Juan Luis Guerra’s quintessential song is “Ojala Que Llueva Cafe En El Campo,” a song that comes across more as a incantation that the poor and hopefully at the least have coffee somehow fall from the sky to bless them, as if to say that G_d might bless them with their basic necessities to relieve them from their hunger, strife, and sorrow. Riddled with metaphors and as passionate as any song you’ll hear, it’s a reminder of how simple his people’s needs really are. In our own little way, we can be that “cafe” for someone else, not necessarily saving the children, but giving them what they need as well as we can.
On the first night that I landed in Dominican Republic, in the village my mother comes from, I almost immediately found myself teaching math, in a town in need of someone who understands how to turn “improper” fractions into mixed numbers, and how to divide. It’s scary that, even on my vacation, I’m put in the precarious position of trying to tutor a student on 2 years of math in 2 hours. The 16-year-old had a test the next day, and she didn’t really understand anything her teacher was talking about. Of course, that’s where I get to show off and make students wish they got excited about math the way I do. (ed note: Please don’t get it twisted. For goodness sakes, this is strictly PG if not G.)
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