Greetings from Constanza!
The authors of this blog today are Noah Schembri and Matt Garrison, the two Líderes del Día (Leaders of the Day, or LDD’s).
Today the delegation visited the rural agricultural community of Cañanda de las Palmas, a financially challenged suburb located southwest of the main city of Constanza. After only a 15 minute bus ride, we were greeted with hugs and blessings from many of the families and the president of the neighborhood association, Jose Victoriano. Five of these families welcomed us into their homes with open arms and hearts. And mop closets. We soon were put to work helping with household chores and making lunch for the community. Despite the language barrier, we learned a lot about their lives and their backgrounds. One thing that surprised many of our delegation was that the children enjoy and value schooling and in their free time write and draw. After making this discovery, we started drawing along with them and trying to explain our horrible drawings to the children.
We, as the LDD’s for toda,y were very proud to see our delegation having so much fun working alongside the cheerful residents of the Cañadas de las Palmas community. Everyone had a positive attitude about living their day like a local, from no electricity to bucket showers and non-flushable toilets. We learned about ourselves and how much we take for granted in the U.S., as well as how to be happy and thankful for the little things. One person that we as visitors look up to is Jose Rafael, Jose Victoriano’s 14 year old son. Jose takes the idea of appreciating the little things in his life to another level; from finding creative ways to express his thoughts through music and dance to giving us a better understanding of their unique home life and culture.
Being an LDD today was quite an experience. We learned that there is such a thing as too much enthusiasm (Noah…) and that leading a group through an ever-changing schedule is a doable yet complicated task. We now have much more appreciation for the Global Glimpse Leaders as well as the coordinators for their daunting task.
We would finally like to thank our donors for this amazing experience and many more stories to come!
Thank you,
Matthew Garrison and Noah Schembri