Mangu & waterfalls

Hola, hola! It is your favorite group, group AVOcado, containing Amir, Vanny, and Onil (that’s where the AVO comes from). I (Vanny) woke up first and got ready for the day. I then went to wake up the GGL’s at 6:20 a.m., waited for my fellow LDD’s to wake up, and then together we all went around banging on windows to wake everyone up. For breakfast we had mangu, mashed potatoes, eggs, salami, fried cheese, fruit, and fruit punch. We then got ready to go to our CAP 2 site which was down the block from our CAP 1 site. While waiting for the masons to get ready we befriended a kitten that wandered in and collectively named her Mangu. We then got to work picking up rocks, shoveling concrete, and carrying buckets to make a kitchen area and walkway for the family we were helping. That family’s original home had burned down and unfortunately killed the mom of the disabled person, who was taking care of him. It was an honor to help a family like that and we hope to have made a great impact on their lives. 

After finishing our CAP 2 project at 12:45 and putting in the hard work we finished early we went back on the bus and arrived at the villa at 1:00 and had lunch at 1:15. Lunch was good. We had chicken, white rice, salami, and avocados, also fresh fruits and fruit punch. After lunch we had an activity. We left at 3:00 to go to the water fall. The cooks went with us so it was so nice to include them in an activity and spend more time with them besides breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We got to the waterfall and finished early, it was so fun. The water was very cold but fun to swim in even though it was shallow. We stayed there for a good hour and 30 minutes and had fun taking pictures and looking at the beautiful waterfall in Jarabacoa. We left the waterfall at 5:00. The stairs going there and back were difficult but we made it up and pushed through it. We got back to the villa at 5:30 and gathered ourselves together to finish the final draft for our thank you letters to Global Glimpse. It was nice to appreciate Global Glimpse and write them these letters to show them what we learned and what our experience was like for the few days we have been here.  

After writing our letters, we went off to dinner. We had garlic toast, pasta, salad, with fruits and peach iced tea as a drink. Ending off our night with the nightly meeting. As we recalled the day’s events, we were all proud about the teamwork and unity that we had shown today. Despite how sore and tired we were from yesterday, we had given our all to ensure we had done a job well done because we were able to help someone. We could all acknowledge the amount of effort that each and everyone of us was able to put into our work and how amazing it felt to have been rewarded with the ability to relax in the waterfall. We passed off the torch to Akemi and Andrea as the next leaders. By then, tiredness had set in and we went off to hang out before having to call it a night.