3 days, 300 miles & 6 quarts of oil

We came to Guatemala in September 2007 on a 2 year commitment. So that means between now and September we have some decisions to make - like do we stay in Guatemala or do we move back to the states.

We're beginning to process that decision. Part of the process was us taking a trip to Nebaj (pronounced Neba) this past weekend. Mike & Terri and their kids are missionaries with New Life Advance International - the same organization that we're a part of. They live in Nebaj. Mike is the International Director of an organization called ASELSI. ASELSI does pastoral and church leader training in remote areas. Lee is a teacher (a good one if you ask me) and is looking into the possibilities in becoming involved with ASELSI.

So... on Friday we left here about 8:30 in the morning - sparing you many details of the days before dealing with how much oil we had in our car, or if we had any at all we'll begin this story in Chimaltenango, an hour into our trip, and the check gauges liight came on. Aware that the oil pressure gauge was low we checked the oil - no oil. Added 2 quarts. Skipping many more details, we arrived in Nebaj about 3:45 - and added 6 quart of oil along the way. Nebaj is only about 150 miles from where we live, but it's way up in the mountains, and the roads weren't great in all areas. We checked out Mike & Terri's beautiful home at the base of a very green mountain and then Lee took the car to the local mechanic.

We spent Friday evening with Mike, Terri and their 4 kids. They were thankful that it wasn't as cold as it had been - we were thankful for the long sleeves that we brought. We have become very accustomed to the weather in Villa Nueva - rarely above 80, rarely below 60. So the 40 degree weather in Nebaj was freezing to us.

On Saturday morning Lee went with Mike to an extension site for ASELSI where 8 students had met to receive teaching. One student began walking at 4am to reach Nebaj by 8am for the class. Mike taught a 2 hour session that morning and Lee observed.

After the guys got back to the house we loaded up and drove about 30 minutes on mostly dirt roads to a dairy for lunch. The story is that an Italian guy came to that area in the 1920's and settled there because it reminded him of his home in Italy. 90 years later the family still runs the dairy and makes cheese just the way he did in the 1920's. We had a delicious lunch, including the cheese they make there melted between 2 tortillas. The weather there dumps between 7 and 9 feet of rain every year is never really hot - thus, really beautiful plant life. She had a green house full of orchids among other flowers.

We spent Saturday afternoon and evening at Mike & Terri's house with a few other missionaries from Nebaj. It was great getting to be a part of the community that they share.

Sunday morning the alarm went off at 3:15am and we left their house at 4am so that we could be at a little town called Los Encuentros by 7:30am. After grabbing a quick bite of breakfast in Los Encuentros we drove another 20 minutes to La Argueta. That morning Mike taught for a while and then handed the reigns to Lee for a bit. He taught about 5 pages of the material that morning which took about 45 minutes. Another teacher, Jose, taught the last part. This was Lee's first time to teach in a setting like this in spanish. (He was awesome, if I do say so myself. It's one thing to have a conversation about the weather in another language, it's something completely different and difficult to teach. I certainly wouldn't have felt comfortable in that situation - he didn't mispronounce one word!)

After having a snack and spending some time with a family in La Argueta we headed back to the capital. Thanks to the mechanic in Nebaj, we didn't have to add any oil!!

It was such a good weekend. Great time with great people in a beautiful place.

On Thursday Lee will head back to Nebaj to spend a week travelling with Mike to several extension sites. He'll be gone for a week.

Here are a few pictures of the little trip:


Lee teaching his first class.

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This was part of the dairy that we had lunch at.

Mid-January update

So we'll officially stop apologizing about not blogging more often. We would love to think that we would blog more often, but as you can see from over a year of blogging, we're just not good at blogging consistently.

So here's the run down:
We rang in the New Year's with a bit of a get together in our apartment with fellow gringos. We ate, played board games, and had a great time hanging out. Just before midnight we gathered up our loot (fireworks) and matches. About midnight we began to light one by one the biggest fireworks that we've ever lit. There are a lot of things here that differ from that in the States. One of those is the control of fireworks - there just isn't much control here. So, we purchased 100 shot roman candles - they were about 5 feet tall. Lee got to blow up some huge, very loud firecrackers.

Our kids enjoyed their last two weeks of freedom before school started on the 15th.

We had a team of 6 from Pennsylvania from the 8th - 16th. This team comes twice each year - our kids dearly love them and an always anxious for their arrival. While the team was here, and with their help, we took 18 of the kids to a water park that is located on the pacific beach. What gets better than a couple of pools, a few cool slides, and the beach? For many if was the first time that they saw the ocean. For one little guy it was the first time he'd been to a pool or the ocean, it was a bit of fun overload for him, he hardly stopped playing to eat lunch.

During the rest of their time here, the Pennsylvania team got our phone intercom system working properly again, we know have wireless internet in more areas, they demolished a couple of walls (on purpose), and put doors on a couple of medicine cabinets - oh yeah, and fixed several leaks!

Now that school has started, a change in schedule happens for everyone - it was no fun for the kids to wake up at 5:30am last Thursday. Most of our kids struggle with academics and would appreciate your prayers for their school year.

Without going into details, we'd ask for your specific prayers over New Life Children's Home as this new year has brought some new challenges that it has never faced before.

Thanks for standing with us,
Lee & Staci