I’ve really been slacking on updating our blog. It has been almost an entire month since my last post. What is wrong with me? There is much to write about so I’ll just get started…
As I discussed in the last blog post, the SO Organization (SO stands for significant others – it’s a social support group for partners of SGU students living in Grenada) has become active again and I’m starting to meet more SOs and have become pretty involved in the SO Organization. We had our opening SO social (basically a welcome party) which was nice because Ryan was able to meet some of the people I have been hanging out with. With how busy he is these days I’m not sure he’ll get too many more opportunities to meet them. I’ve gone out to lunch and dinner with a few of the girls and feel like I am making some good friends. Recently I was asked to be the Secretary on the SO Organization Board because they had a few people drop out and needed to fill the position. I agreed to do it and my duties include, attending all board meeting (once a week) and taking notes on everything discussed. I also input my opinion and vote on various decisions the board makes regarding the organization, events, budget, etc. I like it so far and enjoy having some say in the decisions we make.
Also as I mentioned in my last post, I’ve started volunteering at a local orphanage with other volunteers from the SO group. Basically every Monday at 3pm we meet at the bus stop on campus and a SGU bus takes us to the Queen Elizabeth Orphanage in the town of Tempe – about a 15-20 minute drive from campus. Usually there are five or six other SOs that go, some regularly and some every so often. We are not really given any rules or instructions about spending time with the kids, we basically just go and play with them for two hours until the bus picks us up around 5pm. There are about 15 kids, boys and girls, varying from about 5 years old to 8 or 9 years old. They have some swings, an open grass area, and a few toys. Sometimes we bring stuff with us like balloons or crayons and coloring books. It can be hard though because we can’t leave the stuff we bring there because, as far as I’ve been told, the SOs used to bring toys but they had problems with some of the house mothers taking the toys and selling them. So we don’t do that anymore and anything we bring we have to take back when we leave. They have pretty limited resources as is, so the kids will often fight over toys and other things. Most of the time the kids are pretty well behaved, although they can get a little rowdy - but overall they are fun and sweet and I enjoy spending time with them and they seem to enjoy our company in return. I can tell that some of them have speech issues and/or learning disabilities and others, I’ve been told, have either experienced or witnessed some sort of physical abuse and thus, also have some related behavioral issues. Some of the kids are there because they have been taken out of their parents’ custody because of such issues or drug-related issues, others have lost their parents or their parents can’t take care of them for a variety of reasons. My understanding is that there are a few kids that are there temporarily, until their parents can get back on their feet. Besides visiting the orphanage on Mondays, anyone in the SO group is invited to the Saturday beach days which are organized by the med and vet students in the OSO – Orphanage Student Organization. Queen Elizabeth and another orphanage called Bel Air, trade off going to the beach on Saturdays. A bus will take the children and a few of the house mothers to Grand Anse beach. The OSO has life jackets and some beach toys for the kids and we all play with them in the water and on the sand. The kids are usually really well behaved at the beach day because they love it and always have such a good time splashing around in the water and playing on the sand. The beach day starts at 10am and ends at 12pm and around 11:30am the kids have to get out of the water, rinse off, get dressed and the OSO feeds them a meal that usually includes a sandwich, apple slices, juice, and cookies or crackers. The OSO gets a small stipend from the school for this but they also do a fundraiser every term auctioning off the kids’ artwork. This past Saturday I got to see the kids do their paintings for the auction before they went to play at the beach, which was really neat. All in all, spending time with these kids has been a really rewarding and meaningful experience for me. I will definitely miss them when it is time to leave Grenada.
Another volunteer project I will be starting soon will be helping to run the Limes After-School Program. The Limes After-School Program was started by Ann Hopkin (a retired Grenadian nurse) in 2003 to reach less-privileged children in the Limes area, in partnership with the U.S. Peace Corps Volunteers. However, Grenada is short on Peace Corps volunteers this year, leaving no one to run this program. So myself and three other women in the SO Group have volunteered to run it. The kids are anywhere from 5-14 years of age and the goal of the program is to help further education, build self-worth, and spread love. Every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday from 3:00-5:00pm (starting Tuesday, September 29th) we will be doing activities with the kids to further their reading, writing, and math skills, life/practical skills, hygiene, behavior, as well as art and crafts, games, and other physical and creative activities to get the kids playing and having fun. Some of the activities will include, reading circles, journal writing, math circles with flash cards, coloring/drawing, movie days, dental hygiene day, relay races, nature walks, show and tell, collage projects, etc. A local bakery also donates biscuits that we give the kids at the end and for some of these kids, it is the only thing they will have to eat that day. Because I know how heartbreaking some of these kids' situations are, I really want to help make this program meaningful and fun for them. The three other girls and I have been working hard to come up with a bunch of activities and ongoing projects to do with them with little resources and supplies. The program starts next Tuesday and we are working on getting some funds together for supplies and planning out our first week of activities. We have a venue that a local man lets us use and across the street there is a large grassy field so we have plenty of space. I’m excited to be involved in this really special program and think it will be a really worthwhile use of my time here.
An additional highlight of recent weeks has been the University Club pool days on Thursdays for SOs. THe University Club is a sort of off-campus hotel/resort owned by the university. Visiting professors and special guests of the university stay there. Students are not normally allowed at the University Club except for certain special occasions. For example, as part of the IEA club (the school’s honors society) Ryan got to go and eat dinner there and mingle with the chancellor, deans, and other professors of the university. He said it was one of the best meals he has ever had. Anyway, for whatever reason, the University Club allows SOs and their kids to come hang out at the pool on Thursdays from 10am-4pm. The pool is right on the beach at the end of the harbor and one of my favorite perks of pool day is that you can take the kayaks out for free. Last week myself and a couple other girls took some kayaks out in the harbor, which was really fun. I have been itching to do some kayaking here so it worked out well for me. Essentially, pool day is a huge perk of being an SO here.
The most recent SO event I have gone to was a waterfall hike at Mt. Carmel. We all took a bus up to Mt. Carmel, and went on a short hike to the waterfall. The waterfall was beautiful – the prettiest one I’ve seen on the island. There is not much else to say about it except that it was a fun little day trip and I definitely plan on doing next month’s hiking excursion. I think the pictures will do more to describe it than I can…
A few weekends ago I went to Carriacou (another island that is one of three islands that make up the nation of Grenada) for a weekend hash trip. A hash, for those of you who may not remember, is an organized hike/run that happens every other Saturday on various different places around Grenada – once a year they do a hash in Carriacou. Ryan did not go because he had too much work to do, so three other girls and I went. We left Grenada on Saturday morning at 9am on a ferry and arrived in Carriacou in the main town of Hillsborough where everyone was staying around 11:30am. We checked into our hotel and still had a few hours until the hash started so we walked down to this little deli and got some fresh sliced turkey and cheese, and some bagels and made sandwiches which we ate on the beach. Afterwards, we all took a short nap in our room and got dressed for the hash. Buses came and picked us up and took us to the east side of the island where the hash would start. It was a one-way hash so it started on the east side and ended on the west side in Hillsborough (most hashes are normally circular in that they start and end in the same place). The hash was fun – I tried jogging the first part of the hash but you couldn’t run the whole way – some of the trails had lots of rocks and although this hash had less steep hills than the first one I did, there was still a decent amount of uphill inclines that would have made it difficult to jog the whole way. We got some great views of the island and surrounding ocean and ended back in Hillsborough around sunset for a barbeque at a bar on the beach. The rest of the night we hung out on the beach with the other hashers and relaxed. The next day, a group of us hiked to Paradise Bay (about a 45 minute walk from our hotel). We hung out at the beach, played around in the water, got some Pina Coladas at this bar called Off the Hook, and finally took a boat taxi back to Hillsborough to grab lunch and catch the ferry back to Grenada. I had some really good meals in Carriacou – tuna, rice, potato salad, mashed pumpkin – they know how to cook some tasty food. Overall, I had a great trip and am glad that I took the opportunity to visit another island.
After Ryan finished exams last week, he was able to take a break this weekend and relax a little bit. Friday night we went out with friends and Saturday we just hung around the house relaxing. Sunday we went to the beach in front of this restaurant called The Aquarium (I have mentioned this place in another post) and went snorkeling. We had heard that this place had some of the best snorkeling on the island and we found that to be true. We did some incredible snorkeling in Hawaii but this was different. First since the restaurant was going through renovation, we had the beach and the ocean all to ourselves so it felt secluded – nothing but us and the fish. It’s difficult to describe but we saw so many cool fish – different colors, sizes, shapes, swimming in schools and through these little underwater caves and valleys in the coral and rock. The whole underwater scenery was truly amazing. It was definitely the best snorkeling I’ve ever done. My favorite fish we saw were these little bright royal blue fish with specks of blue sparkly-looking scales. Since we don’t have a waterproof camera, I don’t have any pictures of the snorkeling (they wouldn’t do it any justice anyway) but I do have a few shots of us on the beach. 
That is all for now. I will try to post more often – we’ll see how that works out :)
