Student Trip Blog
Hello, Families! This is Kiran and Jordynn with a summary of day 6. We started our day by waking up to a breakfast of hot chocolate, eggs, and cereal. After our breakfast, we did a mental warmup that reminded of the quote and question of the day and preparing our minds for the day. Then, we took a bus ride to the local community of Sonido Del Yaque, where we met with local families and explored their everyday life. One of the words of the day was “Rio”, which means river; this relates to today as the river go through the community and help with the agriculture. After our tour, we broke into groups and helped with the general needs of the community. With groups sweeping leaves and catching chickens. After the work was done, we talk to the community members of our groups. We learned all sorts of things from them.
To start the afternoon, we had a fresh, local, lunch with the produce they raise; including chickens, and avocados. After that, we bought goods including bracelets, phone charms, coffee, and even ice cream. This was especially important as these things were hand made and buying these goods helps support the community. In our free time with the community, many people decided to spend time with the kids which really showed despite age and language differences as many of us don’t speak Spanish. Another big part of our free time was we took a walk down to the river where we continued to bond with the kids of the community by wading the water and skipping stones. We finished off our time with the community with a chance to share appreciation towards the community; which we call “Big love”, a part of our nightly routine. To finish off the time with the community, we trecked up a monster of a hill, which made us have more empathy towards the community, for they have to journey up and down the hill.
Since the hike up the hill was tiring, everyone was both physically and mentally exhausted for the car ride home. However, by the time they came back, everyone was excited to call their loved ones. With the 10 minutes everyone was granted, we got to check in with people back home. It was a bittersweet reunion, because although it was nice to hear their voices, we knew we wouldn’t see them for a few days. After enjoying some free time, we as a group held a post mid-trip self reflection as well as brainstorming ideas for the CAP project. After that, we ate a delicious meal of pasta, garlic bread, and salad. Lastly, we finished the day with our night meeting, where we not only reflected on our highlights of the day, but showed gratitude within our own community, as well as passing the torch to the next leaders of the day. They showed their talents which consists of poetry, a magic trick, and displaying what we learned recently, which is sign language. Overall, today was a great day, we improved both physically and mentally and bonded with each other. We’re looking forward to the rest of the trip!
Kiran Smith-Iyers message;
To my family, friends, and any other people that are reading this, I am alive and well and miss you all very much! I am thoroughly enjoying this trip and really feel like I am learning not just about the Dominican culture and way of life but also about me and who I am and want to be. I cant wait to tell you about all my amazing experiences as well as all the lovely people I have met! Hope you guys are doing well, try to have fun without me and love you all so much!
Jordynn Albright
Hey mom, Dad, and everyone else in my life. I hope all’s been well back in the states; and I want to tell you that everything is going well over here! I’ve been enjoying the climate, and what it has to offer, and enjoying my time here. I also been enjoying everyone I meet both in the Global Glimpse community and the communities in the Dominican Republic. I’ve been writing about my experience in this program and I can’t wait to share my experience. I love you guys so much and I’ll see you soon!!!