September update for Mi Casa Foundation

1. What are you doing?
2. What are your challenges?
3. What are your successes?
4. Where do you see God?

In the mornings I am helping Irma in the laundry room with outfitting new girls with a set (five days’ worth) of clothing, as well as packing together changes of clothes for all the girls in the morning. It’s a bit chaotic and quite unorganized, but I try to bite my lip and just help out however I can for now. It’s very frustrating and upsetting when the boys don’t have a clean change of clothes to put on after showers on Sunday night, so I am trying to keep an eye out for how this happens and see what I can do to help. Then, I head over to Casa de Niños (3-5 year olds) to play games, read stories, and do activities with them that either I’ve planned or a visiting teacher brings for them. My time there is really enjoyable and I have the freedom to bring my own ideas as well as pick up a few new ones from the teacher at the kindergarten, Ester. An hour later, five of the youngest kids walk over to the guadaria with me for their noontime nap, which has been increasingly easier from week to week and I now have the hang of it enough to go with them alone. It helps that I know many more commands in Spanish, such as “put your shoes on the floor, lay down in your bed to sleep, don’t move, close your eyes, keep quiet,” and “wash your hands and face” (after the nap). Words seem to be quite helpful—especially with proving my authority—in addition to just acting everything out with hand gestures, as I used to do. I also have started using time-outs because earlier I didn’t have anything to do if they didn’t go to bed or wouldn’t stop playing around when I asked. When someone else was there with me at the beginning, the kids seemed to just know her voice more seriously and would do what they were told after a few times. With me, though, that could go on the whole hour. This seems to be helping and even though it’s not the tactic that the teachers use during school, they don’t mind and are content that I found something that works for me and can now take the kids alone. In the afternoons I am still working with Karen’s class of first and second-graders, as well as putting wart medicine on everyone who has them—which is almost everyone, it seems. This is an all-afternoon affair with kids randomly grabbing my arm or digging into my bag for medicine. I have been talking with our afternoon coordinator about starting something more focused with smaller groups of kids in place of the time I spend in Karen’s room with the whole group. I’d like to offer something more personal and fun, rather than try to battle the chaos of Karen’s room that, it appears, only she can tackle alone. For example, we’ve discussed that I could have a few groups of 3-5 kids at a time (at least to start with) for about 20 minutes per day to read stories, do arts and crafts that are difficult to do in a larger group, and play games or maybe go for walks outside La Granja. This is still in the planning process, so I will keep you posted as it evolves. I won’t go into a great deal of detail about my task of anger therapy with a few of the boys here because that, too, is still being worked out.

I would say that one of my main challenges right now is to find a place where I can really offer something that the kids don’t have when I’m not here. This is why I’ve been trying to plan a weekly program full of activities that are fun and that the kids will want to do with me. The hope is that kids will quickly figure out that if they’re not behaving well with me, they will be sent back to the classroom and will be doing what everyone else is doing—with the goal that what I’m doing is special and more fun. I want to offer something that motivates them positively to have good behavior—something besides a threat to do more chores. Another challenge is finding a way to create some kind of rewards system for the kids who are behaving well during the week. (My personal idea has been that I’ll take the kids who’ve behaved well all week to a store near La Granja to choose an ice cream treat. This idea is currently being considered.) I suppose that what is most challenging to me is to work in an environment that I would organize completely differently if the rules were mine to make. It’s difficult to find a balance between being open-minded to the way others do things and to share your education and experiences in order to hopefully make something a little better. I am in the middle of that ethnocentristic battle right now and expect to remain in the position until I leave. My hope, though, is to find a respectful way to share something of what I know in order make an impact that can last a long while after I’ve left.

One area where I have felt some success is that I am getting more comfortable with the older groups of kids here, due in part to my Spanish skills improving slightly. Every little bit helps! I am becoming more confident to just try to say what I can and see if what I’m saying is understood; this can be clearly told by the presence of unmistakable confusion on a child’s face versus the continuation of the conversation. Another part of this experience that is going well is the ordeal of Sunday afternoon check-in. There are a few (maybe around 20) children here who are truly orphaned and have no where to go on the weekends, not even to the house of a relative or friend, as some of the others do. I used to have one of these older kids who lives here every day help me with the check-in process because she knows everyone. However, I am proud to say that I now prefer to welcome all the kids back and check in their cards by myself. Sometimes it’s frustrating because I can’t always understand what they’re saying and not all the kids know which of their four names I am searching for, so they just keep repeating their full name. I am really starting to enjoy these Sunday afternoons, and am still hopeful that someday I will learn all these names!

Seeing God in the patience of one of the sisters here, Maria Del Mar is a constant reminder of who I want to be like and the kindness I want to show the children here. She is here, working, more hours than I could fairly count and yet, never seems to become exhausted of her work or the highs and lows of working with this particular population of children. She is also extremely patient with me (and my Spanish) and works hard to make sure that Luis and I are happy here with the work we are doing. I am thankful for her and can easily see how she is a gift to La Granja Hogar and to my life as well.