And Then There Was Light!..Well... Sort Of

Okay so the electricity man finally showed up yesterday at about 9 o´clock and worked very hard all day with the occasionally appearance of my land lady nagging at him and griping about what he was doing. At the end of the day, about 5:30, he comes in the house and starts trying lights. We finally get one light to turn on and I, being quite accustomed to electrical problems by now, think maybe if we unplug the fridge we will have better luck. I did and we did. So last night, as long as we left the fridge unplugged, we could turn on the tv and one light. We could even turn on the stove but it shocked the heck out of us when we tried to make dinner on it so we decided against that. Evidently there is a ¨pole¨that is lacking at my house that is causing the electricity to not be able to enter very well. I believe that possibly that means it´s not grounded but who knows. My land lord is too cheap to pay for whatever is needed so on Monday my good friend the electric man will come back and I´m going to pay for whatever is needed to completely fix the problem. In the mean time tiffany and I will continue to eat out and watch tv with one light one. I´m finding this whole situation quite humorous and I¨m just extremely glad that we have light and the tv now. For those of you that don´t know about my reality tv obsession I have one and we in the middle of a very intense season. I recommend the show Beauty and the Geek to each of you. We were able to watch it last night and it is quite the tear jerker and laugh maker. If you want to know more just email me and I will be happy to rant. You guys are the best. Love ya!

Who Needs Electricity!

Hey Guys sorry it´s been a while since I last blogged. I´ve been having an amazing week with Meredith, Tiffany, Jack (the dog), and no electricity. The day before Tiffany arrived (last Tuesday) I once again experienced the joy of losing my electricity due to rotted cables under the house. I called up my land lord and she assured me that she would fix it as soon as possible. Well Tiffany arrived on Wednesday and Meredith on Thursday and there was still no hope of the electricity returning anytime soon. Let me point out that in Honduras there is no such thing as calling the electrician company to come out and fix anything. You kind of just have to wait around for some handy man to pass by looking for work who is willing to fix it unless you happen to have an electrician friend. I don´t, and my landlord had run off all electrician friends she once had by failing to pay them appropriately. This caused me quite a bit of stress but we continued on with our week of excitement and nightly candle lightings with much success. I had an exciting spill down the stairs at Cony and Guillermo´s house, leaving me with a sprained foot and several large bruises but not terribly inhibited. We also spent a day at the prison where Tiffany met many new friends and we had a run in with a giant turtle. I also learned that the boys probably aren´t going to be able to have Jack (the dog) and that there is a good chance I´m going to end up with him. We saw a group of American Body Builders break lots of cool things and explode hot water bottles with their breath and we even met some little high school girls that will probably prove to be long time friends. On Sunday we met up with 2 more Americans working here for the summer and headed out to El Mogote and Izopo. That was a long day but a fun one. On Monday we headed up to the national park with the Jesus statue and spend a good portion of the day there just walking around and enjoying the view. All this time we were either eating out or cooking on a little camp stove that I happened to have and holding candle light vigils each night. It proved to be great for conversation, reminiscing, and getting to know each other. Meredith went home yesterday after greatly encouraging me with her presence. God has greatly blessed me with so many wonderful friends and I´m excited about getting to know Tiffany more as we continue to work together for the next 5 weeks. We are still waiting on the electricity and are getting pretty sick of eating out but some guys came by today and said that they would fix the problem tomorrow so here´s to hoping. I love you guys. Thanks for your support. We´re off today to visit my boys from Jovenes and I´m very excited about that.

Bible Study

Last Thursday I started a Bible study with some of the new women at church. I was very nervous about this because I have never really done anything like this before especially with adults. We announced it at church and immediately 2 ladies who had only been there once before expressed their interest. This was very encouraging to me. Thursday I arrived and per usual in Honduras the 9 o´clock bible study started at 10, but other than that everything went wonderfully. The study involves a lot of talking and feedback and I was a little worried about sitting in silence, but they were great. They really got involved and are excited about our next study next week. Afterwards I headed over to Xiomara´s house on the other side of the mountain and we went to visit her sister in law. We were there for a while and then we asked her if she wanted to do the study and she said yes. So I did the study again there and about half way through Xiomara´s brother in law showed up and he stayed as well. This study went a little more slowly because they were more hesitant to talk but still it was great and they both said they would love to study again next week. I´ve been going crazy at home and God has provided me this opportunity to get out into the community again and share the gospel with some great people. I am so blessed to be able to see God working so plainly in my life.

Another New Friend!!

LOL yesterday I went to the prison to visit the boys and ended up coming home with a puppy. Jack, as I´ve chosen to call him, rejecting his name of "Homie", is an adorable baby pit bull. Someone brought him to some of the gang boys and they have to wait a week for permission to have him. They needed someone to take care of him for a week and that someone is me. He is incredibly placid for a puppy. He just sleeps most of the time which is nice for me. It means not a whole lot of clean up. I think a bit of that may be malnourishment though because before he was being fed things like spaghetti and rice. After I leave here I´m going to buy some puppy food and maybe it will perk him up a little. He´s a sweety but very shy. He sleeps on the floor by my bed and hasn´t barked once the whole time. I´ll keep you guys updated on anything exciting that happens during my puppysitting week.

A New Friend

About a month ago I was hanging out with my good friend Xiomara behind my house while she was washing the clothes (an activity she loves and I find impossible). I ventured into the little "maid´s room" that is out there, and that I am afraid to go into by myself, for some unknown reason. Upon entering I saw a grocery sack in the corner and decided to check it out. I had been in this room occasionally before and the grocery sack was new. Inside the grocery sack were several old bandanas (sp?). Nothing too creepy about that except that they are in the scary room and have no reason to be there. So I come running out with my normally overdramatic exuberance and shout at Xiomara, "Look!! Someone´s living in the scary room." Mind you this would require some pretty major acrobatics by a very thin person to even get into the room, but still my mind will do as it wishes. She laughed and stated the obvious about the near imposibility of someone getting into the room and also the large quantities of people (especially children) that come and go from my house and could easily have left the bag there. So that was that and the stranger in the scary room became a great joke between us. It also become the subject of many interesting dreams, not scary just interesting, that Xiomara found hilarious. The owner of the bag still has not been found, but 3 or 4 nights ago I found a very adorable little cat leaving the room. She sleeps there at night and quite enjoys the milk and cat food I´ve begun leaving her but won´t let me anywhere near her. Slowly she is letting me see more and more of her and I`m hoping that soon we will become friends. She has already decided that she really likes to watch tv (my kind of cat) and crawls between the bars on my front windows to watch every night. I´ve named her Bianca because Blanca (the spanish word for white) seemed a little too obvious. Maybe I´m crazy but I´ve fallen in love with this shy little kitty.

Visit with my boys

Hey Guys,
I just got back from visiting my boys for the first time since I left Jovenes. I had talked to them a few times on the phone but this was the first visit. They had their monthly visit with their parents and so they were in town and I just went over to IHNFA (basically the honduran dept of family services). It was wonderful. It was so good to see the boys. They are growing but are still the same great kids that I grew to love. There are now 10 more and I made friends with a couple of the new boys as well. It was hard answering questions about when I´m coming back because there is really no answer to that question. I made plans with a couple of the people that work at Jovenes to have dinner next week and I¨m already looking forward to that. God has blessed me with so many great relationships from my stay at Jovenes. Today also showed me that I really do have a talent for working with children and I truly do believe that is where God wants me. Sometimes it is hard for me to stay on track and I´ve become very good at doubting myself but God knows what I need and he provides it. Isn´t it wonderful that as Christians we have someone who knows better than we do what we need? That is unfathomable to me. God recognizes my problems and works at fixes them before I even realize I have them. That´s an awesome thing. I encourage each of you to take some time and think about how God is working in your life right at this moment. Whether you are feeling thrilled, devastated, or floating along in the middle God is there and he´s working in your life. I love you guys. You are amazing. Email me.

Crazy Thieves

The funniest thing happened the other morning, well it wasn´t funny at the time but I find it hilarious now. I had bought a hammock and put it out in front of my house. This is not an odd thing, it is actually quite common here. The hammock cost about $20 and the two ropes hanging it up costs $1 a piece. The hammock was hanging a total of one day and one night when I woke up, went outside, and saw that someone had climbed over my front gate, smashed the plants on the other side of the gate in the process of climbing over, and stolen not the $20 hammock which was laying on the ground, but one of the $1 ropes. WHAT!! people here are so strange. So I was frustated because on top of this I had no electricity and it was just a bad morning. I go to church and tell Xiomara, my best friend and cleaning lady, about what happened and by this time I think it´s just a big joke. She is furious. She says "where was the security guard he should have been watching your house. I`m going to talk to him tomorrow. " Which she proceeds to do. The security guard, who I expect to blow the whole thing off, starts apologizing profusely and saying that he wasn´t there because he had been in a house around the block drunk for the past two days. I´ve never heard anything so ridiculous. He then says that I don´t have to pay for the security until August and he will pay special attention to the house to make sure nothing else happens. Talk about craziness. I was expecting Xiomara and the security guy to get into a big fight. She was so funny. She started telling me how if I didn´t stand up for myself people were going to walk all over me and I just couldn´t stop laughing. Especially in light of the past months experiences. Oh the crazy hondurans.

Carnival!!

Sorry I´ve been remiss in writing for awhile. The electricity in my house is out indefinitely which prevents me from writing posts at home and then bringing them in to upload. Last Sunday I had 4-year-old Julia spend the night with me and it was so much fun. Because of the lack of electricity we had to be a little bit inventive as far as activities go. So we decided to go out for lunch and eat pizza and play in the little playpark in pizza hut. A common experience at home but here something she talked about all day until we decided to go to the carnival. Now that was an experience. It is just a bunch of mechanical rides like you would find at a state fair all together near the grocery store behind my house. When they began this process I definitely was not anticipating the grand affair that it became. There are two giant roller coasters that went up literally over night. I have to admit I¨m a bit hesitant to get on them but I have seen inspectors looking over the rides during the day so that´s a good sign. Anyway, So Julia and I decide to brave the massive crowds of people and join the fun. First of all, entry to this place is one ticket which costs 5 L. Well me being the planner that I am buy 50 L. worth of tickets so that we won´t have to wait in line to buy tickets when we get inside. We pay our tickets go in look around and decide to ride the little worm kiddiecoaster that has the longest line in the park. There are an indescribable number of people in this place. You literally have to shove your way through to get anywhere. We wait in line for about 20 minutes and then arrive, finally at the worm. The ticket man takes one look at my tickets and says no sorry you need gray tickets, unfornately I had bought 10 pink entry tickets that could not be used for anything. So we go and buy tickets for the worm and learn that there is a different color ticket for every ride. Talk about insanity. So we finally ride the ride and have lots of fun and continue on our way encountering many other people who have made the ticket blunder and trading around tickets as we go. We arrive at a little ride that has the kids circuling in the air in little elephants and cars and such and I put Julia in and step back to watch. I watch a mother place her child, about Julia´s age, crying into one of the cars and then place one of his little friends in with him. She then tells the friend to hold the kid into the car. This poor kid is scared to death and his little friend has a vice grip around his neck. The mom just stands back and yells encouragement until the ride starts and the kids take off. The little boy finally calms down but the friend keeps his hold until the ride is over. It was a little sad but at the same time one of the funniest things I have ever seen. The little friend´s face was priceless. Well that´s about it for now. thanks for reading.

Los Chinos????

Oh the Chinese in Honduras. You rarely see them but if you need something unusual, they are where you go. Yesterday was the latest of many times I haven’t been able to find something and I’m met with “The Chinese, you need to see the Chinese people.” It has begun to really crack me up. These “Chinese people” are never referenced with a location only “Los Chinos”. I have a very large rat problem that has developed rather quickly in my house. I had the problem last year and evidently the change in the weather has brought them back with a vengeance. Yesterday Henry, the husband of my cleaning lady and best friend, came to fill in the rat holes, primarily the giant one under the sink in the kitchen, with cement. I had been several times to several stores to buy rat poison and everywhere I went they were out. When Henry asked me if I had bought the poison I told him this and all he said was, “Los Chinos.” He looked at Xiomara, my friend, and she said, “I went yesterday and they will bring it tomorrow.” LOL It is this underground item retrieval system or something. I know that when we wanted fireworks for the fourth of July we went to “Los Chinos” and later found out the fireworks we bought were illegal. I’m sure that the Chinese people here are wonderful and that the majority of them are not in the market of unattainable items but my experience so far has proven to be interesting.
Disclaimer: for those of you who don’t know me very well I spent my college career volunteering in English classes for, tutoring, and living with Asian girls. I loved each of them very much and have nothing against the Asian culture. I just find this amusing.

Nightmare in El Prado

For my faithful blog readers out there you may remember an experience with ants attacking me from a printer and a brief introduction to my house o’ rats. Well those stories are quiet lovely compared to what I experienced yesterday. I will begin by explaining that my house is extremely old and the kitchen cabinets are wooden and very worn out. Below the cabinets in the kitchen, in one corner there is only dirt that has been gradually taken out by my friends the rats. I had thought that I had overcome the rat problem, and for a few months I saw none, and then about 3 weeks ago they returned with a vengeance. For a while I just avoided the rats. When I told my mom about this problem her first response was “Aren’t you afraid they are going to get on your bed at night and bite your face?", WHAT!!! Well I wasn’t, but I am now. So then I figured out ways to block them from my room at night and talked to Henry about helping me out around the house with this problem. Henry brought in cement and began to fill in the numerous holes that we discovered around the house. During this process we pulled out several parts of the kitchen cabinets which led to an outpouring of large ants and cockroaches. I don’t think I’ve ever been so disgusted. I had seen the occasional cockroach in the house and killed it but nothing like this. I had no idea. Poor Henry and Xiomara were worried about me. I was so sick. According to them this problem should be taken care of with the removal of the cabinets that were rotten and just in case we’re also putting out cockroach poison tomorrow. At one point I had considered buying this house but that is definitely out of the question now. The house is much older and run down than I had realized before. I’m excited though about fixing it up over the next few months. I want to paint the living room and I’ve already starting working on the front garden.

Siguatapeque

Last weekend I took a trip to visit my friends, Cony’s mom and Yuvinny the young boy I have developed a close friendship with, in Siguatapeque with Cony and Michelle. It was really neat. We arrived late on Friday night and there was a little craft fair going on in the middle of town. We walked around for a while and Cony showed us all the things she used to do and the places she used to go. It was really interesting to listen to her talk about where the old school used to be and the first movie theater and many other things that have changed since she was a young girl. We have been there many times before but never have we had so many intimate talks as we walked around. It was very relaxing and fun to see Yuvinny and his grandma as well as get away from everything and just relax.

Cute Jovenes Stories

I have a little 4-year-old friend at Jovenes named Selvin. One of Selvin’s favorite activities is to run around with one of my shirts tied around his neck and say that he is Superman. He is very dark skinned and lots of people on campus call him “chocolate”. The other day Selvin and I were running around together and joking about him being chocolate. I said that I was made of chocolate and he said “No, I’m chocolate you are vanilla.” It was really cute. Another day I was sitting with Selvin and we were watching a storm come in over the mountains and talking about God watering the earth (and the trucks J). We started talking about Heaven and Selvin said that there are two men in Heaven. I was expecting him to say God and Jesus, but when I asked who he said, “God, and the man that drives his car.” I cracked up. Here it is very common for prestigious people to have a driver and Selvin obviously thought that God would have someone to drive his car.

Resourcefulness

I never know what my fellow Hondurans will come up with next. The other day at church I was wearing a pair of sandals which were basically glorified flip flops and very old (hand me downs from a friend) . I tripped (surprise surprise) and broke one of my sandals. Thinking “oh great, this will be fun” I go to sit down and try to make the best of broken shoe. The next thing I know when of the ladies at church is rifling through her purse and says “give me your shoe.” Out of her purse she pulls out a very large needle and thread and proceeds to sew my shoe back together. At one point as she was beating the needle against the bench to make it go through the bottom of my shoe the needle snapped and I thought “well it was a nice try.” But no, she pulls so money out of her purse and sends one of the church teens to buy another needle and fixes the shoe. She then hands me back my shoe and says “There, good as new.” Being the wasteful American that I am I went to Payless and bought some new sandals but I am sure that she would have continued wearing them until they fell completely apart.

The Blog is Back

Hey Guys
Since it looks like I´m going to be in town a lot more again I´m going to try and start up the blog again. I just want to reassure you all that I am doing okay after my abrupt change in jobs and that I greatly appreciate the love that has been flowing in since my email news. You guys are the best. I´ll post something real soon. Possibly highlights from my life at Jovenes.

Incredibly overwhelming.

I just want you all to know that I am more richly blessed than I can even begin to understand. I came in to read my emails today and my inbox was overflowing with supportive emails. Emails that made me cry they were so encouraging and complimentary. You guys are awesome. I knew that I had great friends but this has just blown me away. Each of you have your own things that you are dealing with and yet you take the time to read my blogs, send me wonderful emails, and pray for me. I can´t say Thank You enough. One of the biggest encouragements I receive is the knowledge that I am touching lives even when I don´t know it. I tend to get into my little world with the children (whose lives I know I am touching) and I forget that adults and peers are watching too. God is so amazing. He reveals himself and his love for me in so many different and unexpected ways. And at times when it is needed most. I am a true believer in the idea that God sends people to others when they are in need and that he has sent each of you to me to keep my spirits high. God has allowed me to wake up every morning to a work that I love. So few people have that these days. I have to admit in the past when I´ve heard the phrase ¨my cup runneth over¨I´ve thought it kind of cliche and the product of high emotion. Now I can´t express my self in any other way. God is pouring blessings on me faster than I can take them in. There are always challenges in the life of a Christian but greatly rewards those that are willing to meet those challenges with Him at their side. Thanks again you guys. You truly are the greatest friends a person could wish for. I love you.

Just A Few Reasons...

Why I love my boys
*They run to give me hugs screaming Mommy Amber Mommy Amber every time we see each other after being apart.
*They learned how to say “sit here please” in English just so they could ask me to sit with them at meal times.
*They find ways to sit next to me at movie time even when there is no room. I usually have one with a head on each knee, one on my lap and one standing behind me either hugging me or playing with my hair.
*3-year-old Selvin loves to put his hand on my knee and say “You’re mine, right?, You’re mine right?”
*When they pray they ask God to take care of Mommy Amber who takes care of them and bring her safely back to them.
*The innocent awe and faith in God of the little ones. One day when there was a rainbow in the sky one of the 4-year-olds pointed it out to me by saying “God made that, right”
* Their excitement over little things, like a little wooden wagon one of the directors made for the babies and every kid took turn riding around in.
*Standoffish 11-year-old Mario told me he loved me the other night as I was walking out of his room; Normal for a lot of the kids but a big breakthrough in my friendship with Mario.
*Even after such a rough life, they are willing to share what they have with anyone who asks. One of my favorite things to see is the kids sharing their chips or candy with one of the kids that doesn´t have any.
*When they think no one is watching the older boys are precious with the babies.

Prison Stories

A funny story-
Well one of the guys at the adult prison has decided that I am too old to be without a husband. As we were talking yesterday one young man of 25 asked me why I wasn’t married yet. I told him that people in America wait longer to get married; most of them wait until they graduate from college. To which he asked if I had graduated and I said yes in April. He said that I have had 7 months to get married and asked me again why I wasn’t. I told him I was going to wait a while. He then asked if I would marry a Honduran. I said yes but it was difficult to find a Honduran man my age who didn’t already have children and who was a Christian. This young man is now scouring the gang section of the maximum security prison in Honduras for just such a man. We shall see :) I’m sure this will lead to more humorous stories to share with you.

And a sweet one-Yesterday when we came in there was an 17-year-old boy also coming in. He wasn’t wearing a shirt and he had a bandage on his side on was walking with a limp. After talking to him I learned that he was coming into the prison for the first time yesterday and had been shot twice, once in the side and once in his leg. The clothes he was wearing, a pair of jeans and some ratty tennis shoes, were the only clothes he had. It is winter right now in Honduras and while it’s nothing like back home it is definitely sweater weather. One of the guys in our group said he would bring him some clothes but we don’t come back for a week. I kept an eye on this boy as the other boys were meeting him for the first time. One of the older boys sat down next to him and talked for a little while and then asked, “Don’t you have shirt?” The boy said No that what he had on was all he had. The other boy then said “you’re going to be cold; you can use one of mine until someone brings you something else to wear”. This may seem insignificant to you but it is a rare and touching thing in this environment. It almost made me cry. None of these boys have very much and risking anything by loaning it to someone who is new is unheard of. These boys never cease to surprise me with their openness and love.

Back With My Boys

Hey Guys – Sorry it’s been so long since I’ve posted. I’m now working at the boys’ home 3-4 days a week and I’m pretty busy the rest of the week as well so it’s hard to get to the internet. Things are going wonderfully. Right now I’m fighting some kind of sinus infection and it’s freezing cold so that’s not much fun but other than that I am very very happy. My English classes at the home are going well. The boys are excited about speaking in English and love to practice. I am also having preschool classes with the 8 little ones and I love them. They are precious. I tell them it’s class time and they start chanting “class, class, class” and running up the stairs. I’ve never been involved in anything where I’ve felt so much love and excitement from the people I am working with.

Unique Challenge

Hey There World,
Well I'm finally heading back out to the children's home today and I am soooo excited. I miss my boys. I will now be teaching English and reading to several of the older boys as well as act as a tutor to those that need it. If any of you (especially my dear friend ESL major Ann) have any good ideas for teaching english to kids that can't read please let me know. I've got a few songs in mind and I'm sure things will come to me as I go, but any help will be GREATLY appreciated. Thank you for all your love and support throughout the past couple of weeks. It's been rough and without your love I couldn't have done it. I have a the greatest friends on the planet :) Love Ya!!