The Day Before Easter

I’ve known that everyone here likes to make Sweet Beans around Easter, but I didn’t realize how popular it was until I went to town with Idekel to buy the ingredients the day before. The last ingredient on the list was some sweet potatoes, which are extremely common around here. Yet the day before Easter, they’re extremely scarce. After we’d gone to the fresh produce market, three grocery stores, and over ten corner stores I started trying to convince Idekel that Sweet Beans are good without sweet potato. But he was determined to find some, and at our very last stop we found some very lovely batatas.

I on the other hand didn’t bother making Sweet Beans from scratch this year….. instead I tried out a new product here in the D.R., canned Sweet Beans! They turned out to be pretty good. They’re also a good conversation starter as many Dominicans can’t believe their beloved homemade dessert now comes in a can!

Treacherous Travesia Trip

My trip up to the Travesia two weeks ago just wasn’t long enough so Idekel and I decided Holy Week was the perfect time to make another trip up there. As if the two hour speed walk up the mountain wasn’t enough for me, we decided to join some of our friends to explore a cave about another one and a half hour away.  
The cave wasn’t quite as big as any of us had expected. Actually, we’re still not sure if the passageway was closed during an earthquake, or if we somehow over looked the correct passage way.

Either way, we had fun trying to light sticks to see with, crawling on the ground under enormous rocks looking for passageway, and just hanging-out with each other. Fortunately on our long trip back to the Travesia we found an abandoned bunch of ripe bananas, a nice little swimming hole, and lots of beautiful flowers. Back in the Travesia we ate lots of good food……….
Hung out with lots of our lovely campesino friends……..
Stayed up late telling stories and jokes around a small camp fire………Had a small Sunday School class with the Travesia kids…….. Hung out with more lovely people……
 
Watched our friends work together to dry and store precious organic coffee beans……
And then said our farewells to the simple country life.

First Trip up the Mountain

OK, this wasn’t my first trip ever to the Travesia, but it was my first trip in 2010. Once again it was so great to be in such a beautiful place and to see all my lovely campesino friends. Here are a few pictures of my friends up there.    

Haiti Trip #8

My eighth trip to Haiti was the shortest I’ve ever gone on. Early in the morning we headed towards the Northern most border crossing. We parked our car, walked to the border, and filled out all the needed paperwork at both the Dominican and Haitian Customs offices. Then within a five minute walk we made it to our final destination, a lovely School and Orphanage.

 

Joy and Vidal’s friends help run this school, so we got a great tour of all the classrooms, nurses office, kitchen, and the Sanctuary which is presently housing 52 earthquake victims. (Mostly Orphans who were previously living in an Orphanage in the capital but after the earthquake had no roof over their heads).

After school hours we had the opportunity to go see some of the children in their homes and wander around the surrounding community. With over four hundred students and more than one hundred orphans you can imagine what a great impact this ministry has on the families living in the community!