Earth Day at Altagracia; Playground Repair at Hernando Alonso

 We are halfway through our trip, and have really hit our stride.  Today we divided into three sub-groups, continuing our work at the Altagracia school, returning to the school at Hernando Alonso, and providing nurse practitioner Madonna Gordon the opportunity to connect with the local medical community.  Since I can only be in one place at once, I have commissioned a report from student Chloe Leslie, who was teaching at Altagracia, and I’ll fill in what I experienced at Hernando Alonso.

 

First, here’s Chloe’s report:  “Hump Day at La Altagracia: Today, the DRP group divided and conquered; Rob Grabill and four students headed by bus, after dropping 3 students and others off at La Altagracia, to Hernando Alonso do some important work in revamping a playground and basketball court. Beginning the day with both the DR National Anthem, along with the Star Spangled Banner, and raising of the flag, the students then presented a quick informative presentation on Earth Day, and the importance of taking care of our mother! Students focused on teaching body parts to the older kids, and worked on school supplies vocabulary with the younger groups. Met with many enthusiastic and happy students, many rounds of Simon Says, Head Shoulders Knees & Toes, and the Hokey Pokey took place outside, creating a fun and educational morning. After returning for lunch, Rita organized a trash pick-up activity around the school, and each DRP teacher led a group to pick up as much trash as possible, while multitasking and also quizzing them on their vocab. We left with many hugs and goodbye thumb wars, and are looking forward to another day tomorrow!”

 

Next, here’s my report from Hernando Alonso:  We visited the little school in the hills outside of Cotui on Sunday, and returned today to work on a badly-needed project.  The basketball court/playground which we built in 2018 had really deteriorated.  The lines were long gone, and the surface was rough and pitted.  We hired a crew to put down a new concrete surface, and they finished Sunday just as we were arriving to visit.  That gave us the perfect opportunity to come back today and repaint the lines.  Our first job was sweeping the court, which was covered with residue from the resurfacing. Teachers brought us brooms, including a few straight out of Harry Potter.  We got busy, and soon interested students were begging to help, and several managed to talk their way into borrowing brooms. Together, we did a thorough sweeping job.  Working with a skilled local crew of two men, we got right to work measuring the area and using chalk to mark the lines.  Soon, the two started painting the white lines on the border and the free throw area, and our five students followed with the colored paint.  It was hard work to stay accurate and paint within the lines, and it was a hot day.  But we persisted, and made good progress.  At one point early in the afternoon, it began to rain, and I had to use up a prayer I was planning to use for the beleaguered Boston Celtics to make the rain go away.  The rain left, of course, but I fear for the Celtics tomorrow night. Once most of the painting in the free through area was done, the local crew, with the help of Lewis Marte, our wonderful translator and local guide, fashioned a beautiful and almost accurate three-point arc.  They painted the lines, and we followed immediately with the colorful paint inside and also beyond the arc.  We even had some great help from older students, who were just as fussy as were we about accuracy. By the end of school we were done, and it looked great.

 

We got pulled away from our cleanup for a small and pretty moving ceremony featuring two shy students reading a wonderful thank you note that they had written together in English.  They then led us to the library that DR Projects had built in 2017.  I wrote about this on Sunday, and how good it felt to see how full and active and well-kept it was.  The two girls continued their simple ceremony of thanks.  I showed them the green paint on my pants which was from 2018, and told the girls that they and their school were always in our thoughts and prayers.  We promised to return again, and it’s a promise we may even keep later this week.