Our last full work day!

Yah Mon! This is Coach Bird, I am filling in for Jessica tonight while she participates in “Ladies Night” out in the courtyard. She along with all of our girls are playing games and having smoothies with the ladies from the community. It is a really big deal and so many of the women have really dressed up for the evening. It is nice to see the women being treated special, since that is truly a rarity in this culture.

Today was our last full day of work and for much of the group is was probably the hardest day. Each day we are divided into work crews and we are either bused to our job sites or we are escorted by one of the locals on a hike to the site. Today’s groups went to the two home sites, a new foundation building site, the greenhouse site, and the store.

The two home sites were able to finish the last coat of cement today, so tomorrow morning we will install the doors, window, and the tin roof. One house had Colton, along with 5 of the University of Missouri folks. They got a little overheated since they ran out of water and since water is so scarce they had no place to refill. Since they worked so hard and were in desperate need of water, they were pulled off of the site early to make sure all were well. Colton had a smile through the whole thing and I am sure out worked most of them! The other house had Ryan on it today along with 6 others, and they actually had more time to spend with so many of the locals who kept stopping by to visit. Tomorrow we will have a chance to turn over the keys in a dedication ceremony to the families, so that should be great!

Sarah Turner was our lone worker at the store today. She along with 3 of the girls from the University of Missouri spent the morning helping families come through and “shop” in the store. The store consists of all the items the teams bring down. Each person who shops pays the equivalent of $1.25 U.S. They then get to fill two Wal-Mart bags with all they can stuff in the bags. They also get a suitcase, and a pair of shoes of their choice. After lunch the girls restocked and reorganized the store.

I, along with Skylar and Chase, went to build a new foundation for a future house today. The first three hours were a bucket line hauling “mall” (basically large chunks of crushed limestone) up the hill. The kids will tell you the “Mall Hauls” are a staple of almost all of our sites, and the hauls are ALWAYS uphill! After getting the mall to the site, we helped set the forms for the foundation. After the lunch break we moved a huge pile of rocks into the forms and then ran bucket lines of small rocks to fill in, before finishing with our cement bucket lines to finish it out. It is a pretty cool feeling to finish a day knowing that a house will sit on that site in just a few weeks!

The award for the hardest job today goes to our green house crew. The teams are working on two massive greenhouses . Once completed these greenhouses will provided jobs for more than 20 people, the majority of whom will be women!

This group had Nathan, Jayne, Jessica, Camille, Hannah, Jayden, Shelby, and Jordan. They were hauling the topsoil into the greenhouse to create the rows, they also hauled rocks to build a retaining wall, and finally but most exciting of all got to haul wheel barrows and buckets of Chicken manure to fertilize the rows. When they returned to the Harmony House, let’s just say none of them have ever been this dirty. They were covered head to toe in the deep red dirt. Even after showering their skin is still stained! They assure us that after a day at the beach and a real shower at the hotel it will all go back to normal! Although some of them do like the fact that it looks like a really good tan! The best part about it for me was that I did not hear any of our crew whining about how hard the work was, rather a lot of excitement over how much they accomplished!

To round out the work day I had a chance along with Skylar and Sarah and a few of the U of M folks to go run our second soccer camp. Today was nice and sunny so we had over 30 kids there along with the local coach. It was a little challenging since the boys were ages 5 to 19 so as you can imagine the levels varied! We spent two hours going through drills and playing and then ran like crazy to get back for a great evening!

Tonight was our “meals on heals” night. Our SCS crew was split into 3 groups and we walked to some local homes to have dinner in the homes. It was great fun! All of us had the same meals; Fried chicken, rice and beans, green beans, and a gravy sauce. We brought the drinks and a plate of brownies for our hosts and had a great time. My group of Nathan, Jaden, Jayne, and Sarah ate in a very nice house with a lady named Angela. I got to work with her husband Herman on the foundation today. We ate on the front porch with her two daughters ages 21 and 9. Her 21 year old daughter had her 6 year old son and 4 month old son too. It was a great night and the kids handled themselves perfectly, just like they always do. They even managed to continue the conversation and act natural when Angela’s daughter decided to start breast feeding at the table!

After our walk back we met as a large group to process the day and now I hear music and laughing from the girls downstairs at ladies night. We miss you all and can’t wait to get home and share our pictures and hearts. God has been moving in a great way and it is so amazing to be a part of the project. Tomorrow is a half work day, then dedication of the houses and then free time in the community. Tomorrow will also be our last chance to post an update since we won’t have computer access when we go to Ocho Rios.

Hope you are all well. See you soon! If you haven’t checked out pictures yet please do so at www.wonbyonetojamaica.com

-Coby