The Arrival at Crossroads...

here is our adventure vehicle...our only transportation for two whole weeks! we rode in it about 2-3 horus a day!
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Well, we departed from the PP Airport and said goodbye to half our group, but we met some new people as well. We all squeezed onto a crossroads truck that was supposed to fit 24, and we squeezed 32 people on it...it was tight...but we all worried what our place would look like after driving up a rickety mountain for 45 minutes...but it was amazing....stunning sight....breathtaking....

anyways...the girls lived in two rooms connected, yes, there were 24 of us! lol....it was fun, the place where we lived was great, the lady made it for self-contemplation...i'll show photos in a second...

these are all the girls...we had a girl chat powwow on a rainy day
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Crossroads was an organization called a "dominican ministry".  The owner, Jana, bought land in the dominican, and hired contractors to build villages on each piece of land so that poor dominicans and haitian refugees could have stable houses and villages without as much chance for disease...Jana and her family have lived here doing this for years now and they continue to do ministries to all the different villages and the hospitals...We saw the poorest of the poor villages, sang with them, brought them clothes, and toys etc...we also went to the dump where the people rummaged through the piles of trash to find a living for their families...we visited the public hospital, which was extremly depressing because many people go there to die due to no care and treatment...

the pool on the grounds...
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we also spent the remainder two weeks working/doing construction in a village called nazareth...i will explain that in the next entry...

we not only did volunteer work, but we had lots of free time as well...i spent alot of time reading, swimming, hanging out with the others, playing pool/pingpong, and chatting it up with the girls...every sunday and wednesday we went to a local beach called sosua...we all really enjoyed that there, though it rained almost every day we went to the beach...then again...it rained every single day at 4ish....i mean downpour....