Daily Journal
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Day 1        5-9-07
It's crazy how things just seem to work out. Today was the first day of my Jamaica mission trip. I got a late start and did the traveling alone so that I could be home for my Grandpa's funeral. But, these circumstances added to my adventure. Its crazy how alone I was when I was traveling. I didn't even have my cell phone with me to fall back on. There were some close calls like when I got off the plane in Philly at 9:05 but I was suppose to board the plane to Jamaica at 8:30! Or when I didn't have the address for where I was staying when I was checking in customs in Jamaica . They wouldn't let me through without that. Or when I had to wait in the airport for an hour for our leader to pick me up because of traffic, where a lot of crazy Jamaican people kept coming up to me to talk to me. But, somehow all the little problems worked themselves out. I would like to thank God for that! This should be a fun adventure!!!

Day 2        5-10-07
Today was great! We went to the public school in Jamaica and helped the kids with reading. I had 4 2 nd and 3 rd grade girls. They just loved everything that we did with them. By the end of the day they were kissing me up and down my arms and telling me that they loved me. It was a great feeling. I hope that the rest of the trip is as good as today.

 

Day 3        5-11-07
So far everything is going well over here. We went to the public school again today. I had the same 4 girls as I had yesterday and I helped them with their reading again and did crafts with them. It was a lot of fun. For the crafts we decorated hanker chives. One of the girls in my group wrote on hers “I love Christine”. I thought that was very cute. After the school we went to this place called Cops which is a home for troubled boys. These boys were very violent with each other. The boys were doing cartwheels and handstands and such. So I showed them how I could do back flips and other gymnastics tricks. After that there were a few boys that we attached to me… one in particular. This made me a little uncomfortable because I knew what they were capable of.

Day 4        5-12-07
Today we went to Robin's Nest Children's Home. There are a lot of small children there. I spent the morning doing chores like laundry. But, I spent the afternoon on one of the many porches around the house. I was on the baby porch with all the small children and the 2 kids who had CP. There was this one boy on the porch Ion who had CP that I became attached to. He didn't talk or have good motor control but, he loved playing with balls. He would throw the ball and scoot across the porch and use all his energy to get that ball himself. All that work for a ball! He would do this over and over again. He did this until I stepped in and got the ball for him. He loved this! The smile on his face when I came back with the ball each time was simply amazing.

Day 5        5-13-07
I finally got to catch up on my sleep today. It is Sunday so we went to mass with the girls from Melody House. We only stayed for an hr and 1/2 . I guess mass out there is normally an all day thing, at least 3 hrs. We had to leave early so we could pick up the kids from Robin's Nest to take them to the beach. That was craziness. Every 2 students was assigned to one kid. I was assigned to one of the girls that I was teaching at the school. That was nice that I got to bond with her even more. Its kind of sad to think that my trip is almost over. I'm not ready to go home!

Day 6        5-14-07
Today we went to this new place called West Haven . It was a home for disabled children, both physically and mentally. This was a very hard place to be. There were 85 children there. A lot of them were both physically and mentally handicap. The place was pure chaos. There were children that were tied to fences and crazy stuff like that. There was this boy there that I became particularly attached to and he wore these sock things over his hands. I guess they were to keep him from sticking his hands in his mouth and making himself throw up. But, this little boy just wanted to be held. I love to cuddle so I found it very peaceful to just walk around with this little boy in my arms… despite the heat.

Day 7        5-15-07
Today was the last day with the children. We went to West Haven again which is the home for the handicap children. I'm a little heartbroken after that. I found the little guy that I fell in love with yesterday and just enjoyed holding him again. Then it was lunch time so I helped feed a bunch of the little ones. This is where I got to see that there were even more children that were just stuck in cribs. This was really sad. After lunch I got to see my lil guy again. Though this time he didn't have the socks on his hands and was sticking his fingers in his mouth and making himself puke. By the end of the day I had puke all over me and a broken heart. It hurt to see all of these children there. But, what hurt the most was to see my lil Rasheem that I cared about so much just hurt himself so much. I wish I could have stayed there longer so that I could make a bigger impact.

 

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