Monday, August 25, 2008

Day 6 – 8/23

During Friday night’s dinner, we received a call on the HAM radio from John and Penny Alden (also missionaries here at Loma De Luz) asking if Dad and I would be available tomorrow for br…… and then the transmission cut out. Such is the life of communications here in the campo. Just to give you a sense of how communications sometimes happen here, later John and Penny were able to contact Dr. Renee on the radio and then she called me on the cell phone (yes, there are cell phones here) to relay the invitation to breakfast for this (Saturday) morning. Needless to say, we accepted. Besides never having met John and Penny and wanting to get to know them, I also wanted to get my hands on their truck. It was for sale and we believed that God was leading us to buy it. So up the hill we went to breakfast with John and Penny. I know I keep saying this and I imaging that you might tired of hearing it, but all the same – John and Penny were just delightful people.
John and Penny are some of our role models in terms of integration with the Honduran culture. John works at some of the local Honduran clinics and with some of the local doctors. Penny and John both work quite a bit with a local Honduran church and have invested their hearts into the Honduran people here. I know it sounds crazy, but it is quite possible to come here (in my capacity as a technical person) and never really integrate with the culture. You have to want to. This of you who kow us know that we do want to – but it takes some real effort to make it happen. John and Penny are two people we can emulate as to how they have accomplished this.
After breakfast, John was good enough to take us on an extended tour around the area. We drove to all of the local villages within ten miles of the hospital and John explained each of them to us and kind of gave us a sense of how each of them fit into the local landscape. Since John works in these towns, we didn’t just drive down the main street and say that we’d had a tour. We drove down many side streets, stopped at a few people’s houses, and generally got to know the area. Thank you John for taking so much time with us! The information and orientation that it provided were invaluable!
After some rest, we had a very nice dinner with the Merrits and the Greens. To illuastrate how things often happen around here, I’ll explain how we decided to do dinner together. We had a cooked whole chicken, and mentioned to one family that this would be far too much for us to eat and invited them to join. Well, they were planning on getting together with family number two, but let’s just throw it all together in pot-luck and all three families can eat together. Pineapples were harvested from outside and cut up (you can’t believe how good they taste!), mango, melon, plantains (small banana like fruit – the Honduran potato) and all of a sudden you have a great meal for six! What a blessing!
We had a really nice time of prayer after supper and coffee. We prayed for adult missionary kids living at home, and struggling. We prayed for our family as we prepare to go and for Marinajo as she endures a long time at home without me. We prayed for the longstanding needs at the hospital, more staff, enough money, etc. And lastly, my dad prayed for Marinajo and the kids and I. I was really touched by the fact that my dad was down here praying for me as we prepared to come. What a neat blessing. I know that he’s been touched by all that he has seen and done and I can tell you that he and I have been able to spend more quality time together here than I could have ever dreamed for. Thank you so much God for this time that he and I have been able to spend together!

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