"My Heart" in Santo Domingo

An unexpected activity during building in Santo Domingo was the "gardening" our group did. The area the house was located had a small garden plot in the front yard and many of the other houses on the street had well-tended gardens.... so Reymundo, the house owner we worked with was excited when we offered to plant his.

Joselyn, the daughter of a "maestro" (teacher) on the worksite, and I became the planters and the two Northern Ireland guys, Mark and Andrew, became the fencebuilders (the fence-building became an epic task, see photos). As we started, I asked Reymundo how he wanted the design of the garden laid out: stripes, certain plants in certain areas?... He wanted me to put my name! "I can't do that!" I told him (that seemed really wierd, to have my name in his front yard!). Then he told me to put a big heart in the middle, to symbolize the love that was going into the house.


















The plants we used in the garden came from a nearby park! Joselyn had some gardening experience and knew which plants grew from runners, so all we had to do was cut chunks off witha machete and stick them in the dirt. I had some misgivings about letting the 12 year old hack away with a machete... however it was obvious that she had more experience with the knife than I did... so I couldn't really object.







As we planted and the garden started to take shape, Reymundo was very impressed and said that the heart was mine and that I was leaving it there at his house...

Here's a photo of me, with my fellow gardener Joselyn, after we had finished our multi-colored plantings: yellow, red, and a few shades of green.