My team and I are working in the slums, pronounced watchyoupita (and I don’t actually know how spell the real name!)…people here live in little houses made of anything they can find…this land floods every 2 years and everything is destroyed…the land is actually deemed unsafe because of health reasons…everyone here is sick with parasites, worms, and many other diseases…the people swim, go to the bathroom, and shower in the same water stream which is so dirty and filled with trash…the culture here its acceptable to throw trash anywhere you want to…we are digging canals, doing VBS, trash pick up, meeting the peoples needs, and home visits (did one today LOVED it!)…home visits you just walk by and say hola and then start a conversation and they usually invite you in to their small home…our team walks a total of 2 hours per day to reach this small community in the slums and we work 6 hours a day…we have to shower twice a day because of how unsanitary it is there and we don’t want to get the rest of the people in the house (47 people) sick…
THE CRAZY THING:
My team is required to take two showers per day, clean under our nails, wear pants when doing canal work, bring our own water in to drink, and use hand sanitizer ALL the time, never touch our ears, eyes, or mouth the whole day until we seriously wash our hands, we are told not to let the kids play with our hair because we will get lice, and all of our clothes have been ban from entering the house we share with 47 people because they are too dirty and people might get sick…….now that you have the picture of the things we are required to do to at least try and not get parasites or worms (but we very well still could, people have) and you think of the people in this community you can understand why everyone is sick…..
IT MAKES YOUR HEART STOP:
…while walking with a little girl down the streets, wearing her only shirt and no shoes on her feet, glass everywhere and trash covering the streets, she turns to me and says, “Will you pray for me? My name is Alehandra.” Of all the things 5 year old girls ask for in America, of all the things this little child who has nothing it seems, she asks for PRAYER…. I asked her is she believed in Jesus and she smiled a big smile and said yes and closed her eyes to pray….
…the people here will warm your heart, yes there is brokenness and their surroundings are awful when all you know is living in the US, but many of them have a spirit to them that draws you to them….they invite you into their homes when you speak to them and as you enter their home they run around the one room “house” searching for something for you to sit on…a man today said please stop by my house everyday and pray for me, you were my blessing today, anything I have is yours I will help you in any way that I can….this mans son was helped my AIM (the organization I am with) with his eyes, he was going blind….
….the children pour out from their homes to find you and as soon as you enter the community, you go over this very small bridge, they run to you with smiles on their faces and hug you and hold your hand, and for a moment all seems right in the world…
….the children here want to be a part of anything and everything we are doing…you cant even stop them if you wanted to, they want to pick up the trash, they want to move the rocks and pull up weeds ( we were trying to clear a place for VBS that would be safe with no glass, trash, and where the kids could play)…they will use their only shirt to collect rocks in to help you gather them….they work hard and the whole time with us…and they LOVE it…they want to belong, the think we are role models and want to do as we do…
FUNNY THINGS:
…goats and dogs and cows walk around the community like they own the place and they make me laugh every single day…the kids here play this awesome game where they take an old tire no one is using and then take a stick and hook on half a milk jug they found and then use it to run through the streets pushing it with the stick and milk jug contraption!
JUST BEING REAL:
This is hard…emotionally its hard…physically I am more tired then I have ever been in my whole life…and some days on the budget we are on you are hungry…its crazy trying to cook a meal on a tiny little stove with 47 other people…I cant believe it hasn’t even been two weeks and I cant believe that I have over ten months to go…I feel like I have been gone forever!
PS:
I miss all of you and am SO incredibly blessed to have you in my life and encouraging me the way that you do…also I will try to make the blogs shorter but ya’ll know me and I write how I talk which is usually a LOT!!! Hahha I LOOOVE YOU ALLLL!!!! and i wil try to post pictures soon but you guys know me and i am not good with computers and i am still learning! where is melissa when i need her computer help lol!
