Sunday (June 17) we planned to have pancakes and bananagrams –
however, the power was out, so we didn't have very many pancakes, but
we played a LOT of bananagrams :-) Ate lunch at KFC, did the grocery
shopping, skyped with the family, attended youth group at the church,
had dinner at the church afterwards. The youth group was fun – they
did a combined event (usually, they have 4ish different groups) –
there were about 100 of us there! It was cool because several of them
had just been baptized that morning. It's so cool to see how strong
the youth group is there! They definitely have a presence at church –
so encouraging, for sure!
Monday, we didn't have internet at all (I had thought it was because
the electricity was out, but apparently there was something wrong
with the router). At Casa Hogar Vida, we had our exercise class (it
was rainy, but only Erica and her kids came – a little
discouraging), English class at 11, lunch in the office, planning at
the orphanage for the next few days' classes. Around 3, an invasion
of gringos! The week-long mission team was taking the tour of Limon
and Casa – it was definitely interesting to see it from the other
side. While we drove back after it was over, we had an interesting
conversation of the benefits of long term and short term missions
trips. Ask me about it sometime! I may do a post about it, I don't
know... After dinner (“Chop suey” aka anything remotely Chinese),
we had our bible study on Joshua. Good stuff!
Tuesday: Still no internet. Exercise class (more people came! There
were clouds! Nice...). We attempted to have Bible class for the kids
at 11, but the week-ers came around then, and the kids were too
distracted. We chatted with the week-ers, and got to see Criz again!
He was translating for the week-ers, then he'll be working with us
after :-) The week-ers got the office, so we took over the store next
door – just a small vending place with some tables under a roof. I
should take a picture sometime... We had bible class later with the
kids and the other gringos, and it went a lot better
:-) After playing with the kids and chatting with the tia, we had
dinner and band practice.
Quick thing about band practice: it's one of the few places that I
have to remind myself that we're in Honduras, a different country,
with a different culture. In America, band practice is straight to
the point – we sing our songs, we fix anything that needs fixed, we
try new things if necessary, we're done. Here, there's hanging out
before, oh I guess we'll play a song, talk about the song, practice
harmonies (granted, there are a lot more singers here), play
the same song again, chat some more, maybe even play the same song a
third time... after 2 hours, we've practiced two songs. It's teaching
me a lot about patience and Honduran culture :-)
Wednesday: Usual day at casa – we had women's bible study for our
class today, had lunch outside again because the week-ers had the
office :-), nothing new... dinner was crispy (fried?) tortilla with
shredded chicken... we had milkshakes (yay!!) and I posted a blog
post while sitting right outside the office, because I finally
heard that the office had internet.
Thursday: The weekers were at the Casa Hogar hotel all day – we
didn't see them except right when we got there, which was weird...
English class was on the schedule, but no kids came in the morning.
We tried again after lunch, and there were a lot more kids. Lunch was
fun, because David joined us – he works at Casa and is related to
about half the people at the church (not really). He's super cool –
he knows a bit of English, and a lot of us know enough Spanish that
it all worked out nicely. So many laughs! Taylor got the brunt of the
teasing though, since he's the only guy of us 6 working at Casa :-)
(Taylor, Sarah, Rachel, Xan, April and me) We left Casa early in
order to get Xan, Taylor and I to band practice. It was a long band
practice. First, it was just Jose Carlos (electric guitar and I think
one of the worship leaders) and us three, so we could learn
chords/words, etc so that when “real” practice happened, we could
actually practice. Sounds like a good plan, except that that
meant we were practicing for over 5 hours. Ahhhh!!
Friday: Finally! Internet! So exciting! At Casa, Sarah and I went to
manualidades real quick to discuss a new bracelet idea Sarah had –
however, it involved jicaro, and the woman working with jicaro wasn't
in that day, so we chatted then left. Eli (the boss, I suppose... no
one here really has titles) was showing Taylor how to roast the
coffee beans when we got back, and Sarah was super excited :-P We got
to try some coffee and it was so goooood.... I'm craving some
right now :-) As Eli was pouring the coffee into the sample glasses
(that were pretty small), he said, “I feel like I'm playing with my
daughter right now.” We all laughed. After a few glasses, I was
getting hyper :-P It was fun! Then a lot of the staff came into the
office and we had a birthday celebration for Pastor Giovani
(spelling? It's different every sermon haha) and Eli! It was a lot of
fun. I think the cake was pineapple or something like that. Good
stuffs. After all the celebrations were over, we went evangelizing a
bit – there were a lot of empty houses, but we managed to talk to a
few people. There was one family that may not know Christ, so be
praying for them. There was another family that loves God, but only a
few can read, so it makes it harder to read the bible. They were a
lot of fun to talk to!! Pray for them too, there's a lot of issues
with their kids' health.
Had another laundry scavenger hunt when we got back, had pizza hut
for dinner (turning into a tradition!) and went to an HLT session
with a Nicaraguan speaker. It was fun, because he spoke pretty
clearly, so with the translator and him, I caught a lot of Spanish
and made me happy haha... Xan, Taylor and I played with the band
which was super fun as well. After it was over and all the different
small groups were getting together to talk, all of a sudden, wedding
music started playing and one of the men proposed! It was so cool!
I'm pretty sure it's the first proposal I've seen in real life :-) It
was so great to witness the church celebrate for the new couple!
And there's week 3. *whew* Don't worry, week 4 is coming, but I'll
leave you with this for now. :-)
