Author: Big Mama

Thoughts after three days and a lot of Mexican food

We left the Dominican Republic at 9:20 a.m. last Friday morning and I finally arrived at the San Antonio airport at 5:45 p.m. after two time changes, six bags of in-flight snak mix (Apparently the airlines can no longer afford the “c” in snack), countless Diet Cokes, and finishing “Such a Pretty Fat” by Jen Lancaster. (Hysterical book, by the way.)

P ended up having to be out of town to guide hunts for a friend, so I called my daddy when I landed to let him know he could begin circling the airport while I waited for my luggage to make its debut on the baggage carousel, otherwise known as Suitcase Roulette.

I made my way down to the Baggage Claim area, taking my time since I knew I’d have to wait, but then I looked up and saw Caroline holding a big, pink rose, with a huge grin on her face, waiting for me. I ran the last few steps, picked her up in my arms, and started to cry. It’s a moment I’ll never forget.

We immediately headed to the nearest Mexican restaurant because I was feeling faint from lack of chips and salsa. It’s like my body had been in detox for a week and was beginning to revolt. Two taco nortenos and a bowl of guacamole later, I was a new woman.

So I’m home.

The weekend was full of activity. We went to see Madagascar 2, we explored a cave, and spent most of Saturday with Gulley and her youngest son, Will.

I went straight from temporary missionary mode to mommy mode in 2.2 seconds without a moment to catch my breath.

But even in the midst of all the activity and all the laundry, the children from the Dominican Republic were never far from my mind. I’d hear Caroline laugh, see her smile, watch the way she and Will were playing in the backyard, and I’d see the faces of those precious kids that I may never see again.

They have left a permanent mark on my heart. And I miss them.

On Sunday morning, I was sitting in church and we began to sing “Everlasting God”. There is a line in the chorus that says “You’re the defender of the weak, you comfort those in need” and when I sang it I felt the tears roll down my cheeks because now I know what need really looks like. I saw it firsthand last week.

But I also know what comfort looks like. It looks like a handful of letters from sponsors that have been kept in plastic bags for years. It looks like children singing in their classrooms knowing that they are going to get a meal and an education.

It looks like little kids running up to us and yelling “JOHN SMITH??!!” because that’s the name of their sponsor and since we’re from the United States they assume we must know him.

I saw need.

I saw sadness.

I saw comfort.

I saw joy.

I saw the difference Compassion is making in the lives of children all over the world one sponsorship at a time.

And it’s amazing.
A little pre-holiday treat

A few weeks ago the nice people at CWDKids emailed me and asked me if I’d like to give my readers a chance to win a $100 gift certificate.

Umm, yeah.

Then they asked me if I could start the giveaway on Monday, November 10th. A quick look at my calendar told me that would be the Monday after I got home from the Dominican. I figured I would be emotionally and physically exhausted.

Turns out I was right.

I hate to admit it publicly, but the laundry has beat me. I have one pair of jeans in particular that probably never should have come back to U.S. soil.

But enough about my problems.

This is your big moment. You have a chance to win a $100.00 gift certificate from CWDKids. All you have to do is go visit their site by clicking here or on the graphic above, then come back and leave me a comment about which outfit you loved.

Because I like to share with the group, I will tell you that I particularly love this outfit and also this outfit. And, oh what I wouldn’t give for Caroline to have this nightgown for Christmas morning because, HELLO, flashback to my 1970’s childhood.

I’ll leave comments open until Friday evening and pick the winner on Saturday morning using my friend the Random Number generator.

Have fun!

***Only one entry per person please!***
The post that should have gone up on Friday night

Clearly I am no longer on the airplane because that would be pure torture considering we left the DR two days ago, but I wrote this on the way home. Then I got home and was nearly assassinated by a huge pile of laundry and forgot all about it. So I’m posting it a little late. Just pretend like I’m not and the world will be a happier place.

At the moment I’m writing this I am on the plane from Miami to Dallas. I’m listening to my sweet 80’s mix on my iPod because international travel puts me in the mood for Chicago’s greatest hits with a little old school Michael Jackson and some Tiffany thrown in for good measure because who doesn’t like Mall Rock. I won’t lie, it’s a mix that is 31 flavors of awesome.

We left the hotel this morning at around 7:00 a.m. and I immediately regretted my decision to stay up until 2 a.m. the night before and then take a Benadryl. The good news is I’ve been able to sleep intermittently on various legs of the flight and treated the people next to me to the glorious sight of me sleeping with my mouth open.

When we got to Miami we had to clear customs, which took a sweet forever and then headed straight for some comida Americano (that means “American food” for those of you who aren’t bilingual). Most of our group decided on California Pizza Kitchen, but I went straight up Burger King because my gastrointestinal system hadn’t been exposed to fine fast food cuisine in six days and that is too long, mi amigos.

I am so ready to get home to my peeps I can hardly stand it. And I’m not just saying that because we’re going straight to eat Mexican food the minute they pick me up from the airport. I’d be glad to see them with or without the presence of warm chips and guacamole. But don’t think I’m not going to scarf down copious amounts of avocado and cheese-based products.

This past week I’ve talked a lot about Compassion and the people of the Dominican Republic, but there’s a whole other element of the trip that I haven’t discussed, spending a week with eleven people I’d never met before.

It’s kind of a weird thing to go to a foreign country with a group of strangers. If you don’t like them then the best you can hope for is that you find a few locals to hang out with who don’t get tired of you asking them how old they are because it’s the only Spanish phrase you know.

I can say with all honesty that the group exceeded my expectations. And there’s nothing better than starting a week off with everyone being polite and ending it being comfortable enough to make fun of each other.

On the last night, we all met in the conference room of the hotel to talk about the week and share any thoughts we had about the whole thing. We talked about the serious aspects and then talked about some of the other things we’d done, such as jumping off a cliff into the Caribbean. (Not me, by the way. My days of jumping off cliffs are long gone, if they ever existed at all. Which they didn’t. Risk taker? Not so much.)

One day a group of us went down to the beach area outside the hotel to witness the aforementioned jumping off cliffs. I made the comment that I’d stuck fairly close to Marlboro Man on the way down to the water because I figured if he can wrestle steers (cows?) to the ground, then he could probably take on a thug hiding out near the ocean if the need arose.

Shaun asked why I didn’t feel that way about him and I had to tell him it’s because he’s a musician AND he went to Baylor. Neither of those things really scream BODYGUARD MATERIAL.

But, Shaun, if I am ever in the need for some great adult contemporary music, you are totally my go-to guy. And if y’all don’t believe me you can go here and listen to Shaun’s new song. I’ve probably listened to it a hundred times in the last week.
A piece of mi corazon

**I thought I set this to post while I was flying home today, but apparently it was a major fail. That’s what happens when you take a Benadryl before posting.

After we visited another Compassion project yesterday, we went to the market since it was our last day and we all wanted to pick up a few souvenirs to take home.

Here are a few things I’ll take home with me.

A fab amber ring that was a total bargain thanks to my mad haggling skilz (Can I pull off skills with a z? I’m on the fence about it).

The ring totally reminds me of something Rachel Zoe would wear and when I saw it I said, “I’m dying. I am totally dying”, in my best monotone voice.

I also purchased some Dominican coffee because rumor has it that it’s even better than that slop Juan Valdez is peddling down in Columbia.

And, lastly, some pure Dominican vanilla extract because it is going to make my Christmas baked goods muy delicioso.

But there are other things I’m taking home with me that aren’t tangible, yet will remain etched in my memory forever.

And then there are the things that have caused me to leave a big piece of my heart in this country that was totally foreign to me just five days ago.

I owe a huge thank you to Compassion for what they have shown me this week. I am truly forever changed.

To Shaun Groves, thanks for sending that follow up email asking if I was sure I didn’t want to come on this trip. I can’t imagine anywhere else I would have rather been for the last week.

And a special shout out to my roommate and photographer extraordinaire, Keely Scott. Every photo you’ve seen on my blog this week has come from her. I couldn’t have told the story without her. And I wouldn’t have laughed nearly as hard if she hadn’t been my roommate.

Thanks to all of you who have sponsored children this week. Words can’t express the difference it is making in their lives. And if you haven’t and would like to do so, it’s not too late.

To read the other accounts of the week you can go to Compassion Bloggers.
It’s a bird! It’s a plane!

At some point over the summer, Caroline discovered The Justice League cartoons. Here is where I could go into a long tirade about how I’m not really a fan of Flash Gordon and confess that Spiderman kind of creeps me out, but I’ll save that gem of a post for another time.

Caroline became intrigued with the whole concept of superheroes, especially Wonder Woman. If she’s like her mama then it’s because of the cool red boots and the great hair that is always in place, but I suspect it’s because Wonder Woman isn’t afraid to use her Golden Lasso and save some folks from danger.

And somewhere deep down in us, don’t we all have a little bit of a desire to be a superhero, with or without the kicky red boots and silver wristbands?

This week is your chance to become a superhero.

All of the bloggers on this trip have talked a lot this week about the difference you can make by sponsoring a child through Compassion because we are in the midst of an incredible opportunity to see the change that sponsorship can bring in a child’s life.

Yesterday we went to another project to meet two girls who are part of a Compassion program called LDP (Leadership Development Program). This is a different type of sponsorship program that provides a college education for impoverished high school graduates.

We were able to watch two beautiful young women with the brightest smiles I have ever seen tell us about the difference that Compassion has made in their life.

Mariolvis told us that she became a sponsored child when she was five years old. Her sponsor wrote to her and encouraged her all the way through high school. She is now twenty-three years old, attends college with a major in Marketing thanks to the LDP, and told us that she still reads the letters she used to receive from the family that sponsored her throughout her childhood.

And when we went to her home, she pulled the letters out and showed them to us.

SHE STILL READS THE LETTERS.

Julia was the other girl we met and she had more personality than should be allowed. She is currently attending college studying Engineering and Computer Science. I’m considering asking her if she could tutor me by email because I could use some computer education.

We were able to go to Julia’s home as well and meet her sweet mother. When we asked her mother about the difference Compassion has made in their lives, she literally threw her hands up in the air and waved them around. She had no words.

Julia had slipped back to her bedroom because she wanted to show us her high school graduation photo and some academic medals she had been awarded. As she walked back in the room she had tears in her eyes and shared with us that she vividly remembers being a young child and being picked to become a part of Compassion’s child sponsorship program.

She had to have her picture taken for her sponsorship packet, but literally didn’t have clothes to wear for the photo. As tears streamed down her face she told us of how she had to wait in the bathroom with no clothing, while seven other little girls took turns changing into the same dress for their sponsorship photos. That dress was all they had.

The shame and sadness of that memory filled her with grief even fifteen years later.

But now she is a beautiful, vivacious twenty-year-old woman on her way to earning a degree in Engineering.

We asked her about the difference Compassion made in her life and this is what she said:

“People who sponsor children through Compassion are the superheroes of the Earth.”

You may not be able to leap tall buildings in a single bound, but you can be a superhero of the Earth by sponsoring a child.

And I think that’s pretty cool.

Please sponsor a child today or if you are already a sponsor, please think about sponsoring an additional child. I can’t even explain the impact that sponsorship has on the lives of these kids. These children are holding out for a hero. (Don’t make me bust out the song from the “Footloose” soundtrack because I totally will.)
The irony is that I’m eating Oreos right now

I talked about how hard yesterday was in my last post, but it was also my favorite day so far. The kids were so excited to see us and I got a small glimpse of what it must feel like to be Hannah Montana, but without the long blonde hair and legwarmers.

I couldn’t get enough of them as they climbed all over me while saying, “Mi Americana! Mi Americana!”

They were all so precious and I took pictures of them with my camera so that they could see themselves. I let them hold my backpack. I let them braid my hair and wear my Aggie baseball cap.

At one point one of the little girls lifted up my shirt a little bit and started poking my stomach. Wanting to use one of my few Spanish vocabulary words, I said, “Blanco!” thinking that she must be fascinated by my white skin.

The translator looked at me a little sheepishly and said, “She says you’re a little bit fat.”

Perfect.

So I said, “Great. Tell her the fat girl wants her camera back.”