Holla! Today is Labor Day in Jamaica... so Happy J-Labour Day to you all! I spent the morning visiting the 3 work sites: clearing jungle, building a house and building a water catchment system. Hot hot hot outside today, but all teams were doing well considering. I made the church fb status CHOOSE JOY this morning, and that should be the theme for the day for them too! I'm trying to drive past the frustration of people not wanting to understand by putting life experience in perspective. A girl this morning pointed to the coffee pot and said, "what does that taste like?" to which i replied, "have you ever had coffee?" She said she's only had coffee that she ordered at Starbucks, and has never put the cream and sugar in herself either. I helped her through the process, being as encouraging as I could. She took the cup and looked at me saying, "There are just so many new things here to try!" She was serious, and overwhelmed. This was BEFORE the workday began! I said a prayer for her this morning, and when I saw her at lunch I could tell she needed more!
I helped pack up lunches, and delivered first aid supplies/sunscreen/bugspray. I was pleased to see the teams interacting with the Jamaican team leaders - that is really the point of all of this. Arthur is leading the house team - and they had to carry supplies down a steep, slippery, muddy hill to get to the building site. Energy and Patrick are leading the catchment system so we can irrigate with rain water, and Randall and Cleveland are leading the brush clearning. That team is learning to love their machetes in a very REAL way today... blisters and all.
If you are following the issues in Kingston it's getting pretty dicey. We are safe here - but we are taking precautions to keeping the team in at night instead of the usual evening trips into town. We are adjusting so they still get to do everything, but want to not tempt any unnecessary adventures.
This morning I had a nice chat with Eli, who works in the house sometimes, and sings ALL the time. He loves history, and we talked about Abraham Lincoln, and a plane crash from the 70s and a few other odds and ends. I thank my parents for giving me that love early on so I could maintain a conversation with a pretty quiet fella! Brad, the painter who also sings all the time, and I are getting to know each other quite well. He drove me around a little last week, and now we have a little chat daily. He has the quietest voice, and looks so innocent, but has a great sense of humor and talks smack on a regular basis. We sang Macy Gray (the only song we know) in our "pretty" voices while Eli emulated her scratchy voice while we cut carrots for lunch.
Pumpkin soup for dinner tonight, followed by a staff Bible Study.
My spider bite is draining nicely now in case anyone wondered. Also I took a hot shower this afternoon and shaved my legs around the mosquito bites. I feel amazing.
Have a great rest of your day!!!
Allison Paige Beekman
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