Today was the kick off day of the new boys and girls club. We are temporarily using a school in the community run by a very sweet lady named Hilda who knows everything about everyone in the community. She was the one who recommended a lot of families for our program. Everyone that was supposed to be there today, showed up, and the attendance sheet was full! We held the boys club in the morning, and the girls club in the afternoon. Everything went SO smoothly.
For the craft, we had the kids cover their hands in paint, and then make their hand prints on construction paper. Then they decorated with sparkles, and wrote their name on the sheet. We also had them write (with our help) what they wanted to be when they grow up in English and Spanish. One of the boys, Sauri who is 14 and one of the leaders in the class wrote that he wanted to be a fisherman. We asked him why and he replied “so that I can feed all of the people in my village”.
After the craft we let the kids outside into the basketball court, and they went crazy! Running around, playing basketball; they LOVED it! At the end of the boys club, two of the older boys, who we have appointed as class leaders, one of them being Sauri, came to us and said some very kind words. Andy, who is 13, and who I have gotten to know over the past 7 weeks, said, “on behalf of everyone in this community, all of the Mothers, and all of the boys who were in this room I want to thank you all for working to help our future”.
*above photo- Hilda, Melissa, Luis Gustavo, Cathy, Adriana, Sauri, Nikki, and Andy
As soon as Liz translated this for me, my eyes welled up with tears. Andy looked at me, and I looked at him, and all I could do was give him a huge hug. This was also the same boy that said he wanted to be a pilot so that he could fly to Canada and visit us. For me, this moment made all of the paperwork we did, all of the dry preparation and application process we did for this club SO worth it.
The girls club in the afternoon we did the same craft, and we realized that girls are a lot calmer than the boys. They are so sweet, and they listen so well. Some of the girls brought containers full of cut up fruit such as pineapple, cantoloupe, and banana to share with everyone. After the craft, we played the game “What Time is it Mr. Wolf”? They had a lot of fun with that, and then of course, they wanted a huge 25 person game of “Stella Ella Hola”. It took a really long time to finally get a winner, but the girls had a great time.
Overall, we had an amazing day. I have no other effective words to describe it.
No comments:
Post a Comment