This was a pretty uneventful week I suppose. Work has been much less strenuous …in fact, sometimes I think they just make up work for us to do (like sweeping/raking the floor of the greenhouse! What?!). Of course, one reason that I personally didn’t do as much hard labor was because two of the days this week I took care of the little ones Duña and Julieta (18 months old and 4 years old respectively) …daddy for the day, if you will. So far I’ve been the only one of the guys to take baby duty, so I’m pretty proud of myself for that haha. They are quite the characters, these girls, and oh-so-adorable! It was a different role than I was used to, but I definitely enjoyed it! Luckily, I didn’t have to change any diapers, so that’s a relief!
Another bit of Mateo-domestication this week was hand-washing my own laundry! There is a big basin filled with water, and some concrete washboards built right next to it. You wet your clothes down, rub some soap on them, and get to scrubbing! Though I can’t say I exactly enjoyed it, it was at least cool to say I have washed my own laundry by hand. Of course, I’m hoping next time I can convince one of our lovely ladies to do it for me ☺
Also, as you are all aware, Thanksgiving was this Thursday…but since it’s a primarily american holiday, we did not celebrate (in the traditional way at least). To be honest, I think even if we had wanted to, neither our WR teams nor Cicrin could have afforded to splurge on the extra food items, but it worked out fine – I may never again be in Nicaragua on Thanksgiving, so it was one to remember anyway! We contented ourselves with a few hours of work, reading the Bible and praying for our teams and our families back home, and really trying to be thankful…even without the super-delicious turkey, sweet potatoes, and pies! And even though I didn’t eat any coconut cream pie this holiday (my all-time favorite), I DID have some fresh coconut! And when I say fresh, I mean I sat there as Jimmy, an 11-yr old here at Cicrin, chopped open the coconut with a big machete and then cut some of it off for me to eat. Awesome!
This week we also played quite of a bit of baseball with the kiddos here, which was fun and hilarious and strange. I say “strange” because the kids have decided they want to play with only two bases and home plate (no second base, just home-first-third), and the bases are like 130 feet apart instead of 90 feet! There are basically no foul balls unless it goes behind the batter, and the trees, bushes, soccer goal, basketball goal, and walls are all in fair play! Possibly the most fun I’ve ever had playing baseball!
Yesterday we went to the beach again, and it was super fun again! This time though, DJ and I did some exploring! We found a trail that led up along the beach, so we figured, “Well let’s see where this takes us!” – best decision of the day. We followed it for probably an hour as it rose along the cliffs next to the lake, so we had a near-vertical drop next to us. Eventually we got to the very end of the trail, climbed/slid down the seventy or so feet down to the very point of the island, and just sat there in awe of where we were! The waves were crashing, the wind was blowing us over, and there was not another soul in sight! It was an amazing experience to take in with a brother! Unfortunately, since our adventure started right from the lake and beach, I did not have my camera with me, so I have no pictures from it…sad day ☹
On Wednesday we will depart from our wonderful island home here, and we’ll head to debrief with the rest of the L-squad in Jinotepe. Can’t wait to see everyone again! One of the hard things about leaving here though, will be having to say goodbye to all the kiddos here at Cicrin. We have had so much fun and good times with them over the past few weeks, so to say goodbye [probably forever] will not be easy for anybody. We just have to keep reminding ourselves that as long as we love them fully as Christ would do, then the legacy we leave behind will be just that – the love of God the Father.
