Mount Lemmon Take 2

Friday night, Erinstacy (friend from Boston that now lives in Phoenix), drove down to have a girl's night/ sleepover since Ryan was in LA recording! We made a great dinner and sat on the back patio for hours chit-chatting away.
Saturday morning we packed a picnic and drove up Mount Lemmon to go for a picnic and a hike. Our hike turned into more of a rock climbing adventure because we wanted to get what we were sure had to be the best view on the mountain...and I actually think it very well may be the best view...getting to and from the 'best view' though, is a wee bit challenging... :)

Destination...


View...


The climb down...



Survivors...

Block Party!

About a month ago I listened to a podcast sermon from the Vineyard (our church in Boston). The topic was on being a host, and even moreso, being a host to those you might not even know. During the sermon, they interviewed a woman from the church who had a party for her entire street (Clarendon Street) in Boston! That is a big feat because there are many apartment buildings with many people living in each building...she had over a hundred people attend, most of which she had never met before! And, it went so well that they have since had other get togethers since then.
(If you'd like to listen to the sermon, http://vcfcaudio.bostonvineyard.org/podcast/vcfgb-podcast.html it's the sermon from March 18th by Christopher Greco.)

This sermon really inspired me to want to get to know our neighbors more. Last night, we invited the neighbor kids over for pizza and to watch "Night at the Museum". Then, today we had a block party/brunch for everyone on our street...it was soo great! There were about 20 people who came, and most stayed to the end, or even past the stated "ending time". One of the woman on our street who has lived here for 30 years, said it was the first block party that the street has had in 28 years!

It was super easy to do, and a lot of fun. So, if you have neighbors that you haven't met...I'm encouraging you to throw a block party! :)
The neighbors who came are already scheming a street garage sale for later this summer, and a BBQ for the fall!

Our invitations...


The spread...


Some of the people...

Cinco de Mayo!

Last week I dog-sat for Lily and Stanley.


They are quite possibly two of the most spoiled dogs I've ever met. They only drink filtered or bottled water, they eat homemade organic casseroles (or, if they won't eat that, they go to Arby's for a roast beef sandwich), they have doggy car seats (which I'm actually an advocate of b/c it keeps the dogs from jumping around while you're driving), they go for a walk every morning and to the dog park every afternoon, Stanley has a stroller that he gets pushed in on walks b/c he has bad joints, they have more toys and play houses than most children I know...but, wouldn't you know, I've fallen for them and love dog-sitting!

Stanley at the dog park...


Lily in her car seat...


This past weekend, Melissa graduated!!! Her family came into town from San Francisco to celebrate with her at the commencement ceremony and her graduation party!


And, of course there was a full mariachi band present for the ceremony/cinco de mayo celebration! :)


On Sunday, I ran in a 'seis' de mayo 10k! I don't get it...all the places I run around my house are as flat as can be, but every single race I've done since moving out here is filled with hills! :) It was a beautiful run out near the western mountain range of Tucson.

Displace Me

Saturday afternoon I went up to Phoenix with some friends from church for "Displace Me". Displace Me events happened in major cities all over the country on April 28th; there were a total of 67,871 people across the country who participated, 1,700 of which were in Phoenix. The event was to spread awareness of what is going on in Northern Uganda. In 1996, many Ugandans were given 48 hours to seek refuge in displacement camps. They have now been there for over 10 years, living in horrible conditions and only getting little food and contaminated water. The conditions have been getting worse and worse and the rations smaller and smaller because of foreign aid being cut. "Displace Me" tried to simulate the experience of what it is like to live in a displacement camp. Participants were asked to bring enough cardboard to build themselves protection to sleep out over night, one box of saltines, and one 1.5 liter bottle of water. Upon checking in, I had to hand over my saltines and water, so that they could be later re-distributed during the night, and then I got to work building my shelter.

There was lots of creativity when it came to building shelters...


Our friends, Matt and Abby, building their home...Matt came with a plan of how he wanted to build it, but unfortunately didn't have as much cardboard as he had hoped for..


Throughout the night they would show a film clip of what is going on in Northern Uganda, and then they would direct us toward doing different things: writing a letter to our senator, writing a letter to the Ugandan President, taking 21 minutes of silence to represent the 21 years that this war has been going on, etc.
Here's the screen that they would show clips on..


In the morning, we woke up to African drummers and dancers...

Blue Skies

So, I've been home from Jamaica for 3 weeks now and I haven't been able to think of what to write to sum up my experience. I think the pictures probably do the best job of describing what it was like. I still don't how to reconcile the fact that I'm back in the united states living in our own house, with the opportunity to work and make money to buy food and other things that we need; While I now know so many in
Harmons, Jamaica that aren't given even those 'simple' opportunities. While I'm here in the U.S., I know that I can look around me and pour out that same kind of love to neighbors, friends, family, and strangers that live nearby and are needing in different ways.

My mom and dad were in Tucson visiting when I returned from Jamaica. Ryan picked me up from the airport and we drove home to eat my favorite meal by my mom on our back patio. Their visit was very relaxing and nice. We planted some produce in the garden (squash, zucchini, strawberries, cilantro and basil), we played card games, and we went out to some favorite restaurants. One afternoon, we drove up Mt. Lemon (it takes 45 minutes to get to the top from our house). It's a beautiful scenic drive and about 20 degrees cooler at the top (something you learn to love when you live in the dessert). We had a picnic along the way and then stopped at the famous pie shop at the top.





On Easter morning we participated in a sunrise service at our friend's ranch. It was a pretty magical way to start the day watching the sun rise over the mountains. Ryan played guitar for worship, and our friend Ben led the service. Afterwards, everyone joined in a potluck breakfast.

The Infirmary

The pace has picked up significantly since the rest of the team arrived in Harmons on Sunday evening. Just to back track a bit, Liz and I went to church on Sunday morning at the Baptist church down the road.


I would say there were about 70 people total (adults and kids). Many of the kids we knew from the school, so we were surrounded in the pews, which was really comforting for being in such a new environment. Church here is very formal…everyone was in their Sunday best topped with fancy hats. The first 1 hour 15 minutes, was singing led by two woman in the front of the church singing and others in the pews shaking tambourines. About 45 minutes into that singing, someone joined the musical efforts by getting on the old drum set that was on the ‘stage’. It was some of the loudest acapella singing I’ve ever experienced in church…and some of the most beautiful hand clapping rhythms I’ve ever heard (most of which I wasn’t coordinated enough to clap along to).

Sunday evening, 55 students from Mizzou University, Ryan Licoln (Liz’s husband), Charla and Elaine (2 nurses) joined us at the Harmony House. Each volunteer brought with them 2 – 50lb suitcasese of donations to be sold at the store.


Most of the students are spending the week building houses (13X15’) for families in Harmons. In order for a family to have a house built for them, they go through an application process. Applications are then considered based on need and the family’s contributions to the community. There are currently 600 families on the waiting list and they are able to build about 50 houses per year.

Here are what some of the houses look like in Harmons…


They have outdoor latrines…


Outdoor showers…


And, outdoor kitchens…


The house itself is mainly just enough room for sleeping. Some of these houses sleep anywhere from 3-14 people. One of the teams is currently building this house for a mother and her 2 teenage sons…it will allow them to move out from living in her father’s house of 14 people.


I have been spending everyday of this week with Liz, Ryan, Charla, and Elaine at the Clarenon May Pen Infirmary. The Infirmary is pretty much a ‘last stop’ kind of place. The people there are considered wards of the state and have been placed there because of mental illness, physical handicaps, cognitive delays, or a combination of all three. The age range is from 20-80+. Very few people (if any) get visitors, and the employees don’t seem to have much (again, if any) passion for their job or compassion for the residents of the infirmary. At first glance, it’s just a really sad place to be. At second and third glances, its still really sad, but you begin to see small glimpses of hope.

There are 136 residents at the infirmary, pretty equally split between male and female. Due to many of their physical needs, they go through a lot of laundry everyday. Elaine (one of the nurses on the trip who has been to Harmons twice before), applied and received a grant to buy the infirmary 2 washing machines! This will hopefully make the process of laundry that they currently do much easier. The only thing, is that it will take convincing the orderlies that work there, that putting bleach in the wash will kill off germs. They are currently under the assumption, that it is only by boiling the clothes, that germs will be killed.

Here is their current process for doing laundry….

HUGE laundry pile…


Boil clothes…


Bleach and then rinse clothes…


Hang clothes to dry…


The resources at the infirmary are few. There isn’t enough patient care, depends for patients to wear, medicines to make patients well, money to do anything about these things…etc… During the day, it is common to see multiple people sleeping in the same bed w/o any sheets on it…



Sitting with blank stares and nothing to stimulate their minds or show them love.



Medical needs that could’ve easily been addressed in the U.S., go unaddressed and leave many unable to walk, use their hands, or even speak.

17 years ago, Mary went to have a basic medical procedure done, and her spinal cord ended up getting snipped, leaving her in this position of lying in half. Her mind is completely sound, yet she has no one around her to have stimulating conversations.


Our goals this week were to go around to each of the six wards and spend quality time with each resident at least twice during the week, in addition to any activities that they participate in. For the first one and a half days, I went around and visited with the patients. Many of them wanted me to read to them from the Bible and pray for them. I was amazed by some having scripture memorized and wanting to either recite it or say it with me as I was reading.


Another goal of ours, was to do art projects with the residents. This goal had many sub-goals…stimulate their mind, inspire creativity, increase sense of productivity, create community, improve fine motor skills,… In just a day and a half of doing art (coloring, drawing, painting, and cardmaking) I’ve seen leaps and bounds of hope!

This is CarryAnn. She doesn’t talk, so I don’t know her story. All I know is that she can’t walk, talk, or use her hands. She gets around by dragging her body forward on her elbows; she has a beautiful smile and squeals for joy when she’s happy. I brought her up some paints an set up an area on the patio (where she normally lays) for her to paint. She squealed with joy when she saw her own marks on the paper, and then later on a wooden cross. It was a fun challenge for me that brought me back into Child Life mode—how do I get someone who can’t sit up nor has much use of her hands to paint? I loved it!


Millie, who usually spends the day walking around on the sides of her feet, unable to talk; spent the day painting approximately a page per minute.




We had some guys from Mizzou come with us to the infirmary for the full day today and they brought a guitar and djembe drum…the men were all outside on the benches facing the courtyard singing for most of the day today. It was incredible to see them come alive.

I go back and forth from feeling hopeless, realizing that we are leaving at the end of this week, to having hope that these people could have a very different life if they were given more attention and compassion. I’m still trying to make sense of all the injustice going on at the infirmary in my mind and know what I can do about it, and how something could be permanently put in place. Liz and Ryan having been wrestling with these thoughts and questions for years now. I invite you in on this journey to experience the infirmary, whether on a future trip or in prayer.

sewing and storms

Today was a bit low key since there is no school on Saturday. We spent the morning and early afternoon sewing burlap coffee bags.

This took many many hours, and the task still is not complete because the sewing machine (a.k.a. "The Mighty Mender") we used, wasn't quite the industrial level sewing machine that was needed for the job.

The Harmony House buys coffee beans from a local farmer, and sells them to people who come through as volunteers in these cute little burlap bags.

We spent part of the morning staring at the kittens that we named yesterday...Marley, Garvey, and Owen...all named after famous Jamaicans. (Owen being Owen Plant, of course.) The poor little things seem to be awfully weak, there mom isn't getting much food, and thus they aren't getting much either.

Liz and I walked around the Harmony House and checked out the new addition that they are building on to accomodate more volunteers. Unfortunately do to the storm we got shortly after they put the cement up on the walls, much of it got washed away and they'll have to redo it. But, I guess this keeps a job for them longer, which is a good thing!
At around 2pm, we got another hurricane-like rain storm!! I suppose this is good for filling up everyone's water run-off tanks.

So, Liz and I stayed in and played a couple of close games of scrabble...


goodnight!

Harmons, Jamaica-2nd day of school

Day3--Friday (however written on Saturday)

Yesterday, we got to the school at about 9am. Again, school starts at 8:30, but the teachers had yet to begin teaching and students hadn't really made their way to their classrooms yet (probably because the teachers hadn't either). I don't really quite get what is going on in the school here. Is it that they don't have hope of making something huge with their lives so they don't care about school? I don't entirely think this is true since when I ask the kids, they all know what they want to be....teachers, pediatricians, cooks, etc. Is it just a lack of resources that the teachers are just burnt out trying to do as much as they can with very little? Perhaps. at 10:30, the students have their break, so the teachers came into the computer lab with Liz and I to learn some of the software that we brought for their students to use. After about 45 minutes of us just working with the teachers, a couple of students figured out where we were, and they made their way into the computer lab.

Within just a couple of minutes, there were about 40 kids in the computer lab surrounding the computers and teachers...it was a priceless moment.

We then sent the teachers back to the rooms (in hopes of them teaching) and just kept a couple of students in the lab to work with individually on the computers.

As you can see, the teachers didn't really take the other students with them...so I ended up taking the extra students outside so Liz could work more closely on the computers with just a few of them. Outside, we played a lot of games...spider in the web, blob tag, hokey pokey, you name it...it was really fun...and also quite tiring.
Some kids just wanting to pose for the camera...

At the end of the school day, we walked home with the kids...many of them hanging off of us. It was about a 2 mile walk, and just as we were about home, it started pouring rain! Within minutes, it started looking like a hurricane minus the winds, and the power went out...for 8 hours! Actually, I think I was more surprised about it coming back on, than I was about it going out.
We decided to go out to dinner with Candy and Lloyd at a little place in Harmons.

The door on the left (with Candy peaking out) is the restaurant, the door on the right is the shop where you can buy bread and such. The restaurant was about 4X9' and had 4 stools in it that you could sit on to eat at the bar. They cooked the food in their house and would bring it in for you to eat. It was very very very good...fried chicken!


Well, I'm going to head out and see what needs to be done...the rest of the volunteers are coming tomorrow and there aren't enough beds, benches, or tables, so today is going to be a building day of sorts...