We Can Still Celebrate--By Lauren

Today was a pretty amazing day. We separated into two groups, one group traveled to the largest hospital in the Dominican Republic to interview the director of the hospital and hear about the good work that they do for mothers and infants. The second group traveled for two hours out into the countryside of the DR to visit a rural health clinic and the surrounding communities. I was in the second group. Along the way, we saw disturbing scenes of poverty interspersed among some of the most beautiful landscapes I've seen. Our arrival at the health clinic brought a significant amount of pleasant surprise. We witnessed the workings of a well-organized, well-stocked, and highly supported provider of health care. The facilities were clean and comforting. The rooms for seeing patients were private. The pharmacy was full of life-giving medicines. Our guide, one of the administrators, was a well-dressed, friendly young man who willingly answered our pages of questions. He shared that the meal packages from Stop Hunger Now acted as a form of medicine for the people who came to the clinic. They received two packages of meals, once a week, along with prescriptions for their illnesses. He said that he had seen patients receiving the meals start to "fatten up". It was an awesome feeling to know that this food, packaged by volunteers in the U.S., was doing so much good. Even if we know that providing food is not the only thing that needs to happen to end hunger,it certainly seems to mean a lot to the people we meet here.

Our group had reflection time this evening after all of our visits were complete, and Marcie, our professor, made a comment about what an amazing opportunity this trip is. I agree, although it didn't quite sink in until today. We are experiencing both the deprivation present here as well as the richness. So many people are unable to purchase or supply enough food to their families, and live in houses that most Americans would not be able to tolerate. Their children suffer from parasites from the dirty water and are stunted by malnutrition and disease. This is devastating to me, but what I've seen is that it's not the whole story. There is a tremendous amount of faith, celebration, and vibrant energy that flows through this culture. There is community and kindness, sharing of resources. The children make beautiful art and sing energetic songs. There are individuals who are devoting their lives to relieving the suffering of poverty. My question is, how are we and our actions complicit in the perpetuation of global poverty? Why do we justify our actions by demeaning the poor with negative images and broad generalizations? Why don't we open ourselves to knowing and growing community with those we see as poor. If there is one thing I have learned through experiences like this trip, it is that no one person is alike, no one person completely fits into a stereotype. Every person is given gifts and talents that we can appreciate if we'll be open to it. In the language of my faith, each person is made in the image of God and they are loved by a being so much greater than ourselves. It should be our honor to love them as well. Another exceptional part of this day and this trip in general is the hospitality of Stop Hunger Now's partner organization, and our host, CitiHope International. They have embraced us with open arms, shown us many aspects of Dominican culture: the music,the singing, the food, the history, and the identity. We are finding that there is a healing power, a community-building component to celebration. We have experienced it within our own group dynamics. We've only been here for 3 full days, and already our group has laughed to the point of tears, cried from the emotion of witnessing such poverty, opened up about wonderful, painful, and personal experiences, and offered care and concern to one another as we absorb and process the visible symptoms of poverty and systemic oppression. I cannot think of a better group of people to travel with to do this work. It's hard to find a group of people more genuine and authentic than this group, and I'm grateful that I have this opportunity to be a part of it. My final thought is that there is much hardness in this world, much suffering, and much pain. Working to set our systems and structures right so that all have access to the opportunity to thrive is a part of this group's destiny. And it's emotional and it's tough.But what I'm realizing is that we can still celebrate. We can celebrate community, kindness, love, gratitude, and hope. We can celebrate life and healing and friendship. We can celebrate those who devote their lives to the work of changing lives. We can celebrate cultures and identities and growth. We have much to celebrate and much to lift up. So, I will finish this week in quiet celebration of this experience, our lovely hosts, my social work cohort (and good friends), and the opportunity to better our world.

Day Three in Santa Domingo--By Mandy

Tim Tuccelli, Director of CitiHope DR

My heart is overflowing with gratitude at this moment. Stop Hunger Now’s Dominican Republic partner, CitiHope has made our welcome and experience here nothing short of incredible. Not a moment has passed without Tim, the founder, and his wife, son or daughters (Juanita, Abraham, Eunice, Tahni) guiding us to and through our next experience. CitiHope receives Stop Hunger Now meals to distribute to orphanages, clinics and schools throughout the country. This week we are visiting CitiHope’s partners to evaluate the impact of Stop Hunger Now meals. Tim and his family have planned not only our visits to their partner agencies, but also scheduled additional activities, like a tour of the Colonial Zone, and lunch and dinner at restaurants they enjoy or ones that will give us the true flavor of the Dominican Republic. In addition, they have set aside time to accompany us on all of the visits to their partners. I have had the chance to talk (and laugh) with Eunice the most and I appreciate her patience while I ask her question after question about the DR, her life, and the work they do. She is making sure we have an enjoyable time, so much so that she has decided that every night we should celebrate some one’s birthday, even though it’s not actually our birthday. At some point during the day, she decides whose birthday it will be, but that person does not find out until the restaurant staff, while singing and accompanied by a small band, places a (free) cake in front of them. Thus far, we have celebrated Erica and Cathy, but there are still several days for us to celebrate several more. This moment, while seemingly totally unnecessary on the surface, provides this incredible space to celebrate one of our classmates. Together we laugh, sing, and wish this person a happy (birth)day. This brief moment provides much needed levity to an otherwise, overwhelmingly emotionally charged day. Eunice believes we should celebrate and enjoy life, and in this moment I see that we do not take the time to celebrate and cherish those around us. We may only be here for one week to help Stop Hunger Now evaluate their meal feeding programs, but every moment has been and will continue to be an incredible chance to celebrate and cherish those around me, and for this I am eternally grateful.

Mandy with Rose Maria at Jackie's House

Day Two--By Jared

Saturday, February 1 This morning, we got up bright and early to get ready for the meal packing event at the Hard Rock Hotel.


 Most of us felt much better after getting some sleep after our long day of travel and work. Some of us did not sleep quite as well because of the wonderful Dominican music that played throughout the night, but we all were up, packed, and ready for breakfast at 7! Breakfast was really delicious - it was a Dominican style breakfast, with eggs, corn cakes, cheeses, meats, bread, and fruit. We arrived at the meal packing event slightly after 8, and split into 4 teams. Each team covered a section of the conference room, helping the volunteers as needed with any issues that arose during the event. Though it was early, many of the volunteers seemed engaged in the meal packing event - several of the volunteers had their children with them volunteering as well. The volunteers packed almost 100,000 boxes in less than two hours.

 After the meal packing, we stayed for a few hours helping to clean up, then went to a nearby food court to have lunch. The food was DELICIOUS! Most of us had meat, rice and beans, and a salad option, along with fresh juices, etc. Punta Cana is predominantly a resort town. You can tell that most of the infrastructure, shops, and overall persona of the town is geared towards tourism. Interestingly, there is a rather sizable Russian population that lives in Punta Cana year round. Our drive to Santo Domingo took around 3 hours, on a road that seems to have been built just to transport people between Santo Domingo (the capital city) and Punta Cana. The drive followed the coastline of the island for the most part, but we got to see a lot of the countryside and several large farms. Sugar Cane is, several hundred years later, the main agricultural product. And as history dictates, most of the sugar cane goes to the production of rum. Most people in the campo [country] work in the farms. Hours are long, work is hard. The countryside is mostly flat, except for a few river valleys. People in the smaller towns were a little brazen by American standards when it came to crossing a four-lane highway during heavy traffic. Being a pedestrian in this country requires a fair amount of guts, gusto, and glory. Santo Domingo is a lot like other cities in the Caribbean and Central America. Lots of traffic, and super-luxurious malls, car dealerships (there's a Bentley dealership right next to the Porsche dealership, which is right next to the Lamborghini dealership) that are immediately, and almost violently contrasted against urban slums with many roadside stalls selling fruits, vegetables, and other basic necessities. There are just as many glamorous boutiques like Michael Kors as there are people laying out sheets on the sidewalk right next to oncoming traffic to sell you a toothbrush. As we learn more about Santo Domingo, we will get the opportunity to see the strikingly different sides of urban poverty versus rural poverty. Our first site visit Monday will be to Jackie's House, which is an orphanage about 45 minutes north of Santa Domingo. In the meantime, we look forward to settling in, beginning to understand important aspects of our evaluation process, and meeting with our team leads at CitiHope/Sanar Una Nacion. The heavy lifting, the important work, begins Monday.

Day One on the Road-By Christina

Although this is a few days late the impact looking back at it is very interesting. Our first day started off pretty rough. Most of us didn't even sleep due to our 4:00 am flight. However, as always we pulled together to make sure we could get everything we needed on the flight for the kids. At the end of the day this is what this trip was for. Once we arrived we had a little over a hour to enjoy our space. We flew in to Punta Cana which is a very beautiful city. At first appearance it made me think if this is what we would be seeing then this week wouldn't be that bad. However that hour was short lived. We as a group divided up bags, set up tables, and prepared for a meal packing event designed. We spent probably about four hours getting ready for an even truly designed for SHN's children. As much work that went in to the event, experiencing the event for a person who has never been out of the country was amazing.

If you wish to travel far and fast, travel light. Take off all your envies, jealousies, unforgiveness, selfishness and fears. . .

I’ll start by introducing myself. My name is Krystal. I am doing the Advanced Standing Masters in Social Work at NCSU. I intern at Stop Hunger Now, focusing a lot on the coordination of this trip, this class, and this work. I love working there. I love the people I work, I love the way that they humbly engage with international partners, I love the way they are always growing as an organization. My MSW program is the best academic environment I have ever been in. I’m challenged and stretched and I believe that what I learn is preparing me and equipping me to do work once I graduate. I am not sure what kind of work this is yet, but I trust that I will know when I need to know, and because of this program I will be adequately prepared to thrive in it. Last night we met at Dr. Marcie Fisher Borne’s (our professor) house for our pre trip gathering. It was a rich evening together. As a student, it is a rare privilege to have a professor open up their life with their class as many times the separation of work and life is one that is not breached. Not Marcie. It was clear that she was delighted to share her family with us, and they hosted well: cooking a beautiful meal, providing space for us to gather and the fun and lightheartedness that adorable young children bring. We did our first reflection activity, sharing our intentions with one another: what we hope to be on this trip. A thoughtful group, members discussed their desire to be present, to be open to the experience and open with classmates, to do meaningful research, to engage with the people, to practice sharing space well. Members talked about their process of preparation and things that might challenging for them: missing family, getting over sickness, the life that will keep happening here while we are gone. As each member spoke we tossed yarn to one another, weaving the group in a web of connectedness-showing that these intentions are not only personal, but also deeply communal. Intentions that we will hold one another to in gentle and gracious ways. We discussed all sorts of other things that may seem small but matter. Things like the right clothes to wear, and random items worth packing, the itinerary, how we will do field visits, what’s worth bringing and what’s better to leave-small things, yes, but things that matter when you are traveling abroad. As I write, its Monday morning, and I know that in less than four days (at 3:45 am on Friday to be exact) this same group will meet at RDU, nervous and excited, bags filled with sunscreen and bug spray and snacks. With notebooks and clothes for every situation and other quirky comfort things and we will make our way down to Punta Cana where our journey will begin. There is much to be done this week, and I hope that we are able to see the preparation process as part of the experience, and not as tedious or “one more thing” in an overfilled schedule. As we are packing, there is a quote by Cesare Pavese that I’d like to end on:

On the Road to the Dominican Republic with the NCSU Stop Hunger Now Collaborative!

Beginning in August 2013, students in the Advanced Social Work and Evaluation course in the Department of Social Work began a partnership with Stop Hunger Now (SHN), an international hunger relief organization, based in Raleigh, NC. Students have been working on a number of monitoring and evaluation projects, and this blog is to highlight one in particular, our trip to the Dominican Republic to visit 14 partner organizations, all providing food aid in conjunction with other community development efforts. We will be traveling with our Dominican partner NGO, CitiHope and hope to learn more about their local partners, their specific strategies to address hunger, and ways SHN is moving towards its mission to "end hunger in our lifetime" in the Dominican Republic. As a new Assistant Professor at NCSU (in my second year) I feel incredibly lucky to have found an academic home that prioritizes community engagement and community-based research. I want to thank our department and the Office of Outreach and Engagement for funds that helped to make this collaboration possible. I look forward to hearing from our graduate students about how this experience impacts their understanding of research, evaluation, and strategies to address the root causes of hunger and poverty.