Spaghetti for Breakfast: Advent

About Louverture Cleary School

Louverture Cleary School (LCS) is a private, Catholic boarding school near Port au Prince Haiti. Unlike most private boarding schools, this school costs almost nothing for students to attend. Though it is one of the best schools in the country academically speaking, it is not for the small elite with money. Kids at this school come from families who might otherwise struggle to send them to school at all. Students here are incredibly talented academically, but the purpose of this school is not to train kids for the best foreign universities, to go out and make money somewhere else. This school's mission is to transform Haiti, one child at a time. Students learn to value hard work - both physical work and intellectual work - and they are challenged always to live lives of service to the community around them. Upon graduation, they go to universities here, get jobs here, and many stay on to work at the school itself. Having met many graduates, I am amazed and impressed by the people this school produces. They are intelligent, kind, fun, caring people who I really think could be the ones to transform this country.

Monday, November 30, 2009

Advent

Today is the first Sunday of Advent. I always love this season because I love Christmas, and the anticipation of Christmas, and the music we sing during this time of year is just so much fun. This year though that anticipation has a whole new meaning for those of us who are really just dying to come home for a month to see family and friends, sleep in our own beds, curl up under a blanket and read a book on a snowy day, eat our favorite foods that do not involve rice or pasta and enjoy a nice merlot with dinner. Two weeks until I come home … more than four weeks until Christmas …

But I’m trying to keep my head in the game here and enjoy the things that are wonderful about being here. We had my absolute favorite lunch today – diri ak sos pwa (rice with bean sauce and other yumminess). This morning I went outside and there was one of our security guys up in a coconut tree throwing them down to the ground where someone else chopped them open for a little midmorning snack of coconut milk and the fleshy stuff inside. It’s mango season finally and they’re insanely delicious. Yesterday we spent a day at a fancy hotel and sat out by the pool all afternoon. We had cheeseburgers and fries for lunch! The weather is absolutely gorgeous now and I get to wear flip flops every day. I did yoga outside this morning about 6:15 before breakfast. The kids here really do crack me up every day. Their favorite game now is saying “yo gusto” to me because that’s about the most grammatically incorrect thing you can say in Spanish and I told them it makes me cry when I hear it. Now they just think that’s funny and say it to me as often as possible to watch me scream and run away.

Life is good here – but I can’t wait to be home for a while!