I am very grateful and fortunate that this is my second trip to Jamaica on this global service intiative with Stevens. But this year's experience is definitely different from last year, but both are very fulfilling. Yesterday, during the first night of curriculum, we discussed the difference between fix, help, and serve which I had a general idea of the between the three, but the second time around really helps make the picture clearer. Fixing has the general assumption that something is already broken, whereas helping usually involves being onesided and one gains satisfaction. Serving is another story. Serving benefits both parties. When you serve, you see the wholeness of the people you are serving and feel gratitude. Today, I felt gratitude.
Instead of Merit, our super skilled Jamaican bus driver, driving us to the site, I, along with three other returners, had the opportunity to ride in Kaye's car. She had previously driven us in her car last year and know we are used to her driving down the narrow, winding, and bumpy roads of Jamaica. We drove down the familiar road to Pedro Plains Primary School. Turning right into the school and seeing the sign brought back the great memories I made last year serving at this school. As we pulled up onto the street where the school was, we could see all the hard work we did of painting the wall that surrounds the school. It brought back flashbacks of all of us working together to get the whole wall painted in the blazing heat, with paint brushes in our hands, using buckets as seats, and singing along to whatever song came up next on someone's speakers. Our teamwork and persistence that day was amazing and I immediately became excited to see what this group and today would bring.
Last night, Kaye gave us the run down of what would be happening today. She told us we would finish painting the principal's office and the rest of the net ball court which included, but was not limited to, painting the ground, building a wall next to the bleachers so the children would not jump off of it, render the surronding wall, and paint it. These tasks altogether seem like a daunting task, but with our super motivated group, we were all ready to take on the tasks at hand.
I have noticed that our group has really great, inspriational people who want to make a difference in the world and I know our energeries feed off of each other. We were introduced to the Jamaican day laborers that we had the fortune of getting to learn from them. We all jumped at the opportunities they gave us to serve. Surprisingly, none of us fought over which job we wanted to do, we just all fell into our own little niches and got to work. Some were sweeping the net ball court area prepping it for a paint job, others were filling a large vessel of water so we could use it for the cement, another group was gathering cinderblocks for the wall, and the last group was mixing the cement into concrete.
'I was part of the concrete mixing crew. Kevin was the day laborer who taught us how to mix the perfect concrete. We all worked together to mix gravel/sand, cement, and water with the mixing technique Kevin showed us. This required a lot of strength. There was a ton of physical strength including continuously mixing the concrete with our shovels, which is a lot harder then Kevin made it look, then carrying buckets full of the concrete to the crew who were buidling the wall. This also included a good amount of emotional strength as well. Not going to lie, concrete is heavy. Mixing and carrying those buckets of concrete back and forth was a lot, but knowing that this court would be completed soon with all our efforts motivated me to keep on going. The faster we brought the concrete, the faster the wall would be built and rendering would be complete. I'd hate to be the chemistry nerd, but I felt we were the rate determining step in this reaction. The crew in charge of building the wall was waiting for us to bring them the concrete so they could get started. It was really funny when the other group would continually yell "MUD!!!!" and that meant they needed more concrete, but we were in the middle of mixing, therefore our step was vital to get the process going. I just thought it was really cool how we all relied on each other to complete the job at hand.
Reflecting even on this one step of concrete I believe correlates with service. Our team dynamic works so well, it almost mixes just as well as the cement and water we worked with today. With a little effort, such as the work we put in today to complete more of the net ball court, we can go a long way. With time, like concrete, we all solidify together with the one ultimate goal, to serve. It was truly gratifying to see the work that we did today make a difference at this school. Many people in our group brought jump ropes, soccer balls, frisbees, and bubbles for the school children to play with, so knowing how much joy that brings to them, I can only image how happy they will all be once this court is finished.
- Jane
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