Hi! We came to Ariadna´s house on Monday. We have started our gardening project and it´s really coming along. The garden is located at a military run technical school. Students go into all sorts of fields after studying at the school for one year. They have classes for baking, painting, mechanics, electronics, automotives, and much more. The graduates of the school make what is equivalent to $100 a week, while those who work in the free trade zone make roughly $30 a week.
Ariadna works for FUNICOM. It is a great organization that focuses on the needs of children. They give children medical care and school supplies among other things. Their focus is on child labor in the Dominican Republic. They work hard to get legislation passed to make work safe for children. Many times, children must work along with their parents to provide food for the family. The conditions they work in can be dangerous to their health and the girls who do domestic work in others´ houses can be raped. FUNICOM hopes to make work more enjoyable and safe, for the children who need to be working for their families. Children in these bateyes live in poverty. They don´t have the chance to go out and explore the city. FUNICOM is very good about taking the children out once in a while. We saw a picture with children in an aquarium who were amazed with all the sharks and fish circling around them.
Today, we went to a poor neighborhood and distributed toys to the children there. It was fun to spend time with them. Each child got a box filled with something appropriate to his or her gender and age. We got to know the kids and we took pictures with them. It was nice to see their excitement upon opening their boxes. It was funny-- I noticed that towards the end, the children were talking with each other and making their trades so that everyone got what they preferred. It was a great time! It was definitely my favorite thing we´ve done so far!
Until next time,
-Ann
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment