One thing about having a large group is that you get to meet new people. There are quite a few people in this group that I hadn't met before, either from the Keys or from TN. Working side by side with them always gives you plenty of time to talk. There are so many great people on this team and lots of great young people who have a passion for serving. It's always a blast to hear peoples stories and why they are here and things they are doing back home. Just one day of working with people you just met and you feel like you've known them forever.
So today I was working outside and thinking about how hot it was and how much I was sweating and how great a dip in the pool was going to be at the hotel tonight then I stopped and had a quick laugh as I thought about how much closer I am to the equator and yet it isn't 105 degrees here but it is at home. Just the thought of not being there and being here instead put a smile on my face haha. It really was quite warm though but not as warm as the southeast right now although supposedly you can get sunburned more easily down here.
Today we got started on our projects at the Church just outside of Catacamas. A group painted while a group started putting up a chain link fence around the 2 and a half acre property. The post were already set but they wanted a trench dug at the bottom so that the bottom of the fence could sit in a few inches of concrete to keep kids from crawling under it. So I swung a pick for about 5 hours today. Kinda tired but the fence is coming along nicely. The church has a feeding center for kids in the area and they are fencing in their property in order to start a garden and Tilapia pond. The pond is built but dry due to the lack of rainfall. We had a group get started on the garden today similar to the one in Mololoa just a bit larger. This group definitely got it's first good day of work in. Lots of tired bodies are rolling into bed right now. There really weren't any great stories to tell from today except for Norlan driving the bus 20 minutes completely in the wrong direction while trying to get to the church this morning. The community that we are working in is a very poor area. There are roughly 270 people with a lot of those being kids. I forget how many kids the feeding center feeds but it is quite a few. The people from the Church are so eager to help us no matter what we are doing. They dug trenches and set fence post and helped with the garden and gave 110% just like the gringo's did. It's really great to see how much they are encouraged by seeing their brothers and sisters in Christ travel such a long way to help them in whatever way we can. They don't just sit back and watch, they jump in and want to help and learn and get to know you.
Hopefully the heat won't be too bad for you guys this weekend. I'll drink an extra bag of water tomorrow just for you.
Saturday, June 30, 2012
Friday, June 29, 2012
Let the fun begin!
So the first day was quite eventful, not so much for us as for our
group leader, Terry Reeves, but I'll get to that in a second. Our
flight landed about 11:15 local time and the second plane with our
people on it landed about 12:30. Flying down here is leaving home and
going home all in the same day. We leave family and friends at home
which sucks but we land here and it's just like landing at home. You
know that you're going to get to see all the great people and friends
that you've made over the years and it feels like home. Well after we
ate lunch we headed straight to work at the warehouse where we store all
of our supplies. We had two containers full of hundreds and hundreds
of boxes delivered a few weeks ago with clothes, shoes, meds, hygiene
packs, toys, and other stuff to sort through. So we started right away
opening boxes and sorting through things. There's really not much to
tell about it, it's a long boring thing to do but it has to be done.
Afterwards we made it up to the mission house and had a fantastic meal
for dinner, had a few things to take care of then I was off to bed.
The second day was like the first minus the plane ride. We got up and had breakfast and I led a quick devo before we loaded the buses and went back to the warehouse for a full day of sorting. We were able to go through most of the boxes, like 90% of them, and get them broken down so that when we are back in Teguc next week we will know exactly what is in each box so we can grab them and take them where they are needed. We got back to the mission house and had another devo by Terry since he was now here, story coming shortly, and a meeting about our plans for Thursday and then it was off to bed.
So the American airlines flight was delayed by an hour on Tuesday and those of us who flew in earlier on Delta were wondering what the hold up could have been. After a bit of extreme speculation the American flight landed and we were able to get a great story which Terry retold when he arrived Wednesday (he was supposed to be here Tuesday but here's why he wasn't) Apparently somewhere in the Miami airport he was either pick-pocketed or his passport fell out of his pocket. So when he went to get on the plane he realized his passport wasn't in his pocket. So obviously they wouldn't let him on the plane and he had to sit and watch his mission team leave without him. Now if any of you have a passport you know how long it takes to get one, a few weeks at minimum. So to make a long story short he goes to the government agency in Miami who issues passports and then they send him to another place who then sends him back to the passport place where he then waits for over an hr until he finally talks to someone who can help him who tells him that they close at 3pm, and it's 3:15, but the guy listens to Terry anyways as he tells his story and the guy does something he says he has never done before and grants Terry a passport on the same day as he applied to the cheers of other people in the lounge/waiting room. So Terry got a new passport on Tuesday and got a flight for Wednesday and is now here and all is good. He now has another great story to tell people. We seemed to manage pretty well without him though.
Today the real fun has started. We picked up 45 people at the airport today and after lunch loaded them on a bus and drove 5 hours from Teguc to a town to the North East called Catacamas. We made it here about 7 and are now in our rooms for the night. It seems like a pretty nice place but I really have no idea. It was a long day of traveling and there are 45 people that felt like the interns did Tuesday, worn out and ready for bed.
The group of interns that I'll be part of seems to be another great team. Some of us new each other before we landed Tuesday but just a couple of days into this trip and we all seem to mesh really well. One of the great things about these trips is that you are always going to meet some really amazing people and it seems like the intern team is full of amazing people. I'm really excited to be working with them for the next few weeks. It's going to be a blast. We are also going to be traveling to new areas which I always love. Going back to places you've been is great because you build relationships with people and see the development of areas but I'm always excited to see new places like Catacamas and a new area in Choluteca that we'll be going to in a few weeks. New people and new places always leads to exciting things. Back home it sometimes gets hard to see how God works in peoples lives and in different situations because there is so much stuff to distract us and so many things to fill our minds with doubt but when you really focus and look for ways in which God is working everyday in every situation it's amazing what you see. Just in the few days we've been here we've had a few hiccups but every time something unexpected happens it seems we have someone watching over us to guide us out of trouble and onto the path He has for us. After all, this is His mission and He is in control. We may make plans but God is the one who guides us to the places and people who need the help. I re-named the blog in case you didn't realize it. We have come to Honduras this summer to build houses, to give away food, to give out clothes, to have a few VBS's, to have medical clinics and many many more things. We have brought our bodies to serve, our minds to teach with the hope that through us God will pierce their hearts to the core. As Christians we should strive to put ourselves into positions to let God work through us. I think that no matter who you are or where you are, every person deserves the opportunity to hear about a God who loves them and a savior who died for them. Over the next few weeks we'll have the opportunity to do that here in Honduras and I ask that you pray that in all the things we do that God would be glorified and hearts will be changed and souls will be saved.
The second day was like the first minus the plane ride. We got up and had breakfast and I led a quick devo before we loaded the buses and went back to the warehouse for a full day of sorting. We were able to go through most of the boxes, like 90% of them, and get them broken down so that when we are back in Teguc next week we will know exactly what is in each box so we can grab them and take them where they are needed. We got back to the mission house and had another devo by Terry since he was now here, story coming shortly, and a meeting about our plans for Thursday and then it was off to bed.
So the American airlines flight was delayed by an hour on Tuesday and those of us who flew in earlier on Delta were wondering what the hold up could have been. After a bit of extreme speculation the American flight landed and we were able to get a great story which Terry retold when he arrived Wednesday (he was supposed to be here Tuesday but here's why he wasn't) Apparently somewhere in the Miami airport he was either pick-pocketed or his passport fell out of his pocket. So when he went to get on the plane he realized his passport wasn't in his pocket. So obviously they wouldn't let him on the plane and he had to sit and watch his mission team leave without him. Now if any of you have a passport you know how long it takes to get one, a few weeks at minimum. So to make a long story short he goes to the government agency in Miami who issues passports and then they send him to another place who then sends him back to the passport place where he then waits for over an hr until he finally talks to someone who can help him who tells him that they close at 3pm, and it's 3:15, but the guy listens to Terry anyways as he tells his story and the guy does something he says he has never done before and grants Terry a passport on the same day as he applied to the cheers of other people in the lounge/waiting room. So Terry got a new passport on Tuesday and got a flight for Wednesday and is now here and all is good. He now has another great story to tell people. We seemed to manage pretty well without him though.
Today the real fun has started. We picked up 45 people at the airport today and after lunch loaded them on a bus and drove 5 hours from Teguc to a town to the North East called Catacamas. We made it here about 7 and are now in our rooms for the night. It seems like a pretty nice place but I really have no idea. It was a long day of traveling and there are 45 people that felt like the interns did Tuesday, worn out and ready for bed.
The group of interns that I'll be part of seems to be another great team. Some of us new each other before we landed Tuesday but just a couple of days into this trip and we all seem to mesh really well. One of the great things about these trips is that you are always going to meet some really amazing people and it seems like the intern team is full of amazing people. I'm really excited to be working with them for the next few weeks. It's going to be a blast. We are also going to be traveling to new areas which I always love. Going back to places you've been is great because you build relationships with people and see the development of areas but I'm always excited to see new places like Catacamas and a new area in Choluteca that we'll be going to in a few weeks. New people and new places always leads to exciting things. Back home it sometimes gets hard to see how God works in peoples lives and in different situations because there is so much stuff to distract us and so many things to fill our minds with doubt but when you really focus and look for ways in which God is working everyday in every situation it's amazing what you see. Just in the few days we've been here we've had a few hiccups but every time something unexpected happens it seems we have someone watching over us to guide us out of trouble and onto the path He has for us. After all, this is His mission and He is in control. We may make plans but God is the one who guides us to the places and people who need the help. I re-named the blog in case you didn't realize it. We have come to Honduras this summer to build houses, to give away food, to give out clothes, to have a few VBS's, to have medical clinics and many many more things. We have brought our bodies to serve, our minds to teach with the hope that through us God will pierce their hearts to the core. As Christians we should strive to put ourselves into positions to let God work through us. I think that no matter who you are or where you are, every person deserves the opportunity to hear about a God who loves them and a savior who died for them. Over the next few weeks we'll have the opportunity to do that here in Honduras and I ask that you pray that in all the things we do that God would be glorified and hearts will be changed and souls will be saved.
Tuesday, June 26, 2012
It's go time BABY!
Summer 2012 is here and away we go. Another hour and a half and I'll be heading to Charlotte to catch a plane to Atlanta, then another one to Teguc. Roughly 12 hrs from now I should be meeting up with our team at the Toncontin airport to start getting everything ready for the first 80 person team to arrive on Thursday. I don't really have a lot to say, mainly because it's 1:30 AM but I just wanted to put up a post saying that I'll hopefully be able to post a blog every 3 days......hopefully. The internet has good days and bad days in Teguc and you never know what day will be a good one. We will also be traveling a little and staying in new places so I can't guarantee I'll be able to post a blog but keep checking and they'll be up eventually. It should be another great trip. There are a few interns returning from last year but also a few new faces to the intern team. It's going to be a blast and I can't wait to get down there. Hope you enjoy the blog again this year and I'll get something posted up in a few days. Peace
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