September 2014 Today I was so very thankful for all of those years of softball coaching and playing experience. Really! I had just an awesome awesome day. I went for my first field trip and loaded up two 50 lb sack bags of zaboka that is avocado for you English speaking types) and it is just like playing catch in baseball....well, close enough. One person performs like a pitcher, preferably someone other than myself and who most definitely needs to be able to climb trees, is way up in the zaboka tree, he snags the ball and throws it down to the catcher (that would be me). Now, there aint no baseball gloves in Ayhiti (Haiti) so you take a plastic sack, kind of like what the big bags of rice comes in, put both arms through the top and pull the bag tight. So the pitcher throws the ball down to the catcher who makes sure that it lands in the middle of the bag. The best way I can explain it is like in the cartoons when someone is jumping off the roof of a building on fire and there is a bunch of crazies down below all hanging on to a round tarpoline, and he jumps just as they move to the right or left just a little bit. I know youve seen that one... funny, isnt it? Yeah, it was a barrel of laughs alright.... First, in order to catch the zaboka you have to look up - way up. And he is so far up there it is really hard to determine the trajectory of the precious fruit that I love so much and would hate to have smashed all over the ground or on my head, if you get what Im saying. I am laughing so hard, while also being greatly impressed by this guy way up in the tree, going up and down and all around like .... well, like a squirrel or something AND he was barefoot AND he spoke no English AND I know very little Creole. We were having the best time. He would be chattering away and making all kind of motions like move here or move there and I would be shouting Bon Bon (Good, good) or okay okay okay - which works in any language. He was so impressed with my catching - I only let one drop and smash. He was grinning from ear to ear and with each catch would shout out yeah! The highlight for me was when I looked up at him and shouted, Mwen bon baseball. He laughs and says, Mwen bon Futball. Which simply meant that we actually communicated and had a conversation.... this is awesome stuff here and dont even get me started on describing how delicious the zaboka is here in Haiti right off the tree.... love it! Lastly, dont ever doubt that God doesnt use the things we enjoy, like baseball and zaboka for His purpose for our lives. All good things coming from the Lord - Here are a few pictures of my tree climber -
Posted on: Wed, 03 Sep 2014 02:01:21 +0000
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