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A lot has happened in the last few weeks! We have purchased supplies and broke ground on the project, my friends Justin and Tomas visit Jamaica for the first time, and I even scored my first goal while playing football (soccer) in Hayfield! I am back in Idaho as I write this update. We are going to need to return to Jamaica one final time so we can finish the project and wrap up any lose ends, but I am really happy with where we are right now. Keep reading this blog below for an update with everything that happened with the project since the last blog post that I wrote on January 11.
It is always good to arrive in Hayfield after I have been gone for a long period of time. I love seeing my friends in the community. The first day back I like to walk the road and talk with everyone.
Friday the 14th, I went to Morant Bay with Ricardo (the contractor, aka Bigga) and we purchased the first of the supplies. We bought some 2x4 board, metal wire, buckets, shovels, and some nails. We had them delivered to the school and a couple people helped us unload everything. The teachers said we could store all of our supplies in the school cafeteria, so we locked everything up in that room.
Saturday the 15th I assembled a crew to help me clean up the area that all of the sand and gravel will be delivered. Because of the location of the school, we are not able to drive the dump truck directly to the spot that we are going to build. I talked with the community members, and we decided the best spot to dump the materials is behind the football field, which is located above the school. This way, we can carry the heavy materials down the hill instead of up the hill. I worked with 4 other people to clean the bush and grass so that the dump truck has a spot where it can dump and then people will have an open path to move the supplies.
The 16th of January 2022 is a day that will go down in history! I scored my first football goal in Hayfield! I have been playing almost every Sunday that I am in Hayfield since my first day in the community back in 2018. After I scored, everyone went wild and cheered for me! I was so excited! Some of my friends on the other team were giving me a hard time, telling me it's about time that I scored! In my defense, I usually play defense, but it was cool to finally score a goal!
Since the moment I got back to Hayfield this trip, I have been trying to coordinate with the supplier of the gravel and sand. We needed him to deliver some materials up to Hayfield for construction of the retaining wall and ramp. I wanted to have the materials before my friends Justin and Tomas arrived. Partly because I wanted to put them to work while they were visiting, but I optimistically wanted to complete the entire project before leaving Jamaica. Every time myself or Bigga would call the truck driver, he would have another excuse as to why he couldn't deliver the materials. Sometimes the machine to collect sand would be broken, sometimes his truck was broken, and sometimes he didn't pick up his phone at all. It was rather frustrating.
We weren't able to coordinate the drop of supplies before I left for Kingston to pick up Tomas and Justin. On the 19th of January, I left Hayfield to pick up my friends at the Kingston Airport. I left money with Mr. Dean in case the truck driver would show up while we were in Kingston. It wasn't until after 9pm that Justin and Tomas made it through customs. We got some late-night pan chicken (what is pan chicken?) and took a taxi back to the hostel. The next day we did tourist stuff, saw graffiti, and tried new food. It was fun being a tour guide for my friends who have never been to Jamaica before. I was excited and a little relieved when I got a video from my friend back in Hayfield showing that the first truckload of sand arrived in Hayfield.
The three of us traveled to Hayfield on Friday the 21st. We stopped in Morant Bay and bought some more supplies. This time we bought 50 bags of cement and two wheelbarrows. We also bought some rum and some cups for the workers (Jamaicans like to drink rum when they are doing physical labor). When we were done shopping, we took a taxi to Bath, the town at the bottom of Hayfield road. We waited there for the truck carrying the bags of cement. We rode in the back of the truck up the dilapidated 7km road to Hayfield.
We got to the top and stopped at the school. We managed to convince a few people to help us carry the 50 bags of cement up the stairs to the school cafeteria. Tomas, Justin and I must have carried half of them, and I will be the first to say that it was challenging. Each bag weighs a little over 90 pounds! My friends came to Jamaica, and I was already putting them to work! By the time we made it to the Dean's house we were tired from traveling and carrying all of the cement. We cleaned up, had dinner and then went to bed.
That Saturday we went down to the school's teacher cottage, which is being renovated into a community center. There was a community workday there, so we went down there to help out. We were cleaning up the overgrown bush, shoveling the dirt out of the way, and cleaning out the inside of the building. A couple people were cooking lunch for everyone. It was a good opportunity to help out and Tomas and Justin got to meet everyone in the community.
In the evening we played some football. Tomas and I were on one side and Justin played on the other side. Tomas ended up scoring a goal in his first game. My friends gave me a hard time for this too. It took me four years to score a goal and Tomas scored in his first day.
On Sunday we relaxed and went to a friend's house who was doing a cookout. They cooked some pan chicken and soup. Then we played some more football in the evening. We went to sleep early because we had a big day the next day.
Monday the 24th of January was a big day for the project. We finally broke ground! Justin, Tomas, and I showed up around 8am and there was a group of people ready to work. Bigga marked the area that we were going to build the retaining wall. The agenda for the day was to dig out the trench that the wall would go in. The only thing is that no one would start working until a chicken was killed. There is a belief that by spilling the blood of a chicken, then none of the workers blood will be spilled. It took another 45 minutes to walk up and down the road looking for someone who had a chicken we could use. We finally did the ceremony and then the workers started digging. The dead chicken was cleaned and then used when we cooked lunch for the day. I was impressed with how quickly everyone was working. Maybe it was from the Jamaican rum that gives them the energy to move so fast.
The next day, Tomas, Justin, myself and my friend Jermaine left for Kingston. Tomas was flying out on the 27th so we decided to hike to the Blue Mountain peak before he left out. We met up with my friends Rasheena and Krystal, then the six of us rode in a vintage land rover to the cabins at Portland Gap. Our ride dropped us off and we hiked about an hour to the cabins. They were simple bunk beds, but they were perfect for what we needed. We managed to get a little fire going, which was difficult because all of the wood was wet from the constant dew and rain up at the peak. That night was especially cod, and I don't think that any one of us had decent sleep.
We woke up at around 3am to hike to the peak in order to catch the sunrise. It was pitch black. It was so dark you couldn't see your hand in front of your face. We all started walking with flashlights and we quickly warmed up. It wasn't until after 6am that we reached the top. Unfortunately, it was a very cloudy day. We didn't get to see the sunrise, but it was a fun time anyways. It started raining so we quickly walked back down to the cabins.
Fast forward a little bit, Tomas successfully went back to Boise on his flight, and Justin, Jermaine and I went back to Hayfield. On Monday, the 31st of January, we had our big casting day. The sand, gravel and stone arrived, and it was moved down to the school. We had all of the materials we needed. The trench was dug out and Bigga prepared the ground for construction. We were ready to start casting the foundation for the retaining wall.
That morning there was a group of workers that came from Castle Hill, the community down the hill from Hayfield. I think in total we had a group of around 20 people from both communities working that day. Everything started out smoothly. There was a team that was mixing the sand, gravel, and cement to make concrete, there was a team that was transporting the concrete, and there was a team that was setting the foundation along the trench. I was amazed with the whole process. Like I said, everything started out smoothly. Then the rain started to fall. It fell lightly at first and towards the end of the workday. But then, right when we finished, the rain started falling heavily. It ended up raining throughout the night. It was so bad that some towns actually experienced flooding.
We checked out the work the next day and the rain did some damage to it. Because the rain was so heavy it washed out a lot of the concrete that was set. Luckily it didn't completely wash everything out, and Bigga reassured me it wasn't as bad as I was thinking. The next day he had a crew of workers working on repairing the damage. After the work was done it looked amazing. That same day, Bigga and other masons started to lay the stone to make the retaining wall.
My time in Jamaica ran out and Justin and I had to come back to the US. The work will continue on the retaining wall while I am back in the States. The next step is to add a fence and then finally we will lay concrete for the ramp. We are waiting to get a cement donation from Carib Cement so that we can finish the project. Whenever they make the donation in May or June then I hope to return to Jamaica so we can finish the project. I am optimistic that this next time we will be able to finish the project!
Once again, thanks to everyone who has donated to the project and is supporting us. We wouldn't be where we are now without the support from you all! Special thanks to St. Thomas Renaissance Foundation, Mr. and Mrs. Dean, Friends of Jamaica, and everyone in Hayfield who is helping out with the project.