Rambles

We worked in a remote mountainside village on Friday, building the tin-sided houses. Didn't really do anything new, so no stories to report about farms or schools or goats. There is volcano news, so I'll just ramble on a little (hah, that's all I ever do!) about it and other stuff that is happening with this team.

We're all wondering about the volcano. Mt. Pecaya, the same one we climbed 2 Sundays ago, had a bigger eruption on Thursday, and put 3 inches of ash on parts of Guatemala City. We're 50 miles or so west of there, and see no evidence of the ash. It's been rainy/overcast here for the last few days, so we can't see much of any mountains. The ash has closed the airport. There are 2 church ministers here with Ryan's team who were supposed to fly home to the states today, Saturday, but their flights are canceled. They hope to catch a flight on Sunday now. I'm supposed to fly home next Thursday, surely the airport will be open by then. Stranded by a volcano, has that ever happened to anybody you know?

Every time I see something around here where I say, "That's the poorest . . . the steepest . . . the roughest . . . the least accessible . . . the dirtiest . . . " well, then I see a place that feels poorer, on a hillside that is steeper, up a road that has more rocks and potholes, to a village that is more remote, in a ravine that looks more like a landfill, than anything before. Such is the case in the village we are building homes this week. I have no idea how to get there, and I've tried hard to memorize the route. The hills are the steepest that I have driven or walked. The poverty is just intense. And to top all of that, it rained off and on Friday, making the people and the place feel even more forlorn and forgotten.

The new team from Memphis is amazing. All 45 of us sloshed through the mud and rain and gloom and kept working, digging holes, pounding nails, leveling dirt and mud, without a single complaint that I heard. Ryan had me in charge (sort of) of a group of 11, and we got 2 houses finished to the point of ready to pour the cement floors, and a third house to the point of putting on the tin sides. Amazing workers with me, young and old, male and female, all with interesting backgrounds and personalities.

The first day of a new team is always the hardest. There are no orphanage visits or Bible programs for kids, we all just build on that first day, to get to know the village, and to experience the construction. 11 people on a construction team is too many for these houses. People are tripping over each other trying to find a job, but it's a good way to get to know your new teammates, and everybody gets to do a little hammering. Now on the second day (Saturday) we'll break down into smaller teams of 5 or 6, work a little harder, but probably get more done because we now have our bearings, and each of us will have a specific job. Fewer people standing around looking for a job. It just works better.

On Friday, my team was working on a home, and the Guatemalan family was there working with us most of the day. The wife was 45 years old (can't remember her name) and had 15 grandkids, most of whom were under her feet (and ours) all day. We didn't mind, they were cute and fun kids. She also had a little basket of ear corn sitting there on her porch, some yellow, some blue, some white, some mixed. I told her I was a corn farmer back in Iowa (not exactly a lie, I have grown sweet corn in the past) and asked if I could buy a couple of those ears to take home. It was actually for my brother, he wants to try to grow some of the 15-foot-tall corn. The woman told me she wouldn't sell it too me, but she would GIVE me 2 better ears that she had inside a storeroom. She went and got it. We argued about pay or no-pay, and finally I gave in and accepted her gift. That made her very happy. Denny will be happy when I get it home, if I get it home.

One more unrelated story that I don't think I've told you about. We built a house for a woman last week, a 40-year-old single woman who lost all of her money and possessions to a very bad and abusive husband (apparently, there are plenty of them here in Guatemala). As Keeci and I learned more about this woman last week, we discovered that her father is an American who was here in the Peace Corps in 1970. She was born after he went back to the States, and she has never met him. Long story short, she would like to know him now, and she has good reason to believe that he would like to know her, and in fact he has come here to try to find her without success (that's another story about people who have abused this woman). We've sent everything we know about her and her father to Keeci's family back in Iowa, and they are doing everything they can to try to make contact this week, while we are still here and can go see her again with any news. Would that be incredible, or what?

The coffee is on, wish you were all here to have a cup with me right now! If you're reading this, you're somebody I love! And if you're not reading this, that's fine, too (that's a joke, if you're not reading this, well . . . get it?) Adios!