Well, here we are at the last night of the week of being here, and it went by very quickly. This morning Paul and Fred went over to work on the library project since we still had some dividers to cut and all the shelves to screw into the shelving frames. The rest of us went to Casa Hogar and played with the kids and visited a few of the families that are now living there (there are 10 families living in the homes and six children in the orphanage buildings).

We left Casa Hogar early so we could go back to Limon and go to more houses to share the gospel while Paul and Fred continued to make progress. In the library.

After lunch we went to a family near the river the church knew of that has a three year old and a one month old baby both suffering from malnutrition. It was a heart-wrenching sight and story. The family is unable to read or write, and so they cannot get steady work, depending on opportunities for manual labor to help provide for food. The grandfather in the house worked all day shoveling dirt and was paid the equivalent of $2, but sometimes there are no labor jobs which means no pay for the day. The church here is bringing them to a house in Casa Hogar soon and giving them steady work. The church is also coming up with ideas to help break the cycle of illiteracy in these poor areas so families can afford to equip the kids with basics (like shoes and supplies) to send them to school.

After that visit, we went back to Limon and shared with more families. Two young women accepted Christ and came to the youth event the church held there. Paul and Fred completed the shelves, and the library was finished with windows, shelves, cabinets…just needs books!

Heading to bed now to get up early tomorrow for about 14 hours of traveling. See you soon!

This is El Fred. We went to Limon this morning and finished some tables and cut the wood for the shelves that will go in the library book stands……. Also got an amazing amount of sawdust in my hair and on my clothes (see Reina for photographic evidence). After early morning work we went to the beach and had lunch. I had fish, it still had a head…….. it still stood no chance against me. I did play in the pacific with everyone else although it looks slightly different than the way I left it in ’98. In the process I replaced that amazing amount of sawdust in my hair with an amazing amount of sand! On the way back from the beach we stopped at a souvenir shop and looked around. I didn’t see anything that appealed to me so I missed out on my negotiating opportunity; maybe next time I’ll get something. Once we got back we ate dinner and saw a slideshow of everything we did thus far (side note – my camera battery died today and I forget my charger…….highly disappointed).

Anne here sharing about what I did today. While Fred was working on the shelves with Tom and Rachel, Paul, Jacob and Edgar (Pastor Gyovanny’s son) on the corner desk, Amanda and Reina went to help with breakfast at the Malnutrition clinic. Cameron got to help with the English class. All the students were very thankful to practice their pronunciation and I helped manage the rest of the team with painting touch ups on the wall until the new shelves were ready to be painted. If on Sunday, you see us have blue nails, it’s a reminder of all the hard work we did. The beach was enjoyed by all but not the fish. Rachel, Cameron and even Marissu, one of our translators opted for chicken and not the yummy fried fish. The evening of dinner and a slideshow was also accompanied by a time of sharing by the team. Some spoke about the joy the kids have. Other about how much the church does in the community. One even is starting to pray if missionary work is in their future. God has not only blessed those in Choluteca through the project of the library, but He also blessed the team with this life changing experience. Can’t wait to see what our last day of work will bring to us.

Hey, this is Paul, Cameron, and Jared. Today we mostly worked on the library, in Limon. We also helped some kids with their English, but that’s getting farther into the day. Let’s start with this morning.

Hi, this is Paulie. (Paulie edit by Becca) Not much interesting stuff happened in the morning. We all got up at about 7. Around 7:45 we went downstairs to have breakfast and talk about our devotionals. Because of the nice people in Casa Hogar, we got some great Honduras coffee to drink. I read 2 Corinthians 8. After breakfast and the meeting we got on the bus and started off to Limon. Cameron will tell you about our time in Limon.

Wassup Evergreeners? It’s Cameron, today we went to Limon and worked on the library walls, mainly painting and repainting them. Before that though, Paul, Jared, Alec, and I went to the English class and helped the teacher teach the students some English. Apparently they don’t like to study English, so we sat down with them and helped them with their English (we were naturals :).  Jared claims that, “I am so good at English that I forgot my Spanish!” All and all, we had a great time in Limon. Now Jared will “enlighten you” about the evening.

Hey it’s Jared here to tell you about the evening. It started with the bus departing from Limon. We left to head to the church for some dinner after working up a huge appetite. We entered the building to find we are eating pizza for dinner! :) After filling up at dinner we went to Wendy’s for some yummy frosties. And now we are back at the hotel for a good night’s sleep (and sweating a ton while writing this). Good night everyone!!

- Paul, Cameron, and Jared

Hola! Me llamo Alejandro! (I’m Alec!). Bonjour! C’est Jacob! (It’s Jacob!). Woops! Wrong language haha. We’re going to start our “day” when we first woke up…around 3ish in the morning, thanks to our previously mentioned native alarm clock: Senor Rooster. We believe this rooster actually runs on East United States time and starts crowing when the sun rises…in D.C. (which happens to be too early here). Anyways, we’ll skip forward to our actual day. The team began with the typical breakfast and devotional time. After our devotional meeting, we left for Limon to work on the library. Early on, we two (Jake and Alec) left with Miss Anne and Levi to pick up more material for the library. While we were out, I bought a machete for $3! (Jacob). Back in Limon, some of the team played with the kids; Mr. Marron, Mr. Millar, and Fred worked on some of the desks/tables; and some other workers smoothed out the edges of the windows with cement. Once we got back to the library, we unloaded our new materials and headed over to the church for lunch.

After lunch we went to Maxi Bodega for some supplies to give to people we were going to evangelize to. Such things include flour, rice, spaghetti, sugar, salt, and…other stuff…I think. We put them all in a nice bag for da people. Then we went back to the hotel for some rest.

Next comes my favorite part: evangelizing! We took the bus to Limon and met with a few of the church members at the Malnutrition Clinic. After splitting up into our four separate teams (I was with Cameron, Miss Rachel, Fred, and Frank, our translator), we all took off in different directions. My group came across four teens (ages 14 and 15) and decided to stop and talk. Unfortunately, being teens, they didn’t seem to pay much attention because as we all know, being a Christian isn’t “cool” (It’s so much more than cool!). As we continued on, though, one of the girls sitting there began to really pay attention. In the end, we got to pray with her for her. We continued on and stopped to talk to another women. She invited us into her house to escape the quickly brewing storm, and we began to discuss salvation. She was a Catholic, and firmly believed in salvation through works. After a long conversation between us all (near the end mostly Frank again), we prayed for her family, and gave her one of the supply bags. Although she didn’t quite accept Christ, I think we were able to give her a lot to think about (Thoughts from Alec).

Alright, now for my story. My group included Becca, Ms. Anne, Edwin (our translator), and an English teacher with some of her observing students from the classes in Limon. First off we only talked to one man in his thirties. He had accepted God into his heart about 3 years ago, but his relationship with him had fallen apart. He also explained to us that he hasn’t been going to church much and the times he does go he doesn’t really listen. We tried to explain to him that it isn’t the good deeds that get you into Heaven; it’s only the acceptance of Jesus’ gift of eternal life and submitting yourself to him. He told us that doing that was a personal matter that he wanted to do on his own and so we ended by praying with him for his life in general. Then before we could talk to anyone else, it started pouring, so we raced to the computer classroom (A.C. yay!). We then proceeded to play solitaire and quizzing the English students on words like nose, arms, teeth, and other body parts. After everyone was done we proceeded to the bus (thoughts from Jacob)

We headed for the church for an excellent dinner of strictly Honduran food. Sooo good!! After dinner we came back to the hotel and had a group meeting. So here we are, writing the blog. Now we’re off to go play nertz. Night Evergreeners!

- Alejandro y Jacob

Hi it’s Amanda. Wow what an extraordinary day. Today the girls were the last ones up. We discussed some bible versus to start the day. I didn’t know what I was in for today. We went to the Malnutrition clinic. Luiz told us about the plans for the clinic and how they choose which children to come the clinic. Needless to say, my heart was ripped to shreds. Literally my tears could of filled a pool. The poverty was unbelievable. We are so blessed in the U.S. Even the poorest of us are better off then the misery here. I met a lady who could only make money by washing clothes because washing clothes was all she knew how to do. If there were no clothes to wash, then there would be no food to eat. I’m forever changed by this experience.

Hello hello! Becca here. I’ll be talking about the same day as Mrs. Amanda but the second half of it. After the Malnutrition Clinic, we headed back to the hotel for a resting period for an hour and then headed straight back out again. But this time our destination was Casa Hogar Vida. I had been there last year, and it was amazing how much progress they had made! They currently have about 30 homes built for those who are unable to ever own a home. They are working on many more. Another orphanage has been built and there are 6 children living there. It is awful to think that each kid has lost their mothers to AIDS but it’s encouraging to know that they have a place to stay where they will be taken care of properly. Besides the orphanage they provide jobs for the locals such as roasting coffee, building bricks, building more homes, and makes crafts (purses, bracelets, earrings, etc). Casa Hogar has also broke ground on a hotel that mission teams will be able to stay in. They say work will be done on it in March so that should be the place we stay next time we come :D (super exciting!). They have many other projects that will open more jobs and make the community even better. The day ended with a trip to maxi bodega (their wal-mart) for some delicious Honduran snacks, a barbeque dinner (which was super good!), and now we are going to watch a movie. It’s been an awesome day!! :D back to working on the library tomorrow.

We made it! The team arrived safely in Tegucigalpa around 10:30a, Central American time. The flights and layovers went very smoothly; other than Anne and Amanda getting stopped to have their luggage searched at security (not a big deal though)! We met our translators, Carlos (or Charlie) and Maryssu, and had a great lunch at Pollo Campero. On our way to Choluteca we stopped for our traditional zoo visit and sang worship songs while Alec strummed along on his guitar. We arrived in Choluteca in the early evening and everyone showered before the church service. Pastor Geovany delivered a great message about how we must share the gospel with those who are lost, because the destiny of a person is not a game: it’s an eternity with or without God. Afterwards, we had a delicious dinner and came back to the hotel for the night. God is working miracles here!

-by Reina