Weekend Report

Happy Monday.

I hope everyone had a good weekend. It sounds like Minnesota has had its share of interesting weather. I am happy to have missed it. We had a steady downpour of rain here on Saturday.

The weekend was full. I am getting a big kick out of having no watch and literally falling into activities. . . which happens frequently; Like on Saturday, Sunday and today. I am not in charge. This is a blast.

Saturday morning, I was invited to go on the "Pilgrimage Walk" with the youth (teens). Roxanna, the head of the "religious department" told me about this and I wanted to go. The kids here that have a strong set of beliefs do much better in life than those that don't and it is good to join them for prayers, singing, and worship-- even though I can't understand anything outside of "Allelujia, Amen, and Senor. Oh and Santa Maria.

Roxanna, her husband Armin, and their son, Ernesto were where they said they would be at 7:30 AM. It was raining. Roxanna looked disappointed when no one else showed up. We waited. A few people trickled in, eating mangoes. We waited some more. Five, ten, then twenty more teens came! Everyone seemed cheerful, as usual, as they shared umbrellas in groups of two or three.

Finally, about an hour 1/2 later, a bus pulled up and took us to a village just outside of Tegucigalpa where we waited for at least another hour 1/2! I couldn't help but imagine this scene in Minnesota. Folks would be far less comfortable. I have to talk to myself a lot in situations like this and learn to be quiet, to observe, and to appreciate the situation for what is there. This is huge. : /

Several people got up on a makeshift platform and spoke to the group before we embarked on our trek. . . .We started walking around 9:30 AM and we got back to the ranch around 5:00 PM! It was a mini walk-a-thon without the pledges. There were about 150 of us walking and singing. Every 3-4 miles, there was a skit put on by one of the parishes. Each skit was about making healthy choices with God's help, put on by teens.

I couldn't help but notice a few things:
1. The parish groups did not mix much.
2. No one complained at all.
3. Several kids' shoes were completely worn out and they were basically walking with their socks/skin to the ground.
4. The guitar players kept playing, rain and all. . . happily.
5. There was an elderly lady in flimsy sandals and a skirt who walked the entire time. . . happily.
6. The group had to wait at least an hour for lunch to be served on the side of the road and about another hour for clean up. . . People here seem totally used to waiting. . . happily.

During the waiting period, Armin took me on a field trip. We walked about a mile to see a brick "factory." Imagine the most primitive kiln, that's what we say. (I have photos.) On the way there, we ran into a couple of men that were toothless and staggering drunk. Armin said that this is tough work and that when it rains, they basically can't produce the clay bricks. So they drink. Moonshine.

Armin has great compassion, without much (expressed) emotion, for the poor. He is an interesting man;. He was raised in a stable environment and family in Switzerland, visited Al Salvador in the 80's to promote bicycling as a mode of transportation (during the war), met his wife there, and now they work for NPH while raising two wonderful sons. (I got to see visit their house here on the ranch with Christina. The boys proudly showed me their large iguana that had free reign inside their home, as well as the parrot that sat on a bucket in the middle of the "living room." This family fascinates me. I want to clone their sons.
So, that was my Saturday surprise. I was stiff and sore on Sunday, but it was well worth it.

Alas! There has yet to be an uneventful day here in Honduras.

P.S. I met Angela!