1 week in the village
So today is June 7th, I've been in the Jamaica Deaf Village now for just over a week. I'm sorry I am just now posting this blog but I've had many many problems connecting to wifi and my laptop breaking, so its been difficult to be able to have contact with everyone back home. On a side note, I'm not the best with grammar, so I'm going to intentionally put errors in this blog so you can't tell the difference between what I did on purpose and my mistakes :).
The hardest part about this whole thing was getting through customs and immigration at the Jamaican airport! The immigration agent did not understand why I was staying here for 10 weeks. She asked me where my return boarding pass was for going back to America. I told her I didn't have the boarding pass yet, so she made me give her my phone and she looked through my emails till she found one from Delta saying I was going back to the states. Then she asked how much cash I brought with me. I told her I had a card and could charge things to it so I didn't have to carry around so much cash, so she made me give her my credit card. So in all she was holding my passport, US I.D., phone, and credit card. It took about ten minutes but I finally made it through.
The first few days in the village were very relaxing. It was just some prep work before the first team came on Saturday. Did some chores, watched some movies, ate, and slept. I enjoyed the down time, but the days went by very slow. Just laying around made me think about home and miss it a lot. Then Saturday came around and the first team was here. We took the three hour drive back to Montego Bay to pick the team up from the airport. Its a small team of 9 people and 1 baby from Chattanooga, TN. They are a great group and I love spending time with them. The work we have been doing is helping build a back porch and a driveway to some houses in the village where the deaf families can live. The weather has been great and working hard has made the days fly by. Im excited for whats in store for the future and seeing the ways that not only I can help the people here, but how they can help and teach me. Thanks again for everyone that has been supporting me and I will try to blog more (cross your fingers my computer doesn't break again) and stay in touch with everyone back home!
Your favorite red-bearded American Jamaican,
Charlie Vines.
The hardest part about this whole thing was getting through customs and immigration at the Jamaican airport! The immigration agent did not understand why I was staying here for 10 weeks. She asked me where my return boarding pass was for going back to America. I told her I didn't have the boarding pass yet, so she made me give her my phone and she looked through my emails till she found one from Delta saying I was going back to the states. Then she asked how much cash I brought with me. I told her I had a card and could charge things to it so I didn't have to carry around so much cash, so she made me give her my credit card. So in all she was holding my passport, US I.D., phone, and credit card. It took about ten minutes but I finally made it through.
The first few days in the village were very relaxing. It was just some prep work before the first team came on Saturday. Did some chores, watched some movies, ate, and slept. I enjoyed the down time, but the days went by very slow. Just laying around made me think about home and miss it a lot. Then Saturday came around and the first team was here. We took the three hour drive back to Montego Bay to pick the team up from the airport. Its a small team of 9 people and 1 baby from Chattanooga, TN. They are a great group and I love spending time with them. The work we have been doing is helping build a back porch and a driveway to some houses in the village where the deaf families can live. The weather has been great and working hard has made the days fly by. Im excited for whats in store for the future and seeing the ways that not only I can help the people here, but how they can help and teach me. Thanks again for everyone that has been supporting me and I will try to blog more (cross your fingers my computer doesn't break again) and stay in touch with everyone back home!
Your favorite red-bearded American Jamaican,
Charlie Vines.
Comments
Post a Comment