El Sembrador

Hello from Catacamas where we are visiting the (residential) farm school at El Sembrador. This is another WGM ministry that has been around since 1954 and we wanted to check it out. We came here Wed-- it took about 3 hours and Nate and I rode in the back of a pickup truck the whole way. It is interesting for us to see a very well established and successful ministry like this where underprivileged young men can come for schooling (high school) and learn a trade. Pastor Jorge Pinto (who founded Proyecto Manuelito) was a student at El Sembrador. We have visited the various vocational areas (woodworking, welding, mechanics), toured the 2000 acres of farm...very mountainous and jungle-like. Lemons the size of softballs, termite nests in trees, monkeys in the wild, Ellen held a newborn pig. We also had a chance to visit with 3 boys who were formerly at Manuelito who are now students at El Sembrador (Juan, David, and Alexander).

We return to Manuelito this afternoon and will have supper back at Manuelito. It will be nice to get "home" and see the kids again. Although we have NOT missed the Manuelito roosters crowing at all hours of the night!! And day!!

Everyone remains healthy and we REALLY appreciate your prayers for continued good health and good interactions with the kids and local people we work with on a daily basis.

Our Spanish is getting better -- we have tutoring Mon-Fri for 1-2 hours provided by a local pastor (female) -- we may have already mentioned that...not sure.

the picture we took yesterday in the jungle.

P.S. Nate's hair is now very short ---- he got a Honduran haircut last night. It takes FOREVER to upload pictures so we will try later.

Update from Talanga

hi everyone this is Ellen. It is Sunday afternoon after lunch. We went to church this morning at a small church in a gentleman's back yard. 25 of us, yes 25 of us got in a mini van to go to church and back. No policia to stop us down here!! It was, of course, all in spanish, so it was a bit difficult to stay focused, but it is always great to worship with others no matter what the langauge is. Everyone is very welcoming to us at the Project and at the church. We are a bit of a novelty in town, so we don't go to town by ourselves. Right now, the 5 of us are all at the Internet Cafe and one of the older boys at the Project, Ricardo, walked to town with us. About a 15 minute walk.
Everything is going fine and we are all healthy. It is so difficult to even explain where we are living and what we do everyday. So far during the day I have done everything from sew little girl dresses to laundry to cooking to playing with kids to fixing the swingset. Our days begin VERY early and I have school with the 3 Miller kids from 7 to 9 on the porch of the dormitory. Most of the kids re at school in town during that time so we can sort of concentrate. Each day is different depending on what needs to be done and who needs help etc.
The kids are just as cute, fun, and naughty as I remember them being from previous trips. There are 18 at the Project in Talanga and they range from 5 to 18 years. Most are under 12 tho. OK I am going to hand off to someone else to write for awhile. They are all looking over my shoulder. One more thing before I go. Our 3 kids have been doing great. They are interacting well with the Manuelito kids, are learning Spanish quickly and generally being terrific sports about all of this. Charlie and I doubt that we would have done as well at their ages with all of this. Thanks for the prayers. We can feel them even way down here!!

Charles here...random thoughts

. cow poop
. chicken poop
. roosters and dogs from midnight to the morning
. bad smells.
. good food
. good health
. talanga..picture an old west movie with clint eastwood in old mexico...that is talanga today!
. today we will move from sharing a house and bathroom and with clarita and luiz and will have a room and bathroom to ourselves.


yo it's alex...
the spanish here is way different than at school, but still....I am doing alright as translator for my family... It's hot here...we are sunburnt...I turned off the light last night to go to sleep and ten seconds later I had a spider on my face...but hey. we are having fun! We all love the kids and they seem to like us pretty well too. Adios amigos!

hi its Chase now everything is good here... its really hot but fun. I macheted grass the other day it was hard. I miss you guys a lot but hey see you in a few weeks. Learning spanish is pretty hard but we all learn fast. The kids are really fun... sometimes misbehave but still are good. Some punishments down here are digging stumps and shoveling cow poop fun huh. i will write next
week


nate here.
well.
really warm here.
im roasted and sunburnt like no other.
have played alot of soccer so far in the trip.
walk moslty everywhere here.
well.
be on next week.

Quick Update

Hey there! This will be a very short update. I am sending this on a PC via cell phone at the Proyecto. We are all healthy and well fed. No accidents or anything bad! There are some issues (housing for instance) that we are dealing with. Weather has been great. I am up every day at 5am to get the boys of the Proyecto ready for breakfast and school. Now Ellen is up at 5:30am to get breakfast ready for the US work team because the cook is sick. LONG days! All in all we are having a great time. Hope you are all well too. More later as time permits. Continue to keep us in your prayers.

Adios and Gracias.

EWM saying hello

Thought I would write a quick note today too before we leave for Talanga. It seems like we have been gone for a long time already, but it has only been 2 days. Yesterday was Charlie's birthday. As part of the Chruch service where we worshipped, they always introduce guests. All 5 of us had to go up front--Charlie spoke in English and Pastor Jorge translated. Then each of the kids had to say their names and ages. Then Jorge kept Charles up front and had the whole congregation sing Happy Birthday. He was surprised to say the least!
All is well, and we feel assured that we are in the right place, doing just what we are supposed to be doing. One thing that is so cool for me this trip is that we are all together, experiencing the same things, meeting the same people. Always before, I have done these trips to Honduras by myself (not by myself, but not with my family). I can already tell that this will be such a neat bonding time for the 5 of us---with memories galore to share for lots of years to come.
Thanks for all you have done and are doing for us--we feel the love and prayers even this far away from home! By the way---the weather is beautiful---about 78 and sunny!! We will talk again when we can. EWM

Last Update for a while?

Charles here ---- Early Monday morning in Teguc. Everyone else is asleep and I am doing a quick load of laundry. Around 11:30am we head to the airport to pick up an arriving "work team" from the States. We will then all head directly out to Talanga. I am excited to get out there and get started. I imagine our kids are a little apprehensive not knowing what to expect. The work team will also be staying at Proyecto Manuelito all week.

Staying in the "guest house" these last few days has been a good transition period for our kids. They are slowly being introduced to the Honduran culture. The guest house is sort of like a way-station for various missionaries of World Gospel Mission who may be coming or going. I have attached a picture of the outside. All buildings are fortified like this with gates, razor wire, etc. There is the main house (pictured) which has a living room area, kitchen, office, several guest rooms and a small apartment for the couple that is the host...or runs the whole house. There is another large building in the back that is more like a dorm - this is where we are staying. There are different sleeping rooms and shared baths in the hallway. We all eat together as a large group.

Just as a note - being the "guest house host" is something that Ellen and I have talked about doing at some point once the kids are gone. We could conceivably come here for...say 3-6 months and provide that service. Anyway...

I laughed out loud yesterday in church (as we were trying to sing in spanish) because I looked at our kids trying to sing and thought to myself "these are pretty good kids to be such good sports about this whole thing!" I don't know what I would have thought if this had happened to me at that age. The whole process so far has been fairly "Americanized" because we have been hanging out w' american missionaries, eating american food, having internet access, etc. They have not really seen much poverty yet, etc. The real adventure begins today! Now we will really be living in the country-side as the real hondurans do. Although we will still be around American work teams, etc.

I will actually be driving a pickup truck out to Talanga while our missionary friend (Jeremy) drives a school bus with the work team on it. I have driven in Honduras before but not through the mountains! Should be fun. The boys have seen people cutting grass with Machetes and they are excited to try that out! We will try to keep all fingers and toes intact.

Please continue to pray for health and safety for all of us. That is one of our main concerns. We are all doing really well so far. Now we go live with a Honduran couple in a small house with a shared bathroom though....getting a little cozier now :) .

We were able to go to a "Sam's Club" (aka PriceSmart) yesterday and get some snacks for us for Talanga. We also got some skim milk - unrefigerated, in boxes. This way we can refrigerate a box or two as needed and not waste valuable refrig space.

Well...that about does it for now. Thanks for thinking of us...don't forget us...and keep praying. We will update as we can.

Buenos Dias

Sunday 2:15pm...

We went to church this morning (all in Spanish) and got introduced to the congregation. We also saw the "transition house" at Manuelito. There are kids there as young as 15 months...eventually these kids will go to Talanga with the older kids.

We had lunch and then went to a place like Sam's Club to load on on some snacks for our room(s) at Talanga. Not sure what we are doing the rest of the day.

Tomorrow (Monday) we meet a work team from the U.S. and we all head out to Talanga to being our adventure. That''s when the real fun begins! So far we have not been "roughing it" at all.....but tomorrow we start!

Not sure when I will update next....so keep us in your prayers as we travel tomorrow and meet the kids out there and begin our 6 weeks of service.

Thanks!!!!!!!!!

Safe Arrival

It is now 7:15 PM in Tegucigalpa and we have just finished supper. All of our travels today were uneventful and we arrived safely and on time. We think we will be at this guest house in Teguc until Monday afternoon when we will head out to Talanga.

Thanks again to all those who have helped us prepare for this trip. We are very excited to be here and to begin our mission work.

We hope to be able to update this over the next few days.

Adios for now

Well...we leave for the airport at 3:45am tonight/tomorrow morning. I thought you might enjoy this comic while we are travelling to Honduras! I think it is important to laugh out loud once in a while!!!

We need to finish packing and picking up the house tonight. I am afraid it won't be as picked up as we would like for our house-sitter...but it will just have to do :)

We are obviously as ready as we are ever going to be. By this time tomorrow we should be in Tegucigalpa.

Talk to you soon.

It's almost funny...

You know, the issues we have been dealing with in the last week or so (mostly health) took another interesting turn last night. I don't tell you this to make you feel sorry for us or for you to worry....but....

Chase was a the Emergency Room last night from 1-3am! Can you even believe it?? He woke up at 1am crying with a horrible earache. Being the strong husband that I am I told Ellen I would stay home and protect the house while she took Chase to the E.R. :)

Turns out he had a bad earache and he has pills and ear drops!

Les than 48 hours to stay healthy and get on that plane! Yee-ha!

Oh yah.....Molly has some weird cough and is on antibiotics. I don't think she has been on any meds for more than 5 years....but now it happens THIS WEEK!!!!

Later.

Latest Update!

So, since we last chatted here is what has transpired:

* Alex got into a car accident and sustained whiplash injuries. She is feeling better. She is very quick to point out that the accident was NOT her fault. She was in the car by herself and got rear-ended and she then crashed into the car in front of her. The interesting part of the story is that the driver of the car that hit her was arrested on the spot and taken to jail for no license and a prior conviction. The car that Alex hit left the scene of the accident before police could arrive. Hmmmmm. Very interesting.
* Ellen and Nate got violently ill Monday night and were up ALL night getting sick. I got my exercise going from bathroom to bathroom consoling, them and doing other things with bodily fluids that are too gross to mention here. As of Wednesday they are on the mend but still feeling weak and yucky.
* Ellen has had a couple crowns done
* Alex had some unexplainable kidney pain that has subsided

We continue to prepare to leave...but we lost some time here due to sickness. We will get it all packed up and leave on time --- just pray that the rest of us don't catch the "bug" that Ellen and Nate got!!

Needless to say, we are very excited to get on the plane and get to Honduras!! Keep us in your prayers! We hope you are all doing well.

Adios.

Sunday - February 10th

Here is a great video about the Manuelito Project:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fwALlFyv3Y

This is Ellen--it is my turn to write something for a change! While we are gone, we will try to let each of the kids write periodically (uncensored) so you will get a chance to hear their perspectives about what is happening and how they are doing. Also--many of you have asked how you can send us messages. Probably the best way is to leave us comments right here on this blog. At the bottom of each note that we write is a place you can click to write a comment....so when we are able to get online, we will be able to hear from you.

A million things to do this week before the big departure for the airport at 4AM on Saturday morning. We have had some challenges during the last week too--challenging times at work for Charlie and me, a fender bender for Alex (she is fine except for a sore neck), abdominal pain that required a CT scan (Alex again--she is fine), a bad cough for Chase--I have heard others talk about how evil tries to create doubt when you are on a path to do the Lord's work. I believe that this may be the first time we have ever been the target!! So--I ask for your prayers--that our faith and resolve remain strong and that any doubt that tries to sneak in will be replaced with peace and certainty.

More soon!! EWM

More Prep

Okay...we leave in a little less than a week. By this time next Saturday we will be in Houston waiting for our next flight -- to Tegucigalpa!

We are feverishly preparing all the final details of this adventure. We start our malaria medicine today and some of us are still taking Typhoid pills! The dog has been to the vet, the newspapers are scheduled to be held until our return, we need to get Molly (the dog) over to visit the house where she will be staying, we need to get Krista over to our house to show her the ropes since she will be living at our house during our absence, we need to pack, we are waiting on a few more deliveries to arrive so we can take more stuff with us, etc, etc, etc.

Jeremy (who works with Project Manuelito as a full time volunteer in Honduras) was in town this past week so we had dinner with him so the kids could ask all their questions. It was a nice time and the kids enjoyed learningmore about where they would be staying and what a typical day is like in Talanga. Jeremy has now returned to Honduras and is scheduled to pick us up at the airport on 2/16.

Things seem hectic and crazy. We will be glad when we are on the plane and on our way. Hopefully then we can take a deep breath and focus on God's plan for us in Honduras. We know He is with us in all this prep work too....but boy is it wild right now!!

ALSO - thanks to your generous donations we are taking hardware to make the computer lab in Talanga a wireless network. Also we have the "learn english" software for the kids.

More later.