Each day, week, and month is different while on this crazy adventure called the World Race. For those back home, I thought I’d share with you what my first day of ministry in Nicaragua looked like earlier this month. At the end, I've included some other photos.
Ministry Day 1 – Nicaragua Style
6am – Wake up and run
I ran with a new friend, Amy, who is a young gal in her early 20s and is living on the property I’m staying at this month. She and 11 others are here on a four month missions trip through the same organization, Adventures in Missions. Whereas I’m on the World Race which is an 11 month journey, she’s part of the 4 month group called Passport. They have been here three months and have another month to go. In total, there are 25 of us in our 20s and 30s who will be doing ministry together. A young couple from Idaho, Dan and Kathleen, are here in Nicaragua for six months working for Vision Nicaragua. Vision Nicaragua is the organization we are working with this month. Check out: http://visionnicaragua.org. They are a "non-profit, multi-denominational Christian organization, whose purpose is to make known and serve the spiritual, physical and financial needs of the people of Nicaragua."
7am – Breakfast
Fried egg, peanut butter on pineapple (pineapple versus a piece of white bread was my chosen vessel for the peanut butter), and coffee! I made my own coffee using my new coffee sock (a one dollar investment I purchased in Honduras last month).
8am – Depart for our ministry site
Our main method of travel this month is in the flatbed of a large diesel truck. Between 1-3 times a week this month we will be working at an orphanage located about 45 minutes away. There are currently 18 kids who stay there. The orphanage was founded in 1998. The orphanage just moved to a new 100 acre+ property and they are hoping to expand their facilities to hold 36 kiddos. The orphanage is trying to operate as green as possible, which I find very exciting. They get a lot of their food from their organic garden. They also compost and use cow manure to generate methane. This is my kind of place! Go green!
9am – Manual Labor
We split up into multiple groups. I donned the machete (having had practice in the corn fields in El Salvador two months ago!) and worked on pruning the dead leaves off the banana/plantain trees. Definitely a first! These trees are beautiful. They compost the dead leaves. And instead of using pesticides, they bring in other critters to eradicate the pests. For example, to remove the rats they brought in a boa; thank goodness, not while I was here.
12pm – Lunch
I devoured my PB&J sandwich and lemonade that we brought with us. The workers at the orphanage blessed us with organic greens from the garden. The best salad I’ve had in two months. Simple pleasures!
1pm – More work
We planted green bean seeds and corn seeds, while other groups painted.
4pm – Wind down
Gather mangoes from the field across the street from the orphanage.
6pm – Dinner back at the property.
Tortillas, potatoes with meat (appears to be a common Central American meal as we had it last month in Honduras), and rice. This year I’m taking a break from being a vegetarian/Alaskatarian.
8pm – Team time
Debrief the day and team bonding
9pm – Quiet time and bed time (er, for me, hammock time!)
Bienvenidos to the Vision Nicaragua property, our home this month! This is the view from the guard tower at the front of the property. The volcano behind us is San Cristobal, the highest volcano in Nicaragua. It's 5725 feet. Smoke is constantly coming off of it and occasionally I've seen lava on the side of it. It's one of five volcanoes in the chain nearby.
Note the lava and smoke from the bottom left-hand corner of the volcano.
Another missions group here greeted us warmly. We found notes of encouragement on our bunk beds when we first arrived.
This is my bug-free hammock. I'd rather sleep outside, under the stars and in the "cool" breeze than in the bunk room. Right before we arrived, a snake was discovered in the top corner of the girl's bunk room. Another girl had been stung twice by scorpions before we arrived. There are a lot of interesting bugs here. Thank God for my screened hammock!
Our main mode of transport this month: in the flatbed of a diesel truck.
This is the orphanage we are working at this month. Apparently the orphanage has received a fair amount of funding. They have a lot of projects they would like to get accomplished, however they don't have enough manual labor to get the job done. That's where we come in! This also reminds me of the following verse in the Bible, Matthew 9:37: Then Jesus said to his disciples, "The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few." This is a reminder that financial support to the poor is important, but sending out people to help is important as well.
These are the gorgeous looking banana trees I pruned with my machete. They weren't ripe yet. The dead and diseased leaves go to the compost pile.
The orphanage wanted to install a sports court; I'm pretty sure it's for basketball. They had this rectangular area that needed to be filled with dirt and gravel. For you engineer folks back home, they dumped big rocks in the area too so they wouldn't have to use as much fill material. Sometimes we moved the same pile of dirt five times to get it to the center of the court area. We used only shovels; don't be fooled by the piece of machinery in the background. Here are some 'before' and 'during' photos.
We also installed a swingset at the orphanage. To dig the holes for the poles, we used a steel rod and jammed it down into the ground so we could break into the volcanic rock. It was tough work. We dug down a foot or two.
These are the amazing organic greens they served us at the orphanage from the garden. Purple beans, lettuce, tomatoes, and herbs. So delicious!
This is one of the bunk rooms at the orphanage. I found it was so sweet to see the girls' little dresses hanging in the closets. It also broke my heart to see only a few dresses hanging in fairly empty closets.
That's it folks for now. Thanks so much for your continuing prayers and love. I wish I could be back home for my friends and family for various reasons, but I also know this is exactly where God wants me to be at the moment. My next blog will be about the local people here in Chinandenga, some of the communities we've visited and some of the unbelievable hardships they are facing.
Love Love Love… Dios te bendiga.
