’t as easy as it seems. We brought lunch for every family and we sat down and enjoyed a meal with our new little family.  When it was time to leave, people were quite upset because they got so attached to their own family and the families to us BUT, I happened to cheer everyone by slipping down the hill.  It was a prank, the cameras everywhere.

Tending to the wood burning stove (+ the camera crew in action!)

 

Sorting through beans for this week’s meals

It was so nice to experience what these people do everyday of their lives. Even though these families had so little and living in very bad conditions they were still very happy and offered us all they got which was their love and compassion. These families proved to us that all you need is family to be truly happy. After this amazing trip, we got home and got the chance to exchange some more money and we got some gifts for you guys. Look forward to it. We presented our CAP project to “The Hormiguitas ” and they seemed to really like some of our ideas. For the rest of the day we continued with living a local so we had gallo pinto again for dinner. For me, Jesse, this trip really impacted me. Seeing how these people live of course made me feel grateful for what I have but that’s not what I took back from this experience. I went back to our hostel with a very different perspective on how to live, which is to be happy with what you have.

It’s Bryan again. Overall we managed to enjoy the day like always, having each other by each others side is all we need to crack a smile.  I love you all back at home, hope you guys are having fun and hope everything is great back at home. Miss you guys. Take it sleesy and we’re out.

Brybry & Jesse