Friday

I'm over a week late in posting this but I don't want to forget!

Friday morning we got up with our normal "ready-to-go" attitudes! We knew we were doing some pretty cool things today! We lazed around at breakfast, took our time in the hammocks and drinking coffee. Around 9, we headed off to a village road that runs through the mission straight into town. It's the road that has the chicken house on it and has quite a few houses that Carlos has had built for various families. These are families that he hand picks for some reason or another from villages and brings them to HOL. He puts the father to work in the fields or warehouse or greenhouses and trains them how to support their families. Anyways, we walked the road all the way to town handing out goodies to all the kids that weren't in school at the time. We had tye died shirts, candy, bubbles, and toys. These kids got some loot! And hugs and smiles.
We got to see the foundation that our guys helped to put in on a new house (that was dedicated this past weekend by the way). They really enjoyed being part of a project that in one week would house a family! On our walk to town, we even got to see Gerber's house! :)

We had some time to kill before lunch and were able to spend an hour playing at the nutrition center. We took a lot of the kids out to the porch and just held and loved on them. There were two boys hanging out in the "yard" and our boys began a game with them and played for almost the entire hour! The kids were great. What a blessing for us and them to spend some time with them.

After a quick lunch on site, we loaded the bus and headed off for two food distributions. The first distribution was at a village where we were the first team to do this distribution! (That's 2 firsts in one week!!) We gave out the bags that the girls had packed earlier in the week. The man in charge of the village began calling out names of the heads of house and the women began coming forward to get their food. It is such an amazing thing to watch this go on. It's pretty hard to describe the emotions that go along with knowing that you helped to pack the food that will feed a family for a month!

(The man on the right is the man in charge in the village)

We then reloaded the bus while the man continued handing out the food, and headed for the dump in Teculutan. There were more people than I have ever seen standing in line when we arrived.


We joined another volunteer group from the city and began feeding another group of people close to 1000. It was another loaves and fishes moment. The team did great keeping the line moving and they got to see what a more organized feeding looks like (compared to Monday's feeding). The people here always look so worn out and are dirty but they are polite and grateful and the kids are so playful and fun to be with. We got to meet with Juana, the grandmother that our team helped and loved on so much last year. We saw some people sorting through the garbage. We saw hope and tears all in the same glance.

We returned to the mission and all rode up the mountain to the orphanage for the last time of the week. The boys played soccer, the girls hugged. There were photos taken (by the team members AND the orphans!). There were songs sung. There was candy eaten and gum chewed. There were gifts given. There were hugs, kisses and tears. We finally detached the team members from the kids and changed for our goodbye dinner party.

The mission threw us a party full of local cuisine, a Cuban band (during which Cody danced with his mom and then Rick stepped in and showed his son how it's done!), a video by the mission and a special presentation by the dancer group from the orphanage. They are super cute and talented. It was so much fun to see them one more time! It was a great night of testimonies, fun and team bonding (as if we hadn't spent enough time together this week! haha).

Thank you so much for all of your thoughts and prayers this week. They were felt all week long. I can't wait to get home and share more stories of our trip with our supporters, families and friends. I think every single one of us has been impacted in a new way this week. God has worked in our hearts and used us to bless His people in Guatemala.

Thursday

Thursday was a busy day! Lots of projects going on around here on site. The team was once again split into girls and guys (by choice of most of the guys, mostly the younger more energetic ones!). The girls went back to the hospital to continue priming/painting. We finished the first coat on the second floor and, when we asked if we should go to the third floor, we were told to go back over it and put the second coat. Okay! You got it! We had a great time yesterday. We weren’t quite as productive as there was a lot more socializing involved, singing, some dancing and just being goofy. Natalie and Brenna were harmonizing while waiting for Giovanni to get more paint. They would also burst into song after hearing certain phrases that would remind them of songs. Angelica was one productive chica! Angel and Angel were a great mix of stories, laughter and productivity. There were serious talks and silly talks. It was a great time!

The boys spent the morning and a few hours after lunch helping the construction crew lay the foundation for a house that will be built next week. They unloaded a truck of concrete blocks. They mixed concrete. They moved the blocks AGAIN. They made rebar. They said that they really did have a good time and it was easier than the rocks! Haha! I think they would say almost anything was easier than the rocks! The guys have bonded really well. The Vernon boys are honorary Trenary boys on this trip. The five of them have bonded and are always together! The bonding is one of the things that I love about being on these trips. You come down here with a group of people that you barely know and leave as a family with memories and inside jokes.

The afternoon WIPED. US. OUT. We brought the entire orphanage to the pool. We had such a great time. It was crazy keeping track of the kids but they had a blast. Aaron describes the pool party as chaotic! Angel A’s observation is that most of them don’t have bathing suits and she found it interesting that they just swim in their clothes. A couple of the girls were swimming in jeans! They love the hot tub, too! They swim and wrestle in it just like it’s a regular pool. A lot of them also got coffee or were eating the creamer. It did get a little crazy right before dinner but we made it to dinner. We had a pizza party for them – Domino’s pizza. We sat them all down, handed out plates and the team members helped pass out pizza, two slices per child. They also handed out cups and poured Pepsi for the kids. Most of the kids were putting ketchup or green hot sauce on their pizza. They LOVE it!! We all ate the pizza (or peanut butter sandwiches) as well and I have to tell you. Most of us thought it tasted just like the Domino’s we know in the States! We had such a great time with all the kids. It was so fun to treat them in a way that they don’t often get.

Today we are doing some food and hot meal distributions and then free time. It will be an emotional and memorable last day. Please continue to pray for good health, especially as we are nearing travel day. No one wants to be sick and travel! Also that we would have chances today to share God’s love through our actions and smiles and words.

Wednesday

Due to the heat from the previous day's work, when you mention "the greenhouses", pretty much our whole team groans inside (a few maybe actually groan...) so when I was told I had to split the team between the greenhouses and painting at the hospital, I knew I was going to get a little "feedback" from the team. They only wanted 4-5 people on the painting so, although I dreaded doing it, it was really just easier to send the girls to paint and boys to the rocks. It was only going to be the morning so I knew the boys could do it because they weren't going back after lunch, which is when it was REALLY bad, and they were going to be outside in an open field so although the sun was out, they weren't in the hotbox covered greenhouse. I told them the plans, boys to rocks, girls to paint and I had the following responses: Graham - "Okay. I just need to change my shoes." Cody - "Any girl want to switch?" Marshall - "I'm feeling a little feminine today." They were troopers and tore through some rocks. And although they were hot, they admitted it was not THAT bad. Not that they want to go back today though... :)

The girls were taken to the hospital. The bottom two-three floors have wallboard in place to create rooms while the top floor is at a standstill until another donor steps forward. We gave some money but not enough to finish an entire floor so the crew is currently working on two houses nearby. We actually painted primer and got a lot accomplished! We got the entire main area painted, the hallway and 3 rooms inside. The only trouble was the high part. We only had one extension pole. We finally started to use ladders near the end of our work time but didn't get to finish the high stuff. When we walked down the ramp to load the bus, there sat 3 more extensions (after they told us there were no more). hahaha Welcome to Guatemala!

At lunch, we were fed the team's favorite meal (ever, says some of the return members). It's a local dish - a HUGE tortilla shell (looks grilled maybe??) and either steak or chicken to put in it and then there's a cabbage mixture and homemade salsa. They also had a mixed veggie dish salad with avocado.

After lunch, we received new jobs. The girls were going to bag food (lentils from USAid with 3 cans of random soups) while the boys were digging the trenches for a foundation for a new house that will be built next week. They definitely had the hard labor jobs! At least there was some shade at this job site. To reward them for doing the hard work, we let them go first in line for dinner and the girls also took over the dish washing. There is a group of men that have been in the dishwashing crew for almost every meal! Rick and Steve are ALWAYS there and have been joined by any combination of Zach, Cody, Sam, Jim, Angel A, Foster and Graham.

Last night's devotions were great with Rick leading us through a great prayer and talking about letting God write our life stories.

Please continue to pray for good health, always seems to be some mild stomach issues... Today we are painting, bringing all the orphans down for a pool party and having a pizza party with them. Praising God for another great day in Guatemala!

Tuesday

I'll be honest. Yesterday was tough. We spent the day picking up rocks and leveling tough ground. It wasn't the work that was tough. In the morning, as the sun rose high in the sky, we were a team on a mission. We were loading bags and buckets and a wheelbarrow with rocks (not dirt clumps!) and created piles outside of the greenhouses. (These are the greenhouses that are going to supply the peppers and other veggies to the Central American Walmart chain.) Sidenote - they took out a loan to build the first four greenhouses from an American business man. He is not charging them interest and they only have to pay him back as they find sponsors for the project. I think that kind of faith is awesome, to KNOW that God is going to provide the money and to go ahead with the project. Some would call it crazy, why go into debt? But for some reason, at this mission, it doesn't seem crazy. It's faith.

Anyways, in the morning, we were good. Working hard. Moving rocks. Leveling dirt. We went to lunch (which was delicious as always). Once we returned to the work site after lunch, it was a little bit of a different story. To quote Aaron, "We took a walk on the sun." It was easily 95 outside and then even hotter in the greenhouses (because they are made to retain the heat afterall). We had to take a break and sit in the shade after (literally) 10 minutes. Some of us were getting dizzy, got headaches, just couldn't get our bodies to move. We couldn't get our core temperatures down (Thanks for the verbage, Graham!). Somehow, I think with a miracle (and mandatory team breaks every 20 minutes or so), we completed the project. I'll be honest, a few of us are struggling with a little bit of stomach unrest this morning and I really believe that it's the heat. It was a tough day.

But, after showers, some pool time, some orphanage time, and ice cream after dinner (!!!), we had a great devotion with Natalie talking about making your whole life an act of worship. Even moving rocks.

Please pray for health today. We are painting the wallboard in the hospital and are excited to be on the site! Thank you so much for your prayers so far. They are felt and appreciated!

Monday

Good morning! (My clock got reset to EST so I'm up an hour too early...) Yesterday was an amazing day and a pretty monumental day for the village of El Modelo and we got to be a part of it! You may remember El Modelo as being the village where we have built a church (Jan 2008) and sponsored 4 homes (Jan 2009). The village continues to grow. Some updates on El Modelo - when our team was here in 2009, they were trying to dig a well very close to the construction site. They went down like 500 feet (might be an exaggeration...) and couldn't find water. They tried in a different location and had success! They have plans to build a pavilion type building to do hot meal/feeding distributions. Yesterday, we participated in the very first ever feeding in El Modelo. We served chicken soup type food with carrots and potatos, rice and tortillas and juice. They each bring their plate/bowl and a cup. If they come without them, we have styrofoam plates and cups to give them so we don't turn anyone away hungry. We also handed out 2 bags of dried lentils to each mother. Each bag should make 50 meals for her family. It was a little chaotic because the villagers didn't understand the line thing. There were people cutting in line all over but let's be honest, if you were hungry, wouldn't you cut in line?? The mission had planned for about 500 children. We fed close to 1000 people yesterday. It was definitely a loaves and fishes kind of moment. We were down to the dregs of the soup and had about 20 people to go. God pulled through! We were so honored and excited to be able to be part of such a big event because we have ties to the village. In fact, we saw two of the boys that we built the houses for and they remembered us!

On the way back to the mission for lunch, we had our own adventure - the bus started making a really strange noise and wouldn't shift gears. Praise the Lord we were out on the highway and not going uphill through Zacapa. The driver was able to pull over to a nice wide clear spot on the side of the road. Yup, the bus broke down. The guys called for another bus that came and got us. While we were waiting, they had coolers of drinks for us and with all the windows open on the bus, it was comfortable. We had a great little adventure. When we finally got back to the mission, there was a large helicopter on the landing strip. There were people from Guatemalan congress here to meet with Carlos.

We also took the tour with Sal, Carlos's brother. I know that I see new things and hear new facts everytime I come. We visited some new greenhouses WAY in the back of the mountain. And today, I believe we are picking rocks out of the dirt in some HUGE greenhouses. They are working with Central American Walmart to be the provider for peppers. A lot of the newbies on the team were amazed at how many different areas the mission does. It IS pretty amazing. Devotions last night was great - Aaron led us through song worship songs and then Angel and Graham led devotions. And there was even a shooting star that crossed through the sky while Graham was reading a Bible verse. It was magical :)

Today we will be working under the hot sun. Prayers for sustainability would be appreciated! Pray we continue to stay healthy and have open hearts.

Sunday

Sunday morning brought a cool breeze and many smiles as we all awoke in Guatemala! With breakfast at 8, we had a leisurly time getting ready for church only to get to breakfast and find out that church started at 10 instead of 930. haha Welcome to Guatemala!! Church was a great experience. Angel A gave her testimony on true joy found only through God. She did a great job!! Angelica helped translate the welcome part of the service. Our whole group got on stage to sing ¨How Great is our God¨ with Sam debuting his guitar skills in public. Xiomara, Christian the pastor´s wife, gave the sermon and she is such a passionate speaker. There wasn´t a translator because she speaks so fast that it would have been hard to translate!

While at breakfast, we were joking about how hungry we would be at lunch after only sitting in the service. Sure enough, stomach were growling and ready for food! They even surprised us with ice cream cones for dessert!

After lunch was free time. Most of our group was anxious to get to the orphanage! Marshall and Foster packed a few soccer balls, which helped start a rousing game. Rick and Graham were goalies - Graham was pummeled! Steve spent the game running and running and running. The kids who play soccer at the orphanage are ruthless. Aaron was also in on the game and all the boys who played were definitely sweaty when they stopped! Zach and Sam made it up to the orphanage a little later ready to take over where the others stopped except they were playing basketball with the soccer balls. Of course, the kids couldn´t let them win so they would hold the bottom of the basketball net so the balls couldn´t get through and they would hit them out the top so the boys couldn´t score any points. The girls of our group went a little more mellow with the activities. Angel A, Angel S, Angelica and Natalie were painting fingernails (and got their own painted as well). Marie, a woman from the western shore who is joining us for the week, spent much of the afternoon handing out candy and hugging on the girls. Brenna spent her afternoon loving on her kids. When she got off the bus, a lot of the orphans started chanting her name. It was cute :)

Showers were taken to rinse off sweat and dinner was inhaled by many of the team. Again, with all the fresh air and orphan playing, we were HUNGRY! We loaded the bus again and off to evening church we went! This time we attended the church in Rosario. The worship band at Rosario is the group of Cubans that play at the parties in the cabana or in town. They are so fun to listen to. Pastor Chris, from the small group from Texas, preached on discipling people not only in other countries but also in our own ¨Jerusalems¨. It was a great reminder that while we are on the missionfield now, we are also called to do the same in our own towns.

Today is an exciting day and a monumental day for the mission and personal for our team. I´m not going to share just yet what will be happening but we are dressed as Team Green and ready to go!! Please pray for safety and continued great health and open hearts today.

We´re HERE!!

Just a short little blog to let everyone know we are at Hope of Life safe and sound. We had quite a long travel day yesterday. We met at the Johnson house at 4am, prayed, loaded luggage, and off we went. We made excellent time to the airport (can´t imagine why, it´s not like we hit a lot of traffic at 5am on a Saturday morning...) and were smoothly checked in by 815. Everyone made it quickly through security (no body scans needed for this group!), boarded the plane and off we went! We had a quick turn around in El Salvador and a very smooth little hop of a flight into Guatemala City, passing the volcanos on the way!

We were pretty much the only people in line at customs so we quickly and smoothly made it through, grabbed our luggage (made simpler thanks to the yellow GROUP tags that labeled them!) and found our HOL staff anxiously waiting outside the doors! We were supposed to have been the last group of the 3 arriving today (we are here with a group of students from Salisbury Univ and a group of 5 from Texas) but we were actually the 2nd group. We were still waiting for the SU group. They were supposed to arrive around 12 but got very delayed in Miami. Melany said that they sat on the plane for almost 2 hours while they were working on a mechanical function - a broken toilet... Then they got off the plane to switch planes and of course had to wait to have it fueled and all the luggage switched over. So they actually landed about 20 minutes after us!

We did a quick stop at Pollo Campero (Guatemalan KFC) and off we went. We didn´t arrive at the mission until almost 8. Had a yummy dinner (that we were pretty much too tired to fully enjoy), got our room assignments and crashed!

Today will bring church and free time on site. I know our team is really excited to go to the orphanage!! Please continue to pray for good health, open hearts and opportunities to share God´s love. More to come...

Godspeed!

Hey Team!
Hope you guys made it down safe. We're praying for you all and will continue to pray that you spread the love of Christ over the next week and that you are all blessed by this experience. Everyone tell Sandra-ita and the rest of the amazing kids I miss them and I’m praying for them! Godspeed - Josh

Looking Back - February 2007

Nothing emotional, just the facts.

In February 2007, 14 missionaries from Soul Discovery loaded a van headed to BWI for an 8 day excursion to Guatemala.

The people involved:
Don Arter
Lonny Arter
Mike Davis Sr.
Evan Davis
Mike Davis Jr
Allison Hackler
Mick Haensler
Ken Johnson
Steven Latham
Nancy Mayonado
Brenna Shevlin
Margaret Swade
Rick Trenary
Lori Trotter

Cost of trip: $1500
Project: Wing (2 rooms) on the orphanage at Hope of Life, $4000
Dates of the trip: Feb 17-24, 2007

In addition to building (and dedicating) the wing at the orphanage, the team also packed and distributed over 500 boxes of food at nearby villages. They were the first team from Hope of Life to participate in a distribution at the landfill in Teculetan (about 30 minutes west of HOL). They also were the first team to distribute food in El Modelo, which would later become the site of future SD/HOL projects.

Reminiscing June 2006

For memory's sake, I would like to begin documenting our past trips. I'm going to start at the beginning with the very first trip, the discovery trip that started the entire process and changed the life of our church.

People involved:
Reid Sterrett
Mary Sterrett
Maddie Sterrett
Steven Latham
Phil Harsin
Steve Adkins
Margaret Swade

Trip cost: $700 per person (basically airfare)
Dates: June __ - __ , 2006

The five day trip was spent touring the mission site, visiting a construction site to see how the process works, attending hot meal distributions, and a boat trip. They returned to Soul Discovery with glowing reports and a strong desire to act immediately. Thus, the January 2007 trip was put into place!