La Chimbomba

Oh my goodness I don't know where to start. Tonight was a great night. I took a picture with Marlon wanting to share his story with you and really expecting to be low on pics today. Then we went to La Chimbomba and took lots and I had a really hard time picking. So we'll start with Marlon. Marlon here has been coming since the beginning. He's precious. I think he told me he was 22 but I could be wrong there. Marlon is blind, he can only see things that are very very close but he doesn't let that stop him. He travels around everywhere by himself, always with a huge grin on his face. Tonight he showed up and said, "Hey Momma (that's what most of them call me anymore) who've you got with you tonight." It was just me and the boys but he made sure he said hi to everyone, including everyone that had come to eat. Marlon is such a joy to be around and I always leave his side with a smile.

At La Chimbomba Darwin pulled out the camera and it was a HUGE hit. All the girls love to flirt with my boys and ask them when they're going to run away with them. It cracks us all up. So Darwin with a camera was a HUGE source of flirting and showing off. We got there early tonight so Lucy and I sat down with everyone while they ate and just shared some time talking and deepening our friendships. You'll notice in this picture some cardboard on the ground. Each night one of the guys brings a bunch of cardboard from whereever he could scrounge it up, and that is their bed. Most of them sleep right there on that corner.

I love this picture. They are such a family to each other. There are a few of them that are a lot more mentally gone than the rest and then there is baby Leticia running around but they all look out for each other. They have found love and acceptance in a very unlikely place.

A few days ago I talked about Maria Leticia and her mom, whose name is Maria Elena, who live on the street. Leticia is 1 1/2 and absolutely adorable. She comes running up giggling every time we pull up. I cannot imagine raising my baby on the streets. Elena seems so tired. I can't imagine how emotionally draining it must be to feel like you can't give your baby a future. I am continually praying for ways to reach out to these two in particular and all of my friends living on the streets of Honduras.

Oh and I almost forgot. We saw Wender tonight!!! I was so happy to see him. He is the daddy of the first baby I knew to be born at the stadium and also the first of the kids to start calling me Mama. Marlen, the baby, is doing well and living with Wender's mother, a very typical arrangement here. He seemed to be doing well despite a huge hole in the side of his face where a tooth had abcessed and rotted through his cheek. It sounds horribly painful but he let Darwin clean it out and showed us his antibiotics so there's not much else we can do. We hadn't seen him since returning from the states so it was a great relief to see his smiling face again.

P.S. I'm posting extra pics from tonight, and a few of Lucy, on facebook.