A Dominican Christmas

This Christmas was the very first time both Ryan and I were away from our families for Christmas. Though it was hard, we still had a great time. On Christmas Eve, one of our Dominican friends, Cristian, was nice enough to invite us over to his family's house for dinner. It's a little different here than in the States in that Christmas Eve is the day when everyone gets together for a big meal, and then Christmas day is pretty uneventful. So all in all, we felt pretty honored to be invited to celebrate with his family. The dinner consisted of an entire roasted pig on a stick that they had bought off the side of the road, chicken, rice, beans, apple salad, and another Dominican food that I don't know the name of. Everything was really good. It didn't feel too different from an American family meal...everyone ate a lot and then sat around and talked.

Then Christmas day we has a "Virtual Christmas" via Skype with both of our families. It was about the closest thing to being together without actually being together.

Our Christmas tree. The Troyer family was nice enough to let us borrow their Christmas decorations since they were going to the States for the holidays. And our families were nice enough to send us lots of beautiful gifts to put under our Christmas tree.

Skype! On the top is Ryan's mom. On the bottom is a close up of Booper, but if you look closely at the computer screen you can see my sister making a ridiculous face.

Ryan's mom bought us these Frog Toggs, which are completely waterproof clothing. Which is awesome, but at the same time a little goofy looking haha. Especially Ryan's because not only is it hot pink, but the sleeves are about 5 inches too short. We had fun taking pictures in them, and scaring Booper.


OK, so I don't want to be one of those people who is obsessed with their dog and takes pictures of them all the time, but we took Booper to a park the other day and some of the pictures are so cute I just couldn't resist posting some of them!

Booper

Exciting new everyone...we got a puppy! Her name is Booper and she is a 9 week old Chihuahua. She is so sweet and cuddly! We're still working on potty training, but she's learning very quickly. Enjoy some photos!

Her first bath!


Snuggling with daddy


Snuggling with mommy


She's so tiny!


So cute...

Las Fiestas de Navidad

First of all...I want to post a public thank you to both the Bonzek and Holloway families for all of the Christmas gifts! We received 5 boxes packed to the brim with Christmas gifts, none of them weighing less than 20 pounds. I know it was a hassle for everyone involved in this, so THANK YOU again for your generosity! Now we just have stare at them sitting under our tree for 3 weeks until Christmas. My mom told me that this is a maturity test for me to see if I can withhold "sneaking peaks" at my gifts. We'll see what happens....

There have been some great things going on at the Social Work site lately. Each year, SI recieves several donations of Christmas gifts to give to people in the community. With this, each site is able to have a Christmas party for the people they minister to, and each guest is able to walk away with a gift bag. This was a very exciting time for the women and girls in El Callejon.


The girls' party. They are singing Padre Abraham.



Charades!


We paid a woman in the community to make brownies for the party. Of course, the girls loved them!


The girls with their gifts. So precious!


The women's party. This is a game where the women hold a spoon in their mouth with a marble in it and carry it across the room and have to get it into the bottle. I think we used to play this on field day in elementary school :).


La ganadora! (The winner). This was the women's favorite part of the whole thing. Each woman had to bring something small and that they use frequently in the house (like an onion, bag of sugar, oil, etc). We put everything together in a bag and drew a name to determine the winner. This woman, Liliana, won. She was super excited, even though we made her wear a goofy crown :).


We also raffled off this iron. As you can see, Milagros was THRILLED to have won!


And Rosemary was excited to win this shiny new fan! (On the right is my co-leader, Daisy).


So as you can see, the parties were a success! Another quick note, Ryan asked in the last post if you would pray for me as I lead the site alone for 2 weeks. Well, I think God heard your prayers, because this past week went very well! There's been a good turnout everyday. The women had a great study on the parable of the talents and very much enjoyed making hot chocolate! And Ryan has done an excellent job helping me teach the teenagers English (he definitely has a gift for teaching). I think after the first day the girls must have told their friends that it was good because there were twice as many girls the second day and they were all excited and eager to learn. Praise God!

I know this is getting long but just a couple short prayer requests. I know that you all have been praying because we've definitely seen God answering your prayers. So thank you for them! We couldn't do this without you!

1. Continued prayer for Caroline as she leads the Social Work site by herself again this coming week.
2. Ryan is in Santiago today to meet with Esperanza (an established Microfinance organization in the DR) for a 2nd time. They are discussing the possibility of Ryan volunteering with them for a couple months to get a better understanding and vision for what the SI Microfinance site should look like. Please pray for clarity in this situation.

Thank you again and God Bless!

A few reflections

So I just finished my delicious lunch (ham, cheese, and egg quesadilla, an avocado, and hot sauce) and am watching the rain on our front porch. Today is the 6th straight day of rain and it's pretty cool outside, maybe 68. I heard it's been unseasobably cold in VA so 68 probably sounds pretty nice. I thought I'd share a few random reflections I've had in our first 5 weeks here.

"It's stange to..."

1. ...live in a place with a climate totally different from everything I've ever known. My body is really confused...my brain cells tell the rest of my body that today's date is November 24th, while my eyes are seeing nothing but thriving, green vegetation, and my skin is content in shorts and a tshirt most of the time. My stomach is thinking thanksgiving but my nose is confused as to why there hasn't been even a hint of pumpkin, or anything orange and brown for that matter. Hopefully I don't have a revolt on my hands...wait is that a pun, I don't even know.
2. ...be a minority (or more maybe accurately...an immigrant). It's one of those things I've always thought about as probably being tough...and it really is. Either people really are staring at me, or I'm just paranoid that they are because I know I stick out. It sort of feels like my privacy is being invaded while I'm in public because I don't blend in. I was thinking...is part of the reason that races in the US often settle together because they don't want to feel like that all the time?
3. ...be assumed to be rich because I'm white. First, White and American are the same thing, and second American means rich. The funny thing is that we're probably average middle class here. Now they don't have a big middle class, but that's where we'd fit. My thought is this...It feels uncomfortable and even a little hurtful when people assume we're rich, I bet it's way worse to be assumed to be poor.

Prayer Requests

1. Spanish. We've been searching for a tutor we can afford for Caroline and have come up empty. Pray that the right person comes along.
2. Dec 8th-19th. Caroline's co-leader will be gone and Caroline will be leading the site on her own. Pray that attendance is still good and that this can be a time for Caroline to really connect with the women.
3. Adjustments. There's tons of little things with life here and being confronted with them all at once can be stressful if we let it. We need to be able to take these in stride and not let them affect our ministry or our marriage.
4. Microfinance Site. I've been praying to meet a Dominican to join me in my efforts. Also, Pray that God would show me how to connect with the community in little ways over the next several weeks as I try to build their trust. I need boldness to do this.
   

I miss Wal-Mart

Like Ryan said in the last post, many of you have asked if there is anything we need/want from the States. So I came up with a list of things that are either ridiculously expensive or just don't even exist here. So here it goes:

-cooking spray
-chocolate chips (or really anything chocolate)
-tampons
-lotion
-spices (any of the basic ones that we use- dry basil, ginger, nutmeg, cumin, etc)
-plackers (for flossing)
-any sort of packaged food (snacks, cookies, nuts, almonds, canned things-broth, diced tomatoes, etc, sauces, dressings, marinades)
-things for our walls (world map, bulletin board, anything decorative)
-peanut butter
-Splenda
-tissues
-shampoo, conditioner, body wash
-Glade plug-ins
-Multi-Vitamins

God Bless!

Settlers of Jarabacoa

3 weeks in and we're totally "settled in" at this point. By "settled in" I mean that we have a car, an apartment, furniture, phones, food, etc. The staff here keeps telling us how quickly and smoothly it's gone for us. Our current schedule is to study Spanish in the morning and work in El Callejon in the afternoon.

Funny Cultural Differences:

1. Have you ever been at the store and thought that they were starting to sell things for an upcoming Holiday way to early? Well when we went to Santiago on October 18th the stores were totally decked out for Christmas and playing Christmas music all day.
   
2. Electricity is really expensive here and we live in a pretty modest part of town but yet every other house already has Christmas lights up. Most of them would be considered hideous and tacky in the US.
3. The country only has 1 hit song at a time on the radio. We probably here it 7 times a day on our street, in the car, or blaring in El Callejon. It's a love ballad in Spanish.
4. Instead of a traditional church service this pass Sunday a Christian Rap Artist from Santo Domingo played a show. If anyone from MTI is reading this you'll LOVE his name: Aaron Kelly...I promise.
5. Motorcycle drivers have a complex hand signal system that explains what they're about to do...including: left turn, right turn, stop, pass, slow down...and several others that I haven't figured out yet.
6. There's no door-to-door mail service here, but there are bills. We received our cell phone bill when someone got out of there car and threw it on our balcony.
7. Car washes are also bars. When Dominicans get their car washed there's always a bar on site and they sit and drink beer until their car is ready. This starts at 8am!
8. I talk best in Spanish when I'm trying to be a Spanish Radio DJ (not really a cultural difference). Caroline and I also really enjoy talking in Spanish like we're on Rosetta Stone.
   

We can receive mail now, so note our new address on the blog homepage. Several people have asked us if there's anything we need/want from the states. Caroline is in charge of posting that list so look for it soon.

Prayer Requests:

1. Spanish. That we would learn quickly! The Spanish where we're working is pretty rough and hard to understand. Also for boldness in communication
2. Microfinance site. We're in the process of creating the system from the moment we meet a possible client to the day they make their last payment. Pray for wisdom as we plan.
3. Relationships. Pray for our relationship with each other and that we would make close friends with other US missionaries and nationals

Here's some pictures of the Aaron Kelly Concert and our place. We tried to make them more exciting then just pictures of rooms.


At one point he rapped to the beat from "Jesus Walk" by Kanye West.


It was pretty crowded...probably 300 people....in a small room...with no AC.


Our front porch on Laundry day. We live above an 80-year-old couple whose daughter is our Land Lady.


Our dining room.


Second story apartment means SWEET view.


Caroline is in timeout.
The 3 bedroom apartments were the same price as the 2 bedroom ones, so we have an empty room. Hopefully, we'll be renting it out by the first of the year.


The office/guest room. The couch Caroline is relaxing on is also a bed.


Our living room. The couches are way less comfortable than they look.


Just for fun.

Site Tour

Yesterday Ryan and I went around to all 12 of the different SI ministry sites here in the DR. It was really cool to see all of the different ministries and how each one fits into SI's vision. Each one has a unique and affective way to connect with the community. Enjoy below some of the pictures we took of a few of the sites!

P.S. We signed the contract and paid the deposit on the apartment, so we will start shopping for furniture, painting, and moving in this week! Prayers for this process are greatly appreciated!



The agriculture site


The Sports site




The Preschool in Mata Gorda




The Preschool in El Callejon




The Social Work site (where Caroline will be working!)




This is a street in El Callejon where students from the Art Site came and painted the walls.





The Special Education and Developmental Theorapy site.

Making Progress

So...we're about half way through day 3 here in the DR, and I would say that we've had a good amount of success so far. We came in Wednesday night and basically just ate some dinner, talked to some people, then crashed. Thursday we began the pursuit of a vehicle. Our director, Lowell took us around to some car places in La Vega, which is a bigger city close to Jarabacoa. A few things we learned:

1. Cars are more expensive here.
2. Because of the unpaved, mountainous roads, and just general "rough" driving, cars typically get beat up a lot quicker here.
3. An SUV with 4 wheel drive is essential.

So we looked for a while and didn't seem to find anything good within our budget. But then later that night, Lowell happened upon a green 1999 Honda CRV in good condition and within our budget. So we tested it out, had a mechanic look at it, checked out the paperwork, and today we bought it!

We've also been looking for apartments and I think we found the one we're going to get. It's the second floor of a house, but its made to be an apartment, so it would be totally our own place. It has 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms, which is more than we need, but it's hard to find one smaller and we're getting it for really cheap. We also figured that if the opportunity comes about, we could rent out the extra room. But anyways, it has an awesome balcony, a good size kitchen, dining room, and living room.

OK I think this post is getting too long. Oh, one more thing, we got cell phones and probably no one will want to make an international call, but just in case here are our numbers:

Caroline: (809) 769-6581
Ryan: (809) 769-6582

That's all for now, I promise we will post pictures soon!

Caroline

Miami International Airport

So here we are. On our way to the Dominican Republic. After 3 years of dreaming, 1 year of fundraising, and 3 months of training....we are actually on our way. It's quite surreal, and I don't know if it's actually hit me yet.

Our airport experience has actually been very successful so far. Every one of our bags was between 0.6-0.0 pounds under the maximum weight. We were very proud of our ability to "max out" each bag, and very lucky that the scale we used beforehand wasn't 0.5 lbs off. And I was able to sneak on an extra carry-on bag with no one saying anything. God looks out for us even at the airport!

So we've been sitting in the Miami Airport for about 5 hours now and have only one more to go. Luckily, we've been able to keep ourselves busy enough with our new laptop fully equipped with Skype and Slingbox. ***By the way, if you have Skype our name is Holloways623....add us because we want to keep up with as many people as we can!

Well...thats about all for now. Hopefully our next post will have some exciting pictures of where we'll be living!

OH...one more thing. Here's a link to a 13 minute video my dad found of a guy recording the downtown area of Jarabacoa. It's the one on the left called "Jarabacoa Tour." It might give you a good idea of the area if you're interested!

Colorado Springs

Hello everyone,

We're back in Virginia now after 3 weeks of missionary training in Colorado Springs. It was a great 3 weeks. We had training everyday from 9-4 which consisted of a mixture of seminars, various group activities, small group time, worship, and personal coaching. Basically the training focused on different issues that missionaries have to deal with such as conflict resolution, cultural differences, adversity, stress, etc. The program is called SPLICE, which is an acronym for Spirituality, Personal Growth, Lifestyle, Interpersonal, Cultural, and Enjoy/Endure. It was really good to discuss issues that we maybe hadn't thought about before. It was also really great to meet missionaries going all over the world, that were all in about the same place as us. After only 3 weeks we got really close with many of the people, so it was really hard to say goodbye.

Another great thing about the trip is Colorado is BEAUTIFUL!! I would definitely recommend it for a vacation spot. A few of the fun things we did included Garden of the Gods (an area with giant red rock formations), Pike's Peak (the highest point in Colorado), and the zoo.

So now we're back in Virginia until we leave for the Dominican next Wednesday the 15th. It's hard to believe that after all this time, it's actually here. So until we leave we'll just be getting ready to go and saying our goodbyes. Once we get there we will be staying in a guest room at our director's house until we find our own place. So first few weeks we will be looking for a place to live, a car, working on getting citizenship, and others odd and ends things.

Prayer Requests:
1. Saying goodbye to our friends and family has already proved to be very difficult. Please pray that God will be our strength and comforter through this process.
2. Guidance on where to live once we get to the DR.
3. Transition. Moving to a new country and culture will no doubt be difficult. Please pray for us during this process.

Here are just a few of the pictures from Colorado:


Some of the girls after Hip-Hop Abs video.


Ryan getting a haircut by our friend Allyson....it wasn't quite as scary as it looks.


Worship.


Climbing around on rocks at the top of Pike's Peak.


A couple times we saw a rainbow...so beautiful!


A red rock at Garden of the Gods.


Ryan and I with a bunch of the kids. We hung out with them just as much (or more) than we did with the adults.


A view part of the way up Pike's Peak. It was incredible with some of the leaves changing to yellow.


Same place...different view.


Some of the guys on top of Pike's Peak.


Some of the girls on top of Pike's Peak.


Ryan being pensive.