The Mayan Village

This morning Marc and I drove to the Mayan village where the artesan center is located. We were planning on buying merchandise for the Casa de Esperanza store. In October we walked up there. It was a long, hot walk. This morning it was a bumpy ride and we were in four wheel drive part of the way. As we drove, I could not help but notice how many children were not in school. We did see the school and I noticed uniforms must not be required in this village. Many of the kids did not have uniforms. No one had black shoes, just flip flops. Of the children that had uniforms, there were not many new ones nor ones that fit very well. Most of the uniforms I saw were way too big, in need of repair and stained and dirty. No one seemed to mind. I was really glad that the rules were a bit more relaxed in a village where if the rules were not relaxed, no one would get to go to school.

We walked in the house to buy our dolls. There was one lady working on the dolls and her children. The oldest little girl was cross-eyed. Bless her little heart. Maybe she was seven. I do not really know. There was also, probably, a three year old. One of those children that no matter what I do, I cannot get to smile. And then, there was a four month old baby girl. She liked attention. As long as Marc or I stood there talking to her, she was happy. These girls had very worn, very torn and tattered clothing. The baby had no diaper and the tattered clothing was way too big.

We could tell, by looking around, there was not the number of dolls we needed. We talked to the lady and told her how many we needed. She said ok and they would be ready tomorrow. She stepped outside and, while I did not hear her, and probably would not have understood exactly what she said, spoke something to the effect of ladies we have work to do. Women and their children began to come into the building. All were smiling. There was work.

After we paid a deposit for this work and agreed on how many dolls and when we would pick them up in the morning, we walked on down the hill to the place where the weavings are done. Again, there was only one woman in the store. She quoted us a price and we picked out a few weavings. I quickly added how much money this was and took it out of my backpack to pay her and she gave me a discount because of the number I bought. I almost cried. These ladies work so hard. I was there to buy some of her wares to help her and then she gave me a discount.

Then we saw my little friend that helped me down the hill in October. She remembered us and we remembered her. She had three little dolls she was trying to sell. What a hard life she lives.

It is hard for me to describe how this kind of poverty touches me. How gracious these women are. How grateful they are for just a little bit of work. I am so constantly reminded of the poverty and the needs of this country.

We will go back up in the morning. I wish I had clothes for some of these kids.

Terri

Another Adventure

Friday my daughter, Nicole, and her husband Matt will be flying into San Pedro Sula and we will be getting them at the airport. Casa de Eseranza is preparing to open a small gift shop. While we were in Copan last October I saw some things that I thought should go in the gift shop. A few weeks ago, Marc and I decided to drive to Copan today, buy the gift shop items tomorrow, and go back to San Pedro Sula on Friday to get the kids.

Marc found another shortcut to Copan. It is a wonder that I even got in the car with him. We got on the San Pedro Sula highway. At km177 we turned off of the highway to take the shortcut. We had a lovely time driving the country roads. This country is full of beauty and this road was no exception. An hour and a half later as we turned back onto a highway, not the highway we thought it was, we quickly discovered we were on the San Pedro Sula highway and km190. Boy, we had covered a lot of mileage. Only we were headed back toward Tegucigalpa. We were laughing hysterically. After making a uturn, we had an uneventful trip the rest of the distance to Copan. We visited and enjoyed the beauty.

I am looking forward to being here, doing my business and seeing the kids on Friday.

Terri

School Supplies

To many of you, school supplies is an old subject from me. I have emailed telling the high cost of sending a child to school in Honduras. This cost includes registration, fees, uniforms, books and school supplies. With wages so low here in Honduras, school supplies alone for one child can easily cost one day's wages.

Thursday, Marc and I bought school supplies for the children at Casa de Esperanza. They already had backpacks, pencil boxes, crayolas and many other things. Their lists were long and included toilet paper and soap for the bathrooms and children's headache tablets. I took for granted that those things would be furnished by the school. The other things on the list were very specific, and, in most cases, expensive. Today we had to bring some people into town and Karen said she had another school supply list that came home on Friday. This list was not near as long, but still, it was more supplies.

The schools and teachers are very picky. If a particular item is not exactly what they ordered, they will not accept it. Thursday I bought the wrong type of drawing paper. The right kind of drawing paper is one of the items on the list today.

Basically, there is one place in Tegucigalpa to buy all the supplies. Or, we could run around all over town and get a few here and a few there. For most people that live in Santa Ana and other communities as well, they would have to ride a bus (meaning they would have to pay bus fare) to town to get these specified school supplies.

The children at Casa de Esperanza have their school supplies, but it angers me that so many children cannot go to school because they can't afford drawing paper or toilet paper. This is the government's way to not educate as many children as possible, thus perpetuating the cycle of poverty.

Thanks to all you purchased school supplies to be sent to Honduras. The container should be on its way.

Terri

Hard Narrow Benches

We soon will be starting a new work project in the community of Mirador Oriente aka Nueva Oriental. We drove up there yesterday to talk to some people about this project and check out the land for possible sites. We also stuck our heads in the new kindergarten building that was built last month. We saw a bunch of smiling, happy kids in their uniforms, eagerly learning. We walked further up the hill where the church and the Sunday school classrooms are located. The church building was built in April of 2007 and the Sunday school classrooms were built in June. One of the ladies opened both the classrooms and the church for us to see. I had never seen inside either one. To say the least, I was stunned.

Both the classrooms and the church are nice enough, simple and adequate. There are 150 kids every Sunday in two classrooms. When I thought about 75 kids in each one, the classrooms seemed much smaller than they really are. I could imagine all those little voices singing praises to God. There was not a lot of teaching materials and prepared literature like we have in the states. Then we walked into the church building. Two hundred adults meet here every Sunday. The benches you see in the picture is all there is. It has to be standing room only. I wondered, out loud, how many of us, myself included, in the states would go to church every Sunday if we had to sit on a hard, narrow (very narrow) bench without a cushion and without a back. And, no doubt, many people would be squeezed on those benches quite cozily. Many would be standing. I attend a Honduran church every Sunday. It doesn't matter how many people are there, or how crowded, or how uncomfortable the seats are, they are there to worship God and sing His praises and are grateful for a building in which to meet.

Would we, could we worship God every Sunday if we had to sit on a hard, narrow, crowded bench instead of a wide cushioned pew?

Terri

Two Babies

Our friend, Don from Indiana, went to Hospital Escuela on Monday. As everyone is when they go there, he was very touched. He met a couple of babies with which we really connected. One was an eleven month old baby boy that was having heart surgery yesterday. He prayed with the mother. The other was a few day old baby boy that had club feet and severe breathing problems and possibly other problems. He had been abandoned in the hospital.


Don and his daughter leave tomorrow. He asked if we could take him back to the hospital today to check on these babies. Of course, we could. We found the baby who had surgery. His mother was holding him and smiling. The surgery was successful. We said a prayer of thanksgiving with her.


We also found the other baby. He was in a little crib in the corner by himself. Not even identification or age was on his crib. Both legs were in casts, in an attempt to correct the problem with the club feet. As bad as this precious baby's breathing was, Don said it was better. He had the least little cry. I am not sure what anyone else did, but I prayed over this little one. A nurse came in and began to give him a bottle. We started to leave, walked out, and then walked back in to look at him again.


I have no idea what may become of this little one, but I think he needs a lot of prayers.

Terri

A Feeding Center and The Dump

The first few children as they came into the feeding center

People rummaging for food at the dump

Today we took our guests to work in the feeding center at San Miguel. This is an extremely poor community. Children in the community are fed one meal a day at the feeding center. Without this meal, at least 50% of the children would have nothing to eat. This community has no running water and has to buy water with which to cook and do dishes. The water is stored in the church's baptistry and is hauled in as needed. Each meal is served for about fifty cents. The cost of the water and the cost of the propane for the stove are figured into this fifty cents.

We got to San Miguel in time to help prepare the meal. I chopped tomatoes. I also helped dish up the food, serve the children and wash the dishes. I knew I had to put small portions on the plates, and I was spooning what I thought were small portions. I was told they were too big. Two hundred kids came today to eat. I thought we were going to run out of food and the portions had to become even smaller. No one complained. They ate what they were served and were grateful.

Some of the little kids were so dirty. There is no place to take a shower. There is a rock down by the stream that was the community pila. One person would come wash their few clothes and then another would come and then another.

I am thankful I got to go to San Miguel and help in this feeding center today. I am thankful for this feeding center where these children are assured one hot meal each day.

From there, we went to eat. I could not each much, after leaving the feeding center. I just boxed my food and gave it to someone that was really hungry.

We drove out to the dump. The dump is a horrible place. The odor is awful. At least two hundred people live, yes live, at the dump. When the garbage trucks come in, these people rummage through this filthy, stinking, sometimes rotten garbage trying to find anything to eat. Rotten apples, banana peels, anything. They pull out plastic bottles or anything else they can find to recycle. Hundreds and hundreds of buzzards live there also scavenging for the same food these people are. Most of the people there had on clothes that were tattered and worn. That is not an adequate description at all. Iam positive this would be the only clothes they own. The shelters these people live in are also just what they can find and put together. They would offer essentially no protection from the wind and the cold. How they sleep at all, I do not know. There were little children there. Little children that should have been in school.

The dump is without a doubt the worst of the worst. It just doesn't get any worse than what I saw today. Marc and I are definitely working on a way to get those people fed once in a while.

This has been an emotionally draining day, in some ways harder than building houses. I will not forget what I saw today for a long time. I hope I don't ever forget. I need to be reminded of those that need to be served.

Terri

Terri

Happy Sounds

The top three pictures are of some of the people for whom houses were built this week. The man standing by the ladder was so happy about his house. He has worked with us for 3 days, helping with everyone's house. He also led the prayer. As you can see, his hands are raised as he prayed. Several others that were praying had their hands raised, also.

Today we arrived at the job site at 8:30. We were excited and eager to start w0rking on houses again. Imagine our surprise when we got there to find one load of wood already there and unloaded. Imagine our bigger surprise when the second load pulled up. Things like that don't happen in Honduras. With all the lumber there, we could divide into two teams and get these houses done.

Thursday we started on a small site. Three houses were standing in that site, thus, decreasing the area in which to work. The area through which we had to carry lumber was narrow, very narrow. This morning there were more people, more kids, more dogs, less space. Everyone wanted to help haul the wood. Very small children were picking up boards, oblivious to everyone else around. Boards were swinging every direction. I was sure someone, possibly me, would get slapped in the face with a board. Fortunately, this did not happen. As I carried lumber through this narrow place, it was much like driving in Honduras. People passing on all sides, cutting in front of you. It was very chaotic, but how wonderful were the sounds of people laughing, talking, and being excited about houses being built for neighbors.

The tin was put on the third house. The sound of tin crinkling as it was being put on the roof was a happy sound as that meant another house was being completed. As we began to dig the holes for corner posts, there was the sounds of metal hitting rock, and then we laughed and talked and cheered as the post holes were dug to the proper level and rocks were removed. And for the record, Sarah and I removed on really huge rock today. We stopped and took a picture with her camera.

The sounds coming from hammers and chainsaws as they began their work meant work was progressing and the total project was coming closer to completion. All day as we worked and people could see three completed houses and two more in progress, the excitement levels increased. As each piece of wood was chainsawed and fell to the ground, there was a child waiting to pick up that little piece of wood and run home with it. Each little piece of wood that is gathered like that, is firewood that does not have to be found from some other place.

After the chainsaws and hammers were silent, that was a wonderful sound as well. That meant we were through. As wonderful as that sound was, the most wonderful sound of all was the sound of the prayers being said. All the workers and all the families for whom houses were built gathered for a prayer. One man who had helped us all 3 days and whose house was built today was going to say a prayer of thanksgiving. He began to pray loudly, praising God and saying a lot of hallelujahs. As he prayed every person that received a house, also began to pray and thank God. Everyone of them praying out loud, praying their own prayers, weeping with joy. It was the most joyous sound I have ever heard. I am sure you can guess who else was crying.

I am thankful tonight that God gave us the strength, and the stamina to get this job done in three days.