Ensalada

Well, well. I feel incapable of putting together a coherent blog post, but I thought I would throw some pictures up and let people know some of the things happening around here.This first picture is stolen from Robin. Robin is the administrator/director of the Makarios preschool, and she rocks. I thought some of you may remember this beautiful little girl, Yunairi. This is a rare sighting: Yunairi with completely free, unstyled hair. Is that not the craziest thing you have ever seen? This is all natural, people. She is still pretty much gorgeous beyond words. Also, I think she comes up to my knee or something, chiquitin.
Can somebody please tell me why the blog adds photos to the top of the post? Anyway, this picture is stolen from Robin as well. This chiquito, se llama Luigi (Luis Miguel, really) is hilarious. He is the older brother of the littlest/biggest punk in the school, Ricardo. Luigi has big ears and one of those wiiiiiide smiles. He is adorable. He comes to our bible program on Fridays. You should just notice his outfit here. Oversized pimp shoes, sagging pants over some Hooters shorts, and that hat. Yes, this is the family that somehow has a pair of Hooters shorts. Thanks, donating waitresses!




Over here-ish you can see Kendall with the muchachos that she played basketball with in Pancho Mateo. Sili, her friend on the far left, has been wanting to play for quite a while, and lucky for him, Kendall is somewhat of a basketball diva. I am guessing that "diva" wouldn't be the best word choice here, but I'm not an athlete, so who knows. Maybe it's all the Beyonce I've been hearing lately. Anyway, Kendall let Sili win a game last week, which she never heard the end of, so this week she played again (for bragging rights, of course). She and Ernesto (center) whooped up! Go Kendall!

While Kendall played basketball, I stuck to what I do best: sitting around. I hung out with some kiddos and let them play with sidewalk chalk from the school. It was a big hit. Mostly I just thought the skirts the girls were wearing looked like babydoll clothes, so I took that picture. They were pretty cute, though. I pretty much had to force them to call me by my name rather than "Gringa." Also, a nice young man asked me "Do you have boyfriend? Please, I like be your boyfriend." So charming. I don't know how the ladies don't flock to him!

Just a warning: Whenever I post a picture, I pretty much have no idea where this blog will put it or where I will be allowed to type. Don't be surprised. This is technology, after all (kind of).

Somewhere around here you can see a picture of Ashley and me coloring with some kiddos in Chichigua. It was our first visit to the village since Semana Santa, and it went great! Coloring books are quite the rage out there. We also have been on the lookout lately for kids who could be potential students in the upcoming year. Things are moving so quickly!




Something loca happened before Semana Santa. Kendall and I were spending the day at the beach in Cabarete, when I saw a certain someone in that I recognized. What?! It happened to be Danielle Bartz and Ellen Haynes who I rowed with at UT! What a random meeting! I was under the impression that Danielle was in a graduate program in Spain right now, but apparently, she was relocated to the capital here in the DR! Ellen was visiting her for a little vacay. Sweet mothers! Our hilarious reunion has Danielle thinking about coming up to the north coast sometime after her semester ends. Awesome.

OK, done with pictures, finally!

Some things to pray about:

* We are about to start having some serious meetings to prepare for next year. Makarios will now add two more classes! The plan is to have 2 Preschool I and two Preschool II classes. This involves so many things, including building on to the school. In order for all of this to be possible, we need prayer! We are praying that God will provide all the funding for the building addition as well as the right teachers to join Makarios.

* I have been casually looking at job opportunities for the fall. Claro, it is early, and I am still not exactly sure what I want to do. I have applied for one graduate program in Human Resources, but: I don't know if I will get in, and I don't know if it is definitely what I want to do. I have mostly been looking at social services and teaching-type jobs. If I decide to try and teach Spanish or ESL (or something), I will need to seriously start setting dates and planning on getting an alternative certification. I'm not afraid of the future necessarily, but thinking about it makes me want to launch into semi-frantic "planning" mode, which isn't great when you aren't sure what God is calling you to do yet.

* Odilsia is our amazing housekeeper and friend. She works both at the Makarios house and at the school. She has a beautiful spirit, and we love her to pieces. Today, she was talking to Cara a little bit about some stuff she is going through. Odilsia said she has been fearful for some reason lately. She doesn't want to sleep alone, and she doesn't even really feel comfortable coming out to the Makarios house alone right now. She said she feels like some spirit of the dead (or something) is around, and she just doesn't want to be alone. Now, although this may sound crazy, Odilsia is a believer in Christ. Talk of spirits, though, would be quite common in Haitian culture. The idea would not seem outlandish at all, even to Haitian Christians. Cara was able to reassure her that fear is not of God and that we don't have to be afraid and everything, but please pray for Odilsia. Your prayers are powerful, and she needs to be set free from her fears.

Ok, that's all for now. Next time I might try and introduce everyone to the rest of the staff here!