After I got back and worked for awhile, Shelly and I headed to the market. I had a soccer ball for each of the houses we visited last year and I had no pump! I went to he place I had gotten the other soccer balls and said 'ayuda me'. He was great and pumped them up for me. I also bought one more for Manuel. he's the little boy from next door that we spent so much time with last year. We got a picture of Shelly standing in front of the smoking volcano and then made some PB&Js for lunch! I got the kids at 10:50 and we took a tuk tuk back to the house because Oscar was picking us up at 11 to take us to Escuela Kemna'oj.
Grace's 3rd grade class raised enough money to buy a book for each student at Escuela Kemna''oj. We were able to go and deliver them. The kids are so sweet. They run up and give hugs right away. Last year we delivered rainbow loom bracelets and beanie babies.
Oscar has us start with the upper grades to hand out the books. The kids were so polite and were excited. The 6th and 5th graders were more reserved but by the time we got to 4th, they were giving out hugs freely. There were a couple of kids that are no longer in the schooll, but we told them to just give the extra books to the library.
We gave the books for the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grade classes to the teachers to hand out and I'd ask if we could hand out the books to the 4k kids. I forgot how chaotic kids can be at that age. I swear...some of them barely know their names and add a gringo or two that is slaughtering their names and you just get blank stares. They were so excited though. And holding up the books to show how proud they were of them. And they were comparing and saying 'mismo!' when they had the same. One of the teachers had on the Grace Building necklace that we delivered last week which was nice to see.
We left (we thought) a suitcase of school supplies and then an empty suitcase that just ad the books in it..and one other thing. They asked what it was. I said 'papa cabeza'. Potato heaad. :) Nice for the kids to play with at break. :) My kids all wanted a shirt from the school so we got those and headed out!
It''s a short drive from the school to the house we built last year. This was the house that my mom, Brittney, Sherry, Jen, Jesi and Vicki built. Mom opened the door full of smiles. I think that you can't just come to build. ou need to come the following year to visit. I gave them the banana bread and the soccer ball. They ran into their house right away and got the picture from last year. They have a beautiful porch in front of the home that they have created and the inside of the house looks great. It's so nice to see how well they are taking care of it. They just stood around and smiled! Then, I opened the suitcase to give them their gifts....and it was GLUE STICKS! I somehow screwed up the suitcases. Go figure. It's amazing I haven't done more of that. So we hopped back in the car with dad and went to the school. The school got all the glue sticks and dad got the suitcase with gifts for his family. Oscar was telling us that the dad has been unable to find work as a mason so he's been unemployed. I am sure they appreciated the gifts. I also left them some Q for food.
I love driving around town. There's something about the Mayan culture that is fascinating...and men walking with sticks on their backs and machetes. The women in their traditional trajes at the local washing station. It's beautiful. When we drove by the school, a little girl ran behind the truck holding her book up to show us. So cute. And as we passed a corner with two little girls they hollered 'Hola Oscar!' He has done amazing things for this town.
We finally reached our house from last year. So excited to be there again. Aura answered the door and got Reina. I gave them all a big hug and introduced them to my family. Their house and yard look beautiful. Instead of rocks and bricks they have geraniums and fuschia plants. I saw a Haley's Comet bag from last year, the shoes we left Fernando and all of the Bindle Babies! They had our photo and plaque on the wall. I wanted to spend the day. I gave Reina her bed and all of the kids their cinchsacks with their gifts in them. Marlon was so excited to go through his. he couldn't stop pulling things out and grinning. Claudia is so big and she looks just like Marlon did last year. Reina said the kids were upset because they thought I was going to come when they were in school and they would miss it. They thought I wouldn't show up at all.
We looked at their stove we bought. The house they were living in has turned into a kitchen. She said the stove is so nice to have. She said it's better for her and better for the kids to not have all of the smoke. She told Oscar that last year she got sick from the smoke but we gave her medicine.
Oscar told us that sometimes they visit families who are not taking care of their things....but it was good to see that our family obviously was taking very good care of their things. I was also able to give them the Children's Bible in Spanish we had purchased. She was excited about that. Lots of tears. Again. Amazing the bond you form in one week of spending every day with a family even though you can't communicate. I told her that I'd come back. Hopefully it isn't next year. I'm having a bit of a problem staying away from Guatemala....
We said some hard good byes and hopped back into the truck to come home. The kids were back in school by 2:30. Ethan was trying to convince us to let them stay home but no such luck.
We all walked to pick up the kids at around 4:30. Jake, Grace, Lily and I came home through the market and picked up a couple of movies to watch. Scott, Shelly, Tim and Ethan hit the Bodegona to look for ramen noodles. Ethan is crazy. Jake told me that he had a conversation with his teacher today. He's been waiting for that. He told me that all he wanted to do was be able to have a conversation in Spanish. And when I asked the kids if they were ready to go, Lily said 'no se'. Which means she didn't understand, but they are using their Spanish.
Mayda showed us how to make Guacamole tonight. It was amazing. She said the secret is mixing up the lime and onion and then adding Guacamole and a little bit of salt. A quarter of an onion, half a lime, 7 avocadoes. She did add another half life when she was done. It was amazing. As always. We had fish for dinner and were all stuffed.
We had about 10 chidren's books in Spanish that were left after we visited the school. We gave them to Mayda for her grandchildren. I also gave her the book Grace by Max Lucado. Patty had left one of those in Spanish. She was excited. Said she was going home to read it last night.
Tomorrow we head to Tecpan to visit the boy that Scott and Shelly sponsor through Compassion International!
No comments:
Post a Comment