Late Night Rides

***Parents: Don´t read this post if you don´t want to have a heart attack. And if you do read it, I´m sorry and I know you´re going to kill me. But I won´t do it again.***

In Morazan, many people can´t afford cars. But they still need some type of transportation.. so many people get motorcycles. They´re not like the big choppers, just sort of like little crotch rockets. Anyways, last night after church Yadira wanted to go for a ride with some of our friends. So she hopped on the back of Anwar´s bike (her boyfriend), I got on the back of Jose´s, and our friend Pati got on the back of Ronnie´s. I thought we were just going to ride around the village, but the boys wanted to go to a paved road. (there´s only one paved street so all the roads are REALLY bumpy). So they took us out onto the road and all three of us were riding side-by-side. It was SO much fun! All the girls were laughing and squeeling with our hands in the air! The boys probably thought they were hot stuff. haha I was terrified, but having the time of my life also. The whole time I was thinking, ¨this is absolutely everything my parents told me not to do.... whoops¨haha Sorry mom & dad, I won´t do it again!

That night at church we were saying any testimonies from the past week. Pati told us a crazy story! I guess while I was in Copan 2 people were shot here? or maybe close by? but anyways, Pati was in front of this little shop talking to a friend. She said goodbye and walked around the street and then heard gun shots. If she had stayed at the shop for even 2 more minutes she probably would have been killed. It was insane!

School was really good today! I walked up and all of the kids were like, ¨Madisol!!!¨and gave me millions of hugs. This little boy Wilmer is getting so good at reading, and I´ve been working more with Bethel on sign language and pronouncing vowels. I just love them so much!

Tonight a group of 10 people are coming from America to go to the mountain village tomorrow. So I´m staying the night at Iris´house because there´s barely any room here. I´m only going up to the mountain on Saturday for the inaugeration of the new school because I want to have more time with my kids at HOPE.

Okay, I´m going to take a nap. I´m always so exhausted here! We sleep like 9-10 hours every night, and I can still take a 2 hour nap every day. I think it´s the heat.

Dulce Sueños

Temblor, Santa Rosa, Ruinas, y SPS

Wow. It has been quite the week! Rewind......

Wednesday night: Well, when I woke up around 230am I about had a heart attack. I thought someone has bumped my bed, and was about to kill me. But then the entire house started shaking and things started falling off of shelves. And FYI, during a crisis, the rate of their speaking multiplies by alteast 3. So not only am I alone in a dark room (and I´m sure everyone knows how afraid of the dark I am) but I have NO idea what is going on. Next thing I knew we were all sitting on the front porch, the entire village in complete darkness. Turns out it was a 7.1 earthquake. Praise be to God that no one here was hurt!

Thursday: A mere 4 hours of sleep later, I left for Copan with Mari, Kelvin, and Karen. First we went to Santa Rosa de Copan, a beautiful city! Ít´s really hilly, but absolutely gorgeous! They had to run a bunch of errands like getting haircuts, getting new ID´s, etc. It was fun just getting to see someplace new. Then we went to this living place where Kelvin lived by himself for 3 months while studying the Bible. It was GORGEOUS! There was this huge field where Kelvin and I played soccer, next to a beautiful river and a hammock where we sat and told stories. My spanish is getting so much better! We spent that night at their grandmothers house/shack thing in the mountains. Their grandmother is this precious 80 year old lady who´s as strong as an ox (all the while in her little blue silk dress with lace. lol) But holy crap that was the closest to crying I have been so far. All 4 of us, plus abuelita (grandma) slept in one room. Karen and I shared a ¨bed¨made of 4 slabs of wood and a blanket, Mari and abuelita on a bed, and Kelvin on the floor. We also shared the room with about a million mosquitos and a rainstorm. I think I got about 3 hours of sleep, and woke up with 21 mosquito bites on one arm alone! Talk about God testing my strength! But it was still fun, and definitely an experience!

This is Santa Rosa De Copan

Friday we drove all the way to Copan Ruinas, only to find out that the park had closed 50 minutes before we got there. But I think I´m glad, because we got to stay the night in a little hotel in the city of Copan Ruinas! It was SO cute! I absolutely loved it! Hilly and with stone streets and little shops all along the side of the road. So beautiful! And that night I slept like a rock on an actual bed, with a fan and no mosquitos. Glorious. =)

This is Mari, Me, Kelvin, y Karen at the little hotel in the City of Copan Ruinas.

Saturday we got to see the ruins! They were absolutely amazing!! Beautiful and ancient. It was really fun! The guide spoke all spanish, and I actually understood most of it (which was nice)! After the ruins we drove 4 hours to San Pedro Sula to stay at their old house. The house is beautiful! It´s right outside of the Centre (the big city part) and it´s coral with a cute black gate and a hammock on the porch. Again Kelvin and I hung out in the hammock while translating songs back and forth from english to spanish and vice-versa.

Karen, me, and Kelvin in front of one of the ruins.

This place was so so beautiful!


A place where the Mayan King and Queen would stay.

Sunday we went into the city to do some shopping! Boy is it a crazy place! All along the sides of the streets are little shacks where they´re selling things or food. The roofs of all of them are tin or cardboard boxes. From above it looks kind of like a miniature version of the slums in Slumdog Millionare. It was so neat though! We then went to a friends house to rest outside for like 4 hours. Again with the hammock, stories, songs and reading newspapers. Kelvin and I are also getting really good at the Soduku puzzles in the newspapers! And naps in hammocks are probably some of the best.

That brings me to today. I´m back home with Celenia! I´m kind of glad to be back because I´m quite exhausted... but I had so so so much fun! Now I get to go back to my kids at HOPE tomorrow! I can´t wait to see them!

Buen Viaje.

Estoy Enferma

Just asking for prayer. I got pretty sick last night.. it was either the papaya or the pizza, we can´t decide. I´m starting to feel better but the trip to Copan is in a few hours, so prayer that I get completely better would be wonderful.

Thank you so much!

The Past Few

Sunday: At church in the morning, we gave the kids backpacks! The 4 people from America had brought them. It was so cute seeing how happy they were! Church at night was incredible! At the end of the service Mary (the pastor) called all of her kids up, plus me, plus a few others to the front of the church. She poured oil on our heads and began to pray for each of us individually. Talk about amazing. When she got to me, I understood most of what she was praying for. She was praying for things over me that I have been praying about for months. It was unreal! So of course I was kind of crying, and Karen (her daughter whom I love) was right there next to me giving me a hug while 2 of her other children were singing and playing music. Then, after church, a lady came up to Mary who was having stomach pains. So Mary called me over and we prayed over her. Such an incredible night!

This is a picture of the kids with their new backpacks and soccer balls! (Mary´s church, next door/kind of a part of their house)

Monday: I got to go back to my school!! The kids all ran up and gave me huge hugs and kisses. I missed them so much! Oh, this is the school for kids with special needs (the picture at the top of my blog). We worked on words that start with the letter D. After lunch the kids had to leave though because it was too hot. We had no electricity all day.... it was awful! You wouldn´t think having a fan would really be that much of a difference, but boy does it matter! It was scorching. I literally thought I was going to die. But it eventually came on, thanks be to God.

This is me working with Bethel at HOPE. The little boy closest to the camera is Victor.

Today has been good. Back at the school we worked on the letter E. I also got to work with Bethel, one of the deaf girls. They´ve taught her the letters in sign language, so I got to try to help her say things like ¨ma, me, mi, mo, mu¨It was so wonderful when she´d get one. She´d have the biggest smile on her face! I´m really excited too because that´s sort of the kind of thing I would be doing with speech pathology. So hopefully I found what I actually want to do!

I leave tomorrow for Copan (a city a few hours from Morazan)! Mary wants me to meet her mother and family, and they want to take me to see the ruins! (Don´t worry mom & dad, I´ll be safe). I´m really excited because I´ve never gotten to actually see the historical places in Honduras!

This is the pastors family (minus the pastor, Mary). The boy in the white is Jose, red is Angel, Blue is Kelvin, the little girl is Karen, and the older girl is Yadira. I absolutely adore each and every one of them.

I´ll write when I get back from Copan!

Tortillas y Iglesia

Day 1: incredible.

When I woke up (a whole 12 hours after I went to sleep) I was hot... and felt like I had a permanent layer of sticky over all of my skin. But before I started to whine about it, I realized how insignificant it was. Out of all of the problems in the world, my least was that I was hot and uncomfortable. And that right there made me thankful, thankful for the chance to experience this kind of lifestyle and thankful that I have been so blessed to have the life that I do.

Today I learned how to make homemade tortillas! I was awful at first. I don´t know how they get those things so perfectly round! I got a lot better though, and they tasted amazing! After writitng down all of the lyrics to a few songs Jose had on his cell phone (so they could sing the english version), I unloaded a bunch of logs out of Mary´s car and helped to clean the house. Saturdays are pretty relaxed since there is no school, so it was nice to get to just spend time with the pastor´s family.

Tonight was church at Minesterio Rio de Vida (Mary´s church). I cannot even begin to explain how awesome it was to hear atleast 15 people praying and worshipping in spanish! It made me realize how small I am and how big God is. His glory and His praise spreads all over the world, in hundreds of different languages. People from all over are praising Him, and I am merely one person. Sure makes me realize how much I need God to accomplish anything. We have church in the morning again at 10 and we´re bringing backpacks as a surprise for the kids in Sunday School! I am so excited!

Time for bed... in this hot, sticky, and completely Christ-centered home =)

Buenos Noches.

Welcome Back

Well, I made it alive! I wish I could somehow describe the feeling of coming out of customs to see Karen (the pastors 9 year old daughter) run up and hug me with the biggest smile I have ever seen. It made the 2 and 1/2 hours of sleep totally worth it!
I´m exhausted. But driving in to Morazan while watching the neon orange sun set behind the mountains was incredible. It´s amazing how much God´s beauty is shown in His creation.
When I got back to Celenia´s house, the entire family (4 guests from America included) greeted me with hugs and smiles and cookies. Amazing cookies. And when I say whole family, I mean extended family and everything. Even the pet dog Gary looked excited to see me! Goodness I love this place. I wish I could bring every single person I know to Morazan so that they can experience it themselves.
It´s some kind of holiday here, so there is a carnival type thing at the end of the street! A ferris wheel that looks like it could be the death of me, and lots of food!

I´m back, and it´s wonderful.

The history of my time in Honduras

Since this is not my first time in Honduras, I thought it necessary to fill in some background information on what this country means to me. So in as few words as possible, I will try to explain:

2 years ago I went on a spring break trip with my missions and evangelism class to a village in Morazán, Honduras. Obviously I instantly fell in love with the people there. We painted a house for a lady named Iris, taught english and bible in the small christian school, and held a soccer tournament. The school was started by a lady named Celenia Carvajal, an incredible woman with an even more incredible heart. She worked in America for 7 years to save up the money, and got many uniforms donated for the school. Her goal for the school was to give kids a learning environment that surrounded the kids with teachers who love the Lord. 

 

Once I got home, I just knew that I absolutely had to go back there, no matter what it took. So, after some serious convincing to my parents, raised money to go back again for spring break of my freshman year at OSU. This February, Celenia started a new school for kids with special needs called HOPE. There are 10 students with disabilities ranging from cerebral palsy to seizures. So when I went in March, I spent the majority of my time there and of course fell in love with the kids. I also met the most amazing family in the world. The mother, Mary, is a widowed mother with 5 kids. Their father died only a

year ago of a heart attack leaving the 22, 21, 19, 16, and 10 year olds with the mother to take over the church that they had started and provide for themselves. This family has more faith than anyone I have ever met. I spent quite a bit of time with them as well.

 

So this brings us to now. I have decided to go back this summer for an extended period of time in order to work more at HOPE, possibly teach english at the other school, and help out with the development and beginning of a new school that Celenia is starting in the mountain villages. It is going to be a long and challenging time, so I figured it would be a good idea to have a way to update people on what I'm doing and how things are going.

Prayer would be greatly appreciated!

                                                                 Madison

"I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these, you did for me."

Matthew 25:40