Friends and Laughs

The last two weeks I've been feeling pretty crummy with a nasty cold and cough; something I brought back with me from the Dominican Republic. It really hit me hard once I made it back to Friday Harbor. When I get sick, I can really suck into self. Thus, my blogging was halted for a week. The title picture now up on the blog was taken at Bahia de los Aguiles, one of the most beautiful beaches in the world, in my opinion. It is located near Perdonales in the D.R., about a 3 hour drive from Barahona. Willi and Miraldo decided to bury Collin in the sand and the laughter was plentiful during the process. I love the fact that the laughter is contagious. See the photo of Austin and his seaweed hair and Rambo dangling his pink shoes over the front of the boat. Both of these scenes generated a ton of laughter amongst all of us. Gershon and Manuel climbing the coconut tree for fresh coconuts at the Casa also provided many laughs. I still don't know how they do that, amazing! Laughter on a daily basis is something I really miss in the Dominican Republic. The people are so joyful and seem to take life a little less seriously. Yesterday in the barber shop CNN news was on and there was anything but laughter there as we were bombarded with the news of the theater killings in Colorado. This hit me like a ton of bricks and sadness swept over me like a dense fog. The seriousness of life, and the reality that life is short and precious is in my conciousness today.

more and more amigos

Sitting here listening to almost four hours of thunder clapping above us in the sky, causes me to reflect on the Dominican Republic again and my friends there. The type of thunder we are experiencing around Friday Harbor is very unusual; more common in the D.R. Our Dominican friend list is exhausting, which is very cool. I have even started in on our new American friends who visited us this summer. That will be another blog story...so awesome what God has done this past summer, knitting our hearts with others. Shooting the basketball is our friend Leo, the Casa handy-man/helper, who stays at the Casa five nights a week. He has become a great friend, practicing english and spanish together, playing dominoes in the evenings, greeting me in the mornings when I wander down to the kitchen to get the coffee going. I miss the morning laughter with him that began every day. Standing in front of the new basketball basket are Nando and Franklin. They are two young guys I've known for four years now, who live in Los Robles. Both of them are in the COTN university program. Franklin's english has improved a ton! They are both young leaders in their community and I'm encouraged by their life and faith every time I see them. Alejandro is a driver and mechanic who works for COTN. He has also become a great friend. On the side, he makes beautiful jewelry with larimar, the blue stone that is only found near Barahona in the D.R. Willi, Rambo, Renso, Juanchy and I gathered together for a photo the day before we left. All of these guys, young and old, have helped our family out in many many ways over the years. Juanchy is the lead translator, and has helped us with team, communication and learning spanish. Rambo also translates, drives and helps out, Willi is just a fun young guy who is a helper and Renso is a driver who is studying to become a lawyer, attending night classes. Our cooks, Manuela and Iris are pictured with Carly in typical form, laughing and singing while preparing awesome meals in the kitchen. We love them! Pictured in the blog banner are Monique, Mikaela and Magali, a couple of young ladies who Monique tutored in English in Los Robles. Their meetings were informal, yet very productive because they had more one on one time together. Monique got help from them with her Spanish too.

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Friends and more friends

Monique and I are home now in Friday Harbor, thanks to friend Mike Martin who went beyond the call of duty to pick us up at 12:15 a.m. at SeaTac. Thanks so much Mike! I continue to reflect on friendships in this blog and on Facebook. On the way to the airport yesterday we got to do something I've wanted to do for three years now. My brother Jim is a professional baseball scout working in So. Calif. for the Boston Red Sox. Here in the Dominican Republic, baseball is the number ONE sport. All the kids play baseball and dream of being in the Liga Grande one day. (MLB) In the Dominican they do not have a draft system like in the U.S.A. A prospect is discovered by a private scout, who acts as an agent for the player, taking the kid in to his baseball school and developing him, so that one day the agent might sign him to a professional contract with one of the major league teams. All the major league teams have baseball academies near Santo Domingo. Yesterday, thanks to David Cuevas, COTN-DR Venture team coordinator, and a lover of baseball, we visited the Boston Red Sox academy and saw a game before flying back home. I'm pictured with David and his son in front of the academy office. We had a great time! The next photo is with my friend Pablo. Pablo and I, along with others, have gone into the bateyes to tell our fatherhood stories and we've seen God open the hearts of the young people to share their stories too. We find healing together in the love of Jesus, and lean into the Father's love for us. Monique and I are pictured with Franklin. He works in the COTN office and invited us to his church last summer. This summer we were invited to do a marriage conference there. The conference spanned over three evenings once a week. Franklin did all the translating and also helped us out by translating all of our other conferences. He is a great friend of our family. After our marriage conference at Templo Biblico, we had a photo taken with Julio and Maritza and a young couple from the church. Julio is the pastor and his wife Maritza is the director of Happy Little Faces, Felices Caritas, a school for handicapped children in Barahona. It is the only school of its kind there. Last but not least, the girls are pictured with Manuela, our dear friend and cook at Casa Batesada. She is a special friend, someone who has served our family in so many ways.

More friendship photos

Friendships

One of the beautiful things we see here every year is the friendships the develop and grow. Sometimes the friendships are new, sometimes they are acquaintances that grow into real friendship. The new photo on the blog is one of Fred, CJ and Rambo. Rambo was one of our translators for the basketball camp. He very hard with Fred during the teaching sessions and they have become friends. The following photos show other friendships that are beginning and or growing. We look forward to seeing our team again and growing friendships within our team in Friday Harbor. We will do this by opening our house for "Casa Nights" throughout the summer.

Blessing a family

One gift God had for me while our Friday Harbor team was here working on cement floors in Altagracia, is seeing our guys and gals experience the joy and thankfulness a family had for the work of laying a cement floor in their home. Here is our team with a family in Altagracia. Some of the guys from the community help us too and they are pictured with us. Ellie, Carly, Lizzy and Monique entertained the kids who always swarm around the project to see the Americanos.

Team in Altagracia

We took this team photo in front of the "Hands" Austin and Jordan Nash painted last year in Altagracia. We had just completed the cement floor work there.

Hard Work

The cement floor project is hard work. As you have seen in other blog posts of teams, mixing the cement, shoveling and wheel barreling it to the house is exercise. Our Friday Harbor team did a fantastic job of sharing the work and keeping everyone involved. We had some excellent mixers; C.J., Isaiah, Austin, Vinnie and shovelers; Collin, Otis, Fred and Mandy. Monique got in there a bit too. I was great at leaning on the shovel. (-: I think everyone took a turn at the wheel barrel too. After the work was done, we had some play time with the kids and Collin needed an extra workout so he hoisted kids above his head for 10 minutes. They loved it as you can see. The two boys with their tires were ready to play their favorite game, rolling and balancing the tire, using a stick. They are very good.

Joy and Praise

One of the comments I heard most from our team is that of the joy that the children and young people have in life. This is a joy that comes from something outside themselves, as it becomes quite clear during a week spent here in the villages; that the joy doesn't come from the stuff people have acquired. Here is an example of Monique experiencing this joy a couple of weeks ago. See the video.

Spontaneous front porch Praise! from Victor Woodward on Vimeo.

"7" a shooting game

In this brief video you can see the enthusiasm and excitement the guys had during basketball camp. We were playing a shooting game at both baskets that I call, 7 game shooting. It is simple. The first team to make 7 baskets wins the game. Vinnie Carter was on the winning team; notice his excitement too. It was contagious for all.

7 game from Victor Woodward on Vimeo.

Reflections from the Casa rooftop

I was sitting on the roof of the Casa the other night and thinking, how in the world did you get here? Honestly, me in the Dominican Republic, for the fourth year in a row. Then I remembered a short conversation I had with my friend Darlene Clark about taking basketball to another place far far away from San Juan Island; teaching skills...a camp...wouldn't that be fun, she asked? She gave me a little encouragement, off she went and so did my imagination. However, I had no idea I would end up in the Dominican Republic, in fact the geography was pretty foggy in my brain...hmmmm? Where is the Dominican Republic? Here I sit, four years later, reflecting on last weeks camp, which saw young people from Friday Harbor, experiencing the people of the Dominican Republic, serving our great God through basketball and the hard work of mixing cement for families in need. I'm feeling pretty filled up with awe and wonder...just like I know our team is as they fly back to Seattle. Just take a close look at Otis, pictured with the little boy in his arms, a know what a huge impact he made on this little guys life. This scene was multiplied many times over this past week through everyone of us. More stories and pictures are coming. Thanks for making this possible for all of us through prayer and financial gifts. CJ said it best I think for all of us when he shared something like this at our good-bye party..."These memories will live with me forever and I have been changed."

Camp talks

On Tues. and Wed. we had our basketball camp, teaching basketball skills to the guys in the villages (bateyes). After each camp session we took the opportunity to share our life stories with the guys...stories about our walk with God. Manuel Emilio from Altagracia, (pictured here) also shared his life story with us. As you can see, all the guys were riveted and connecting with his story. Austin and C.J. shared too...which demonstrated that life's challenges aren't unique to different cultures. Austin encouraged the Dominican guys in how they treated Mandy with respect during the camp, and exhorted them to treat the girls in their villages to treat young women in the same way, with honor and respect. I'm so proud of our team, as they are mixing and building relationships with everyone here. So beautiful to see with my eyes and I hope the photos bring this back to you.

Team Friday Harbor is here

Hello friends and family! Our island to island outreach has begun. We welcomed all our friends from Friday Harbor here to the Casa on Sunday night. We were all very excited to see everyone and show them around, introducing them to our COTN family here. Here are a few photos and there will be more to come. There are a ton of photos posted on Facebook too. Check out our page; Dominican Republic 2012 - COTN. The basketball camp has been going great. It has been really really hot here during the camp...so we are guzzling the water. It is kind of weird, we get a few cooling rain showers, they stop and then the sun super heats us with intensity and humidity. I think I speak for my family in sharing that we are seeing relationships grow amongst our team and with the Dominican kids and young guys here in the bateys. Life changing stuff...things of God.

Saturday night

I wrote this last Saturday night...and am just now getting to post it. If you listen to the music above the post will have more flavor and meaning... It is Saturday night here in Barahona and that means that you can almost always hear music in the distance, sometimes merengue and sometimes bachata. I’m not sure I would want to be next to the speaker it is coming from, because it has to be very loud for me to hear it at the Casa. Whoa! This music makes you want to move...very fun to listen to and hard to stay seated. We just got news that the team from Seattle that is coming tonight won’t arrive until around 7:30 p.m. I’m pretty sure they are going to be exhausted. I hope their drive here goes smoothly. We had some thunderstorms here in Barahona today; refreshing when it happens, then the humidity usually ramps up big time. Our friend Manuel Emilio stopped by the Casa to see us and get out of the rain. He came in town with friend Yelin to get some medicine. Dominicans generally don’t like the rain, at least working or traveling in the rain, especially if your riding a motorcycle. Last night our friend Franklin invited Carly and I to his church. As we were driving around the streets of Barahona I was struck by how many neighborhood churches there were here. Our cook Manuela tells me that there are four churches on her street. Just driving through the neighborhoods you can here people singing praises to God. It was a Thursday night too. The people this church meet four times a week.

The Bread Man

This man, who I will call "The Bread Man", cruises up and down the streets in the barrious near Barahona selling bread to the small colmados, little one room family stores. He has bread hanging from every inch of his motorcycle.

More eyes

Hi Friends and family! I want to link you to Aaron Soderlund's blog. His team is here now and you can hear his perspective on their work here, some photos too. Here is the link: www.asod.wordpress.com

Hauling Sand by Hand

Yesterday afternoon the team started in on the second cement floor of the day, however, this required a different type of work, and it took everyone to get it done. Even Carly and I got into the act of hauling sand and dirt to the house site. The woman with the bucket is Melanie and it is her house where the floor will be poured. (see photo of her with the bucket) She is standing in front of her house. I didn't get a picture of her husband. The fact that her house is not next to the road, but on a side of a hill, makes this job more difficult. Hauling sand and dirt down the hill to her building site was exhausting for all of us. There was one guy who didn't seemed to be phased by the work. (see the photo of the little boy with the pail on his head) This little guy went up and down the hill with a pail of sand, outworking all of us. He couldn't be more than 5 years old. Wow! He was there to help us, and this is not his house. We couldn't figure out who he was related to in the community. This community is Don Bosco, a barrio of Barahona. It is a huge community in the hills above Barahona. COTN's school there is the largest of the COTN schools, grades K-8, double-shifted, approx. 900 students I think. The heat was turned up on us yesterday, as the rain is gone and temps. above 88 degrees with huge humidity are back.

The Little Children

Hello friends and family, We had just enough of a break between thunderstorms to squeeze our visits to the communities with the new team that is hear from Redmond, WA. We are so thankful that Monique is here. We missed her terribly, and are missing Ellie big time too. Ellie will be here on Sunday. When a new team comes we start their stay with a tour of COTN's office, where we meet the staff and then spend the day visting the children in the bateys (communities). Carly and I were blessed to see some little children we have been watching closely the last four years, seeing them grow, be cared for and nourished through the people God brings into their lives. COTN plays a huge part in providing all the opportunities these little one will have in life. This is where you and I come in, doing our part of lend a hand. I'm reminded of Jesus' words. Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these." In the photos, Carly cuddles Diego and Diana, the twins in Los Robles we fell in love with three years ago. I've been posting photos of them on this blog every year. Another little boy I met last year, Brandi, is being held by his grandmother. He is about 1 1/2 now. A new boy that latched on to my hand yesterday is Aro. I'm pictured with him. Please lift these little ones up in prayer. They are precious in sight and should be in ours too. Wouldn't you agree?