Dominican Republic

Today will be our third day at Batey Libertad, but I already feel like we have been here for weeks. I´ve gotten to know many people, and after yesterday I finally feel like I am being useful.

The first day at the batey was full of ups and downs for me. At first it was amazing to finally be there and play with the many, many children. They all want your attention and affection so bad and that first day it felt so good to be able to give it to them. I was hanging out with one little girl, and I thought it would be great to do hair because they love to play with hair, like all little kids. I went to get some little hair bands and clips that I had brought from home for the kids and although I´d just been playing with one little girl once I brought out this bag of hair goodies within five seconds twenty little kids were there and fighting over the hair ties and clips.

Shocked, I didn´t know what to do. A boy about twelve years old or so but very mature came to help and organized all the kids, handing clips out one by one. I felt so stupid as he explained to me slowly that if I give one child something, I have to give one to every child. In the excitement of that first morning and my wanting to do something and give and give, I´d done something very stupid because causing conflict among the children, or in general bringing conflict to a community you are there to help (which is all too easy if you do not think about what you are doing) is no gift at all. So I understood right away that the most effective way to help in any situation is by spending time and thoughtful effort, not giving away at the first moment material stuff, although you want to give everything you own when it is so painful to see that you have so much that others do not.

But since then, I´ve had a great time interacting with the kids in a way that seems to be so much more meaningful to them, by teaching them games we know or helping them with their english or listening to music together. I have been trying to get to know people of all the different ages, because of course it is easiest to play with the little kids, but I learn a lot also from talking with the kids my age- learning what their daily life is like (we are more alike as teens than different) and working with the adults.

The men have work to do sometimes (lots of work on building the house, for example) but in general I see them much less busy than the women, who are left with all the work of running a family and a household- taking care of the children, washing dishes, cooking, cleaning. We of course have these same typical gender roles in American home life, but here the work for the women seems much more strenuous here. I was so happy when the women of the family I eat lunch with let me help out in the kitchen. Although my Spanish has already gotten so much better, we didn´t communicate much - it was more than enough to just work together.

Finally we got to play soccer with the girls yesterday afternoon! This was lots of fun and it was great to get to know the girls. The first day it was mostly guys that had reached out to talk to me, beign as the girls are busy helpign at home. I want to learn mroe about the football para la vida program.

Today I hope to go to the medical center and help there translating.

Shara Esbenshade
University Laboratory High School
Urbana, IL