Saturdays in Venilale

Woo, what a day! I was busy for most of it and it seemed to just fly by!

The clinic is not open on the weekend, so I decided to go down to the orphanage to spend time with the girls I had met there yesterday. As I set out towards Ulla’s house several girls rushed up to me. They took my hands and lead me down a dirt path. I thought we were going somewhere, but apparently we were just walking around, which was fine with me. I had asked them what they were doing and they told me “eskola!” it took me a minute to comprehend what they had said, but then I caught on. We talked and sang songs together. They asked me to teach them a song, and can you believe the first one I could think of was The Barney Song? Now a dozen or so ET girls know, “I love you, You love me, we’re a happy family, with a great big hug and a kiss from me to you, won’t you say you love me too?” They asked me to sing it over and over again so that they could learn the words and hand movements (hug, kiss, smile, I and you) that I made up on the spot. Once at Ulla’s house they even had me write the lyrics down so they could better memorize it.

As we knocked on Ulla’s door, the 4 year old girls peeked through the window, and upon seeing me screamed with joy. They all gave me a big hug when I came in and one girl took my hands and started jumping! Ulla took the little bicycle with training wheels and lead the girls outside to the basketball court. All the little girls took a turn riding the bicycle, while the older girls (8-12 years old?) stayed with me and we played basketball with small rubber balls that fit into your hand and then volleyball. Soon, the girls got hot and lead me over to some steps. Although the steps were narrow (barely wide enough for me to sit down), the girls crowded around me, some behind me, some beside me and some at my feet. They all just seemed to want to TOUCH me! I was reminded of learning how humans long for touch from other humans and how we are supposed to get something like 7 hugs a day to stay healthy. With this in mind, I patted the girls on the back or touched them on their arms any chance I got. On the “with a great big hug” part of the song I made sure to give them a joyful, loving hug. These girls need to know they ARE loved!

After improving with this song, the girls sang to me some songs in Portuguese and even English. I recognized the songs from last Sunday at the oratory. They sang the Portuguese version of “If You’re Happy and You Know It” and I followed along, then they asked me to sing it in English. They kept saying “say-loook” and I had no idea what that meant. Ulla later told me it meant “solo”-they wanted me to sing the songs by myself. I love singing, but I am terrible at it, so it was fun overcoming my shyness of singing in front of others. Still, I wish I was a better singer and couldn’t help but wonder if the girls realized how bad I was or even cared. I also sang “I’ve got the joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart” and had all the girls stand up to teach them

God is a good God, yes he is

God is a good God, yes he is

Because he lifts me up, Turns me around, Sets my feet…on HIGH-er ground!

I thought it was a pretty easy song to learn (not too many words) AND it had hand movements. I was hoping if the girls learned it I could record it and send it back to the Youth Group at Holy Family. The girls seemed to like it, but weren’t crazy about it. Maybe it will grow on them. Soon they were back to singing one of their many songs. The girls then asked me to DANCE for them! I joked with all my friends that I would teach all the girls HSM songs and videotape them dancing to them. I guess I could have had my chance right then and there, but I didn’t want to pull out all my stops on the first day of singing and dancing with the kids. Instead, I improvised and did a lot of crazy dance moves, including shuffling and spinning around. I then thought of teaching them the Makarena. They had never seen this dance before and absolutely loved it! I hope I can bring them the music sometime so they can dance to the song. I think they liked when you shake your hips before jumping and starting again the best. Each one came up to me individually and asked if they were doing the movements right. They were so interested and entertained by it! Who knew?!

In the afternoon we opened the “toy room” for any kids who wanted to come and play at the school. A group of boys flooded in as soon as we opened the doors. Soon most of the boys were playing “Memory”. I watched them play and it was very funny and entertaining to me. They all got so excited whenever they got a match, and Ulla had to keep a vigilant eye on them because they liked to flip cards when it wasn’t their turn or flip more than 2 cards over at one time. One particularly competitive boy shuffled the cards around every time he flipped 2 over that didn’t match, as if to say, “If I can’t match them, none of you should get the chance to match any either”. When there were just 4 cards left (2 matches), the boys shuffled the cards so that the boy guessing wouldn’t have an advantage and know if the 2 cards he would flip over would match. As 4 boys in a row picked 2 cards that didn’t match, each laughed every time they didn’t get the match. They were just so joyful, happy and playful, and the spirit was contagious. I found myself laughing out loud just watching these boys play cards with each other.

On Saturday afternoons, many school girls play in a basketball league and the seminarian boys play soccer. Everyone who isn’t playing comes out to watch. It was so fun watching the basketball game with all the children. Children lined the entire perimeter of the court, and anytime anyone scored, they ALL broke out in cheers and applause. It was very exciting. The soccer game was played by the seminary boys (all aged around 15). I was surprised to see that they all wore matching uniforms and had shin guards and cleats. Apparently soccer here is a very serious business. One of the priests was the referee and he was sporting a black and red striped English jersey. The goals here do not have nets, and there are no lines on the field. The ball is in play until it is kicked into the rocks near the sidelines or is clearly out of play over the end lines. The boys all played very respectfully (i.e. no foul play, high kicks, slide tackles, etc) and never argued with the referee’s calls. I think the game ended as a 1-1 tie.

During the entire game “Nina”, an 18 year old student at the school I stay at, and I talked. She told me that she is an only child and an Australian couple supports her financially so she can attend school here. Her parents are farmers so they are not able to pay for her schooling. She is a 3^rd year studying Tourism and hopes to attend university in Dili. Nina was very good at speaking English and she taught me more than 15 helpful Tetum words including Birthday, teach, remember, forget, dream, wake-up, rosary, pray, etc. We had a really nice time together.

Today I got much better at saying the rosary in Tetum, although I am far from perfect and am not even close to leraning it memory. I know that will come in time, but it was nice to see that I was actually able to pretty much SAY it all today with the help of the translation. Yesterday I had a hard time even reading as fast as the children were saying the rosary, and today I was able to speak it and pretty much keep up. Yay!