Our animal population has been growing – we now have a parrot, four bunnies, several dogs, and we just got two 4 month old St. Bernard puppies, which we are planning to breed (to help pay for the copious amount of food they eat!) This breed of dog is known to be kind, loving and loyal, which we thought would make them just perfect for the children…what we didn’t count on was that the littlest children would be absolutely petrified of them (and they aren’t nearly full grown yet)! Most of the little ones will now pet the dogs hesitatingly, but are still more than terrified if one of the dogs comes eagerly running to greet them! Only baby Arian, has been pretty much fearless from the start.
This spring we have been very excited about our eco- project. Our goal is to make the ashram and orphanage self sustainable and ecological. We are currently looking into installing “earthworm composts” by the main houses. This seems to be the most effective and fastest way of composting our organic waste, but we will need a lot of worms, as it takes one kilo of earthworms to make one kilo of compost per day! The earthworms are expensive, but an engineer friend has donated our first 10 kilos for free!
We are currently arranging an exchange program for groups of students to come and stay on the ashram, in exchange for landscaping gardens around the children’s homes, and building irrigation systems which recycle the water from the homes. This will supplement the food supply from the greenhouse, which is also being prepared to produce presently. We have a chicken coop just finished and are working on outfitting a solar room, where we can power our most important appliances. We also recently installed drain pipes to the large soccer court roof which funnels all the rain water into an enormous cistern. We can then use this water throughout the dry season. Since we only have rain during four months of the year, and no underground spring water, catchment systems are imperative.
Meanwhile the new children have been giving us so many funny anecdotes over the past year. Here are a few we thought you would enjoy hearing:
Dovin, age 5, and third youngest in a family of five, is one of the most impish little people you will ever meet. When he is excited and happy, he’ll often break into a jerky dance while pulling the most hilarious faces. He is full of enthusiasm, but loves to say “No!” to just about everything you say. One day, two of our teenage girls, Kendra and Rubi, began complaining that something or someone was leaving rocks in their beds night after night! It remained an unsolved mystery for a few days, until Dovin was caught in the act of sneaking into one of the girls’ rooms and filling her pillow case with rocks!
Recently all of our boys, ranging age 4 to 10, have discovered the joy of fort making! They will spend the entire afternoon building forts from just about anything they can find. Atair, age 10, and our most recent newcomer, is the master architect; he’ll spend hours making and remaking some of the most elaborate constructions on his own. Alex and Dovin, our 3 and 4 year old brothers, work more like a pair of mini engineer twins, chattering away as to the merits of each new piece of plastic or plywood they put into place.
Now Alex and Dovins’ older brother Abundio likes forts but he would much rather busy himself loading and unloading wheelbarrows of rocks, digging holes, and collecting brush. He so loves to help with “real work”, that he actually becomes immensely upset if his help is ever not needed.
We are very proud of our almost 4 year old boy Gaby, who suffers from Ehler Danlos syndrome (characterized by hyper elasticity of the joints) and dwarfism, as he is making the biggest effort to become mobile. He gets so excited when he sees a child running, that he shrieks, flails his arms and bounces up and down and motions them to run some more for him! Although his legs are still weak and floppy, his arms are strong enough to support his own weight now. His favorite thing is going down the slide; he likes to hang from the rails at the top of the slide, then let himself go whizzing down as he holds his breath! Gaby really loves the thrill, and the moment he comes to a stop, he calls out “mas, mas!” for more. One day while getting his diaper changed, Gaby came up with another new trick – he rolls over and then scoots himself backwards off the bed! We happened to catch one of his first tricks on video; check this link to see it!
Another great kid accomplishment, which we can’t take the credit for, is Oscar’s recent reading and writing progress. Oscar is just turned 11. His family of 3 arrived in the summer of 2009. None of the children had ever properly attended school, and Oscar was extremely self conscious about his inability to read or write. But thanks to a special volunteer, Antares Hernandez, he is improving by the week! Antares has been very dedicated to her daily three hours of tutoring him; so much so that she recently decided to commit to stay here for an entire year, instead of the two months she originally had planned, so that she could continue to give Oscar all the individual attention he needs, both academically and as his special “auntie”!
We have also had Betina Mansbach, a veteran elementary school teacher here for the past month as another great help tutoring the children in our special learning classrooms. With her passion for teaching she brought an enthusiasm and excitement to the classroom that kids and staff really enjoyed.
Our first and second graders had a blast in Betina's inspired classes!
As for our other volunteers, we’ve just had an acrobat from Germany, Kristin VeiB, who gave a 3 week beginning acrobatics course to the children, which culminated in an informal performance for all the families!
Melody White, another one of our artistic volunteers, created a puppet theatre with our 11 and 12 year old girls Misha and Danya, which they performed for the other kids! Alex and Dovin must have never seen a puppet show before, because they kept jumping up to scrutinize the puppets and then very gingerly try to touch them, to see if they were real!
Artistic opportunities for the children seem to just keep on coming, too; this summer we have both a professional pianist and modern dancer coming to do artistic programs with the children!
Thank you all so much for your care and support; we are deeply grateful for the kindness that you continue to share with us!
Wishing you all a wonderful summer!
With lots of love,
Tashirat kids and staff
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