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Today we woke up to a delicious breakfast of pancakes, eggs, and fruit made by our amazing cooks. On the way to our destination, we sang and conversed. We made our way to “Fundación IMPACTA Kids.” There we met Dona Carmen. Dona Carmen is the sister of Manny Acta, a third base coach for the Seattle Mariners. She presented a slideshow and showed us videos of how the foundation has evolved more than it would’ve ever imagined. It was so beautiful seeing what passion and love lead to. The foundation supplies equipment, coaches, and a safe environment to play.

We learned about how it is important to change youth lives by encouraging them to practice their favorite hobbies especially baseball and other sports as well as learning in school like Math, Science, Spanish, etc. This will help the youth, especially those who live in less-resourced communities. We also learned that chances of getting into MLB are not high so it is a great idea to have a school so youth could have better futures and prevent crime as well as poverty thanks to Manny Acts founder of Fundación impACTA kids. Glimpsers experienced the Dominican Republic’s great hospitality and how the house owner welcomed us with great traditional Dominican food and Coca-Cola. In the end, we as Glimpsers encourage and support people and other organizations to help communities and youth all around the world to achieve their dreams to make our world better.

After learning about the foundation, we practiced hitting, catching, and throwing. Then, we made two teams with both Glimpsers and kids and played against each other. Everyone had lots of fun and all the students enjoyed making fun of all the Glimpsers trying their sport. All the kids were grateful for playing with us and willing to show us their passion. A special highlight of our day was when one of the students, Louis-Miguel, claimed it was a blessing to have us playing with them.

After playing baseball and returning to the place we were staying, everyone wound down by playing 8-ball and enjoying some time in the pool. We reflected on our day in our nightly meeting where we planned out our next day.