Wednesday - Team Building Day

Today, we prepared for our day camp, while also getting the chance to meet the Dominican teens. Getting to work with them already had me excited to get to spend time with them for the rest of the week. I love how we were all able to properly work together and bond in the few hours we had.

 After prepping for day camp, and sorting our donated school supplies, all of the teens went to the Ojos Indigenas (fresh water lagoons that feed into the ocean). It was a very fun and rewarding experience. I got the chance to work on my swimming skills, while also making memories with my fellow Virginia and Dominican teens.

Cole Morgan, Wise Co.

When I signed up for this trip on such short notice I wasn't sure what I was getting into, but already, I've learned so much. 

This morning, I woke up drowsy after the exhausting day before, but I got up and went to go eat breakfast. At home, I make a killer bacon egg and cheese sandwich so I wanted to try the one here. I'm really harsh on bacon, egg and cheese sandwiches, so it means a lot when I say that it was actually pretty decent. 

Afterwards, we took a van to the Ecological Foundation. We'd been there before, but very briefly. It's really nice there. The breeze was really refreshing and the building was very easy to get used to and was great as a place to meet new people. We met the other teens there, the ones from the Dominican Republic. I had thought before, wondering what they were going to be like and we had met one of the teens, her name was Leanna, but all of them both met and reached what I had expected. They were all super nice and reminded me of my friends and people I knew back at school and home.

We then went outside to learn names and meet each other. We went in a circle and said what our names were, why we started 4-H, and what are favorite animal was. I remember a good majority of the teens' and the adults' (both American and Dominican) reason that they joined was either that they had been doing it since they were a camper or their friend wanted them to do it. I thought that was so funny, because anyone you ask back in Virginia, that's probably going to be what their answer is.

While we were there, we also organized the school supplies that we had brought to donate to the schools here, we painted the picture frames that our group photo is going to go in later, and we tie-dyed our shirts. We also played a few games all together. One of the games we played, had a sort of ball with feathers attached. You hit it with either your hands or feet and try to keep it up in the air. During that, all of us talked together, just about what things are like around here or casual conversation. It was cool to talk to everybody because it's interesting to see just how similar we all are, whether its school or sports or family, but also what makes our cultures unique. 

We then ate a Dominican lunch, and got ready to walk to the "Ojos Indigenas" or the "Indigenous Eyes". We walked there for about 5-10 minutes. It's a part of the Ecological Foundation, so it was close by. Walking there, I chatted it up with some of the other teens. One of them, that I mentioned earlier, is interning with the Foundation and she talked about how she had gotten into birding and said that she saw this very sought after bird in the birding community called The Barrancoli (The Broad-billed Tody. She was so hyped to tell me and she had already told some of her Dominican friends. It really impressed me to meet someone so excited for what she did, because you don't see a ton of people express that back at home.

When we got to The Eyes we got ready to get in. It's this beautiful fresh body of water surrounded by trees and rocks. You could either walk in by the steps or jump in of a short ledge off to the side. Obviously, me and some of my friends decided to jump in together. A few people went in front of me, then I ran and jumped in. OH MY LORD! It was so cool! It felt so much better than just a pool. Me and my friends swam around and sat on the roots and rocks. Again, I was chatting it up with the other teens! I think all of the teens from the U.S. also really enjoyed meeting and being friends with the teens here. They're so much like us I feel or at least people I know, but just not from where we are.

Anyways, a couple hours and a few more jumps later, we were walking back to the foundation. A thing that both me and Cristy, who was listening from behind us, was on our way back when my friend, Manuela, was talking about how her sister accidentally cut herself on a plate and then it was brought up how if you accidentally hurt yourself your mom would be like "Oh! Why are you so clumsy? How could you do that to yourself?", but then if your mom accidentally hurts herself it would be like "Oh!! How could this happen to me?! I have been so hurt! I am completely absolved of all blame!". Manuela then was then like "Oh my god! My mom is exactly like that! That's so funny!". It was a small thing, but it was really cool to see just how many small or big things we had in common. Anyways, that's been my long blog about our first whole day at the Domincan Republic! 

 Thank you for reading!

-Ian Edwards, Culpeper Co.