July 11th I drove to Miami to meet up with the rest of the CWE volunteers at the airport for a week in the Dominican Republic. We arrived to a sweet surprise. If you've looked over some of the previous trips, you've noticed that we don't always get a nice place to stay for the week. Here is a photo of the house CWE had rented for us. Nice huh?
It was huge, on a golf course, with a pool and even air conditioned.
The following day was Sunday, we went to services at the SCORE complex. The music was very nice, the guitar player was excellent.
After lunch, we went to the jobsite to unpack the shipping container and prepare the job site for the following day's work.
I noticed a trend in these photos.
I'm doing more standing than working.
Monday we arrived early in the morning and got right to work.
Before too long, it was beginning to look like a building.
By the time the girls arrived with lunch, Ken looked like he'd been bathed in mortar.
Lori was surprised to see the guard had a shotgun. Is she trying to take it from him
As soon as we finished lunch, we went right back to work. Oh wait, we're just standing again.
As the week went on, we kept on building. The guard even helped by leveling some dirt on the floor, even with his shotgun over his shoulder.
Lori liked things neat. She picked up a lot of trash and here she is picking up rocks from around the job to help fill in the floor.
Bruce and I taking a water break.
Having a laugh while taking a break.
Some cattle walking by.
Wednesday we took off early and went to the beach. How do you like that farmer's tan?
We had fun at the beach that day. We swam across a reef to where the waves were breaking. It was a lot harder than you would think. The little channel between the reef and the beach had a current like a river. When you would try to swim to the beach from the reef you would be swept away.
By Thursday afternoon, we had all the block laid and were winding down.
We even played a game of baseball with a duct tape ball, a stick for a bat and bases made of cardboard. It was about three steps for me between bases.
Friday morning we went to the Jumbo, it's like a super Wal-Mart and bought some food. We were going to a village out in the sugar cane fields and wanted to take some food to share with the people there. Some of them don't have enough to eat so every little bit helps.
Upon arrival, the kids swarmed us. We gave piggy back rides and just hung out. I don't really know what the attraction is to us.
Here, Kiko is giving out one of the bags of food. They have the families listed in order of most needy to least. We fed the most needy 28 families for a few days with our visit. Also gave out some nice new CWE shirts.
We left the village after spending an hour or two there and went to a girls orphanage. It turns out it's the same one we visited on the trip in 2004, 5 years ago. I wondered how many of the little girls I saw then were still there, now as teenagers.
They were happy just to hang out with us and have visitors. Oh yeah, they liked the stuffed animals too.
We left the orphanage, did some shopping, at dinner then went to bed.
Real early Saturday morning we got our things together and headed home. It was another great trip.
Kevin