Meet one of my favorites: his name has been somewhat of a mystery for a long time.... At times I've called him something between Javier, Jaer, and Andaer. His name is actually Leonardo Jahir and he goes by the 2nd name. I'm beginning to think that he has hearing problems because he always yells and has a large speech impediment which explains partially why no one could figure out his real name. I do know that he is 7 years old and that this is his first year at Casa Hogar Douglas and every time I am at Douglas, he comes over and hangs out with me whenever he sees me. Two women came to visit him a few weeks ago while I was there- maybe one is his mom or grandma but I'm not totally sure. He didn't seem very eager to see either of them which worried me a bit. What drew me to him initially or so was his anger towards just about anything and his yelling. Regardless, this little boy has held my attention since I moved here 9 months ago. Two weeks ago, many of the Casa Hogar Douglas kids spent friday afternoon swimming in our pool. I spent most of the afternoon swimming with a 2 year old name Angel until the pool floats finally got inflated and little kids started to get into the big pool with their new floaties. One of those kids happened to be who i often refer to as "my son" (pictured above). I'm confident that this was one of his first times in a pool and it was also his first time in the big pool (we have a kiddie pool and a large pool). An adult was making fun of him and saying that he didnt know how to swim. That angered me to no end- regardless of if she was joking around with him or not, I wasn't going to take it. So i jumped in and tried to teach him how to swim in spanish. He doesn't have much confidence and didn't want to lay parallel to the water and kick his legs but he had a great time and it boosted his confidence I'm sure. I spent at least an hour pulling him back and forth in the pool like I was the motor for his boat and he loved it. He kept yelling at the other kids in his slurred spanish to watch him and see how fast he was going. It was awesome. So if you ever get a chance to visit Douglas and want to know which kid is my "son" just listen for the yelling- that's my kid.
Meet one of my favorites: his name has been somewhat of a mystery for a long time.... At times I've called him something between Javier, Jaer, and Andaer. His name is actually Leonardo Jahir and he goes by the 2nd name. I'm beginning to think that he has hearing problems because he always yells and has a large speech impediment which explains partially why no one could figure out his real name. I do know that he is 7 years old and that this is his first year at Casa Hogar Douglas and every time I am at Douglas, he comes over and hangs out with me whenever he sees me. Two women came to visit him a few weeks ago while I was there- maybe one is his mom or grandma but I'm not totally sure. He didn't seem very eager to see either of them which worried me a bit. What drew me to him initially or so was his anger towards just about anything and his yelling. Regardless, this little boy has held my attention since I moved here 9 months ago. Two weeks ago, many of the Casa Hogar Douglas kids spent friday afternoon swimming in our pool. I spent most of the afternoon swimming with a 2 year old name Angel until the pool floats finally got inflated and little kids started to get into the big pool with their new floaties. One of those kids happened to be who i often refer to as "my son" (pictured above). I'm confident that this was one of his first times in a pool and it was also his first time in the big pool (we have a kiddie pool and a large pool). An adult was making fun of him and saying that he didnt know how to swim. That angered me to no end- regardless of if she was joking around with him or not, I wasn't going to take it. So i jumped in and tried to teach him how to swim in spanish. He doesn't have much confidence and didn't want to lay parallel to the water and kick his legs but he had a great time and it boosted his confidence I'm sure. I spent at least an hour pulling him back and forth in the pool like I was the motor for his boat and he loved it. He kept yelling at the other kids in his slurred spanish to watch him and see how fast he was going. It was awesome. So if you ever get a chance to visit Douglas and want to know which kid is my "son" just listen for the yelling- that's my kid.
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