Friday started early for me because I was on breakfast duty. We made pancakes, and when some of the youth asked about chocolate chip pancakes, Raul's mom brought out dark chocolate bars for us to grate into the batter. I had to try them and found that they were delicious! After asking her where she got them, she gave me a pack of them! She is such a giving lady!
Our morning activity was to go to the Shimpis church and check out the trenches that the church people have dug in order to get clean water and electricity to their houses. Our church, Charleston Baptist Church, has been partnering with them to help them with the money for this project. The jewelry business, JOY, has also helped raise money through jewelry sales in order to help with expenses. Once the water and electricity is connected to the houses, the people in the houses will be responsible for the bills.
Before we started on our walk, we hung out at the church for a little while.
Nathan with one of the children that live near the church
Last year the shelter was there, but no concrete was poured.
This is used mainly for children's ministry.
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The view from the shelter
The little boy finding a Gatorade! This is Karla's son.
We gave him the Gatorade and he liked it, even if he didn't smile much!
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Nathan playing catch with a youth from Shimpis
Alexia found a friend.
We had two trenches to look at; the first of which started near the Shimpis church. It went to three houses of people in the church and one other neighbor because it went through their property. The three church members were actually sisters and all involved in JOY.
The trench for the water pipes.
A chicken in the trench!
The first house along the trench path. Florensia and Melissa and their sons. They are believers and very involved and faithful in the Shimpis church. One change they made after becoming involved in the church is that they got married instead of living together. This is a good thing for their family and their two boys! He told us that one reason they want clean water is for the health of their boys. They have been sick a lot due to lack of clean water.
Crossing the stream that contains water contaminated by sewage drain off.
Florensia standing beside the pipe that is cleaner water than the stream, but still not clean. It drains from a stagnant pool of water.
The pool of "clean" water that runs into the pipe.
Florensia showing us a rainwater collection tool for people to get water. It wasn't very clean.
Picking lemons!
Yuka root!
More Yuka root!
An orange tree!
Samanta's house
Plantains!
Samanta and LuRae. Samanta makes jewelry for JOY.
Pastor Domingo is always full of energy...he says he drinks 10 cups of coffee a day!
Samanta showing us the natural beads that she uses when making jewelry.
Buying jewelry from Samanta, Jessica, and Melissa. Three sisters (and there are more) who make jewelry for JOY!
The second trench that leads to other church members' houses.
They all thought it would be a good idea to try the pepper!!
All smiles before eating the pepper....even though Nathan is starting to look a little nervous!
Less smiles and more sweat after they all ate a pepper...the video is even better! They all were glad for the PB crackers I gave them because water was not making the heat go away!
After we left the Shimpis church, we headed back to Macas for lunch and VBS.
The new bird at our host's house that was a gift from their live in house keeper's parents.
At the Macas church, I was able to talk more to Genny, Abigail's mom. Our craft for today was decorating a cross with colored buttons. They kids also had time to make pictures on construction paper. Most made creation pictures. They were very creative; even using cotton balls to make sheep and cats! The crosses turned out nice, however, we underestimated on buttons and didn't have enough for the next two VBS groups!!
A favorite song of the church here! Big and strong is our God!
We had dinner at the church, and a brief time to change, and then back to Shimpis for a youth service. We thought there may be 10 or so youth there, but when we turned into the church, there was a big crowd! Their youth did a choreographed song for us; and we did one too! Ours was named Everything, and I have better pictures of this from the Saturday performance.
Teresa singing! A favorite of our group was to hear and see her sing!
The moon in the jungle!
The Shimpis youth
Allen giving the devotion
Playing some game that I didn't understand, but involved a lot of jumping!
Many of us were hungry after the youth service, so we went to Tiro Loco to eat. I got a hamburger and fries and a Sprite for $5.75. And this is a more expensive restaurant for Macas. It was a good meal!
It was a long, but rewarding day! We did not get to bed at 9, but do get to sleep in in the morning!!
