Day 2: New Excitement, New Adventure

Starting our first full day in the Dominican Republic, everyone was eager to get to work bright and early in the morning (not really but the car ride help catch up on last minute sleep). After a car ride to Cabarete, we arrived at the DREAM Project. The DREAM project mission is to ensure that “all children and youth in the Dominican Republic have equal opportunities to learn and realize their full potential through transformative education programs that combat the effects of poverty.” Our group began by touring the community that we were going to be working with until Wednesday. It was interesting to see a community that in many ways is different from ours back home, but in ways very similar. We learned about the blatant economic discrimination in Cabarete. Just across the street there are five star resorts next to this impoverished community. It’s two different worlds divided by 50 meters. Our group was split in half – one half worked with Montessori school children and then picked up water bottles, while the other half helped to build bookshelves for the Montessori school children. The children that we first worked with were from 3-5 years old. We were split within the classroom – half of us working on an art project with the kids, while the other half just interacted with the children. The kids were so welcoming and were quick to open up to us and wanted to help out with the water bottle activity. In the afternoon the older kids (8-15 years old) came to help out, and it was interesting to see how the ones that were more involved in helping out were the younger kids. On the other hand the other half of the group were assigned to build bookshelves for the Montessori children. Building the shelves allowed many of us to understand that in the US we tend to be materialistic and have overcomplicated lives. If we were back in the city we would be quick to buying something as small as a bookshelf, so it is interesting to experience building something that to someone like a child will mean the world. On the other hand if we were to build a bookshelf back home for some reason we would chose to build it using rulers, lasers, and every existing tool to establish accuracy – however, here all the drilling, lines, and building was done using basic skills. Having the opportunity to work with the students that are going to be using the bookshelves allows us to give a more personal touch to the work that we are doing. We ended our hard day at work on the beach reflecting about our experiences. For us it was the perfect way to end our day. Just looking around at everyone bonding and laughing with each other made us feel like if we were a family, instead of just strangers living together for the next week, doing volunteer work. In only 24 hours we have already leaned so much and we are looking forward to seeing what tomorrow and the rest of the week holds.