Oct 15, 2012 We arrived in Quimistan after an uneventful trip a little past 1pm, Honduran Standard Time. After a nice lunch, we met with Dr. Constantino and Maynor, to discuss the medical mission activities and our schedule for the week. The main purpose of this trip is to gather information which will be used in our vision conference to establish plans for our 2013 mission activity. Two very interesting items we learned include that a Red Cross representative told Maynor that there has been a marked improvement in respiratory health recently due to the people having Justa Stoves. We also learned that the ladies in La Montanita, who started sewing with HAF assistance, and then grew into a bakery business, have been noticed by USAID, which has donated ~$3000 to help them improve their bakery facilities. God is good and has rewarded these ladies for their hard work. I view this as confirmation of HAF’s micro enterprise development activities in La Montanita. After our meetings we had the evening meal and turned our attention to settling into our quarters and getting ready for a much needed shower and a good night’s rest.

As the construction phase closed out today, I think we all can say, “muy bien” or translation: “very good.” The crew at Gloria’s home worked fervently to complete the pour on the rear veranda, or in southern speak – the porch. Stanley led the charge as usual; Jen, B-Rad, Hans and Frans, along with our adopted friends from South Carolina Team Aiken N Hurtin’, joined at the mook pile for Mas Mook Siesta! Fighting grueling conditions as usual they persevered and came through like the champions that they are.  All the while our trusty and faithful bus drivers sat in the cool shade of the home and watched Futbol’ until time to go to the restaurant at eat fried chicken… Again!

After lunch, the team divided into maybe three separate and distinct parties. Mater, Carl, Stan the Man, Jen, B-Rad, Hans and Frans returned to Gloria’s home to continue the Mooking Siesta and complete the second phase of the Pila. Once the mook was placed, Stan the Man, who is only 5′-5″, had to lie across the Pila to shape the concrete. The dude has some serious abs, but several team members had to assist by holding his legs to prevent him from face planting the Mook. B-Rad and Frans continued to pound in Gloria’s bedroom creating a new access to her brand new, and well deserved baño (bathroom). They completed that task with a vengeance that would surpass Superman busting through a brick wall!

Team two, consisting of Ajax, Aiken n Hurtin’, Coop, Jeff-Ray, Arooon, Lorie, Narnie, and Joe left the mess hall with bellies full of artery busting chicken. Folks, Colonel Saunders can’t touch this doom of the grease that is oozing out of this pollo (chicken). They headed off to Santa Clara to deliver the communion set to Arturo and visited the children who were located there.

We completed our day at the Tejeras… For those who are not familiar with this area, let me say this… We should consider all that we have been blessed with, my friends. They literally live on the side of the road in shacks, and not just any road… this would be like I-85 at rush hour. Semi-trucks blasting through at half the speed of smell, while these precious little children of God play precariously just yards from the highway! There I met Kevin for the first time. He was the little boy that was severely burned about a year ago while collecting plastic bottles in a trash pile. Thank God someone in San Pedro Sula had connections in Boston, Mass to save three of his limbs. He lost all his toes and the fingers on his right hand, but showed no signs of pity. He was this vibrant litte boy that had accepted the cards that life had dealt him and he carried a beautiful smile that only God could supply. After feeding the children, which is part of Sandra’s ministry, Chris Jericho broke out the the soccer ball and mayhem ensued… Let’s Get Ready to Rumble! A 60 versus 1 Mosh Pit broke out as the children introduced us to a new Honduran game called Rugby Soccer! Chris succumbed to the relentless pounding as the children drug him down and started the ground-n-pound method of removing said soccer ball from his hand. Chris scraped his knee during the melee and the Type O Negative oozed from his wounds, which required more first aid action.

The day was completed with a wonderful dinner provided by Gloria and Sandra. Devotions and blessing were led by Jarred and Mark, who delivered a powerful and emotional devotion based on the scripture from Paul’s letter to the church in Philippi. All you bloggers, please read chapter 3:4b-13 and consider or weigh out the choices in your life. Everything in life is but rubbish compared to a relationship in Christ Jesus. Consider this: we are blessed and yet we want more. I have seen a lot of sad things here this past two weeks, and yet there is so much joy in the eyes of these children. I am blessed to have been a part of this team and I hope to share my experiences with many, many people.

Mark

After a weekend of relaxation and some minor celebration we returned this morning to our work of service, another Monday spent in deep in the Northwest of Honduras. 

The trip so far has been a remarkable experience.  An opportunity to explore a new country, to meet new people and to witness a culture that is unique and unlike our own.  As per a typical day, our morning began with a 6:00 am wake up call, and breakfast at 7.  The meals have been mostly exceptional, served to us by two lovely hostesses, Sandra and Gloria, and have featured jalapenos and peppers constantly, even for breakfast.  Unfortunately the language barrier has prevented us from truly getting to know Sandra and Gloria, though if two nicer women exist in Honduras they would be a sight to behold.

After breakfast, we divided into two separate groups, off to two separate job sites.  One at Gloria’s, and the other at a school, off in a separate village from Quimistan.  And that was the group I joined today.  

Though school was not in session today, several neighborhood kids still ventured to the site to help us mix concrete and to share in our breaks as we played football, futbol, and good ole fashioned American baseball conducted with a plethora of sticks and broken plastic pipes for bats, and a small sized hollow plastic soccer ball for a baseball.  The games today were as competitive as always with the kids eager to pitch and to take their turn at the plate.  Because of their relative unawareness of the official rules, I was able to manipulate the officiating in my team’s favor, which was clearly necessary as my team fell behind early and struggled at bat.  As we tried to launch of comeback, one of my young teammates, Mauriceo, got a hit but stumbled as he ran to first and ripped open a a pinky toe with the toenail nearly detached.  After an immediate pause for First Aid Kit attention, the young Amigo eventually returned in the inning and got another hit, placing him at hero status in my eyes.  We’ve witnessed a lot of violence on this trip.  The first aid kit has come in handy.  

At that point, we paused for lunch.  Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches as always.  The hardcore work at the school site was intermittent today, and filled with breaks and pauses to play sports and interact with the youngsters.  

After work we ventured briefly into town for ice cream before returning to the Villa to rest for an hour and then go off to a fancy and delicious supper.  At dinner we were joined by out hosts, Martha and her husband Gary, our translator Maynor and his wife Jesse, and our beloved compadre in work, Stanley.   As we waited for dinner we enjoyed the air conditioning and a big screen television where we found “The World’s Fastest Indian” with Anthony Hopkins in English with Spanish subtitles.  After dinner, Stanley told me that we would have the opportunity to meet his family tomorrow, to which I replied, “We are your family now, and you are a part of ours.”  And that has been the true and often unspoken blessing of this mission.  

Though this trip is only for a short period, it is a reminder that we are all in this journey through life together, as different as a bunch of Gringos from Wilkesboro and the fine people of Quimistan can be.      Not only do we live out our own lives, we in a way live out the lives of everyone around us.  With the ability to help those in need, pick up those who have fallen, and save those who are lost.  

Most of the hard work of our journey is done now, with only a couple days left on site before a day of rest, but our work will always continue, and the size of our family will continue to increase, especially in the number of Hondurans.


Pictures of today’s work:

Michael Cooper
Ambassador, WUMC  

This blog covers the events of yesterday.  Internet went out last night on the ranch because of a storm, so we couldn’t post it until today.


We woke up and headed out to do Bible School at two different schools. First we went to Nueva Esperanza, where the Wilkesboro group roofed three school buildings last year. We all piled into the back of two sketchy pickup trucks to take the hour and a half journey up the mountain. After the hot, dusty ride, we made it safely to the school. We played with the kids for a while and then started the Fruits of the Spirit Bible School. All the kids came together for an opening program, then they divided into two groups to travel to the four different stations: games, drama, art, and music. Brad, Alex, Abby, Jerry, and Stanley did arts and crafts, where they helped the kids color a picture. Brad went to sleep:

Dane, Anna, Jennifer, Lorie, and Maynor assisted with games. There were three different games: one with a towel, ball, a balloon, a sack race, and freeze tag all teaching the kids about patience. Josylin and Cooper sang and danced with the children in music.
In drama, Jarred, Aaron, Chris, Joe, Arnold, Daniel, and Mark told the story of Jesus healing the paralyzed man. They had the children act out the story and asked them questions about the story. Sam was the bell between each of the activities by making the rooster crow. After the kids cycled through all of the stations, everyone sat down for a lunch of chicken and rice served by the teacher. We packed up and headed back down the mountain to do Bible School at the second school.

Nueva Esparanze is about an hour and a half from Quimistan. It’s up in northeastern Honduras close to Guatemala. The journey to and from is a long, tedious one. The road is curvy and covered with potholes, and it’s very narrow so cars can have trouble passing each other sometimes. On the way back down the mountain our group happened upon an accident that had occurred a matter of minutes before we arrived. We’re not sure of the particular details of the accident, but we do know a pickup truck had flipped multiple times before hitting a bank. The truck had been carrying three or four people in the back of it, most of whom had minor injuries. One man had a broken nose. One woman was in pretty bad shape with a crushed leg… they rushed her to the hospital just as soon as the first of us arrived on the scene. But we were more or less the first responders, and as soon as our group arrived we immediately found a first aid kit (Scotti Stevens would be proud) and some of us began doctoring wounds and passing out bottles of water to all the people that had been involved in the accident. Considering the nature of the accident, wounds were fairly minimal – a lot of scraped elbows and some hits to the head. The people involved were lying in the road and beside it, some in a daze, trying to come to grips with what had happened. It easily could have been much, much worse. The man driving the truck saved a lot of lives by steering the truck into the bank rather than toward the drop-off on the other side of the road. It wasn’t a pretty scene, but our group’s response wasn’t a surprising one. Chris Lakey was very proud today. This group has worked and sweated and fought and cried and grown up together over a lot of years, and our response reflected that. 

After arriving a little late to the second school, due to the accident, we started our second round of VBS. This time we divided the children into four groups and did the same rotation as described above. This VBS was done at the same school we’ve been working on over the past six days.




Abby & Brad

Another HOT day.  I believe temperatures reached around 95 degrees with humidity making it feel like 115 degrees, but that did not stop us from accomplishing the task laid before us.  For the past four days we have been in the business of tearing down and rebuilding… (sounds a lot like what God does with us, taking the old and making it new.)  Tomorrow we get to take a break from the building, hauling, and digging.  Tomorrow we head up into the mountains (NE) to visit a site where we replaced roofs for a school last year.  There we will do a VBS for around 50 students and hopefully we will eat some doughnuts and drink some coffee.  In the afternoon we travel back down the mountain to the school at Milpa Arada to do a VBS for around 140 students.  It will be different from the last four days, but it will be a good change.  I have witnessed a lot of things on the several mission trips that I have been on and I must say, these college student still amaze me.  Their willingness to stay on the job until the job is done blows me away.  Yesterday the adults on Gloria’s site came in bragging about how in temperatures that reached around 95 degrees (real feel 112) the college students made a huge impression on them.  My friends, if our future as a Church and as a nation depends on students like these, we will be OK (of course God is the one who gives us the strength.)  


Today at both sites we accomplished laying more blocks.  But what amazed us the most was the crazy way that the Honduran people build scaffolds, which is taking as many scrap pieces of lumber and nailing it together (some of the students because they are from the south termed it “redneck” scaffolding and “Death Trap 3000”.)  The Honduran  people are amazing to watch work.  They are the ultimate in recycling.  However their work ethic and craftsmanship is amazing.  Each of us have been trying to learn their language and at times get a good laugh out of the Honduran people when we miss pronounce their words. So far we have had a great trip.. .the team has come together and God is in control.  We will accomplish whatever it is that God has planned for us and then the rest we will leave for the foundation.  

Peace, Chris               

Both groups left to go to Gloria’s house to see the progress that was made. Then the school group headed to the school.

The school group had a slow start. The girls played Frisbee with the kids, while the guys shoveled dirt. We made cement to start building the kitchen’s storage room. By the end of the day a lot of cement was made to mortar five layers of cinderblocks. Several buckets of cement had to be carried to work on the top of the building. We hung out more with Christian, getting to try a whole bunch of new fruits. 

We left work a little early to make sure we made it to the “Walmart” before it closed. Anna and Abby completed the mission to buy shoes for Oscar.

The wall has reached the point where we’re having to build benches to stand on, since the masons at work can no longer work on both sides of the wall due to its height.  At some point a door will have to be constructed via demolition from the inside of the house to create an access.

The heat index today was 112.  Tomorrow it’s supposed to be 118.  Wish us luck.

Anna, Abby & Brad

Today both groups started out by going to the school to see the progress that was made yesterday. After seeing the children come out, the one group went to work at Gloria’s house while the other group stayed at the school.

While waiting for the Honduran workers, the group at the school played with the kids. Some attempted to jump rope, while others played Frisbee and volleyball. Once the workers arrived, they marked the outline for a storage room that is going to be added on to a kitchen. Then, we started digging the footers for the room. Others cut wire and made triangles and squares for the rebar columns. 

After our lunch break of Pb&Js we got back to work. More work was done digging and making rebars. Dane and Jared met a new friend, named Christian, and they went to his house for popsicles. Sam met Oscar, an 11 year old boy who can’t go to school because he cannot afford a uniform or supplies, and put Abby and Anna on a mission to buy the boy shoes at the local “Walmart” because he could not afford them. 

Our final task of the day was to make concrete and fill the footers. It was touching to see how the Hondurans did so much work to improve their conditions. Even the women wanted to help and made us some local food for us. We played throw the ball into the wheelbarrow with the kids before heading back to the compound for the day.

For the team that worked at Gloria’s house, they spent the day laying block and mixing concrete.  See pictures of the block laying’s evolution (compliments of Brad, who encourages readers to click these pictures in order to zoom in on them for maximum detail):

 

Anna & Abby (with help from Brad – blog overlord)