Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Nuevo Oriental




With Mike back in the country we've been trying to get everything lined up for our upcoming Malone mission team. The team arrives on the 12th and will spend a week serving the people of Honduras. Among other thing the team will be building two houses while they are here. Since we needed to secure house sites and paperwork for two houses we headed out to my favorite village... Nuevo Oriental. I've posted before about my two little boys ...Christian and Jorge. Both live in Oriental so I couldn't wait to get out there to visit them. I was more than ready to squeeze them tight. 

As we pulled into the village it was so nice to see familiar faces come towards the car calling out my name. It still seems crazy to me that with as little time as I get to spend in that village that they are able to remember my name...and get excited about me being there. None the less it touches my heart in deep ways. 

We spent the day helping in the feeding center, visiting families we know, and checking out house sites of families that need help. It is always biter sweet because even though you are helping you are never able to do it all. There are always people you have to turn away or say no to. I had countless people come up to me asking me to build them a house, buy them food, or help their children. I longed to have a never ending bank account that would allow me to bless their socks off! 

Best of all I got to spend the entire day hand in hand with little Jorge. (Christian was gone for the day) Jorge walked me around the village....helping me up and down the mountains. There were honestly times when he balanced me and kept me from falling or when he got behind me and pushed me up a slope. He picked me flowers, took me to visit his sweet momma, and hugged the stuffin out of me. It was great just to be near him. 

His family consists of his mom, dad, and 7 brothers and sisters (Isabel, Katie, Santo, Kalie, Kevin, and two older ones I've never met) They live in one of the first Torch houses ever built. It is starting to bow and fall apart... and is a one room structure for 10 people. Yet they are some of the best and kindest people I've ever met. They are dirt poor but full of laughter and love. The dad works his butt off to keep food on the table and clothes on their sweet selves. Every time I've been out there Jorge's feet have been bloody and bruised from walking around the mountain barefoot. They can't afford shoes and they certain can't afford to send them to school. I'm working to raise enough funding to send at least Jorge...and hopefully a couple of his brothers or sisters to school this coming February. If you would like to donate toward their education I would greatly appreciate it. 

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