soy dominicana...

It has been over a month since I have updated this little blog and for that I apologize! Things here have been wonderful and crazy and joyful and draining. I have been living in Jaibon for the past month and I cannot express how much I have loved it. I fell in love with Monte Cristi three years ago and have fallen in love with Jaibon this past year. God created a special place in my heart for this area and these people and I just can't describe it. The people in this community are so genuine. I haven't met people that are so happy and content with what they have. They love from the bottom of their heart. The boys that live at the orphanage are so full of life and joy. They are extremely respectful and love God and their brothers. I'm beyond blessed to be sharing life with them.

The past weeks have been busy. For two weeks we had over 250 people in Jaibon alone, and 200 more people in Monte Cristi. It was lots of fun and I really enjoyed seeing that many people experience the DR, but it was definitely exhausting. This week, we have 60 volunteers here... which used to seem like a ton, but now it feels like there are barely any people here.

Last week we ran a dental clinic on the property and a medical clinic in some local villages. It was amazing to see the doctors and dentists use their skills here. I am clearly not gifted in any of these areas, so it was neat to see them sharing their talents with the Dominicans. I even had minor surgery! One of the doctors cut a wart off of my finger ;) I did have 250 people asking me if I was ok though... haha.

I also got to celebrate my birthday here! It was the best one yet! Having my Dominican family remember and celebrate with me was priceless. Here they don't really give gifts on birthdays, but instead they throw water on you... ALL day long. Christine, one of the other leaders, announced this tradition at dinner on my birthday, so in addition to all of the Dominicans throwing water on me, I had 250 volunteers dumping any water they could find on me. It was crazy but fun! It happened to be a cool night and it took me about 2 hours to thaw out after having ice cold drinking water dumped on me. I ended the day hanging out with the boys and them singing and counting off the years of my life and a surprise oreo cake that Sharon made. It was wonderful :)

Soy Dominicana ahora. I am now Dominican. :) And I take pride in this fact. Haha! The other night I was at the boys' worship service with them and they were like, "Why aren't any Americans here?" I replied, "I'm American." And they quickly assured me that I am Dominican now and no longer an American. Then last night Jose asked me why I don't have big, red mosquito bites like all the other Americans. So I said, "Remember, I'm not American." :) So to the kids here, I am now either a Dominican or a Heather... but either way I count it as a success :)

I will be here in Jaibon for another week and a half. I've already started to get emotional thinking about leaving so I'm trying to push those thoughts out of my mind. Don't get me wrong, I love Monte Cristi so much, I just have this special attachment to this place. But I am excited to love on all my little girls in MC! I have missed them.

Life is beautiful. God is faithful. Hope you all are doing well!

i love jaibon.

I figure it's time for a random update blog :) so here goes...

As my last blog mentioned, my parents were here a couple weeks ago. It was great! My parents, along with the parents of most of the other leaders came down for what we affectionately deemed "family week." We loooved showing our parents around where we call home!

Last week, I spent time finishing some last minute things before craziness starts with all of the spring break weeks here. I finished all of my literacy modules... lots and lots of lesson plans... who would have thought I would still be lesson planning after graduation?!

Last week I tutored the five oldest kids at the orphanage in Monte Cristi. We did M&M math, percents, graphs, ratios, probability, and all those other things you can tie in to eating candy :) My brain hurt after trying to teach all of those things in Spanish, but it was fun!

I am in love with two little twin girls at the Monte Cristi orphanage, named Ari and Arianni. They are three years old and full of spunk that makes them seem years older than they supposedly are. The other day we were tossing a ball to Arianni for a good hour with each person having to say, "ready?" The person receiving the ball had to say yes before you were allowed to throw the ball. It was great :)

Last week we had several "rain days." Equivalent to those snow days that everyone is having in the States, just not quite as cold :) When it rains, it basically shuts down the whole town because the roads are made of dirt and when dirt gets wet... it turns to mud! And lots of it. We had a couple of adventurous days filled with trecking through puddles and sinking in mud while hoping not to fall... it was hilarious.

I moved to Jaibon (the other orphanage) yesterday! I will be here for 5 weeks and I am sooo excited. I just love it here so much! The past two days have been great and I enjoy every minute that I'm here. The boys that live here are great and so full of life and joy. The women who cook here make my day every day. I love spending time with them too. So now my days consist of leading groups from high schools, churches, and colleges. I wake up early to fresh coffee, reading, and conversations with Jaqueline, Betsaida, and Fefa. We work and teach all day and eat the best food I have ever had for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. At night, we have activities with the boys who live here and have become a part of my family. The days are filled with many "Oh Jaibon"s because things always happen unexpectedly, but it's the beauty of living here. I see God in smiles and creation and conversations and sunsets. Cows and goats are herded past our common area daily and we eat food made from completely natural ingredients. The older Dominican women melt my heart and crack me up all the same time. God is good. He is beautiful and faithful and I am so thankful to be here.

I love and miss you all so much! And that's the truth :) Come visit :)

becoming dominican...

In Dominican culture, it's customary to get very dressed up for any sort of special occasion. The special occasion last Saturday was the arrival of our parents. When the Dominicans that we live with found out we were going to the airport to pick up our parents, they told us that they would fix our hair for us... which if you do not know, is an all day process :) Here are a few pictures that document our day full of hair straightening... who knew I would spend more time here on my hair than I do in the States!


Shortly after breakfast, they rolled our hair and put them in these ginormous rollers with strict instructions to be outside in the sun so that our hair would dry faster. This is Elizabeth, Carolina, and I sporting our rollos.


After some partial air-drying, you get stuck under this ancient beauty chair where air gets blown on the rollers and you kind of resemble someone from the Simpsons. Your head is pretty much stuck to the dryer and it's kind of nerve wracking since the kids are slinging soaking wet laundry over the electrical cords. But hey, it's all part of being a Dominican :)

Next, they wrap your hair around your head, bobby pin it down, and put a net over top of it to keep it in place. You wear the "tubie" the rest of the day until you leave for whatever occasion you are going to. For us, we were given orders not to take off our tubies until we were on the bus and headed to the airport.

And the end product is EXTREMELY straight hair! It was great to be able to run our fingers through soft, straight hair once again. Saturday was great and full of stick straight hair and patiently awaiting the arrival of our parents at the aiport.

It's all just a part of becoming Dominican :)

love them.

This morning we went in to Dona Nena, a local elementary school, to teach English. Most of the younger kids at the orphanage go to school there so it was tons of fun to see them looking all grown up in their school uniforms! I'm amazed at how fast they are growing up... it feels like they should still be babies, but yet here they are learning simple English. It's crazy!

Joanni... lookin' so big in her uniform!

Luz Maria peeking out of her classroom.

Mineli, covering up her toothless smile!

Carmelito.

muchas cosas...

God has been doing a lot of change in my heart recently. Stripping me more and more of my selfishness... teaching me to dream His dreams... breaking my heart for the human trafficking that still exists in our world... showing me His restorative power... and so I figured it was time for a little change to my blog as well :)

I continue to love life here. After a busy couple months, I have been enjoying this week (it's the first week we haven't had a group in a long time). I've been able to spend a lot of time working on my literacy program, hanging out with the kids, and resting. Yesterday we did a mini-camp at a batey and I loved it. I love being out in the "campo" (rural Domincan) and visiting with the people who live there. They are beautiful and have such pure joy. It makes me fall in love with this country even more.

I'm reading Chronicles of Narnia right now and it is soooo good! There are so many biblical parallels and God is using it to teach me more about His character. Read it :)

So my roommates and I still had our Christmas tree set up in our room and thought we needed to change it up a bit. Entonces, we made it into a family tree! We each drew pictures of ourselves and every member of our family and hung them on the tree. Each day, we are going to pick someone on the tree and one of us has to tell a story involving them from the past (funny, interesting, silly, serious, whatever!). Just a little creativeness we decided to throw into our days :) I love it! Here is a picture...



AND, we are extremely excited about family week! In a week and a half, my parents, along with the parents of most of the leaders who live here are coming to visit! We can't wait and have a daily countdown going :) I'm pumped!

anddddd... my best friend is engaged :) heck yessss!!!!

God is good!

update...

I just wanted to post a quick update about the earthquake since I have been getting questions about it. Tuesday afternoon I was laying on the floor of my room lesson planning when the building started to shake. We had experienced an earthquake here this past August so I knew immediately what it was. I could hear the Dominicans talking to each other outside about the earthquake and I yelled to see if the girl who lives next to had felt it. She hadn't and neither had most of the Americans that are here with us right now. Most of them were outside and didn't know it was happening. It only lasted a couple of seconds and wasn't bad at all. At that point I just assumed that it was a little mini earthquake that had happened here in Monte Cristi. Around dinner time we found out that our friends in Santiago and Jaibon had felt it as well and they were hours away from us. I still assumed it was just a little earthquake in the Dominican... after all, we had barely felt anything. Later that night, I was teaching math to the five oldest kids at the orphanage when my mom called to see if I was ok. It wasn't until then that I realized it had been a much bigger earthquake than any of us imagined. Shortly after that we had everyone call home to say they were ok and it wasn't until around 11 at night that we were actually able to look up what happened online and see the extent of the major earthquake that hit our neighbors in Haiti. Everything is fine here and I haven't seen any structural damage anywhere because it wasn't strong enough here to do that.

PLEASE continue to pray for Haiti. They lack resources to meet their daily needs, much less to respond to a natural disaster. I urge you to find an organization where you can donate funds to help with relief. They need all they can get right now. I also urge you to remember that these are families, children, brothers, sisters, son, daughters, fathers, and mothers that have lost loved ones, homes, jobs, food, and lives. Let's not forget that these people are faces, hearts, and souls... not just numbers on a news story. And most importantly, let's remember the fact that our God holds the whole world in His hands, that His heart is breaking too, and that He will fulfill His promises of bringing hope and restoration.

He is Hope.

Yesterday was National Human Trafficking Awareness Day. God has recently been placing on my heart a life devoted to bringing restoration to the women and children affected by prostitution, sex tourism, and human trafficking. Each day, He seems to place something or someone else in my path that breaks my heart and opens my eyes to the world around me. While I still feel ignorant, God is really showing me the pain, ache, and hurt that people are experiencing because of these chains that are binding them. Prostitution and a promiscuous life affects the heart and soul. Not to meantion the fact that human slavery still exists all over the world... and sometimes I think we really just have no idea how much pain people are experiencing... because if we did, wouldn't everyone choose to do something about it? And once we see these faces, and hear the facts, we have no choice but to fight these injustices and love our neighbor as ourself. My heart just yearns to provide a way out for people stuck in prostitution (because they are surely not defined by their current occupation), to provide a safe home, to bring them restoration through Christ, and to shower them with the unconditional love of God. I don't know what this means for my future, but I do know that I am in constant prayer about it and that I will go where He sends me.

An organization working to fight human trafficking with a house located in the Philippines.
www.love146.org

An organization and jewelry business in Thailand providing a way out of prostitution.
www.nightlightinternational.com

Another organization and jewelry business in Thailand providing a way out of prostitution.
www.rahabministriesthailand.com

A factual article about prostitution in the tourist cities of the Dominican Republic.
http://dr1.com/articles/prostitution.shtml

There is Hope. He is Hope.