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Mariella, 16 years ‘’¡Ouuush!’’
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Mariella used this non-sense word many, many times a day (pronounced so it rhymes with ‘whoosh’) and it was a bit of an in-joke amoungst all the kids at Mission Mexico as well as quite a few others would use it regularly too. Apparently, ‘’ouuush’’ is appropriate to use in place of a sigh, or to indicate dislike or disdain. Needless to say, there were quite a few ‘’ouuush’’’s used after the volunteers would make statements such as ‘’Haz tu trabajo, ahora mismo’’ (do your job right now!) or ‘’A dormir’’ (time for bed!). Petrina has even started saying it! Ouuush!
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| Clockwise from top left: Mariella, Maria Uno (Maria #1, 18 years), Yuri (15 years) & Roxy (short for Roxanna, 17 years). ''¡Megamente!'' |
Yuri & Roxy adopted the nickname ''Megamente'' for Steve (mega-mind) due to the ever-so-slight resemblance to the animated character by the same name in the recently-released film – basically they both just have no hair and I think that’s about where the resemblance ends! Nevertheless, it was fun to have this ‘in-joke’ just amoungst us and a few of the kids(-: Roxy also speaks excellent English and wants to be a translator and I think she’ll definitely achieve that dream with the support of Mission Mexico (-:
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| Maria Uno again, very photogenic! |
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| And again...taking a selfie (-: |
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Lalo, 17 years (left; older brother Mario, 19 years, is pictured to his right). ‘’You buy me coca?’’
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Lalo worked out pretty quickly that Petrina was not going to buy him ‘’coca’’ (Coca-Cola)…He persevered with Steve though, and would ask most days! Persistent fella!
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| Marisol, 17. Older sister to Mariella, and what a sweetie. She came with me on a few of my runs and we practiced our English and Spanish, respectively! |
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Jose (see below) & Merril, 17 years. ‘’Cun u opun da doir plees?’’ (Can you open the door please?).
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For reasons of safety for the kids, only the volunteers and house parents had keys to the front door. Needless to say, the older kids in particular would really crave their moments of ‘freedom’, and were allowed to leave the house unaccompanied for regular activities like part-time work, sport, youth church etc. Merril always seemed to have an excuse to go out though – we think he had the cabin fever bad!
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Jose Dos (Jose #2, pronounced Hose-a, brother to Yuri, right), 19 years. ‘’¡Beauty-full!’’
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Beautiful must have been Jose’s favourite word in English. Petrina hypothesised this because anything that was remotely good or nice was met with the comment of ‘’It’s beauty-full!’’. For instance, one day the ‘grande’ girls taught me how they apply their impeccable eyeliner, and when Jose saw the results he said to me ‘’you are very beauty-full today’’! Now that might not seem very out of the ordinary (well I, Petrina, wish those comments weren’t out of the ordinary anyway!…). However, another time, I commented on how I liked the way Mexicans shorten the phrase ‘por favour’ (please) to simply ‘por fa’, as its much quicker and easier to say…Jose nodded his head and said, ‘’Yes, it’s beauty-full!’’
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| Jose Dos and Petrina. |
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| Jose Dos (agin!) and Steve. |
Jose ‘Dos’ was one of Steve’s amgios in the house, probably his favourite out of the older kids. As for Petrina’s favourite, well, sometimes the one she liked the most was one that couldn’t talk back, run away or hide when it was bed time, lie, steal or punch etc, etc…. This magical child was, in fact, La Coneja...
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Petrina getting her dose of fur-kid ‘’feel goods’’ in the absence of the two dogs at home…
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‘Snow white’ was the orphanage pet rabbit, and would follow us both around when we were on the night shift once we started bringing our food scraps from our flat and feeding them to the coneja throughout the shift!
But our final blog on the MM kids would not be complete without a shout out to 'Papá y Mamá', the house parents that run this operation. Thanks for the opportunity to have this great experience - we are in awe of them and how they keep on keeping on!
But our final blog on the MM kids would not be complete without a shout out to 'Papá y Mamá', the house parents that run this operation. Thanks for the opportunity to have this great experience - we are in awe of them and how they keep on keeping on!
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| Mariella and Papá, Allan Skuse...hiding a basketball from the kids in his shirt. |
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| Mamá, Pam Skuse |
Hope you have enjoyed reading about the kids and some of the special moments we had with them in the last few blogs. Adios for now,
Steve and Petrina.
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