By Elisabeth Hill
VE Volunteer from New York, USA
Every day at the hogar is completely different – some days are seemingly long, while some fly by. Some days the kids understand every word of my broken Spanish, and others they look at me like I’m crazy and roll their eyes at each simple phrase I try to utter. With all these ups and downs, I had no idea what to expect when I brought my family for a visit. I was lucky enough to have my family – Mom, Dad, and big brother – make the trip to Santiago to celebrate Thanksgiving. They wanted to see the hogar, about which I had spoken so much, and I wanted to show it to them.
As we walked up to the gated home, I said a silent prayer, “please let them behave somewhat well today.” As we entered the house, all the kids were uncharacteristically shy, and my parents were uncharacteristically quiet. “Uh-oh” I thought. Within 5 minutes, I knew I had nothing to be worried about – my brother was playing soccer with one of the older boys, my Mom was entertaining giggling younger kids with her “pull off her finger” trick (something that made me cry and scream “Mom, stop!” when I was little). My dad had just about everyone laughing with his typical antics. It was a strange moment for me – having the group of kids and Tías that had become my ‘Santiago family’ mingling so flawlessly with my real family, despite speaking different languages and coming from very different places.
For the rest of the trip, my family talked about the kids – “Oh, so-and-so was so sweet.” My brother went on a mission to buy new sports equipment for the boy with whom he was playing soccer. It was clear these kids had managed to burrow their way into my family’s heart in one short afternoon. As I wrap up my time volunteering, and look back on all the fun, the good, the bad, and the ugly days I’ve had with the kids, this is one day I will always remember.