My Best College Experience Yet

So my blog picture deserves an explanation. The picture is of myself with a girl named Checa. Checa lives in el Hogar de la Esperanza de un Nino en the Dominican Republic, an orphanage run by a Pentecostal pastor and his family. During the month of may, I went there to live and work in the orphanage at night, and teach in the local, free school started by the organization called Orphanage Outreach during the day. Because I am a Spanish major, I chose to go somewhere where my language skills could be useful, but I found that language was so unnecessary. I learned this and so much more from the kids in this orphanage, and I am so excited to be able to say I am going back on January 1. I can not wait.

A photo of myself, another volunteer, and our English class

Here is a note I sent home from the start of my month long stay in the Dominican. Keep in mind it was rushed because we only were able to use the Internet for a few minutes once a week:



"So, a lot of people have been asking how it is here. Well, Monte Cristi is a little town in the north of the DR along the sea. We are near Haiti, but not too near (although I will get the chance to go to the border one Friday). The town has been marked by tourism guides as an up and coming town and though this might sound presumptious I think the Orphanage OUtreach has a lot to do with it. So the OO was created about 15 years ago, and then there were only about 20 kids. Now, 43 kids live here. There's not really orphans here (though there are a few). Many kids that live here have families but their families cannot afford to keep them. They visit sometimes, other times they've cut off contact. They range in age from 3 to 21.
So the place? Well I live in a ramada...a bit like a long house with 12 bunk beds in it all with big mosquito nets covering them. The ramada is made of wire fencing with a long board to make for a wall in the center (think like a stall...the bottom and tops are just fence that you can see through. The door is held shut but a string that attaches on the inside, goes up the ceiling and connects to a jar of rocks on the other side. Very technical I know. Here we live by a few simple rules. Navy showers for start. We can only turn the water on while we wash out our hair. Have to brush our teeth with bottled water and the water we use is ALWAYS cold. Which I am grateful for actually because it is HOT here. I wake up sweating every day.
but the place is amazing!!! The work the OO does here is amazing. We live on the orphanage grounds kind of as their guests. But we don't just stay here. I teach at the English Institute, an old hotel the OO bought in town where they offer a free English education to any local children willing to come. Children here only go to school four hours a day, and so we offer them one extra hour. The kids in my class are brats of course, but so amazing. The first day I went into the Institute, there was a huge wolf spider bigger than my foot. This little boy, Jose, who comes early to school today to help us clean the place (just because he can and talks the entire time he is doing it) jumped up to kill the spider for us. He is six years old and very proud of himself for saving us. He now persists on killing imaginary spiders on our back every day so we can thank him profusely. He says "Una arana! (he slaps our back) then goes "Lo mate!" meaning...A Spider! I killled it.
The Dominican people are more friendly than I could have ever imagined. When we walk home from people, they always stop to say hello or good day. If they run into you they apologize, never rude. One day I was walking home from school and a little boy ran out of his house and yelled "teacher gabby teacher gabby!" he was in my class. It was so sweet he wanted to introduce me to his family. The houses here shocked me at first, but now I see they're actually really beautiful. Most are made out of wood, wire or scraps and about the size of our garages. But everyone's houses are really like that. They don't have much to compare it to, and they take pride in what they have. They have beautiful gardens and always are working on cleaning.
Anyway, I will be on next week, just wanted to say I love it here. Miss you guys!
Gabby

Let's Get Started

I'm starting my first blog about the day in the life  of a college student. Doesn't sound all that interesting, trust me I know. But that's the problem, people tend to think that university life is a breeze. Perhaps 20 or 30 years ago it was different, I don't really know. These days, we've got a lot on our minds. There are a million things on my mind daily.
How can I find a job in a tough market?
How can I afford to move away after college with so much debt?
How much time do I have to study for these three tests this week?
Why do I have to work all night when what I really need to be doing is homework?
Can I fit in some gym time today after my internship?

The thing is, there's a lot of things we're suppposed to be doing to prepare ourselves for the future. Trust me, I know, it's my last year at university and it's really crunch time.
And I'll be honest, the only reason I've started this blog is, ironically, because I need to practice using social media so I can list it as a skill on my resume.
CLASS, PIZZA, GYM
You may have seen the popular MTV show, Jersey Shore. Their typical day involves GTL - gym, tanning, laundry. The title of this blog refers to MY typical day, though the order often changes. Spend some time at class, head to the gym to teach one of my classes (yoga, pilates, and cycling) then head down the street to the pizza place to put in a few hours of work as a waitress. Sounds enthralling, I know.
That aside, a college student can have some awesome stories, too. Think about it, we're surrounded by drunks and druggies on a daily basis, you know we've seen the strangest scenes out there. I have a lot of varied interests, too, especially when it comes to travelling. I've spent some time in Spain, Costa Rica, and the Dominican Republic, so I love checking out different cultures.

So anyway, check out my blog to see what a day in the life is really like.