Around town ...

Sometimes we run into obstacles when walking around town ...Joella, Jazmin and Clayton CAREFULLY crossing a delicious mixture of what was probably stream and sewage water!

Tres Amigos

Merri Risa, Saqueo and Joanni ...Joanni might just be the funniest kid I've ever met!

Last Sunday at the orphanage we had a little impromtu trivia contest to win Mentos candies that I had with me ...we were all impressed when little Carmelo (facing the camera, youngest of all the boys that were gathered around) was the first to guess the name of another Spanish-speaking island (Puerto Rico). ...they all keep asking 'when are we going to have more Mentos contests'

Last Beach Trip of the Summer

Playa Popa Beach ... probably our last trip with the kids this summer since they go back to school next Monday. Like always, it was a whole day of beach time, sea grapes, and lunch served on the beach by the fabulous orphanage cooks!

Tables and chairs set up and ready for lunch.
Franchesca and Merri Risa floating in an innertube
Should we go in? The water was a little bit colder than normal- but who can complain--the other islands down here were getting hurricanes on this day and we were at the beach! Here are Indiana, Erika and Jessica before getting in the water.
Cristopher and I

This beach has lots of sea grape trees ... for about the first 30 minutes when we got there, all of the kids were picking them to eat and to take a bunch back with us so that the cooks would make a sweet dessert with them later.

Rafael up in one of the trees, picking grapes

Nicol ...modeling a sea grape

Sign Painters

Yesterday we worked on transforming an old sign that was left here by the old owners of the English Institute building. Our intern, Joella, outlined the lettering for all of our English class names and hours. We plan on setting it up outside of our ground level enterance each afternoon while classes are in session.

Here are Meghan, Joella and Jazmin working on the sign
Meghan and Joella starting from scratch

Cristofer in the hammoks

Cristofer, who belongs to one of our cooks and maintenence guy, has been hanging out at the English Institute now that his parents are working here. Here he is enjoying one of our hammoks. ...for those of you who have been down with Orphanage Outreach and remember Cristofer- he just had a birthday last week and is now 4!

Watering the Park

We are now living at the English Institute which is accross from one of Monte Cristi's nicest parks. To keep the grass looking good (because we are in DRY Monte Cristi), the Bomberos, or firemen, water the park a few days a week.

English School MAKEOVER

We have been working on getting the 2nd floor of our new building ready for classes. (the 2nd floor is the entire school floor) There are a total of 2 classrooms, a video room, 2 bathrooms, a common area and small computer lab/library book cabinet. Below is the computer lab area, where only one computer is shown, but where a total of 3 lap tops will be set up.

Here is the white board and some of the posters in the English 1 classroom.

The cabinets in the English 1 classroom

The chair below has a posted "chair" label, and the table has a "table" label ... everything in the school is labeled in English (door, window, cabinet, white board, desk, etc) so that our students are constantly learning the names of the things around them.

One of our new interns, Meghan, setting up our English book library

Jugo De Chinola

Jugo de Chinola (in English- Passion Fruit Juice) is pretty popular here. You can get it at restaraunts and street stores called Colmados all around town. 15 pesos gets you the one below from the colmado accross from where we live.

Happy & Sad

On the sidelines of our Wednesday night kickball game, Domingo shows his best SAD face ...

...and then his best HAPPY face.

Vistitors!

This week we had to friends visit us, Norma and Kathy, who we know from CMU and teaching experiences in the Mt Pleasant area. They spent some time in Monte Cristi and also in the town of Cabarete with us. Here are Norma and Bryan at the top of the El Moro hike.

Bryan and I at the top of El Moro
Our next stop was a trip out to the island ... in this photo- a glimpse at some of the others who joined us last week (back left- boat driver and Bryan, next row, from the left- Carmen, Joella and Clayton (new interns here) and Kathy, in front- Amanda and Eric (who are thinking about moving down to work with OO long term))

Amy & Moncho

Moncho and I watching some of the other kids play kick ball one evening this week

English Institute Makeover Begins ...

This month includes a lot of projects, cleaning, set up and moving (ourselves and 4 interns) at the new English Institute building. 3 new bunk beds were built by Bryan and Tom for the intern bedrooms- here is one of them.

Both our Engish 1 and English 2 classrooms now have brand new white boards- framed and put up by Bryan

Good Grades = Boating Adventure

After renting boat rides out to the island all Spring and Summer, the boat company offered us a free trip through the mangrove trees, for up to 15 people. Since there are only 5 of us here with Orphanage Outreach right now, we decided to make it into a reward trip for the 10 orphanage kids who had finished the past school year with the best grades. Here is a pic of the top 10 smart cookies who won themselves a spot on the boat ...from top right- Jenny, Santos, Leonel, Nicol, (bottom right-left) Jessica, Erika, Manuel, Jose Luis, Edwin and Argenis. The trip included the boat ride through the mangrove stream, a stop at a private platform for swimming and snorkeling, their own bottles of cold Sprite (which might have been their fav part) and a bag of treats for the ride back. They had an awesome time and it was nice to recognize the kids for good grades in school! (6 of the 10 are either already in our English school or are planning to enrole to start level 1 English there in the Fall ...as a 7th, Santos will hopefully be continuing his English with the High School level English school in the Fall)

Crazy Faces- Nicol, Leonel and Bryan ...in the boat, still docked at the Nautical Club The boating adventure begins ... Jessica and Manuel

Photo opp. on the dock/platform before getting in the water

Nicol snorkeling

Leonel falling in back first

Edwin, Jose Luis and Jessica getting ready to jump in together

Jessica waiting to jump in ... other kids in the water below

Jessica jumping off the dock

A running start ...

Jose Luis ready to jump in

Jose Luis climbing out of the water

Manuel