where to begin...

yes. that's the only bag i take.

It's been so long. I've been back a little over two weeks now, but between jet lag and everything I have to catch up with, procrastinating this blog has been easy. In fact, the only reason I'm finally writing it is because I'm on jury duty, and right now I'm sitting on a hard, cold bench outside the courtroom.

I decided to blog about my trip as I have some of my other adventures...in parts. So much happened during the 3+ weeks I was gone, it's tough for ME to keep the details sorted out. Sometimes I have to check the camera roll on my iPhone to figure out when I left one place for the next. 

I seldom discuss my primary purpose for these trips- I think it goes without saying now that I have the worst case of wanderlust you will ever see, but I also have another passion- helping people. Many of the trips I take are solely for charity work. Work that I can't really go into detail about because of my occupation...sad but true. I knew the stigma and how it would affect me when I decided to pursue my career in adult. We can debate all day long about why it's unfair, and why the money I donate is just as green, or the fact that I work as hard as the next volunteer (if not harder) but those arguments have long since been made...and the bottom line is, at the end of the day, I AM a porn star. A catch 22 in this situation because there are few jobs that would make the money to enable me to travel the world and donate to charities. But I accept the double edge sword, and from time to time I lean against it's sharp edge to remind me I'm alive. i know...how melodramatic of me. ; )

Back to Sri Lanka.

WHERE am I?!?

We were part of a really big build- our team was responsible for doing things like digging and backfilling foundations, doing brickwork, shoveling, hauling bricks, lots of really intense physical work. (Did i mention BRICKS?) With NO wheelbarrows & no power tools. It was hot. Like over 100 degrees, and the "monsoon season" we had been warned about was actually a drought. It was fantastic, though. We had one of the best teams ever. It's just so amazing that a group of strangers from all over the world of all ages and walks of life can come together and end up having so much in common. We all bonded over rice and curry, coconut milk straight from the source, and from sharing bug spray and hand sanitizer. AND ibuprofen.

there is no "I" in team...but there is a lot of sweat, dirt, bug spray, and occasionally blood.

We worked in a community that will have 25 completed homes with latrines and a community center. The families work along side us. We eat their food. Try to speak their languages. And we fall in love with them, with their children, as they shovel and haul bricks along with us. In bare feet.

friends.

Have a glimpse at parts of the build. For privacy reasons, I edit other volunteers out of the pictures, so I'm a bit limited. But you get the idea.

These are the specs for the houses, posted on the backs of each latrine. notice the square footage of the house and imagine there's a whole family living there...and the bathroom is outside. 

hauling all of these...

gave me these!

from this...

to this, a completed house.

In my next blog, you'll read about our two days of R & R- never in my life had I seen or done so much in 2 days! <3  

peace.
xoxo,
j