This recap has been a long time in coming. Ever since I got back from Jamaica, my life seems to have made a jump to light speed*. This may be due to the fact that I went straight from Jamaica to Muscatine (which is a feeling similar to rolling a Yahtzee on the first roll), and then I went straight from Muscatine back to school. Thus, I have had no time to sit down, gather my thoughts, and write about my spring break. And, truth be told, I still don't. But while I'm in the mood for some procrastination, I figured I may as well let you, the outside world, know what I really did over spring break.
The other reason this recap has been a long time in coming is because I can't think how possibly to best recount my adventure in Jamaica. To say it was an experience beyond words is an understatement, and as cheesy as that sounds, it's totally true. My spring break was one of the best weeks of my life, and to attempt to sum up the experience in several paragraphs of English seems somewhat futile. My worldview was expanded tenfold, the friendships I made down there were incredible, and the bonds that exist between my friends here at Wesleyan have grown tighter than I thought possible. After this intense introduction, the best I can do is summarize the highlights of the trip in the following bulleted points:
- I was part of a 28 team group of college students (23 from IWU) who stayed in a house on the campus of the Kingston School for the Blind and Visually Impaired. The school was run by the Salvation Army, and our group was sponsored by Adventures in Missions (AIM).
- The kids were incredible! I think I'm correct in speaking for the whole group when I say that we went down there thinking that we were going to help these kids out. However, after the first day, we all realized that the kids had so much more to teach us. Although only a third of the children were totally blind, every child had some sort of visual, aural, or mental disability. Yet despite their disabilities, these kids showed us a love for life and a faith in God that none of us expected.
- With their other four senses being extremely sharp, the kids were excellent when it came to music. I became best friends with one teenage boy in particular who played the piano like it was an extension of his body. And not only that, but he also played the guitar and the recorder better than I've heard Josh Bell play a Stradivarius violin!
- Our groups' daily schedule was as follows: wake up in the morning, eat breakfast, split up into 3 groups to perform various acts of physical labor on the campus, eat lunch, play with the kids all afternoon (this included teaching them to swim, VBS, playing sports, etc...), eat dinner, have our own personal group time, play euchre, go to bed.
- Besides building awesome friendships with the kids, I also felt like we all built lasting relationships with each other as a group. Ever since we've been back at IWU, I'm constantly running into them, and the joy of remembering Jamaica simply brings smiles to our faces. And these are people I'd never probably have met otherwise! If you told me, "4 football players, a theatre major, a music major, a poly sci. major, a volleyball player, a financial wizard, and an international student from China go down to Jamaica...." I would swear you were telling me a joke. But this trip wasn't a joke! Thanks to Jamaica, I now have doubled my "best friend" count here at IWU.
*sigh* These bulleted points are only the tip of a giant iceberg of Bulleted Points. I could literally write for hours about how great this trip was, but I really need to stop procrastingating and learn how to spell "procrastinating." I also need to get lots down before tomorrow. If you see me in person, please ask me to tell you Jamaica stories because that's all I've felt like doing for the last 5 days. If you become my friend on Facebook, you can look at all my sweet pictures too.
*- thanks in part to R2-D2 fixing my hyperdrive.
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