Day 3- First day of work

Wow. What an eye opening experience today. We began our morning at 7 am with breakfast (waffles) then headed to our work site for orientation. The great thing about our work site is that it is literally in the same neighborhood as our hotel and it is a 2-minute walk. At orientation we learned that the 8 girls would be spending the morning painting beams with anti-corroding paint for the roof support while the boys would be flattening out the ground and laying concrete (the old fashion way). The girls finished a bit earlier than designated lunch time and spent the remaining hour or so getting acquainted with the family and getting tours of the neighborhood! The children of the home we are building are sosososo appreciative. They follow us EVERYWHERE, as a matter of fact we just caught them outside our cabins windows yelling "HOLA HOLA HOLA" because they want to play. So hard to turn them down. They also constantly give hugs, put flowers in our hair, kiss our cheeks, and call us muy bonita. The home tours were absolutely heart breaking. I felt so rude when our guide took us from home to home and felt as though we were barging in on peoples personal spaces but I later learned Nica culture love showing off their living quarters. The "home" of the family we are working for is in horrendous shape. They are sleeping on wood panels, flies are everywhere (we were swatting the baby who was asleep on a bed because flies were just swarming his head), privacy is non-existent, and their homes are literally made of tarp and scrap, rusty, sheet metal. The other homes were made more of pli wood but nontheless it's unbelievably sad. Poverty here is ridiculously high.  I want to come back and keep building more homes. For lunch we ate beef skewers, rice, and plantines. After lunch the girls put on a third coat of paint then began mixing concrete as well. IT IS SO HARD. My muscles are so not strong but I loved doing the concrete mixing and laying versus painting because I feel so much more useful. We finished working around 6:30 and then went home for dinner. One of the girls walked with me the whole way home...holding my hand... I kept telling her I would see her tomorrow and that it was time for me to eat dinner in Spanish, but she obviously did not want to go home. By the time the rest of the group realized she was walking with me, my site leader Hillary tried telling her it was time to part, this girl, Lahyra then grabbed her wrist crying for her to come back with her. It was so sad to leave. But, they've climbed the walls to our hotel 2-3 times already since we went home so I guess it is whatever.

 P.S. I love that I can still speak a bit of Spanish.

Did you know???? Nicaragua has over 65,000 people sharing living spaces with others because they cannot afford their own housing? And over 200,000 homes are not satisfactory nor sanitary to be living in right now. After our tour today we decided it is not clothing that these families need, it is linens. They are sleeping on and with absolutely nothing. We need sheets, towels, beds, mattresses, etc. I am excited to continue touring the neighborhood every day for the rest of the week.