Volunteer Blog 30/7/12
by Simon and Kathryn Lang
We had a lay-in today (yeah) but before breakfast we put together all our remaining money and decided how to distribute it. In the end $320 went to the Silva family for their electric supply, $500 to went Manuelito and $300 to AFE.
Breakfast was thin and crispy bacon and eggy-bread or French toast if you are from the US. We gave fun thank you presents to our wonderful hosts Don and Joy for looking after us so well this week.
After breakfast we all piled into the bus and headed for the Linda Miller community just beyond the Dump and the AFE project. Here we were to attend the church which Jonny is pastor of. In spite of a slow ride in we arrived early for church and when the service was due to start we were almost the only people in the building. But as the first choruses struck up a bus arrived and our friends from the dump poured in and rushed towards us with more hugs and smiles. The congregation is made up of people who live on the community and people who live on and around the dump. The music was very lively and we tried to sing along to the best of our ability. It was a communion service much the same as you might experience in other churches except that those taking communion all stand together at the front of the church. The sermon, ably delivered by Jonny was the last in a series about dangerous Christians. It was translated in to English by Rey the America business administrator for AFE.
After church we gave three sacks of clothes and toys to someone to take to the Manuelito home and the money for the Silva family and AFE to Jonny who was very grateful. Then the bus that had collected people from the area left with some of the dump kids so there were many emotional final farewells. It was not easy to see the bus disappear around the corner. As we turned towards our bus we found it had been taken over by the rest of the kids and some parents. We all piled in, cramming every inch of the bus, handed out teddy bears to the children and headed off. As we travelled towards the capital for the last time we sang to our passengers and dropped them off along the way close to their homes.
After a quick sandwich lunch back at the mission home we set out in two vehicles to visit the Transition home about 15minutes drive away. On route we stopped to buy ice cream for the boys, arriving at the home in time to eat the ice cream before it completely melted and catch the last minutes of the Honduras vs. Spain Olympic football match. Honduras won 1-0 which pastor Pinto said paid them back for the Conquistadors!
We had a fantastic tour of the home including a moving testimony from a boy called Santos who had been living on the streets by begging and stealing to survive. Inevitably he got in trouble with the police but was rescued and brought to the transition home. Once the children have learned how work well here they are able to transfer to Manuelito. They showed us how they had been renovating part of the home themselves.
We were treated to some amazing dance routines from the kids. They learn dance for therapy but have also performed at a charity event, for which they received diplomas. They are really talented and try as we might none of our team could match their standards when we tried. They learn a lot of their routines from the internet but had their laptop stolen so it was great to be able to give them a replacement which we had brought from Switzerland. We had a lot of fun dancing, playing football and chatting with the kids. Finally we gave the Manuelito money to the directors Mauricio and Helga as well as another computer for the teachers at Manuelito. As a parting surprise the children were given 500 Lempiras to buy wool for making bracelets which they sell to get a little pocket money.
In the evening the whole team went out for a Chinese meal that was filled with laughter and joy. We returned to the Mission House for a last team meeting in which Duncan encouraged us not to forget all that we have seen and experienced in this amazing trip and to think about what we should do about it in the future.
This is not an end but a beginning and it is all going really well.
NOTE FROM DUNC: The team leave Honduras in the morning and they have been such a blessing here. I will miss them and Matt will make sure they all arrive back in the UK as promised while I head onwards to Guatemala.
The children rushed over to greet us, and Matt hugged several of the children that he already knew. Tom immediately started to play football with the boys and a few of the girls came over to give us a hug. Then we all congregated in the dining room, and the children introduced themselves to us. Then we all stood up together and said ‘hello’. Two games were quickly organised which were Unihoc and tag rugby which they seemed to enjoy, Sally tried to explain the Unihoc rules in Spanish and asked the children what they called the hockey stick, and they didn’t know as they’d never seen one before. Tom entertained some of the children with some card tricks and they were amazed!
Afterwards myself and Becca distributed handmade cards our class at school had made for them which they loved. We also gave them some punch balloons and whistles to play with. We were all sad to leave Manuelito after such a short visit, but none the less we were all very pleased that we were able to go at all. Clearly the children and us felt it was quality time spent with them.
Then we set of to the Valley of Angles, to do the tourist bit and to shop. First of all we had lunch at a local bar and had a typical meal of pupusas (corn tortillas with cheese and meat inside) served with a kind of coleslaw and curry flavoured onions which seemed to go down well. After that we went shopping. Most of the boys are now proud owners of various sizes of knives and machetes, whereas the girls now own some lovely jewellery and bags. We visited the many shops although many sold the same items.
After about an hour of dilly-dallying we got invited in to the school canteen to start watching the presentations for Native American day. Each year group stood up and said a poem (in Spanish-so we had no idea what they were saying) all dressed up in their outfits for each part of Honduras! This then proceeded on to become a dance by the high school which was four pairs in native American dress of boys and girls! They then decided to invite all us English to try the various fruits and vegetables of Honduras, these included such things as coconut fudge, plantain chips, honey and some sort of fruit (including flies), some potato thing and then a various array of different egg and rice kinda drinks. We then had the traditional food for where we were staying which was tortillas with bean egg and rice! Omnom. All presented on an ethnic banana leaf! They then sung songs of Honduran styles and traditions with a few dance moves!
After the many tears had dried we continued to play the children's favourite games as we felt we wanted to end the time we had spent with the kids happily instead of in sadness. This unfortunately involved us in having to run and scramble for rugby tags and hockey puts but was worthwhile, leaving us and the children with many happy memories.
Up again at six, thanks to Dunc’s morning bash on the door. Luckily for Matt and Simon, in his room, he’d been up since 4:15, making sure that everything was well aligned and ready for the day ahead. We’ve tried telling him it might be OCD… he calls it preparation. He was, as you can imagine, so happy that the plans had changed, again. He was going to leave us at lunch to meet Jonny to discuss future plans, leaving the rest of us to run the show. Scary thought. Having survived another on-edge journey to AFE, thanks to Carlos, we started with some “adventure solutions”, which are a fun version of the activities commonly seen on teambuilding weekends. A barrel full of sweets had to be ‘rescued’ from a circle of ‘lava’ using only some ropes, and parachute games followed. While this was happening outside, Matt, Simon and Steve ran a variety of fun games in the dining room, ensuring that laughter (and occasionally screams)[good screams, not bad screams] could be heard out on the field.
Then we had a lunch of meat, which came in a tough slab- which was difficult as they only had forks. It was, however, delicious with the rice, tortillas and veg. Then Dunc left us, alone, to run the afternoon activities of crafts and sports. Helping on the crafts, I think I must have made around 300 badges, and after a while my arms were aching! A boy, Angel, had come down from the dump, and we invited him to join in. He told us that he had worked all day on the dump, but had not earned anything. Dunc believed that any money he had made had been spent on solvents- to numb the pain, not an uncommon practise among street and dump children.
We then went to the school and set up the activities. They were electric maze, pipe challenge and socca-bopper ( this was a sock within another sock in it and you stand in a circle, close your eyes and someone gives you a sock and when the person who gives you the sock says go, you hit the person to your left all the way around the circle).
had built a house for. They were incredibly welcoming, and even though the mother was feeling ill and they have a struggle for money, they still decided to talk to us on how they are. They are having some trouble with the electrics, were they are being charged way too much. It made me feel terrible seeing the family struggling for money, and yet have to go without food to pay the bills.
