Penultimate week... :-(

Hola Allabodies...

Sorry its been a little while since my last update. Its been an amazingly full week so i will try to tell you about it without forgetting anything...

Last Wednesday was the usual day of school in the morning and kids club in the afternoon. At the school we carried on our sequence of incredible dramas on the story of David (that instalment was where David realises Saul wants to kill him), excellently portrayed by Guy (although his version of David was slightly less modest than i would imagine he actually was... those of you who know Guy will know what i mean!). At kids club we did the story of Noah's Ark. In the evening we had an amazing team prayer session. It started of as elephant prayers (where everyone puts their hand on the person to their left and everyone prays at the same time) and then we just carried on and were praying for eachother for ages! It was incredibly powerful and we relly felt that God did some work that night! Wednesday was also Matt's birthday so we celebrated that in the evening by having bacon for dinner! It was a really great day and Matt enjoyed it loads.

Building site is going so well. Last Thursday we dug holes in the concrete 1 foot down as the foundation for the roof! On my first attempt at digging a hole i got a bit over enthusiastic and dug down 2 feet which then had to be filled in! We dug 9 of these holes around the place and cemented the long wooden supports in place. Once these were in place securely, we cut notches in the top of them with a power cutter and secured horizontal planks in place. Over the rest of Thursday and Friday we put in place the entire framework for the roof - lots of planks going forward to backwards and side to side, just as you would imagine, and hammering them all in place. Both these days were absolutely exausting and i came home caked in sawdust mixed with sweat (delightful i know...)

On Thursday, instead of walking home the usual route, we took a detour that involved going across the river on stepping stones. Going even more off the beaten track really exposed us to even more of the poverty that people live in. There is one little guy called Flavio who is 10 who is always on the building site with us (he doesn't go to school). When we walked towards the river (he was on Guys shoulders) he pointed out his house to us which was a very small wooden contraption that was very precariously hanging over the edge of a pretty steep cliff. There is another kid who goes to the school we work at who we have nicknamed 'The Gouger' because he always comes up behind us and grabs our eyes like he is gouging them out. When we walked further towards the river he came running up to us very excited and gave us all big hugs (and gouges). It was just really sad but eye opening to see people living in these conditions and it made me even more pleased with the work that we are doing, to help the kids even in th esmall way we are.

On Friday Pastor Victor insisted on bringing us a dinner of Honduran style enchiladas which were amazing. Just another example of the overwhelming generosity that people here have and show without blinking.

For quite a while we have been looking for a way to bless some of the people here who (as i just said above) have blessed us in so many ways. On Saturday we managed to organise and pull of a fantastic meal of Cottage Pie with Apple Crumble and Summer Berry Crumble. It was a fantastic day and we cooked for 36 people without burning a thing! Mainly due to Claire's brilliant planning and cooking. The guys again did out rendition of the barber shop quartet 'Wade in the Water' which everyone enjoyed. In the evening we prayed for all the other step teams (so if your reading in Chile, Brazil, Peru or Argentina then we are praying for you guys aswell!!)

Monday was another tough day on site. Because all the wood was in place, it was time to hammer in the metal sheets that would cover the roof. It was such hard work getting the nails through a sheet of metal and actually into the wood without missing it (because you cant see where the wood is through the metal you have to kinda guess a little bit) The first nail was close to impossible and took so long, but by about the 20th it got a lot easier. Pastor Reny again put as all to shame by hammering them in in about 9 strokes. By the end of Monday we had almost all of the roof up. Some of the last sheets to go up required nails to go through 3 sheets of metal which again was very difficult. We went home on Monday again as a sweatball so the cold showers were again much appreciated.

Tuesday i was on domestic with Guy which was good fun. Wednesday (yesterday) we went to the school for the last time! We did a really good drama of David in the cave cutting Saul's clothes, and of Saul eventually not wanting to kill David anymore. It was great fun and we made it into a pantomine style thingy. It was really hard leaving the school because i really enjoyed all the work we did there and believe it did make a difference to the kids. They were all so sweet and kept on giving us hugs and hugs and more hugs before we could actually leave. I think that we will be remembered at that school (maybe not for a long time..) but i think the kids will definately miss us so we will continue to pray for Maya as she continues with the lessons, and for the kids.

We went to kids club in the afternoon and did another action packed drama of Daniel and the Lions Den. It was really good fun and the kids enjoyed Luke and Matt being Lions as I (King Darius) threw Heulwen (Daniel) into the den. We had a photo with all the kids which i hope will turn out really nice and will be a great memory. Lol we had a hilarious moment when we found out that Ferse (who i mentioned in the last blog) is actually a boy not a girl. HE is still a very cute kid though.

Kossy is now sitting next to me badgering me to get off the computer because she needs to use it so instead of telling you the rest of the incredible stuff that has happened, im going to get off and leave the computer to her.

Kossy: - You can all thank me later for cutting this insanely long blog short!

Quick Prayer points:
-Helen, our team translator/mother, is really quite unwell with very bad head pains. She is seeing a doctor today so please pray that there is nothing seriously wrong and that she can recover very quickly.
-As we only have 4 more days on the building site (we leave Tegucigalpa on the 4th May) please pray that we will be able to finish the work we came to do as it would be awful if couldn't get it done.

Thank you guys for all the prayers and please continue.

Loads of love,

Joel

Holy Week!

It has been a bit of a strange past week. Last week was Holy Week so we were not at the school on Tuesday or Wednesday because it was shut, and we weren´t on the building site on Thursday or Friday either. Nevertheless it has been quite a packed full on week.

Tuesday was a relaxing day. We were all a bit shattered after the holiday and all the travelling so we spent the day going to the internet cafe and playing football with some of the locals.

Wednesday was Faye´s birthday. We spent the morning planning a drama for the kids club in the afternoon and relaxing some more. OIn the afternoon we went to the kids club which was awesome. I spent an hour blowing bubbles with the younger ones and it was hilarious. There was one girl called Fersé who had an incredible laugh and cracked up everytime she blew bubbles in my face (which she did quite alot!). In the evening we had a piñata for Faye which was great fun. Although spinning around a blindfolded essex girl with a large pole was quite scary but good fun!

Thursday we were takento a leisure centre called Parque Centrale. We spent the day playing basketball/football/touch rugby all mixed in with large amounts of swimming in a relatively cold pool which was amazingly refreshing. We spent ages waiting for lunch but it was good when it came. Thats about all we did there - got really sweaty playing sports before going into the pool to cool off. When we got home we had another immense game of monopoly. Heulwen and I (Team Joelwen) were so intent on ruining Guy and Katy´s chances of winning that we unwittingly gave the game to Faye and Matt but it was stiull great fun. We all get pretty competitive when monopoly comes out but we are very good at leaving it all on the board after the game so its all ok! Thursday was also Kossy´s birthday so in the evening we had cake and the guys sang a bar-bar shop quartet of ´Wade in the water´ because that was one of Kossy´s birthday wishes. She had a great day in all.

On Friday (Good Friday) we went to the city centre at 3pm to see processions that went through the streets. On Thursday people had spent the day making incredible drawings and designs on the ground using coloured sawdust. The processiong then came out of the catholic church in the city centre. There were quite a few floats, some with angels carrying things that Jesus said while on the cross, some with saints, a big one with Mary and then a couple of quite graphic ones with Jesus on the cross. The procession went through the streets over the sawdust drawings. It was an amazing bit of Honduran culture that im really glad we were able to experience.

Some of the artwork on the street.

Saturday was a fantastic day. We were picked up at 11am and drove for about an hour to the Primer Battalion De Communicaciones for a Colonel´s birthday (in case you have forgotten, Don Galo is a Colonel in the army and it´s his house we are staying in, hence all the army connections..). We arrived there and helped set up the room by blowing up`balloons etc... Luke and I went for a wonder in the woodland around the place, just looking at some of the fantastic views when a huge eagle flew over and started flying around us. We think it was probably checking us out for size but eventually lost interest and left. Was pretty awesome though. We went back and had an awesome lunch, BBQ chicken and some frijoles in BBQ sauce. Friholes are starting to grow on me which is good because they have them with pretty much every meal (including breakfast!). After lunch they took us to a shooting range! Those who wanted to could fire 9mm pistols and an M60 submachine gun. The force in just the 9mm was amazing, everytime i fired it jerked my hand up so far, and the noise was horrendous! We were all covering our ears as much as possible. Then i had a go on the M60. It was absolutely immense - just standing on the big concrete platform when others fired it I could feel my whole body vibrate. We used it on semi (1 shot at a time) but it was great fun. When those who wanted to had had a go, Guyy and I asked if we could have a go on automatic. They let us fire 5 bullets each on automatic. The power of it was amazing. By the end of the 5 shot burst my gun had raised so much it was ridiculous. It was hard to see if we were actually hitting the targets or njot because they were paper. Don Galo then showed us all up. Hector ties a balloon at the very end of the range which was about 30m away. Don Galo then popped the balloon with 1 shot. It was an incredible experience and made us all think alot about how horrific it must be in an actual war situation. At about 6 we climed a hill to watch the sunset (yes more sunset pictures...)It was absolutely awesome. The pictures didn´t do it any justice and it´s impossible to sum it up in words. It was absolutely breathtaking. Majestic... Awe inspiring.. its just so hard to sum it up! We sat there and admires the wonders of creation, praising God. We sat there until it got dark and went down to join the others. Back down the hill, another Colonel shared his testimony with us about how God is moving among the army which was really cool and gave us a sort of preach which was really nice. We then had fresh watermelon while looking up at the stars!

The inspirational sunset.

On Sunday, we went to Church as usual. They don´t really make a big thing about Easter here, most of the congregation were away but it was still a really good service. Pastor Victor was preaching from the bit of scripture about Jesus rising from the dead, but the message wasn´t necessarilly what i expected from a talk on Easter but it was still really good and the worship as ever was fantastic. Even though it is just from a CD and its in Spanish, its still amazing. After Church we went to yet another Army base (I think that makes it 4 army bases we have now been to!) where there was a swimming pool We spent the afternoon chilling, playing some ultimate frizbee, swimming and reading by the pool. It was a really good day and in the evening we had a really good prayer session as a team.

Yesterday Kossy and I were on domestic and we made an easter egg hunt for the team! I had brought out quite a few cream eggs and mini eggs and some fairtrade chocolate for Faye and Guy (who has now said that after giving up chocolate for lent - he is now only going to eat fairtrade chocolate). It was great fun and we all had a laugh.


The team is getting on really well. People are still getting to know eachother i guess but we now all know eachother pretty well after living together for over a month now! Its really exciting to see the work that God is doing in all of us so keep praying that it all continues. Pray that we all have patience with eachother, we haven´t had any arguments yet so im keen for that to continue!


Also, as you may know, Tegucigalpa is not the safest city in the world so please also pray for our safety at all times. Work on the site is also getting a little dangerous (working on the roof now) so also pray for that.


I dont really have any more time so will update more sometime soon.


Lots of love


Joel

Beach Holiday!

Friday morning we were picked up by Sarah (Honduran lady who works with a mission out here and goes to the same Church who was organising our trip) and Mario (our driver for the weekend) and set out on a 6 hour cosch journey to San Pedro which is on the North Coast of Honduras. When we arrived on Friday afternoon we met Don Hector (the husband of our host) who had sorted out accomodation for us. Don Hector happens to be a Colonel in the army so we were staying in army barracks on an army base! It was a really beautiful place, accomodation was basic but that was to be expected... They had filled our fridge with a few bottles of coke and had some buscuits and coffee for us which was really sweet. We had a quick bite to eat and drink with the Colonel and then went to Puerto Cortez Navy base which was about an hours drive away. One of the big wigs in the Navy came to meet us and gave us a quick tour of the base and of a ship aswell. It was great fun looking around the place and then we went to the Navy Base´s private beach and had a swim in the Carribean sea. It was amazingly warm just relaxing in the water but was still refreshing compared to the heat outside (the North coast is much hotter than Tegucigalpa which is in the south of the country). We watched the sunset in the water after taking some amazing pictures of it from the land.

Sunset from Puerto Cortez

Me and Heulwen in the sunset from the ship

When we got out it was dark (obviously because we watched the sun set...) and we went to get some Baleadas for dinner (tortillas with frihollis, chorizo sausage, sour cream and salsa) which are really tasty. That night was swealteringly hot so sleeping wasnt pleasant át all but I managed to get some eventually.


Saturday we spent all day at the beach. We were picked up in the morning and drove for about 2 hours to get to a nice beach. The initial reaction was a bit dissapointing. All the sand had huts built over it because no one ever sits out in the sun, and there was really loud music playing. We walked along the beach for a little while until we found a spot which had a little biut of sun with some tables and chairs and some sand, with no music. Needless to say we were in the sea in a matter of seconds, lounging about and chilling in the sun. We swam along the beach a little bit and when we went around a very lttle rocky headland, we found a gorgeous little deserted sandy beach/cove. I went up and sunbathed on that a bit and then we sat in the breakers letting them push us up and down the beach. The disaster struck.. One particularly big breaker rolled over me and ripped m,y glasses off my face. I panicked and told everyone who was with me in the cove. We all stood in the shallows (about 7 of us) looking through the water with our hands for a couple of minutes, and praying, but none of us could find anything. I gave them up for lost (i have a spare pair) so we all stopped looking. I walked back to the others and just at a whim, reached down, put my hands in the sea, and my glasses were right there, where i had put my hand in! It was an absolute miracle! Thank God! Lesson learnt though - remember to bring my lenses whenever i swim...


Ever since we arrive here, Guy and I have been trying to buy some cowboy hats which everyone wears and are incredibly cool. We saw some in the market ages ago but they weren´t very good. A guy was walking down the beach on saturday and we saw that he had some, checked them out and bought a couple of good ones. We managed to knock the price down from 120 lempiras to 70 lempiras which i was pretty proud of. They are amazing!

Hats!

Sillouetted Hats

We went back to where everyone else was sitting on the beach and had lunch. Cue begginning of rant about food... I had a ham sandwich which was very nice but quite small. When Guy´s full English breakfast came out I was quite jealous. He was still hungry aswell afterwards so we went back to get more food. He got a BLT and I got the full english. Thing is we both fancied the pancakes aswell so we shared some of them aswell :-) So for lunch we both had 2.5 meals each but it was so worth it...

We chilled out on the beach and in the sea for the rest of the day until sunset where we all took ridiculously large amounts of picures, before heading out to a mall to grab some dinner. Most of us, myself included, were too tempted by the Subway so had some subs and then the most amazing fresh fruit smoothies.. We then went home, had a group prayer session, and then went to our much needed beds. That was until Katy found a huge cockroach in her bed. For the next 10 minutes Luke and I tried to capture this suprisingly elusive monster while Guy played intense music on the guitar and Katy and Heulwen stood their letting out sporadic screams. Eventually we managed to trap the beast and i took it outside and with a bit of cricket bat action made sure that it didnt bother us anymore.

Sunset from the beach

Katy

Sunday morning at breakfast the colonel gave us all presents. He said that they have a tradition of giving gifts to anyone who stays there. They had got some Honduran army uniform T-shifts made up with our names on which are insanely cool!! We went to Donya Blanca´s sisters house for lunch and we set up`a party because Sunday was Blancas birthday! It was great fun, with lots of balloons, singing, sweets and presents. We also celebrated the birthday of 4 of our team members who have birthdays in April. After that we went to a beach and played some frizbee (which im getting pretty good at) and just relaxed before going home. That evening we had the most epic game opf monopoly. We played for about 4 and half hours until 1.30am which was so much fun - there are plenty more games to come im sure! I didnt win this time but only because i wanted it to be a good game (i could have won easily but wont bore you with the details)...


Monday we went out for breakfast and smoothies and then chilled out at the army base for a few hours before heading back to the barracks to pack and take the 6 hour coach journey back home.

Me and Claire


I have just tried to upload some pictures onto facebook but the internet is rubbish today so will do it another time. I just realised that you can upload pics onto this blog so have done that and will probs do it more in the future.


Thank you so much for all your messages, please keep praying for us that we stay safe and healthy.

The Team. Back: Guy, Matt, Pastor René
Me, Heulwen, Helen, Hector (Blanca´s Son)
Rachel, Blanca, Claire, Sarah
Anna (Hectors fianceé), Pamela (Blancas daughter), Faye, Kossy
Luke








Joel

Wedding bells...

Alan (aka superman) who helps us out on the building site got married last Friday to a woman called Mayra, and they invited us all (10 of us!!) to his reception in the evening after the wedding. It was so nice of him to invite us and it was quite a small thing which made it even more special. He sang her a song which was ridiculously cheesy but pretty awesome at the same time. Everyone had a good time though and it was a great night!

On Sunday we went to Pastor René´s sisters house for lunch. Pastor René is one of the Pastors of the Rocka Fuerte Church (the one we go to) and he is with us most of the time. He works with us on the building site and he walks us to and from the school on tuesdays and wednesdays (because its too dangerous for us to walk alone) and he leads the kids club on wednesdays. He is an absolute legend, so kind, understanding, patient and generous. On Sunday i was looking at his tie and said that it was nice so he took it off and gave it to me! Everyone here is so generous with everything that they have it is just amazing. Anyway, we went to his sister´s and her husbands house for lunch after Church which was amazing. The usual ridiculously large quantities of food and Rafael (the husband) has it in his head that i eat a huge amount (which i am very happy about) so he kept on giving me more and more food. It was awesome!

Katy Dennis, our 11th member of the team arrived late last night. Her sister got married last saturday so she waited until after that to come her but she arrived safely and everyone is very pleased that she is now here with us. Me and Guy had an interesting tiome trying to tie up some balloons to the light bulb in the ceiling, but the ceiling was quite high so it involved standing on chairs with brooms in our hands trying to wrap the string around the light bulb... It was a complete failure and ended up with Guy flat on his back (fortunately there was a mattress on the floor next to him!)

Site is going really well aswell, we have almost finished concreting the floor of the kids club. Next we are going to be replacing the roof which is in a bad state at the moment. When we finish that our next project will be to put a second story onto the Sunday school classrooms attached to the Church.

This weekend (Friday-Monday) wer are going up to the beach on the North coast!! The guys here arranged that for us and we are so looking forward to it. Will be amazing im sure. I wont be able to get on the internet for a little while probably because i will be far too busy sunbathing, swimming and gettiong an amazing tan. After that though it will be back to work. I might be able to get back on the internet some time next week so will let you know how it goes then!