Overnight in Copan

Hola Amigos. I'm here in Copan, an amazing ancient Mayan city in western Honduras. If you ever come to Honduras, stop here. I stayed at an old hotel where Jane and I have stayed before, Los 'Gemelos, the twins. The owner Mafalda, is like your grandma. She keeps a garden in the center courtyard. I ate this morning at " Llama de los Bosques" run by another grandma, it's plain she likes you because she feeds you so well. I'm going to walk over to the ruins. It's like a big park, you can imagine the crowds of mayans gathered around the ball court their faces painted, waving flags, cheering and chanting fight songs. I hope to post some pictures after I get a little technical assistance. Later today I will hop on a bus for Antigua, Guatemala and a reunion with Jane. Dios les bendiga! God bless you! Gilberto.

Last Week. Tegucigalpa

Hola Amigos, I've been staying at my friends, The McCalls, the past week. We're setting up to live in the house next door. It needs the electricity hooked up but otherwise it'll be a good base for us. Close to our friends and not far from the children's home where Jane and I will be working. It's out in the country, a tranquil setting. This last week I visited the children's home, the schools, and the neighborhoods where we'll be and talked to staff and a group of women about a series of health talks I'm preparing. They gave me some good suggestions. I did a health talk at the school on how to keep from spreading disease, what microbes are, and good handwashing. I even got to do a devotional for the Honduran staff. I talked about the psalms, how they are personal conversations with God and we took some time to write our own psalms. Here's one I wrote. " Thankyou God. You refresh me like a cool breeze. Like a drink of water you revive me. I can go on through the desert. Through dry land, I keep walking. Till I come to you. You are my green pasture." Please pray as we get started on our work and build new friendships. Yes, and safety on the road. I'm headed for Guatemala by bus on Monday to rejoin Jane for a couple of weeks. Til later. Gilberto.

a week in Nuevo Amanecer

Hi all. It's been pretty busy. This is my 4th time to the village. It's beginning to feel a little bit like home. each time there have been new faces and sadly some of those we knew before have aren't around any more. We hope that our being there provides some encouragement and continuity to those who have kept at it. We hope too that we are doing something to help the new people integrate into the community. One thing I've learned, farming is hard work,and building a community is even harder. I really like the new staff, the director Joel, the agronomist Saul, and the social worker Sandra. In an effort to connect with folks, we took pictures of all the families and made them into a photo mural which for a while will be posted in the community building. Later they can take them home. Some in our team worked with the kids, helping each one make a little booklet with their own stories and illustrated with their own drawings. We put their photos on the covers. By the end we had the names photos and artwork of almost everyone. that will help as we continue to pray for Nuevo Amanecer throughout the year.We participated in a lot of farming jobs all week long. Starting out with planting plantain the first day. We got into every facet of plantain cultivation, from pruning (the call it surgery), to harvesting, setting up new seedlings (corms),and learned a lot about pests and marketing the fruit too. The farmers have really developed the farm a lot. They built two reservoirs and a drip irrigation system. We worked in the communal garden fertilizing cabbage. We got to do other things too. One morning we went to the little town down the road and visted the school where most of our kids go. There are 2 teachers teaching 70 kids, 3 grades in each class. They're well organized into small groups with each child responsible for certain tasks including discipline, which they rotate every week. Not many books in the library so we're thinking that would be a good project that would help the larger community. They provide lunch for the children which makes a big difference in such a poor area. I had an opportunity to do my Dengue fever talk ( one farmer was recovering from the fever). Friday we cooked up lunch for the village - rice and beans and hotdogs with everything.Then there was cake. It was hard to say goodbye, some of us blinking back tears. I think I'll be able to come back a couple of times since I'll be only 3hours away in Tegucigalpa until September. I saw the former director of AGROS Honduras, Norma .She invited me to stop by when I'm back in town. Norma is working at the nearby Evangelical Hospital training Health Promoters. One of them, Gloria lives in our village . She was looking to put together a first aide kit for the neighborhood. We decided to leave our team kit with her. The next day was another hard one for me since I had to say goodbye to my homeward bound teammates. I'm so glad for e-mail.I'm feeling pretty comfortable in Spanish and more at home in Honduras. I'm missing Jane a lot. She's in Antigua, Guatemala studying with her old prof/tutor about 8 hours a day. I hope to join her and celebrate Easter there later. I'm off to Tegucigalpa where I'll be looking at where we'll be living and working at LAMB's Children's Home.I hope to keep writing like this. please give me some e-mail encouragement and suggestions and questions. Thanks. Gil.

Honduras Bound

I'll be heading off for Honduras tomorrow. Big changes. I wrapped things up at work ( couldn't get a LOA for 6 months so I left my job, I'll check back though when I get back to see if they missed me). We found some friends, Steve and Laura Lympus and their little boy Theo who will be renting our house while we're gone. Still looking for a renter for our place near Port Townsend. I'm trying to pack and move a lot of our stuff out of the way ( to basement and obscure storage areas). If I missed saying goodbye to you, please accept this as me waving to you from the plane. I am going to miss you... I will be with the AGROS team from our church, Bethany Presbyterian. There are 9 of us who will be helping our Honduran farmer friends in Nuevo Amanecer, a small community near Siguatepeque who are working for their own land. We'll likely be helping with construction since a number of new families are joining the 13 who are already there. After the team returns to the US, I will go up to Tegucigalpa where Jane and I will be helping LAMB, a local Honduran ministry to families and kids in that city. Jane will be doing counseling and I will be working in health education. Gotta get back to work. Til later. Gil