I am speaking Tomduran (special version of Spanish) not Honduran...

Sorry it has been almost a full week since I last wrote.  Also sorry that this is going to be a long one. We had one thing right after another with this team, so I never had a chance to write anything. This team was a youth team from Hagerstown Maryland. Their focus was orphanages, VBS, and concrete work. Let's try and break this down, shall we?
ORPHANAGES - this was covered on the last update.

VBS - We took off to a public school in the area to do VBS.  The team put on a puppet show, sang songs, and did crafts.  The show was all on a CD so no one had to learn spanish.  They just had to move the puppets with the words spoken.  No problem right?  Well, if you don't have electricity, it can be a problem.  Part way through the program, the electricity went out and stayed out for the entire day.  That meant the puppet show had to stop. So we did a craft. The craft was an awesome one.  It was clear plastic sleeves used for scrape booking with foamed pieces of fish and ribbon, etc to create an underwater theme.  The children LOVED it. It was a rather complicated craft, but the kids had a blast doing it.  It would have been perfect, except for the small detail of not enough staplers to close the plastic up.  The youth leader had forgotten to get staplers.  She had one decent one and one crappy one. It took FOREVER to finish the artwork. Note to self.  Ask the leader what craft they are going to do BEFORE we leave the campground. We had a couple of staplers there, but didn't know we needed them.

Since the electric was off, Tom thought that
we could pull the van into the courtyard
of the school and run the boom box off
the battery of the van.  It was a great idea.
He got the van in and hooked up the boom
 box and we gathered all 200 plus kids
out to the courtyard and we sang
all the songs.




The kids LOVED singing and using the hand motions and it was fun to see them all so happy. We sang the songs over and over again.

After school was over, Tom tried to pull the van out.  It seems that it was a REALLY tight fit going in.  When trying to go out, the angle was a little different and he ended up getting too close to the one side of the cement wall.  He was within about 1/2 inch from the wall.  He told all the kids to push on the side of the van that was closest to the wall so he wouldn't slide into the wall.  They did; and he did (slide into the wall).

This is a picture of the wall and the van. Note how they are touching....

The front of the van was hitting the gate to the school.   They ended up breaking the gate down in order to get a little more room to move the van.  The problem was the van was laying up against the cement wall on the other side so any movement at all would cause a problem. Tom tried chiseling the cement wall away from the van. At this rate we would be there a REALLY long time....

So the next best thing would be to pick up the van  and move it. Soooooo, that is what they did. Several of the guys got to the back of the van and literally picked it up and moved it over so it would not touch the cement wall.  This gave Tom the 1/2 inch back to go through the gate opening straight.  There was a second problem however.  Going straight meant Tom would drive right into a VERY deep trench. Sooooo, large boulders were picked up and carried out so when Tom did drive out, he could go over the trench. The van and the kids who were also stuck inside were released.

  

A few went back to repair the gate and all is well that ends well (except for the van). So at this point, Tom and I are tied with damaging the "new" grey van.(sigh).

Later that night, it rained like it does every night in Seguatepeque. This time we were all in our hotel rooms and the noise of the rain hitting the metal roof was very soothing.  Then came a knock on our door as I was getting out of the shower.  It seems one of the kids was running (he still insists it was more like a jog...) across the second floor tile.  He slipped on the wet floor (the rain went through the metal in some places) and fortunately broke his fall with his face.  UNFORTUNATELY, he broke his nose and chipped a tooth. Had he put his hand out he probably would have broken his wrist.  It seems this was the second time he ran across the floor, only slipping the first time.  (I guess some kids do need to be hit over the head with a 2 x 4 to get it). Soooo, we got to find out where the hospital is in Seguatepeque. The ER staff were wonderful and kind. We got back to the hotel very late. As you can see from the picture, we were VERY concerned about his injuries...

The following day, it was off to the dentist to consult about the broken tooth. Our thoughts were the dentist would check him out and then ask us what we wanted done.  We were not permitted to go into the room with him, so the youth leader and I sat in the waiting room and visited.  As we were talking I began to realize I was hearing a drill in the background.  Sure enough, that is what it was. Andrea and I just looked at each other and thought, Holy Cow! When he came out of there, he had a tooth that was straighter than his original tooth and it looked great. Whew!!!!

Each day, after VBS the kids worked on the worksite.  Some helped lay concrete, others mixed concrete, sifted sand, and dug Laja.  Laja is an extremely hard rock which the church property is built on.  Laja is used as a solid base in which to literally build the buildings.  It needs to be chipped and then pounded into fine pieces.  It is a horrible job.  But these kids hung in there and did it. Everyone EXCEPT the youth pastor, Andrea.  Pastor Rigo said she was too weak and wasn't permitted to do it. When Rigo wasn't around, she insisted on trying it...He was right. She couldn't do it...

Everyday after work, the kids played volleyball.  One time it was the Hondurans (Tom was Honduran) vs the Americans and the Hondurans ripped their butts.  It was embarrassing. The entire work team, both Honduran and American came to look forward to these games.

The ladies of the church prepared all our meals for us at the church.  This meant that we did not have to go to any restaurants, and with the new water filter system installed in the church, we didn't need to worry about getting sick from the food or the water. It was wonderful.  The teens seemed to enjoy all the Honduran food the ladies fixed and Andrea and I even helped with making pupusas, tortillas and plantains.

On the way back to the campground from our stay in Seguatepeque, we stopped off at a waterfall park to swim and zipline.  Everyone had a blast.  Even those afraid of heights and water conquered their fears long enough to enjoy the view.
There were 11 of us that actually went into the waterfall and underneath it.  Talk about a sermon series!  We had to trust each other and our guide as we could not see ANYTHING due to the constant pounding of the fall cascading down over our heads.  We had to breath through our mouths and not our noses or we would drown.  We had to feel our way with our feet, backwards, through the various cracks and crevices of the rock beneath us. It was frightful for some, exciting for others. And stupid for still others who thought we were crazy for doing it.

The team said their goodbyes on Friday and then on Saturday, we said our good byes to Monica, who was with us for 3 weeks. I must point out here, that the game of FARKLE was NOT played AT ALL this time.  So much for farkle being the work and witness game of choice.  It looks like MAFIA has won out....We celebrated Loyda's 41st birthday at Pizza Hut and then we drove back to Teguc.

Sunday afternoon was spent chill in' with our feet up, watching mindlessly into the television and drinking Monte Verde coffee. Hmmmmm, the simple joys of life!!!!