Jon's blog returns

Yes, it's true, I'm still alive. I apologize for the extended time period without any postings. It's been over a month since I've posted any information, so as you can imagine, there's lots to discuss. At the moment, I'm preparing for the 6th annual Ark Marathon. It's not really a marathon, but it is a road race involving all of the kids from the ark as well as lots of people from the community. I am sort of in charge of it, so I've been trying to put together the final plans. Also, part of my job has been to help the kids at the Ark train for the event. This means that every day that I could, I have been running with the kids, trying to teach some basics of running. The biggest struggle is trying to convince them that running as fast as they can for 5 minutes, then walking, then sprinting again, then walking, etc., is not the best way to run a distance race. They are learning and are actually getting quite good. We're expecting something like 200 runners to show up, so it should be a pretty large event.
Beyond the race preparations, daily sponsorship work, teaching PE, etc., I am continually learning new things about the Dominican culture as well as steadily improving in Spanish. Summer is fast approaching and things will begin to get crazy here. We'll have work teams in every week, a group of 20 interns helping for 6 weeks with the summer program (one of which is my sister, Sarah), the summer program itself, which I have a role in planning, travels to other Kids Alive sites within the country, and numerous other activities that will keep me on my toes.