week two in the books

the incredible thing about time is that it in fact does not fly. it seems to be more of an instantaneous flash. it doesn't matter if you flash for an hour or for a week. but all of a sudden you are in your present place and the past is gone forever. that's what it feels like for this last week.

i am now in mike and goody's apartment. they are missionaries down here but can't be here for the summer because they are having a baby in mid july. yay. and the apartment is wonderful. on the third floor of this building i have quite a view. it is huge for the standards here. i feel like i am in a hotel, a paradise after the apartment i had been staying in before. i really is great. Gracias Senor.

oh man, so many things have happened. we finished cleaning, painting, and restoring the new dorms that are connected to the church. it actually used to be the parsonage for gabriel the pastor and co-president of G.O. Ministries. we finished up that work on friday. then the staff that is down here had a supper meeting at tim krause's. once again he is the field director in the D.R. then Will and Audrey helped me move up here in the apartment. i didn't have a bed yet though and slept on the futon in the living room.

the next morning, saturday, will and I did a basketball "practice" type event for different ages. the young boys just did lay up drills and shooting. the girls did some dribble exercises next. and the last group of older boys were slipt into 4 teams and each team played another for maybe 10 min. and then switched. this was all done on one court for about one hour time slots. the court is a kind of asphalt with the surface being rough because of bigger stones in the mix. the rims weren't bad, but not really good at the same time. not something to write home about i guess, even though i am......nevermind.

after food, i went with will and pedro to check out the courts we are going to be using for the summer. they are spread out all over the city. we will use different ones so kids don't have to walk quite so far i believe, but i may be wrong. we checked out maybe six courts and the last one was near a softball field where our church's team was just starting to play a game. the baseball season is after i leave so i needed to see some dominican softball at least. and it was fun to watch. nothing special though. they do underhand but it's not slow pitch still. there aren't crazy wind ups like girls' softball and they weren't pitching near as fast but the ball never gets above the batter's shoulders even on its way to the plate.

our team has a player named juan jose. he almost made it to the major leagues in america but hurt his knee i believe. he's a great guy and can just clobber the ball, he was the shortstop.

we stayed for maybe two innings and then came back so we could get my bed moved into my apartment. later at 5 i think i went with will and pedro to a minor league basketball game of the team pedro coaches.

pedro is a man that is mentoring here. he's in his forties and was an amazing basketball player here in the dominican. back in the day pedro was the player of the year in THE basketball league as a rookie. i've heard stories of him scoring 83 points in a game and 61 in a playoff or something in that order. he can throw it up from this side of half court and it goes in. but an oddity in the dominican republic where basketball is concerned anyway is that he is very fundamentally sound. he's got a great basketball mind. he helps with the sports ministry with will.

pedro's team ended up losing, but it was quite an experience. the fans are so loyal, they were going crazy the whole game. the announcer did not stop talking the entire time.

after the game me and will went back and had supper with audrey. it was probably nine at night, and then we sat and talked about lots of things.

today for church i played the guitar again. then during announcements, gabriel asked what my name was, "something something americano, uh como se llama?" and i had no idea what was going on because i was already seated in a pew and will shouted out that my name was brent. and he thanked me i think for playing. of course i didn't really understand any of it. then after church we ate at a place which translated is called "the little grill." i had beef and it was amazing. this afternoon we've all been relaxing and it has been raining pretty heavy the last hour or two. it hasn't rained since those first days i was here.

another day will be a big preparation day for this next week and then we have three teams. i am pretty sure i will be doing construction with the team that is from audrey's church. there is a team going to do soccer in haiti. and i don't know what the other team is doing. but they all are coming on the same flight on tuesday. lol, we'll be carrying their bags and helping in tuesday night and then the summer is off like a flash :). craziness. i don't feel ready but i'm trusting God.