Pool and School in the Rain

July 9, 2013. Yup... Fail. But it wasn't my fault! Haha I studied in the morning with the goal in the forefront of my mind for after lunch. But as soon as lunch was ready, talk of going to a pool for a birthday party was brought up. I tried to back out saying I need to start my PC project but of course, "You can start tonight when we come back!" Lol They won. Heading out around 1pm, we caught a free bola on the back of a pickup truck going 80mph on the Duarte :) Pretty crazy. We made it to the pool; Dulce, Lili, Yasmelin, Victor, David, Alex, Margerita, the birthday girl, and I. They swam and my plan was to not because of my disease. Buuuut yet again, fail. But again, a good fail :)  There was rain, chocolate milk, teaching them Marco Polo (so funny), birthday cake (!!), weird cheese, crackers, salami, and friends that came who spoke English. The little girls were 7 and 9 and the boy was 13 years old. They were born and raised in the states but their father is from Villa so they come every summer. They were adorable and it was so funny to watch them speak English and have all of my Dominicans just stare uncomfortably. For the first time since I've been in site, it wasn't me who felt lost and unsure. Haha The rains came hard around 6 so we left in the back of another pick-up truck. Seriously though? Rain freaking hurts when you're cruising that fast! 

We of course had to go arriba first to let Dulce's mom know that we were alright because she called 10X. Then we doubled back, went home, changed, and ate tostones and salami :). Exhausted and happy I went to bed.

July 10, 2013. Well. The tropical storm hit a little today.

This is me walking to the school.

And this is me waiting in the school.

:) I'll be honest. I thought about skipping. Hell, everyone else does it. But I didn't. I got my ass out there, retrieved the key, and set up my room. A half an hour later, two kiddos showed up. One student would have made it all worth it and I had two. I couldn't tell you how excited I was :D. We ordered the alphabet together (they knew maybe two letters out of 27), and I had them write it in their notebooks. Their homework? Read the alphabet to someone in their family and have that family member sign below. We'll see how that goes. It's just as much for the students to practice as it is an experiment for me O:)

Since that took so long I scratched the rest of my plans and took each of them home with my umbrella. The next hour and a half was spent reading, listening to the rain, and looking at all the pretty materials that the school got. Lili and Alex came by to get me (sent by Dulce) because it was raining. I told them I was going to stay because if just one more student showed up, I want to be there. They need to know that I care. So they left me. To which the thought followed... "Wait. Alex is in my class. Why can he walk down and cross the river to go to Dulce's house while it's raining but can't come a little further to class?"  *sigh*

But at 11:15, Genesis came :). She and I worked for a while and then she wanted to draw. As much as it pained me, I said no because I want to make sure she knows that she can't always draw... But I will be sure to use her strength of art in my future plans with her.

Dulce brought me a mango (in the rain!) so after class I ate, packed up, and walked Genesis home. She then greeted me with hot soup for the rainy day-yesssss. How did I get so lucky with this family? Even if some of them are apparently theives... Lol. I decided against the afternoon class but with much guilt... But it was raining really hard and if the street was that flooded in the morning? Ugh, just trying to make myself feel better... But seriously it stormed and I laid in bed for the next 4 hours and it never stopped. One thunder boom scared me out of my sleep haha.

So to save you from boredom, that's how the rest of the night went. Rain, dinner of yuca and eggs (can't wait to be on my own so I can make a ton of coffee on days like this), rain, reading, rain, not understanding my host dad explain something off in the distance with a tree, rain, hot milk and galletas, rain, bedtime.

Buenas noches.