June 6, 2016

     Today was a slow day. It started off about an hour later than usual because of the Dia de Maestros (Day of the Teachers). Profa. Lilly got multiple presents and a song from the girls before breakfast. Then, I was invited to Profa. Lilly’s special breakfast in a small dining room. It consisted of cold eggs, bread, steak, and tea. After breakfast, I hung around the Hogar and helped around with random things. I then went back to my room to work on my Magellan project. In the evening, I played a little game of soccer with the girls and ate dinner with them afterwards. Overall, a pleasant but slow day.

            I think now would be a good time to give you the day in the life of an average girl here. Most girls here are from the ages 5-16 and they come from different backgrounds. Many are orphans or have been abandoned at the Hogar at a young age. Unfortunately, others have a past of being physically or sexually abused by their parents. It is truly saddening to read why these girls are here when you know them so well. They are some of the bravest people I have ever met. Anyways, their day starts out at 5:00 a.m. and they immediately start doing chores. The chore list is posted on a door every week and they are often paired up with other girls. The chores include cleaning, cooking, or repairing (each girl washes her own cloths and tends to them as well). At 6:30 the girls have breakfast, then promptly at 7:00, they leave for school. They learn math, physics, chemistry, languages, and history in their classes. When they get back around 1:00-2:00, they do some more chores (usually ones that they didn’t complete in the morning). After lunch (around 2:00) they make up dances, play sports, hang out, do homework, or bug me. Dinner is usually between 6:00-7:00 then they either have ballet or instrument practices after dinner. There is no bed time for the girls but they usually get to sleep around 9:30.

            Anyways, I will be setting up some sort of way to get the orphanage more funding when I get back to the states. It will be a tremendous help if you would consider donating to the orphanage. They are in desperate need of funding to keep the quality of these girl’s lives where it is at. They also need the funding for vaccinations, medications, and other necessities. Thank you for keeping up on the blog and thanks once again for the emails. They really help. Chao.

 These are two girls misbehaving. I had to get the one off the railing right after I took the picture. These girls are daredevils.

 The girls gave me a huge water balloon and asked to hold my phone. While I was holding the balloon, it exploded on me (it's ok, it needed washed anyway).

 Mother Rosario and I :) (Mother Superior)

 This is the girls lining up for breakfast in the morning. It gets prettty hectic.

The girls peeling coconuts (is that the right term?). They use their teeth because they aren't trusted with knives and aren't strong enough to do it by hand.