End of the Week and Weekend off!

I was so looking forward to Friday, because it meant the week and the outreach was over!

But when it finally came to an end, I was not as happy as I thought. I happened to get pretty close to a few of the high schoolers, and since I hate saying goodbye to people.. it was harder than I thought. The kids I got to know.. were my favorite by far. But we all exchanged facebook names and things like that, so I know we will be keeping in touch.

Friday, Mackalah came and hung out at the baseball site on her day off, which was absolutely fantastic! I loved her being able to see what I do and who I hang out with everyday. Except we didn't have volleyball practice so she didn't get to meet all my girls, but that's okay. We went to the river in the afternoon and jumped off cliffs again and it was a blast! Friday night was the banquet for the end of the outreach, and I loved being able to take pictures with everyone, socialize, and eat some wonderful food. After the banquet, we hung out and played some games with some of the Dominicans, and then Katy and I rematched out Domino opponents, David and Rodley, and lost again.. surprise surprise.

Saturday morning we got up to say goodbye to the Bakersfield group ( which has the students I got the closest with in it), and I said goodbye with the notion that I would be seeing them later since I was invited to go hang out with them at the resort they were spending the day at. One of the staff members here, Amy let me take her car there to hang out with them.. so nice of her! I went and laid by the pool and swam for a few hours and then said my real goodbyes.

That night we went over to the Slabach's house for hangout time, dinner, and a movie. Nate and Maggie Slabach's are two of the head missionaries in this area, and their daughters Andrea and Chastity have become pretty close with us interns, and we all wanted hangout time! One of the interns, Laurel, cooked up some Moroccan food, we played some games, and then we watched Nacho Libre, in which most of us fell asleep :)

Sunday was the day that most of us had been looking forward to for a week!! We were going to the beach!! We know that we have been living on an island for the past month, but since we are in the mountains you can't really tell, and now we have proof! The trip to the beach is about 2 hours, and so well worth it. We packed 14 people into the Students International 15 passenger van and had some great bonding time on the way. All of the interns are sharing their testimonies at one point or another before I leave, and we heard 3 yesterday, and 2 the week before that at Bible Study. I never realized how much testimonies open your eyes to, you can really have a better understanding of that person when you hear their background. It creates so much more community with the group. The beach itself was SO awesome.. oh my gosh. We left at 7:45 and got to the beach around 10. I was nervous how long we were going to stay, because I know that I could stay at the beach ALL day and be completely content with it. We all got to the beach, and we immediately rented some umbrellas and chairs and ran into the water. Oh my gosh, I wish I could explain what it felt like to finally be in salt water again. I loved every second of it! After playing around and laying out for a few hours we walked to all the restaurants on the beach, and landed on one called Jose O'Shea's.. which was an irish pub with all kinds of american, mexican, italian, and dominican food. It was great!

We headed back to where our stuff was, laid out, read, went swimming, body surfed, walked along the beach, laid out, read and swam :) We didn't leave until 6 at night, and got back at like 8:30 ( we were going up the mountain so it took a little longer) We were all sunburnt and tired so we just watched Kung Fu Panda and went to bed. It was a wonderful wonderful day.. I LOVE the beach :)

Today we meet the new teams that are coming in! I'm excited and have big expectations for the SIX girls that I have at my site. Josh (the boys sports site intern) has TEN students, and since we do a lot of things together, it is going to be a big group this outreach. But it gives me more responsibility and I'm really excited about that :)

Prayer Requests:

The new team coming in, that the girls at my site would go a little better than last time

Strength for my next few weeks here, i'm getting sad that I'm leaving so soon!

Continuous bonding with the interns, and all of us being a body as a whole together

The girls that we are coaching would continue to show up and work hard

Have a great day!

An Exciting Couple of Days!

So I left you all with the beginning of the week that I considered to be EXTREMELY long. Well, it kinda was.. but now that it's coming to an end, I don't really know how I feel about it. One, it makes me think of how I only have a little less than three weeks left, and two.. I've really connected with some of the high schoolers and I'm going to miss them a lot.

So Monday and Tuesday were pretty chill days, which was nice. I've created for myself somewhat of a social life since I've been here. Which shouldn't be a surprise to anyone that is reading this whatsoever. We "work" all day, then dinner and then if we don't have to help out with the activity for that evening we try to make other plans. Our newest hangout has been in Cristo Rey, which is the place where the baseball site is. We go with Jess and watch the men play softball, which they are so awesome at. My guy friends that I'm always hanging out with are always there. My friend Moreno and I have been having more conversations lately, but there is a language barrier there b/c he only speaks Spanish and I only speak English, but I really am learning a lot and am trying to get better at it and he is working on English so it's working.. kinda!

Tuesday we went on the prayer walk in the evening for about an hour. I was given a group of 5 high school students, by myself, and we walked around the community of Cristo Rey. The instructions were, that if we felt led to stop and pray somewhere then we did it. Somehow, I got with the 5 high schoolers that I am the closest with. Which I was a little nervous about, because I wasn't sure how involved they would get, or how serious they would take it. It ended up going beyond my expectations. They started a lot of the prayers and the stops we made. But it did make me think, did I pray like that in high school? Did I pray without a lot of passion, but really did mean it? I'm not saying that my praying abilities are so amazing. Because I truly do believe that no matter what your prayer is or how it's prayed, God hears it. This made me look back at see how much I've matured over the years, and made me feel a little accomplished, but also SO proud of my high schoolers as the same time.

Wednesday was one of THE best days I've had here so far. You wanna know why? I really felt like I accomplished a LOT. Remember the game that I blogged about a bit ago that we were trying to get organized for the girls? Well it finally happened! With the help of Raul, we scheduled a game in La Vega, which is about 40 min away. We took two trucks, one for all the volleyball girls and then some, and one for all the baseball guys. They were supposed to have a game, but it got cancelled because of the rain, and they still came to support us, which was so cool! The place we ended up going to ended up being really nice and inside. When I say really nice, I mean it was still a concrete court, and there was no air condition, and no lights inside only natural light from the tons of little blocks cut out. Jess and I have been coaching the younger girls, so that was the most important game. Then we brought a few older girls, and used our two high school girls (who don't play volleyball) and me and Jess to play as well :)

It was fun being a volleyball coach again. ( I coached a 6th grade team for my high school senior project and these girls were about that same age.) And at first we were a little nervous b/c the other girls were all wayy bigger than our girls, and a little older too. But we ended up winning the first two games, and since it was 2 out of 3 it was over. It was a great feeling! Next came the big girls games. I haven't played competitively since high school, so this was so weird, but I loved being back in the competitive mode and getting into it. The guys were so supportive, and my proudest moment was jumping up to block a ball (which never happens b/c I'm so short), and actually getting a little bit of a hand on it and slowing it down! It was awesome :) The only downfall was, we were playing the National team. And they were all so awesome, but we only ended up losing each game by like 6, so that was an accomplishment, at the end we had a little devotional and then Jess exchanged numbers with the coach and one of the girls in order to set up more games in the future. Our goal is to go there once every outreach, and my heart leaped for joy when Jess turned me to as we were walking out and said, "Cristi look what you did, this was all your idea!" My immediate thought was Thank you Lord, you have helped me really be involved :)

Today, we went on that tiring hike again. But this time seemed to be SO much easier since I've done it once before, and I actually faced a fear and slid down the rock water slide. My fear of heights is so evident, but I'm trying little things :)

Tomorrow is the last day with these students from this outreach, and I don't know what to expect.. but i DO hate goodbyes.. with a passion.

Prayer Requests:

Clarity on some confusing thoughts..

Safe Travels for these teams as they head back home to the states..

Rest for me and Jess this weekend..

my family as they are on vacation :)

Thanks everyone.. sorry it's long :)

Sorry I haven't blogged in a while!

I feel like sometimes I get SO busy, all I want to do is plop on my bed and check things really quick and go to bed.

Okay.. so I've learned a little about high schoolers so far. One.. they aren't all at the same maturity level as my sister is (which is what I was expecting) and two.. there are some that I enjoy hanging out with. The girls that are at my site, are a little immature in some ways, but LOVE learning about the culture and are always excited to learn more and be involved which is SO awesome. I'm glad that I've found some of the high schoolers that I can really relate to and actually hang out with, because then I feel like I'm doing my job and being involved, which isn't how I felt with the last outreach group.

Thursday night we went to Dinner in the community at one of our volleyball girls' houses, Tita. She is about 10 and is the sweetest thing you will ever meet, and so is her mom and her twin brother Tito. They make my heart melt with how cute they are! They live in a cement shack, and it was hard to fit even the four of us in there to eat. But her mom made a fabulous meal, and we enjoyed playing with some of the neighborhood kids that kept walking by and talking to us. I even played some hopscotch with some of them, and don't worry I have a video of it :)

Friday, was the last day of the week and I was completely exhausted. I think most of it was just from emotionally actually having students this outreach, and they are a lot to keep up with but it's good for me! Jess got her ipod jack thing fixed, and we rocked out and released some of our negative energy singing High School Musical, ahh it was wonderful! Then after dinner we had a campfire worship time, which was very freeing and nice just to sing with voices and acoustically. We also had a time of prayer, and I felt like God really allowed me to pray as I've always wanted to pray, without the feeling of not saying the right things or looking stupid if I said something. I just prayed it out. I think he's been teaching me that these few couple weeks, to just pray to my heart's content.. kinda like the saying.. dance like no one's watching.. pray like you've never prayed before. It's nice!

Saturday was the excursion day, and then dinner and shopping in town. Mackalah and I got to go on the excursion of white water rafting. Now those of you who know me pretty well, know that adventure sometimes really isn't my thing. I'm freaked out by heights, and if something is dangerous, I just don't even try to attempt it. So going on this trip was kind of a big step. I was lucky enough to be in a boat with another intern, Andrea, and her boyfriend, who made it SO fun. Andrea is a great girl who i'm getting to know better and better, and all the pictures we took were so great. All in all, the rafting was awesome and made my heart race a few times! Our tour guide was funny and adventurous which made it more dangerous, but made it more fu at the same time. For shopping, we divided into groups. It made me feel good when I had a line of students wanting to me in "my group". But we had to evenly distribute everyone, so I only ended up with three, but they were 3 of my favorites so it made it okay :) I had AJ, Darrian, and his girlfriend Paige. Paige is so cute, she reminds me SO much of my sister it's weird. That's why I've really latched onto her this past week or just in the past couple of days we have gotten pretty close, and I love every minute of it.

Today, was the prayer walk, and then church in the afternoon. The prayer walk went well, and we even sang "How he loves us" overlooking Jarabacoa which always makes you feel good :) In church this afternoon an American spoke, and he was SO good. He talked all about "what you are filling your pot with", and it was based on Joseph in the Bible. He can speak some Spanish, but he was African-American and very energetic, so his Dominican wife translated and they were such a great team.

Some prayer for me:

I am confused about my plans after Student Teaching or even just the rest of the summer, so clarity for that.

Being able to keep my heart open

Patience (still)

Missing my family while they get to vacation without me... which I know was my decision.. but still!

Thanks to all who are reading this, and I love hearing what you think and how you are following it.. so keep it comin! :)

Relaxing Weekend.. Then at it again..

This weekend was very relaxing, and at a couple times boring compared to what I have been doing. But it was really nice to relax and hang out with the interns, as well as some sunbathing thrown in :)

A new team came on Monday, a team of all high schoolers. There are some from Bakersfield Christian Highschool (in Cali) and then some from a church in Ohio. At first I was like yay high schoolers! I can relate to them, this will be fun! My thoughts changed somewhat fast yesterday :)

Yesterday we had worship in the morning, and then had lunch and sat with our individual sites. I have two girls this week; Emily and Danielle (or DJ). Emily is a sweet skinny little blonde 15 year old who loves to talk and is always smiling. Danielle, is a tomboy, and when I say tomboy I really do mean tom boy. She loves any sport she can get her hands on, and her favorite is motocross, and riding her dirtbike. That says it all right there. She is a very nice girl, and her intentions are awesome, she's ready to serve the Lord and help people out. The only hesitation is wanting to always be one of the boys. I've found that there is a big difference between kidding around with the boys in a friendly non-flirty way, and literally being with the boys and being one of them all the time. The problem is, the Dominican boys don't see it that way. They see it as a girl who constantly wants to be around them and do the things they do, and that's cool to them. But getting the attention of the boys is the last thing we want to get involved in. In the past, there has been a girl who came on an outreach, and left to go back to the states with her heart with one of the boys from the baseball site. "Special Relationships" are strictly prohibited to staff ( until they have been here at least 2 years), interns, and outreach teams. It takes away from the purpose of being on a missions trip. And i completely agree. It's a little hard for me and Jess, because the relationship we have with some of the older boys is so different, they are like my brothers, and I in turn their sister. There is an understanding of no relationship being able to go anywhere, so it's not even worth trying :)

In other news, today was the second day with the girls and they are hard-workers. I know that they look up to both me and Jess, so I have to be constantly aware of my actions, and learn patience in dealing with attitudes :) Today we taught English in the morning at the baseball field, played around a little, ate lunch, and played volleyball all afternoon.

Oh I forgot! Yesterday night; Me, Mackalah, and Katy took Jess's car (she lets me use it sometimes to have a social life :)) to the baseball field to watch a men's softball game with Jess and some of the guys from the baseball site. My friend Johan and I ended up playing this stupid rock, paper, scissors game. If you lost, you got punched by the winner in the arm as hard as you can. You keep going until someone can't take it anymore. Jess is pretty tough, and I certainly am not. But the boys are always calling me a scaredy cat, so I finally just did it. And today, I have a huge bruise on my left arm to prove it. Johan definitely won. We decided that we needed to make a club of these people that do these stupid games and get hurt while doing them. It's called "los masacis ( i have no idea how to spell it) but it means someone who likes pain for fun haha.

That's definitely not me, but oh well :)

I felt since I've been here that I am not doing as much as I would like to, to a certain extent. So I asked Jess if the girls were ever going to play in a tournament or anything. She was like no but that's a great idea! So we talked to Raul, and we are gonna start kinda slow at first. We are planning to play one game against a team in a different community called La Vega. Raul is planning is perfectly so that the boys will be playing a game there as well. That way we can all cheer each other on. That means that in practice this week, we have told the girls that they need to work hard and we will pick the best 8 to play in the game. I'm really excited and hope it works out!

Prayer requests:

The game against La Vega!

More bonding, and patience with my high school girls

Me being able to be a good example :)

Baseball Watching/Intern Outing/ Carnival

Sorry I haven't blogged in a few days, sometimes I feel like I need to wait longer in between blogs so I can build up the suspense, and make it more interesting. I'm sorry if this is long, but I'm considering this my journal, because my other journal is conversations with God.

Anyways, Thursday and Friday were the most relaxed days I've had since I've been here and it was awesome. Thursday we picked up some of the volleyball girls and boys from two different communities and went to go watch the older boys play against another community of boys. Since I love baseball, I was easily entertained. It also helped that I had little Weme there to play around with. (a little girl that is attached to me and Jess from one of the communities). After a long day of watching that, we headed back to the base. I only had a small break because we had an intern meeting, then the big staff bible study which was really good.

Friday... started off the same as Thursday. Katy took a day off from her site and decided to join us for the day which I loved. We went to OUR field this time to play, and it was fun to watch our boys enjoy playing. Jess, Katy, and I escaped for a little bit to get some frozen yogurt, then headed back to the field to pick everyone up to head to the river to jump off some big rocks.

On the long walk down there, I shared a little devotional with the girls about the harshness of words and how sometimes what we think won't hurt someone's feelings, might have hit pretty close to home for them. It was an issue that needed to be brought up with this group, and Jess got to relate it to them personally after I was done.

Jumping off the rocks was fun, I am too scared to jump off the taller one, and get constantly made fun of for being a scaredy cat by the baseball boys. I'm okay with it, and can embrace that I really am scared of a lot! :)

Last night was also the banquet for the team that's been here for the past two weeks. We got dressed in nice clothes, had dinner, and had a little goodbye ceremony for them. I got to know this team pretty well, considering I didn't have any specifically at the girls sports site. I wasn't as attached as some of the other interns, but i'm hoping since I have two high schoolers this next week that I will build great relationships with them.

After the banquet, four of the girl interns decided we wanted a night out. I was already planning on going out, b/c Jess had invited me. But it was fun to invite Angie, Mackalah, and Katy as well. I knew that they were just as excited as me to have some independence and get off the base. We also found out that we didn't have a curfew for once and were super pumped!

We went to a carnival. A Dominican version of a carnival. There were about 3 rides, all looking equally old and rickety. I only went on one, and it was the scariest one! The ferris wheel. Now your typical ferris wheel is a nice fun ride to check out the scenery and have a nice chat. NO. Not in the DR. This ferris wheel was about 30 feet high, and went around so fast I felt sick. I sat in the middle between Jess and Danjelly ( I don't think that's how it's spelled, but he's one of the boys from the sports site.. he's about 18 maybe? it's hard to tell age here haha) I linked arms with both of them and held on for my life. I lost my voice for the rest of the night b/c i was screaming NO so much and screaming b/c I was so scared. Jess LOVED to tip the cart we were on to make it scarier, and I saw my life flash before me a few times :) But i'm glad I did it :)

Today, since it's our FREE weekend, we slept in. YAY! Ah one of the best feelings ever. Then we just all hung out most of the morning, played some games, ate lunch, and got ready for the day. We went into Santiago, which is about 40 min away. It's a big city, and we got to explore a little. We went to the monument, the DR version of a walmart, a tourist market, and TGI Fridays. YES, the real TGI Fridays. AMERICAN FOOD. I didn't realize how much I missed it until I smelled the familiar aromas when I walked in to the restaurant. It was so good, and well worth the spent day. As well as lots of laughter with all the other interns, with some good memories made. We added one more intern to our group on Thursday, her name is Laurel. We are still getting to know her, but she seems really nice! We have two more coming tomorrow, and Mackalah and I are adding one to our room, which we are a little nervous about b/c we are so close and kinda weird, we hope that she is too :)

Tomorrow, Coach Ivan is coming to pick me up so I can spend the day with him, his wife, and his group of high schoolers from Greenville. I'm really excited to spend some time with him in his home country! We are going to some waterfalls, and then a country club to eat and swim. I know i'll be exhausted tomorrow night, but I can't wait for some good quality time spent with the Estevez's! I'll blog again soon :)

Hiking Day

I would have to say, that today was one of the hardest physical experiences I've had. Jess and I along with about 14 others, hiked down a mountain into the valley into a rushing river. It has been raining a lot in the afternoons, so the water was really high and the current was really strong, which made this trip even more dangerous. There wasn't a set trail for this excursion, we just bushwhacked our way down and up. While down at the river, we had lunch and sat in the sun for a while and then Pastor Don ( the head pastor of a church that is here on an outreach) spoke. He was so good that Raul (boys sport site leader) asked him to speak at an outreach in the community that we did tonight.

Going into this hike, I had white tennis shoes. They are a lovely color of brown now, and so heavy from all the sand stuck in them. The way up was the worst, my calves burned the entire time and I almost didn't think I was going to make it. Raul had warned us about these poisonous plants that had spikes on them, and I made sure to stay clear of them, or so I thought. All of a sudden I felt this awful burning sensation in my leg right below my knee. I was like, "hey uhh Jess, my leg is burning" Raul heard me say that and quickly went into Man vs Wild mode. He said that there were bubbles of venom from the plant in my knee, so he used a cactus needle to pop them and squeeze it out of my skin. I took it like a man :)

But I had been noticing all that day that a couple of my bug bites were getting larger and were radiating heat. Jess seemed a little concerned, and said that if it gets worse we need to tell the doctor. On the way back from the hike, I told Raul that my knee was still hurting and he said that there was still more venom in there. I haven't had a chance to go the doctor yet, so just pray that I get a good night's sleep tonight :)

Even with all my cuts, scrapes, and bruises I'm glad I did it. I will be doing it two more times when I'm here, so I better get used to it. :)

Seeing God's creation in a whole new way always shows you how powerful he really is. I took some pictures and they will definitely be on facebook soon!

Feeling Free

These past few days, I've been pondering what God is going to teach me while i'm here.

I don't think I've found the answer quite yet. But I know he is continually teaching me different things.

This weekend was awesome to me, I feel like I really bonded with the interns a lot more than I have been, and we just all seem to click. At our weekly bible study on Sunday night, we started talking about the book Crazy Love. I've read a few chapters before, but I feel like this is going to be a really good opportunity to learn with our group.

Sunday morning at church we met a fellow group of Americanas as we are always called, and it was cool to see some other people doing mission work in Jarabacoa that aren't associated with Students International.

A new group of students came for just this week. Except they aren't students.. they are all adults, and mostly couples from one church. The head pastor and his wife, the college group pastor and his wife, the worship pastor and his wife and a few others. The head pastor,the college pastor, and the worship leader are all at the boy's sports site but since i'm there almost everyday I've gotten to know them a little bit. They are very interesting to talk to, and one of them even reminds me of my dad. It made me miss him and my family a lot today. I also think that these older pastoral men have a lot to teach me.

God has been working in my life, I am completely immersed in his word every morning during devotions, and have been having daily conversations with him by journaling.

Last night was the Servants Challenge. It's a time when we can have some really alone time with God, and with a partner of your choosing you was each other's feet and pray for each other. Mackalah and I of course were partners. But the crazy thing was, when we asked each other what to pray for, we both had already known the other's answer. God was really using both of us to speak to each other in a way we've never experienced before and it was so great.

Yesterday at the site, I got a new nickname from one of the 7 year old boys. Besides Cristina, Catcha, and Cristi.. I have now adopted.. "cute eyebrows" which in spanish is las cejas linda. Which was SO weird to me haha. Jess and I have had a few good laughs over it since then, so it's probably worth it to have to hear it haha.

Today, was English class in the morning. Put up a quick prayer for two of my girls Kasey and Lili, they took a big English test today to get into a WONDERFUL school called Duolos. They are so smart, they need to be there!

During siesta (the countrywide 2 hour lunch break), we went to a baseball players house for lunch. The food was amazing as always. Then after lunch we started the long trek down to the riverfront to play some games. I saw some crazy dark clouds, but decided to ignore them since it has rained EVERY afternoon we have been here. We started walking and it started pouring. And I mean... the BIGGEST water droplets I have ever seen. There was no coverings or anything anywhere, so my only choice in my dry clothes and tennis shoes was to get soaked. At first I hated it, and was worried about my belongings getting wet. But we found an umbrella and someone carried all the bags under the umbrella. I've never experienced a freeing feeling like that before. It was like.. all was right with the world in just that moment b/c I was so out of control about how my body felt. No matter how cold or wet I was becoming, we reached the riverfront, there is a huge parking lot there that we played tennis ball baseball in, in the pouring rain. It was a BLAST. A moment I'll never forget. I love being the only girl with Jess at this site for right now, we get along with these boys as if they were our own brothers, and it's so nice not to have to impress anyone! I think i've worn makeup only a couple times since i've been here :)