Sunday in Guatemala

                                                       Ministerios Sendero de las Crus

Where to begin?  Ministerios Sendero de la Cruz is "a happening". It is a store front church that opens into a more voluminous room that contains a stage of sorts, straight-backed chairs, and warm, welcoming Guatemalans.  We were  graciously ushered to the front rows despite the fact we would block the view of everyone seated behind us as we are extremely tall compared to most Guatemalans.  The service was about two hours long, about an hour of which was praise music with liturgical dancers that ranged in age from about 6 to 36, all with choreographed movements and tamborines.  It was a spontaneous yet well directed service.  At each transition the congregation erupted into applause after prayers, songs, announcements, and even the offering.  I thought that was interesting...you have to go to the front to give an offering and when everyone has made the trip to the front, the congregation applauds.  Interesting.

We all took away different amounts of the message depending on the degree to which we understood Spanish, but there were many opportunities to follow along in the Bible and we seized those moments to "get with the program."  I believe Phillipians 4: 4-9 might sum it up.

After one of Ginny's near famous grilled cheese sandwiches and tortilla chips, we spent the afternoon fine tuning our lessons, perfecting our Spanish lyrics/music, and practicing our skit.  The skit comes from the book of Ruth and there were many funny moments primarily because Gordy is Boaz in the skit, and he carries himself like he is Caesar; he a good actor but a little type-cast, he seems to enjoy his approach so we are going with it.  Riley who is 13 is Ruth his intended wife...well, you can start to see the humor...let's just say Gordy is not 13, so it was really funny.  It turns out Andrew was born to entertain and he and Michael have a "death" scene that is Oscar worthy.  Emma and Emily whipped our songs into shape, and Bruce has a narrator's voice that is equal to James Earl Jones.  Everyone contributed in their own way, but acting honors go to Katherine, as Naomi.

After dinner we continued to practice and ended the evening unloading supplies, sorting, counting, and boxing with the precision of, well, let's say an unnamed, retired military individual. (He's a keeper!)  Photos are found below.  We also had to melt the ends of 250 cords for an adult craft,
and Jeannie, Sam, Gordy, and Michael "took one for the team" doing that.  There is a possibility they no longer possess finger prints.

We had lots of opportunities to bond today, and we did.  Age is irrelevant here; it is all about living the faith and doing it to the best of your ability.  We are giving it our all.

Blessings and good night,
Katherine, Riley, Kelsey, Andrew, Emily, Emma, Sam, Jeannie, Gordy, Michael, Rachel, Bruce, and Sally


This tienda (store) and panaderia (bakery) is across the street from the
mission house.  The photo was taken this morning from the roof.

This was the finger burning exercise.

Unpacking Supplies and More

What a difference a few hours can make!

(Photo taken on the roof of the mission house after dinner with Ginny and Kevin Holmes.)

Buenas tardes.  Our adventure began very early today.  Everything went off without a hitch thanks in no small part to the dads and male team members who helped us equalize our luggage weight issues by moving around toothpaste, lots of it.  Flights were on time, there was nothing out of the ordinary inflight, and it is always fun to explore a new airport (Atlanta).  The highlight this morning may have been singing Happy Birthday (18th) to Emily in the security line at Metro and even TSA seemed to get the humor, but then again it was 5:00 A.M. and they were still just getting started for the day.  We arrived at the gate just in time to load.

Highlights of the flight from Atlanta to Guatemala City were few and far between. By that time we were starting to truly drag.  When we arrived at the gate in Guatemala, the pilot wished Emily happy birthday over his intercom and most of the passengers broke out into a memorable rendition of Happy Birthday; that was cool.  Our flight included at least four, maybe five, other mission teams and when we landed it felt like at least 10,000 pounds of toothpaste had bounced on the end of the runway.  In fact, we blamed every minor, inflight difficulty, and a little trouble we incountered on the ride home from the airport, on too many pounds of toothpaste, which by the way we are grateful to have and honored to deliver.  

It has been wonderful to reconnect with our friends, Ginny, Kevin, Manuel, and Marta, and we look forward to seeing more of our Groundwork sisters and brothers tomorrow and Monday.  I realize in the world of blogs this one is a little anemic, but the writer does not nap on planes so she is reaching a bit to write today.  I think a picture may have to get the job done.

We feel blessed to be here, safe and sound, and ready to begin a week of new experiences.

Sally y sus amigos

Packed and Ready to Go

Actually, we not totally packed, but we are ready and that is way more important than the details of packing.  This photo is from last Wednesday.  We packed our 24 bags of supplies early.  As it turned out, there were more supplies that needed to go, so the number of bags is climbing. Furthermore, our technique of weighing bags (placing Bruce on a scale then asking him to drag each bag on the scale with him and to add 50 pounds) may not be up to Delta's standards.  We have a back-up plan if that is the case, so no worries. We will meet at Detroit Metro Airport at 4:00 A.M. on Saturday.

Thank you team members, member families, and Trinity members for your support, your supplies, and your prayers.  We look forward to sharing our Guatemalan adventures and faith walks in the coming days.

Blessings,
From left to right : (back) Andrew, Gordy, Bruce, (middle) Emma, Sally, Rachel, Jeannie, Riley, Kelsey, (front) Emily, Sam, and Katherine. (Michael was not present for the photo.)

Good-byes...

Good-byes are difficult in the best of situations; this is not the best situation. We have worked shoulder to shoulder this week with Americans and Guatemalans who have become good friends in a place where a good friend has your back, literally. They keep you out of harm's way, they cook your food, they carry your baggage (literally and figuratively), they care about your feelings, they protect your health, they encourage you when you are overwhelmed, and they share their faith and challenge you to share and stretch yours. Good-byes can be painful.  Each team members knows there is a very real possibility they may never see these friends again.  Even those who plan to return know that life doesn't always unfold the way we plan it, and that some things change with time.  This makes today difficult.

Life in Guatemala seems to perch on the edge of a precipice.  It may not be a comfortable place to live, but it sure is real, and real is powerful.  Our time in Guatemala has been real and powerful.  We have been blessed with an opportunity to see the world from a new perspective and react to what we have seen and heard.  God has blessed our time here.

Thank you for your interest, support, and prayers this week.  We leave tomorrow morning at 3:30 A.M. and hope to arrive in Detroit Sunday evening.  Again, thank you for taking this walk with us.

Blessings,
Sarah, Laura, Renee, Jenna, Gail, Sam, Emily, Emily, Kara, Emma, Jeannie, Kelsey, Lonnie, Jordan, Nick and Sally

Questions

Gonzales Park

What surprised us the most about our week in Guatemala?  What disappointed us?  What did we learn?  Where did we see God this week?  These were the questions we wrestled with tonight and instead of wrestling with the answers in the blog, I thought you might like to see the answers.  I don't know how many photos I can post before the blog implodes, but we would like you to see what we have seen that has hopefully changed us for the better.  More tomorrow...

Sally and Chochi

Sarah, Gail, Lonnie, Nick and Gail with Sandra on house visit

Daniel and Judit

Jenna and friends

Sam and friend

Sandra and Laura

Jeannie and friend

Turns out Jordan is great with kids.

Emily in her element with Carmen and friends.

Kara reading to the younger children

Nick as Pharoah

Rolando and friends

This was on the roof this morning with the Guatemalan missionaries.

Emma and Ana

Emily and Fatima

               

Gonzales Park

Great day today!  It was an all-round great day. We took a group picture with the Guatemalan ministry leaders at lunch, and I think it captures our feelings.

Gonzales Park is a well-worn slab of cement between two cement block buildings in a well-worn section of Amatitlan about 45 minutes from Guatemala City. Our morning began with home visits; we set out in three directions from Gonzales Park.  I know the home visits sound kind of weird, but I have been trying to figure out how to help you understand what they are like.  The Guatemalans we visit are generally people known by the ministry.  They are folks, like most folks here, dealing with BIG issues and for the most part, are homes headed by women struggling to keep it all together.  They seem to desperately need to talk about their struggles with people who they consider sisters and brothers. They ask for and we offer God's words and our own words to help give them the strength to carry on.  You should see us scrambling through our Bibles to find just the "right" words.  (The Guatemalans are masters at this; we are works in progress.)  This morning Lonnie thought of a verse that he had discussed in a religion class at school but could not remember its location in the Bible; Jordan recognized what he was describing and found it. Katarina was asking for strength and comfort since the blinding of her father in a shooting; he had been the primary bread winner in a very large 4-generation family.  It was a sober but loving experience for all of us.  An increasingly common theme at visits has been the apparent rise in violent attacks and their impact on families.  Happily, another group had a wonderful experience visitng a family that makes and sells corn flour tortillas over an open fire in their home.  The rest of us listened to blow by blow details on the success of americano attempts to pat out uniformly thick and round tortillas.  These women can hand make 200 tortillas in two hours and sell them hot to make a living.

We never go anywhere without the Guatemalans guiding and looking out for us. They "manage" the visits, but Sarah really found her Spanish voice today, and it enabled her to have conversations during visits with more depth than those of us limited by high school Spanish.  She became the voice for all of us as we worked to understand each family's circumstances.  We are touched by the strength required by these families to survive, blown way by living conditions, and moved when they welcome us as if God himself had brought us directly to their door.   (Yes, I know.)  The Guatemalans in the ministry understand; we are just willing participants in a ritual that is beyond a privlege in which to participate.

We took our PB and J lunch to nearby Lake Amatitlan today.  It is a beautiful setting but may be among the most polluted bodies of water in the world, and that may not be an exaggeration.  It is electric green and leaves scum on the shore that looks like thick green paint.

The afternoon was a rush of music, at least a couple hundred kids and adults, beads, costumes, stories, frisbees, hugs, and prayers.  Kelsey and I had our turn with the children we sponsor and their thoughtful mothers; it was so touching to see how a relatively small amount of money can change a child's education and a family's life...and ours.

Gail continues to enjoy the medical clinic and works with Guatemalans Anna, Ruth, and Julian.  I think they have developed a mutual respect and appreciation for each other.

We are all on a bit of a high today...and it was also cooler which was good for the gringos.  God has been very good to us, and we are grateful.

Blessings and good night,
the 2012 Guatemala Mission Team

Buena Vista

It's 7:00 A.M. and we are off to Buena Vista.  It takes about two and a half hours to get there, but the trip is breath-taking.  At present we are driving along side volcanoes Fuego, Agua, and Pacaya.  The fog that surrounded the base of the volcanoes yesterday now encircles their tops.  These mountains are covered in tropical, green vegetation except the highest ones where only rock emerges beyond the tree line.  We are heading west toward the Pacific Ocean and lower elevations...and of course, heat!  Today will likely be the hottest day by far; and this is the day we step into National Geographic.

Buena Vista is a "village" that is cut from a sugar cane field on the left and a rubber tree finca on the right. There is no running water and no electricity.  The people who live in the most basic/primitive of shanties, are wonderfully friendly, but desperately poor.  We had lots of fun seeing familiar faces and singing and teaching our lessons, playing soccer on the machete-cut field, and working on crafts with large-ish, engaged, appreciative groups.  Our lessons improved today thanks to a bit of editing last night and our many able team members and Guatemalan translators. We also may have gotten to the heart of the problem with our craft with the adults; we discovered today many of them couldn't see well enough to actually string tiny beads on a series of safety pins because of their aging eyes, just like mine,  but unlike me, they had no glasses.  Emily and I were both approached about giving up our glasses, permanently.  I was temporarily dumb-struck; all I could think about was how I could possibly explain "graduated lenses" to these deserving women living in the middle of the rain forest.  It was another lesson in humility.

We were so lucky to have the day in this place with these people. The K-6 school was interesting for Laura and I to visit, but it was also one of the day's true low moments.  It was dark, poorly equipped, in disrepair (that is an understatement), but worst of all it appeared to be completely ineffective. The photo illustrates the best the school had to offer. It is hard to illustrate it in a photo, and it was hard to get our heads around it.

A high point of the day was a meeting between Sarah Alverson on behalf of her cousin Alyssa Voiland and her  sponsored child, Wendy.  Wendy is in eighth grade and must take the bus to school on Sunday for her one day of  studies, but to get to the bus for the hour ride to school, she must walk an hour and a half on a desolate dirt road through sugar cane fields. There are increasing incidents of robbery and worse on that road and her mother tearfully explained how frightening it was to send Wendy off to school each Sunday.  We sat outside her shanty and listened to her share her torment.  It was heart-breaking to appreciate the risk Wendy ran attempting to continue her education and what it might mean for her life if she did not continue.  Another humbling lesson.

I wish I could write more tonight and do a better job of it, but I must admit we are starting to wear out just a bit, or maybe that is just me...  We continue to be healthy and feel blessed to have this opportunity to share our faith with people that daily face more challenges to their faith, than most of us will ever face in a lifetime.  As I mentioned in an earlier blog, I suspect we are the ones who are really being served.

Blessings, thank you, and take care.