"I aloha you"

So, every week I teach my students a new hawaiian word. The other week I taught them that "aloha" means hello, goodbye, and love. Right after this explanation, one of my students writes me this...

aahhhhh the joys of being a third grade teacher :)

que Dios te bendiga, Ingrid...

No, I didn't forget about my blog.  Things have been going well here. School is rolling, and we are already done with the first quarter! My kids are improving tremendously and learning a lot.

I'll fill you all in on school and life here soon... I just wanted to inform people that i received really sad news the other day.  So remember how I lived with a family in Honduras in Fall 2007? well, we still keep in touch through facebook, and the other day I was notified of some sad news.  Turns out, my host "mom", Ingrid, was pregnant and when she went into labor her, my host "father", Edgar, and "little brother", Andy, went to the hospital. She gave birth to a beautiful baby boy named Rafaelito, but later there were complications with Ingrid.  I'm not exactly sure what happened, but she ended up passing away three hours later after Rafaelito was born.  I am in total shock about this and cant even imagine what that could be like for Edgar, Andy, and the rest of the family. Now Edgar is to care for both of his sons, with the help of his family.
Ingrid was a woman of great character and such strong faith in God. She was someone to look up to, and she is one of the people in my life (at the time I was in Honduras) to really show me what a relationship with God really looks like, and the importance of relationships - with friends, family, and God.  Please pray for the Areano family, as they deal with these tragic, unexpected emotions along with caring and loving a brand new baby.

Rest in Peace, Ingrid... you will truly be missed...

"Light of Life"

So, school is going well at JCS. It's nice to finally have a routine and be productive instead of chaos all the time.  Starting in a couple of weeks I'm going to start teaching piano once a week to 4 kids at JCS.  I'm super excited! One of my 3rd graders signed up, so that'll be fun :)

Here's some fun news... I decided to become one of the leaders for Younglife Jarabacoa! If you don't know what Younglife is, it's basically a "youth group" for high schoolers just beginning to hear about who Jesus is and what Christianity is all about.  Every other Tuesday we have club, which is like youth group but not super deep.  Then, in between club weeks, theres a Bible study that the leaders will run with certain groups of high schoolers to bring the message more "below the surface." I think younglife is such a great idea and i'm SO excited to be a part of it. Younglife is also in the states, and pretty much all over the world, so that's really fun too. 
Two weeks ago we had a younglife retreat for all the leaders at a younglife camp in Pico Duarte - 10 minutes away from my house.  It was fun meeting other American teachers from Santiago Christian School and Doulos Discovery School, and just getting away from real life for a weekend. Here's some pictures!

Under the water

Eating "moro" - a mix of rice and beans, and "tostones" - fried plaintains

All the Younglife leaders for Jarabacoa and Santiago!

So that's younglife so far! our first club was last week tuesday, and we had 26 kids show up! it was a good time - but started out stressful. We had everything set up - powerpoint, sounds, music, etc...and then 10 minutes before we were going to start, the power went out, and it was completely dark. Luckily, 10 minutes later, the power came back on and we continued as planned. You just have to expect the power to go out here at least once everyday I guess.

Bible verse that's been speaking out to me: John 8:12 When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, "I am the light of the world.  Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life." How awesome is that? Let's go be the light of life :)

Survived the first week :)

In church today they touched on Psalm 63. Something about this Psalm really spoke out to me... "O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water.  I have seen you in the sanctuary and beheld your power and your glory. Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you.  I will praise you as long as I live, and in your name I will lift up my hands...."  I really felt God at church today. The worship was amazing.  Don't you love that feeling?

Anyway...
So, i am officially a third grade teacher, and survived the first week of school! Last monday on the first day of school, i almost freaked out in my head and was like "oh my gosh. i am in charge of teaching these kids and preparing them for fourth grade/life for the next YEAR..." things like that. Then i calmed down and started having fun.  i absolutely LOVE teaching. I really think this is my calling and what God wants me to do with my life. How awesome right? My kids are super energetic and hyper... especially the boys. It's funny and difficult, that these kids come from a very social culture, so they constantly want to talk to each other all the time - even more so than american third graders. It's okay though - nothing too big i can't handle!

Let's meet my kids...

Ezequiel

Geremy

Ismeldy

Alexander

Lisbeth

Cristofer

Juan

Mayreline

Rosaleen

Gabriel

Jennifer

Mario

So those are my kids! They're really good for the most part, just talk a lot. Aren't they cute? haha

Prayer requests:Please pray for the health and safety of me and my kids.  It seems like something is going around already, and to get sick right now would not be fun.  Also, one of my coworkers is about 11 weeks pregnant, and has been in and out of the hospital this weekend for having a fever of 104.  Please pray that she gets better soon and everything is okay with the baby!

School starts TOMORROW!!

Hello everyone! So I’ve been here almost three weeks now and I’m getting very anxious for school to start! Since being here, we have had orientation kind of stuff every day at school. It’s been fun getting to know the other new teachers here and hanging out with them quite a bit pretty much every day.
Here’s a little something about a few of the girls I hang out with…
Melissa is 26 and from Colorado. Shes teaching 7/8 Grammar and very “spunky” and fun, and loves to joke around. Our personalities are similar and we get along great!

Natalie is 24 from Fort Wayne, Indiana. She’s been teaching at JCS for the last two years and is teaching the other third grade class along with me! She also has a motorcycle, which is a fun way to get around town here.

Jessica is 23 from Holland, MI. She went to Hope and is teaching 6th grade at JCS. She’s really athletic and wakes up early to work out everyday.. I keep telling myself I’m going to do that, but it hasn’t happened yet…. Haha

My roommates are…
Elissa is 24 from Houston, TX. She’s teaching PreK 2, the two year olds part time.

Natalia is 34 from Flint, MI. She’s teaching 2nd grade, and helping me with which of my third graders I need to be aware of!

I’m having a great time with these girls. They are amazing and I feel like it’s totally a God thing that we all came together like this! What’s really crazy, is that in my process of finding a teaching job overseas, I seriously considered this school in Peru, but when I talked to the administrators of the school I didn’t feel right about teaching there. I was talking to Melissa and the other girls about this, just making conversation, and Melissa was like “oh my gosh, I almost taught at that same school too!” and she later went on to say how she didn’t feel right about that school either. Isn’t that strange? And now we all are together in the Dominican Republic teaching at Jarabacoa Christian School. Small world!

Anyway, since we haven’t been having school planning or anything, us girls have been watching a ton of movies and playing a lot of card games. One night, the girls that live upstairs from us (other JCS teachers) had some Dominican friends over. The night turned from eating tacos and listening to praise music to dancing the merengue and bachata, and playing cards. It was fun! And I got to dance with a cute Dominican guy  Other things we’ve been doing were going to the pool at some hotel for the day, went to Santiago to watch a movie in the theater and ate at Chilis, and I had to go to Santo Domingo for the day for some teaching conference. It’s been fun! And quite the adventures!

A bunch of the new staff at Rancho2Rios pool

Melisa, Natalie, Jessica, and I at the river in Jarabacoa

Me and Benjamin

on our way to Santiago!

On parent's night

Dancing with Joann ("Ja-wan")

Some things that are different, and take getting used to:
- COLD showers.
- The power goes out at least once almost every day. REALLY ANNOYING… especially when laundry needs to get done, and teacher stuff.
- No dryer.
- No microwave.
- No flushing toilet paper
- No drinking water out of the faucet - so far I’ve caught myself every time I get the urge to simply drink out of the kitchen sink!
- Spiders and ants everywhere in the house. Gross.
Just the little things. They’re really no big deal, but still something to constantly be aware of. Funny how us Americans take all these things for granted huh?

My desk area (with reading fish on the Bulletin Board)

School starts TOMORROW. Here’s a peek as to what my finished classroom looks like for tomorrow! I have 12 students... Alexander, Jennifer, Lisbeth, Mayreline, Juan, Ismeldy, Rosaleen, Ezequiel, Geremy, Mario, Cristofer, and Gabriel. 3 of my students have the last name of Rodriguez, although they're not related. Kind of like the last name of "Lee" in Hawaii huh? haha

Class from my desk

Job Wheel

The discipline.

Cubbies

Desk with the caterpillar name tags :)

My door :)

Me in front of my "Fruit of the Spirit" tree - the third grade religion theme this year!

Thank you all for the support. I feel so incredibly honored to have this opportunity to touch young lives, and every person in my life has helped me get this far. I’m so excited for what there is to come! God is doing incredible things!

I'll be sure to write soon about the first day :)

Bienvenido Jarabacoa, Republica Dominicana!

August 3, 2010

Soooooo I made it to the Dominican republic! My flight was delayed in Miami for about four hours, so I didn’t arrive in Santiago until about 11pm. As soon as I got off the plane, I could tell I was in a foreign country just by the smell. Going through immigration was easy, and while I was waiting for my bags I met a guy who was teaching at a different school in Jarabacoa, really close to the school I’ll be working at. It was comforting to know there were other Americans in the same boat as me on my flight! I was really nervous about who was picking me up because my plane was so late getting in, but when I walked outside there was some random guy holding a sign with my name on it, so I figured that was my ride. The whole car ride to Santiago was about 45 minutes, and I talked to my “driver” in Spanish about what there was to do in Jarabacoa, so I learned a little about the culture of the DR on my way there. Although, I still don’t really know who this random guy was and his relation to JCS (Jarabacoa Christian School). Oh well!

When I got to my house, my new roommate Elissa was there to greet me (even though it was around 12am by that point). We ended up chatting till about 1:30am and going online, so that was fun. My house is kind of like a duplex. There’s three other JCS teachers living upstairs, and me and two others live downstairs.  When you walk in theres like a double metal gate kind of thing, plus metal bars on all the doors and windows. There’s also three locks on our front door alone… a little sketch but it’s a nice house. When you walk in there’s a larger living room with a couch and a couple chairs, then to your left theres a dining area with a bench and table setting. The kitchen is down the hall on the left and then there’s three bedrooms and three bathrooms (but only two bathrooms work). My room has some crazy pink walls, a makeshift desk made from wood and cinderblocks, a larger closet, a small nightstand, and a twin size bed. It’s pretty spacious! I also get my own bathroom and shower, so that’s super nice (and it makes up for the pink walls HAH). All in all, I’m satisfied and feel really blessed with what was provided for us! 

messy room

clean room!

My bathroom

big closet :)

welcome sign in our house :)

Elissa doing the dishes

aaaand we still are sitting here... 3 hours later - because we have internet FINALLY!! (Johanna, Elissa, and Amanda - new teachers at JCS)

from in the inside of the house, looking out the front door...lots of bars!

so excited!

Today me, Elissa, Jessica, and Melissa (other new teachers at JCS) walked into the “centro” of Jarabacoa where there’s more shops and grocery stores.  I bought some essential stuff for my room, and we got ice cream downtown as well. The other girls are super awesome and have great personalities. I’m sure we’ll fit just fine! We finished off the day with spaghetti for dinner, and watching “Taken” on Elissa’s computer.  (We have no TV.. so it’ll be movies for the next two years! Haha) Overall, I’m really excited about what there is to come! Tomorrow we have orientation, so that’ll be fun getting to know all the other teachers.

Hope everyone is doing well!! The Dominican Republic continuously reminds me of a mixture between Hawaii and Honduras, and the people I’m working with remind me of west Michigan, so I’m constantly reminded of everything! I miss you guys.  I’ll fill you in on more later!!

JESS

Viva Mexico!

So, although I'm already in the Dominican Republic, I figured I'd fill everyone in on our HS mission trip to Ensenada, Mexico last week.
So, we left July 23 on a Friday to travel on a red eye to San Diego.  I was pretty much freaking out the week we left because I wasn't coming back to Hawaii in between going to Mexico and the DR, so packing was very hectic. I spent almost 8 hours freaking out and packing for Mexico and the DR, so it was super crazy. Then, leaving on Friday was really diffult...saying goodbye to family and friends that I probably won't see for at least a year or so (maybe family sooner? hope so!).
We got to San Diego early Saturday morning and waited for about 4-5 hours in the airport until we got vans to drive us to Mexico.  During that time, one of my friends from my youth group in High School lives in San Diego, and she was nice enough to come to the airport to pick up my two huge suitcases with all me DR stuff and brought them to her house for the week while we were going to be in Mexico (Thanks kinsey!).  I was going to stay with her for a night before heading out to the DR right after leaving the group in San Diego. So that was nice.

Anyway, after we FINALLY got the vans all rented, we went to some place to shower in Mission Valley, and headed on our way to Mexico! The drive to Ensenada was about two or three hours, and when we arrived at Rancho El Milagro (the orphanage we worked in) the tents were all ready and dinner was almost served. We ate so well!!!
So, throughout the week in a nutshell -->
We painted, fixed roofs, dug ditches, built walls, poured cement, built bridges, and more all over the orphanage.  In the afternoons, we did activities with the kids, like decorating pillowcases, constructing key chains, decorating other toys, and making picture frames.  We all had such a wonderful time bonding with the kids throughout the week - no matter what the language barrier of most of our group. 
Since I spoke the most Spanish, I was pretty much nominated to lead the chapel services with the kids at the orphanage, which we did three times throughout the week. This consisted of singing praise songs, acting out a bible story, and a little message at the end of each talk.  It was really fun! and a great way to practice my Spanish :)

Josh, Me, and Eli at the top of our "hike" to see the view of the orphanage on Sunday

Street Ministry Kids, with their decorated pillows and leis!

Kimber, 5 years old :)

One of the kids at Rancho El Milagro

Two other kids at Rancho El Milagro

Christie, Jamie, Brandon (Rancho El Milagro), and Me after the last "capilla" or chapel with the kids

We won't see each other till next summer :(

I could go into more detail about the trip, but theres just so much i can say and i could go on and on for a long time.  if you want to know more, please dont hesitate to ask! i would love to talk story with you about mexico :)

More about the DR soon!!!

Jess