My team and team Neon have been in Puerto Barrios for a week now so I thought I would tell you a little about what a day looks like for us.
Lets take Friday for example. Friday morning I woke up sweating at 5:30 to a rooster crowing. I could hear the rooster in spite of my hot pink ear plugs because he lives almost right outside my window. He then crows again about every 30 minutes. I thought roosters only crowed once in the morning…apparently I was mistaken. I then climbed over the boys sleeping in the kitchen (the 16 of us share a 3 bedroom 1 bathroom apartment) to start making breakfast for the team. I went to turn the stove and a very small, but very cool looking lizard crawled out and ran away
Friday morning we learned we would be going to the red light district. Our plan was to give flowers and cookies to the prostitues who had probably never had anyone care enough about them to bring them a flower or a cookie. During the day, most of the two teams bought flowers, tied them together, and tied spanish bible verses around them. Since most of you know of my love for making cookies I quickly volunteered to be the cookie maker with Trish. We ran into a slight hickup when we realized the oven where we’re staying doesn’t even open, but came to a solution when we were able to use a toaster oven at our contacts radio station. Now, making cookies in a toaster oven can take a minute or two but it actually worked out for the better because it gave Trish and I more time to hang out and pray for the nights ministry.
We left our house at 5. It was still about 90 degrees with roughly 80% humidity so all 16 of us climbed into our un air conditioned van with no seats and drove to the bars. We spent the first hour or so prayer walking the area. Then we started handing out the flowers and cookies. It was awesome to see how excited many of the women were at recieving such a small gesture. One of the women actually cried when she read the verse about how much God loved her. We also met a 5 year old little boy who was watching his mother be picked up by a uniformed police officer. We got to talk with him for a minute in broken spanish and give him some cookies.
Strangely, after a week this rather non typical life has become somewhat typical. I barely even reacted when the lizard climbed out of the stove and this morning I actually forgot I was sweating. Living with 16 people and one bathroom is only occassionaly a challenge and most of the time I adore having someone around to talk to all the time! I know it’ll never be a lifestyle where I’m ever totally ‘comfortable’ but I think thats the point.
