Hey Everyone! Welcome back, Keyla, Isaac, and Ariyana your leaders of the day here! We are wrapping up a day of hard work, full of dirt, sweat, and a motivation to help other. Today was the second day of our Community Action Project (out of three) at Escuela Manuel Tiburcio.
To start the day off, we woke up well rested at 7 am. After getting ready for about an hour, we all gathered up in the Dining Hall for some breakfast (brought to us by our beloved Rafael!). We had cereal, sandwiches, and fresh delicious fruit. Right after finishing up our meal, we headed out on the safari bus to the local school to resume our work from yesterday. We were split into 5 different groups; one group worked on painting wooden signs, two groups worked on shoveling gravel into wheel barrels, and two more groups worked on mixing fertilizer into the soil which they then used to fill up the planters. All together we became a little ant colony, along with the local children and guests from the Jarabacoa Art school. For hours, we were deep into hardcore working mode, shoveling gravel and soil back and forth filling up 5 large planters. After taking a well-needed water break, we got back to work, this time finishing up painting the murals (we aren’t done yet… but we’ll be sure to show you the final results!). We interacted with the children (our Spanish is getting so good!) and got some good progress done on all the planters. Anika and David, our German friends from the non-profit organization of Plan Yaque, were very impressed with our work.
Shortly after we had lunch. We shared our food with the local children, the art school students, along with our friends Anika and David. We got straight back to work and finished up as much as we could before it started pouring. We picked up our materials and hoped that our freshly painted murals would survive. We gathered up in the cafeteria while the loud heavy rain pounded on the metal roof. Eventually, we realized the rain wasn’t going to stop and we made a run for the safari bus. On the ride back home, with a mixture of bug spray, sunscreen, dirt, and sweat on our skin, we realized that our music speaker was dead. Fortunately, we were far too tired to care. We enjoyed each other’s company on the quiet ride back home, with the cool breeze and rain droplets on our faces.
We made it home! Right after a well-needed shower, most of us knocked out for about two hours. We made the most of our designated “quiet time,” and later on in our “free time” we gathered around and played board games. Soon after, dinner arrived. The highlight of our dinner was the delicious fresh fruit, plated fancy, it made us all feel very special. The highlight of our day was getting to work together in groups and conversing with the local people of the beautiful city of Jarabacoa! We are so excited to finish up and see the final outcome tomorrow, on our final Day 3 of our Community Action Project!
Stay tuned…
P.S. See you guys soon, miss you all!!
Hi Luna!!!- K.A
