Sorry I didn’t update this sooner! I didn’t find out our ministry until the night before it started. Our ministry is pretty cool. We are ministering with a local pastor in a small mountain village that´s close to the Haitian border. It´s so beautiful there. The day before yesterday we went door to door and talked to the people Yesterday, we went around with the local pastor and prayed for the sick in the community. It was awesome, I really loved it. There was Felix, who is developmentally delayed, because a pot of water fell on his head when he was 3. He´s 33 now, about a 5-7 year old developmentally. And Raphael, who was in a car accident 2.5 years ago and injured his knees. He can´t walk now. He uses a muscle cream like Icy Hot, and thinks that because his legs feel better, they are healing. He doesn’t understand that he has to move and stretch his legs to combat atrophy. What´s so sad, is that if there were medical care like we have in the US, both of these men would be ok. Their problems were fixable when they happened, but are now irreversible (except for a miracle from God, of course).
Today for ministry we did a children’s service. We had it planned, and thought it would last 2 hours, but after 1 hour 15 minutes, we ran out of material. Oops!! They seemed to have fun though. We acted out the story of baby Moses, and talked about how God protects all of His children. Here’s a funny story about that – 2 people on my team know spanish, so they translated the story. In Spain and Mexico, the word “guapo” means “handsome.” So they used that word to describe baby Moses. Later, we find out that in the Dominican, it means “angry.” So we told the children that the king wanted to kill Moses because he was an angry
baby, and so his mom put him in the river. Like, watch out, if you get mad, your mom will chuck you in the river!! haha. But God will protect you.
We drive about 30 minutes to the town, and it´s a beautiful drive. We all pile into the back of a small pick up truck, which is gonna suck when it rains. The church (iglesia) in the town used to be a bar, and the pastor has a full time job in San Juan as a mechanic. He has 7 children, and him and his wife use all their extra time and money to run this church in the mountains. It´s completely amazing. Yesterday, we had lunch in the mountains, in the woods, next to a river.
I am starting to get homesick. I miss my family. and I miss fast food. haha. I know we haven´t been gone long, but still. Our house has 4 bedrooms and 46 people, and I find myself more homesick, the less privacy I have. Seth and I sleep on the balcony in a tent. It´s a small balcony. I don’t so much miss the creature comforts (I don’t miss hot water at all), just the freedom, to eat what I want, go where I want, sleep where I want… It’s a learning experience. We ate really well for the first week, lots of home cooked traditional food from the lady whose compound we were renting. But now, we’re low on money, so it’s lots of rice and beans. Last night was mac and cheese with hot dogs. Not as good as in the states. But super cheap. PB and J a lot too. The same kind of thing Sherry, my neice, likes to eat. 🙂
We have had some fresh mangoes. The village kids found out that we like fruit, so they bring us fruit from the trees in their yards. Mangoes, pears, cherries, naranja (I think is the name), etc. Our pastor just gave us 7 mangoes from his tree. We are going to boil them with brown sugar tomorrow to make mango syrup for some french toast. Also cheap, but much tastier.
It is soooo hot today. I have tons of bug bites. No sickness on our team yet, thank God!! Our team leader has had some tummy problems, but hopefully it’s just the hot dogs from last night. He doesn’t like hot dogs. I’m known as the paranoid one. I think by the end of the month, that will translate to “healthy one.” lol! I wash my hands constantly, and try not to eat random fruit without thoroughly washing it. That’s harder than it sounds with a limited water supply.
This has rambled a bit, sorry. I’m pretty sleepy – been getting to bed pretty late recently. I will have pictures soon. I have the bandwidth, but I haven’t been taking any pictures. I will post some this weekend! Thanks for keeping up with us!
