Much of the recreation equipment we brought for the Children’s Home required assembly: soccer nets, team benches, pitching practice nets, a mini golf putting green and even tee ball needed to be put together, areas marked off, and equipment laid out for play. This took the early part of the morning.
The rest of the morning was spent in play with the residents of the home. Baseball (tee ball for the younger kids), frisbee, and soccer pick up matches and one on one challenges (free kick vs goalie) were everywhere, often overlapping.
One thing to know about the play yard at GBCH: it can be roughly divided into what could be the hot section, and the ant section. The hot section, out in the unshaded area of the play yard received the full beating of the tropical sun, combined with a seasonal mugginess. The shaded sections, under the large central tree, and along the sides of some of the buildings were dominated by ants. Biting ants. You began to wonder how that ant got all the way to your shoulder without you noticing. Most of the bites seemed to be on the ankles. None of these factors stopped the kids from wanting to play, and if they wanted to play then so did we. Everyone had a blast.
A lot of the conversations today centered around the similarities and differences between Ohio and the Bahamas. People shared what their lives were like and the kids opened up more. Even some of the teen girls who had spent much of the day at the “we’re too cool for all this” table started to open up. Some phenomena are universal.
Drenched with sweat (both from the assembly of play equipment, and from trying to keep up with several very excited kids) we took numerous water breaks but eventually needed to cool down before dinner. We stopped by a local beach where the water was like cool bath water – very comfortable, and may have spoiled our dinner a little by sampling local food vendors. On the way back from the home Jenny introduced us to guinep bought from a street vendor, and taught us the right way to eat its fruit. It was a real treat. Then near the beach there were a couple of food shacks with cold drinks, conch salad, and ice cream. We spent time talking to the vendors and heard their stories of Dorian and COVID and how that one-two punch had impacted their lives. So many here lost so much and yet feel grateful for the good fortune of making it through the last five years. There is still a lot of recovery work to be done, but the people of this island are very hospitable and are working hard to make every experience here special.
Dinner proved to be challenging. Beset by issues, Max nonetheless managed to make a wonderful meal with the help of grill chef Chris and kitchen assistants Andy, Karen and Melanie. This team managed a great meal despite needing to assemble a new kitchen in a different unit. Flexibility is the name of the game down here.
NOTE: You will notice that there are no photos of the children in our blog. As wards of the state, Bahamian law prevents us from photographing the children for their own protection.
