quick quick quick

Our dear Jason left a little over a week ago.  We miss him a lot.  I still get a little pang of pain in my chest thinking about him and the fact that he isn't here at UPH anymore.  Bah!

We are in full-swing summer craziness.  There is something going on almost every day and night of the week.  I haven't been to Bible Study (at our local church) since the beginning of June because I have had some event or meeting or dinner to go to every Wednesday since.  They are beginning to think that I don't love them.  :(

As much as the craziness is crazy, I am enjoying it.  Because it is so crazy, I have to make an intentional effort to get to know the people that are flying through my world in this whirlwind.  But it's about quality, not quantity.  A few good quality conversations and relationships can come out of a summer with a HUGE quantity of people and events. 

I love watching Fausto mix into the big group as well.  In a UPH world full of so many women, I like seeing other guys come into the mix.  He has guys to pal around with and make jokes with.  He has buds to go out for a German beer with.  :)  It's good.  Married couples need friends.

I will leave you with a picture from our recent trip to La Antigua, Guatemala.  Fausto and I went to renew our visas.  It was a great time and we got to spend good, relaxing, romantic time together.  This one is of an older couple who spontaneously decided to dance to the live music that was playing in the public square.  They moved like they have been dancing together for a long time.  They reminded me of Aunt Sissy and Uncle Fran.  It made my heart smile to see them.  And I'm sure the rest of the crowd had the same reaction as no one was really paying much attention to the band, but more the lovely dancers.  

Little gentlemen

On the elevated walkway at SANAA, the water treatment plant

The past two weeks, Camp Hope and Camp Ágape have ventured out on Special Friday as a united front.  The kids from Camp Hope in Nueva Esperanza pile into a van and make the ten-minute drive over to San Pedrito Abajo where Camp Ágape is held.  The children often don't know each other, even though they are from the same town.  Katie, the director of Camp Hope, and I are hoping to create a friendly relationship between the children at the two camps; we're all one big UPH family.

I've been a little nervous about the collaboration.  Kids are unpredictable.  There's always a chance they'll hit it off wonderfully and bond over soccer teams and three-legged races, but they also might be perpetually shy and possibly even rude because "those kids are from that neighborhood" or "she looked at me funny and I don't know her."  Katie and I chatted about how to mesh the kids well, avoiding competition between camps, trying to facilitate their getting to know one another in a relaxed environment.  It's almost like when two moms decide that their children would be great for one another and take it upon themselves to set them up.  We're introducing the two camps with high hopes that everyone will be life-long friends, but still trying to make it look as natural as possible so no one knows they're being set up.  Sometimes it's successful.  Sometimes it's not.

Alejandra (LiderJoven @ Camp Ágape) escorting two of our medianos.

Well, hold your breath no longer.  It went well.  Last week, Katie and I were both pleasantly surprised at the camaraderie and good behavior displayed.  While I would love to take the credit for Camp Ágape's shining manners, I have to give credit to our wonderful youth leaders.

Pictured here, we see Alejandra with her arms around two young boys, Emerson and Didier, from Camp Ágape.  This shot was snapped during the last part of their tour of the water treatment plant in Copan Ruinas.  Didier and Emerson were the only boys in this tour group and the only campers from Camp Ágape.  Alejandra was assigned to mind them during this outing.  As they walked through the different parts of the water plant, Alejandra was consistently reminding them to hold back and let the little ladies of Camp Hope walk through first.  She referred to them as her little gentlemen and they therefore acted accordingly.  

I was impressed not only by the "little gentlemen", but also Alejandra's keen sense of proper behavior towards the little girls of Camp Hope.  I was happy to see that it wasn't just a desire of mine and Katie's that the camps meshed well, but that we were getting good support from our leaders on this front as well.  Alejandra's attitude and actions showed me that she understands that this is not just another job, but that she is actually contributing to the social development and character of the kids she works at camp.

Mama Kathy's Wisdom

Interiano Carranza family

“It takes a village to raise a child,” my mom says as she looks around the dinner table.  She was commenting on the amount of extended family present at dinner that all live on a single plot of land in San Pedrito Abajo.  A father rises from the table to lovingly gather his youngest son who is crying because he doesn’t do well meeting strangers.  This same man’s sister serves food to the group with his wife while his mother, children, nieces and nephews gather around the table in a way that is obviously familiar to them all.  It is quite evident that each adult in this family plays a significant role in each child’s life.  My mom is correct; this small “village” of people is raising children as a shared effort.

This family has three children, Willian, Ada and Jorge, who participate in Camp Ágape.  They graciously opened their home to our Service Learning Group and prepared a meal to share with them. I often do not see the same “village” of support surrounding each of my kids at Camp Ágape in their homes, but my job is not to despair knowing the children face adversity.  Rather, my job is to trust in God’s goodness. 

FPC Service Learning Group

As I look around the dinner table, I am reminded of that goodness and how God provided a village of mentors who contributed to my spiritual formation through the very same church that sent this Service Learning Group with whom I am sharing a meal.  I am thankful for the ways they invested in me and how they have affected my life.  My mind continues down this path and I am reminded that through Camp Ágape, we are providing a similar village that looks out and cares for kids in a way they may or may not receive at home. 

Mom, I agree with you.  It does take a village to raise a child.  It takes a mosaic of people, lessons and experiences to push that child onto greater things.  I’m thankful for the villages in my past, present and future and I’m thankful to be a part of the UPH village that works to support these kids in Copan Ruinas.

Mango Manuel

In Copan Ruinas, when a guy is called a "mango" it's because he's a ladies man. Manuel has the potential to be a "mango" at some point in his life, but that is not why he has been dubbed "Mango Manuel". It is simply because this sweet 6th grader brings a mango to each leader working at Camp Ágape every single day.

Manuel gets to camp just after two every afternoon, just after our team arrives on site to work at camp for the day. He gives hugs to greet each leader and visitor and then fishes through his backpack to find the mango that is just right for that person. I think there may be some sort of a hierarchy because I very often get the largest mango, but I'm not sure whether it has to do with respect for me as the director or genuine special love for me. Either way, I appreciate the mangos. Sometimes he'll even bring a watermelon and ask us to cut it up so he can share with the other campers as they arrive. While the leaders are in our pre-camp team meeting, Manuel will poke his head in the room as more children arrive so we can fairly distribute the melon. Manuel makes sure no kids take a second slice until everyone has had their first.

After the first week of camp, Manuel came in and handed me a mango AND handmade, decorated envelope with a note inside. It read:

Korni es una buena maestra le gusta su trabajo le gusta mucho el ingles y ella quiere a los alumnos como sus ijos verdaderos Korni es como si ubiera una Blanca flor y a ella le gusta comer vegetales
Translation: Kourtney is a good teacher. She likes her work. She likes English a lot and she loves the students as her very own children. Kourtney is like a white flower and she likes to eat vegetables.

I was (and still am) touched and also had a hard time not chuckling about his ending line. It was a surprising ending, although I later found out that a love for vegetables is something Manuel and I share in common.

Manuel has quickly made a space for himself in every leader and visitor's heart at Camp Ágape. All mangoes aside, Manuel has proven himself to be a caring, helpful, considerate camper. He has a keen sense of right and wrong and has helped newer campers adjust to the camp schedule and culture. This past Thursday, as he was hugging me goodbye at the end of the camp day, he looked up and said, "Korni, I never want to miss a day of Camp Ágape." I patted his head and squeezed him a little tighter. I don't want him to miss a single day either.

What we do.

When someone asks me what I do, the normal and quick response is to say that I direct summer camps and after school programs for kids in underprivileged and low-resource communities. If I still have the interest of the speaker, which I usually do, I usually begin to explain how youth are trained by UrbanPromise Honduras to teach and lead the children in these programs and I explain what classes are given on a normal basis: English, Bible, Art, Discovery, Cooking and Health. While I share these basic details, faces of children in our programs fly through my head and visions of miraculously wonderful classes being taught by youth play in my mind.

One such story that occurred this week in camp involves a young boy named Douglas. While signing Douglas up for this vacation camp, Camp Libertad, he was timid to say the least. From the first day of camp, Douglas has participated in activities and gone through the motions of camp, but it was rare to see a smile on his face or a great deal of excitement on his part during any crazy camp activity. I chalked it up to a normal dose of "pena" (bashfulness common among children in the underprivileged communities) because he's new to our programs and decided to give him time.

It appears that time and a Creative Stories option at camp was all he needed. This week, three of our leaders led a week-long Options class on creative stories in which they read stories, acted them out, created alternative endings, and drew representations of them as a group. Our leaders assigned roles to the children in the class before beginning a story and the children jumped into action as the story demanded it, especially Douglas. All week long, my ears have been filled with the voices of excited leaders sharing about how much and how well Douglas is participating as the various characters in the stories, how much he is coming out of his shell, and how impressive it is to hear him read aloud. During various stories, Douglas transforms into Prince Charming or the lead rooster. During the Creative Stories option within Camp Libertad, Douglas transforms into a different child with a different attitude.

In my heart of hearts, I know my quick answer about what I do is nowhere near complete and doesn’t actually speak to the full impact UPH is having on the children and the community. I believe improving the explanation means improving the verbs. Through stories like Douglas', my eyes are opened to the fact that I'm blessed to direct programs the provide creative outlets to children in underprivileged communities. We are blessed to see bashful children transformed as they act out children's stories in a safe space. We equip youth to lead and serve children and their communities and we inspire them to be better, stronger people who deserve the title "leader". This is what we are privileged to do.

Mentor - Mentee - Future Mentees

First of all, I can't take credit for noticing what is going on in this picture. Jason, the intern/long-term volunteer from St. Andrew's University in Scotland is the one who brought it all to my attention.

This is a picture of Melissa, one of our youth, at the most recent pilot program, a sports camp. She is right in the thick of it, doing her job. She is with the kids. She is participating. She is having a good time doing it. What's even cooler than seeing a youth caught doing her job well is catching her mentor watching her off in the distance with a pleased look on her face. If you look closely, Rachel, the Youth Director for UPH, is in the background, watching the action. It is a perfect progression of what the UPH program hopes to be. Adults pouring into youth, equipping them to then pour into children so that we may become a community from which servant leaders step forth.

God is up to big things here in Copan. I'm blessed to be a part of it.

El Pequeñito Fer

There's something about two big brown eyes set in a young smiling pudgy face that my heart can't resist. Little Fernando participated in our third pilot program last week. He darts around the room with energy like a firecracker and is actually too young to have participated in our program. Don't let his miniature size fool you though--he catches on to games and activities sometimes faster than the older kids and fearlessly runs and plays with all the campers twice his size.

He's in Kindergarten and our programs are for children in 1st through 6th grades. However, he was signed up on the same form as his older sister and slipped through my lines of defense with his toothless grin and the excited twinkle in his eyes. Once I realized that we had a stow-away in our camp, it was too late to tell him to leave because he was already part of the camp family. So, I decided it was only appropriate to give him a special name--after all, he was a special addition to the camp. From the beginning, he was known as "El Pequeñito Fer".

I thoroughly enjoyed watching him soak up every activity with wonder and excitement. There's something special about the youngest children who participate in these pilot programs. I look at them and see them as the first set of kids who could possibly go completely through school while simultaneously going through our programs. I think about how the trajectory of their lives will change from the extra love, attention, and support.

On the last day of camp, it occurred to me that perhaps El Pequeñito Fer didn't like being called pequeñito (small). Maybe he wanted to be called big or strong, perhaps El Gran Fer. I stooped down as he was punching out holes in his craft and asked him about it. He looked up at me, obviously confused by the question. He was El Pequeñito Fer, why would he want to be anything else?

"I'm a STAR!"

One of the first rules of classroom management is that you should save your "loud voice. At camp, when we want to get the kid's attention, it does no good to yell. Instead of yelling, one of the leaders or I will stand up front and put our finger on our nose. The children know that once they see a leader with their finger on their nose that they need to stop what they're doing, face front, and not be the last one to do it. The last child to be quiet and have his finger on his nose has to come up front, face his classmates, and do a star jump (crouch down and then jump up and explode, yelling, "I'm a STAR!").

Most of the children in latin america are what we call penosos or bashful and for this reason, a star jump is enough motivation to get the children to quiet quickly when they see a leader with his finger on his nose. However, this week, there was a group of children who enjoyed coming up front to do the star jumps. Some would wait and purposely be the last to put their finger on their nose and others would come up front to do the star jump even if they weren't the last.

The last day of Pilot II, I think the youth leaders felt they needed a better task for the last child with his finger on his nose and they started making them do push-ups! I had been on the side taking care of something and walked over and saw little Manuel doing push-ups along side Alexis, one of the leaders for the week. This continued for the rest of the day and was actually very effective.

Loving Copan, one kid at a time.

Rigo had been giving us trouble since the first day of our pilot program. He had stuck out immediately as one of the young boys who was going to need extra attention and discipline.

After having sent him home for behavior problems on the second day of camp, he came back as the team was cleaning at the end of the day and the children had been dismissed. He reluctantly stood in the doorway of the church, first watching the youth sweep and mop, and then decided to help. The LiderJovenes, glad for the help, mopped happily alongside him.

As one leader, Aura, noticed him helping, she went and moved his name on the discipline chart from “Sent Home” to “You’re Doing Great!”, a change from the absolute bottom to the top. After cleaning, Rigo started walking away from the church. Aura gathered the LiderJovenes together to yell their thanks to him. He turned around with a smile and waved.

The other LiderJovenes dispersed and Aura remained in the doorway, watching Rigo walk away. He had a notable spring in his step that had not been there earlier, especially after being sent home. Aura turned to me with a concerned look on her face and shared, “You know? I don’t think Rigo has known much love in his life. I really think that’s what he needs more than anything else.” She paused a moment, set her jaw as if she were making a promise to show him love, and turned on her heels to gather her bag to go.

I was amazed at the sensitivity and insight that Aura showed in that moment. I was touched by her concern and care for a boy most would dismiss as disruptive and frustrating. I was impressed by her maturity and dedication to the children and community after only two days with them.

Having pilot programs is exciting as a sign of growth and stability in UrbanPromise Honduras. It’s encouraging because it means we’re moving forward. Having pilot programs is exciting because it gives us an opportunity to extend our reach into different communities and get to know the Rigos, learn of their needs, and show them much needed love, even if only a week at a time.

Independence!

Today is Honduran Independence Day. September 15th, 1821, Honduras, along with the rest of Central America, gained their independence from Spain. Subsequently, they became part of the Mexican empire for 17 years before becoming their own republic.

In Copan Ruinas, it is celebrated annually with all the school children parading through the center park with HUGE drums and marching bands. Some are dressed up in typical garb, some are in typical marching band outfits, some are simply in their school uniforms marching with their classes. The whole town comes out to see the parade. For weeks before Independence Day, drums and xylophones can be heard nightly at least until ten o'clock as the groups from the different schools perfect their beats.

For me, one of the most exciting parts of the parade is recognizing the children as they march. I found out today that it isn't Honduran custom to yell out to children and wave as they pass. In fact, we were slightly being jeered at by those standing around us. I decided not to care what the locals thought and clapped and cheered for all the kids I knew, snapping shots and making a scene like my mother did for us as children.

The picture here is of Brayan, one of the kids from Camp Hope. He's in 4th grade at Amigos, a private Christian school in town, and takes a LOT of pride in his drumming. For the past few weeks his attendance at camp has been inconsistent mostly because he's been practicing his drumming and going to team practices every afternoon. He goes all out. He's got a great sense of rhythm and as he drums you can tell that he loves it. His mother, naturally, is very proud of him as well.

Two months [to the day!]

Many apologies my dear friends who apparently DO read my blog. Suffice it to say that the past two months have been a whirlwind of summer camp, interns, short-term teams, wrap-ups, vacations, and now, shifting gears and taking off with AfterSchool Program Pilots. OH and a whole lot of wedding planning peppered in between it all. There really is no way to cover up the whole summer in one blog, so I won't. I'll focus on one part: Camp Peace.

UPH put on two bilingual vacation camps this summer, Camp Peace and Camp Joy. Camp Joy has been running since 2009 and this is the first time Camp Peace has run. I was responsible for setting up the details for both camps prior to July and directing Camp Peace once our interns and the other director, Jimmy, got here.

I had a team of 5 college-aged interns and 6 bilingual high schoolers to ran all the classes and were really the hands and feet of camp. And my job was to manage this 12-person team. Being a director is a very different experience than being a teacher or intern at a camp, mostly because I wasn't in one place consistently and I had a lot of administrative stuff to think about versus the day-to-day planning that the interns did. I learned a lot and was stretched as a leader in these two months. Being a good servant leader is not just about getting everyone to do their job and making sure people know what to do, but rather drawing the leadership out of people, seeing potential in people before they even see it and helping them realize that potential. I know this now, but that doesn't mean I'm great at it. Haha. It just means that I know part of what needs to be refined in me as a leader now. :)

It was a great summer at Camp Peace. Our team gelled really well and the kids of Camp Peace had a blast. I love my interns and miss them a lot. I love the kids of Camp Peace and miss them a lot.

BUT NOW I get to look ahead and start a new site... long-term relationships, long-term growth, long-term commitment... If I can become so attached to a group of people after only four weeks, just imagine how it will be after years!

interns

Last Wednesday evening, the summer interns for UPH arrived in Copan Ruinas. With all the planning and preparing that has been done, it never fully sunk into me the task that was before me as it pertains to these interns.

Wednesday night, we all met for dinner and ate baleadas while we exchanged pleasantries and tried to start getting to know the people who would be with us for the next 6 weeks. As far as my conversations went, no really deep topics were hit and I didn't learn great amounts of information about anyone. I just tried to learn their names as best I could.

As I walked home from dinner, as I went to bed, and as I walked into work the next morning, Rick and Tammie Romano continually came to mind. Seeing the interns, their wide, expectant eyes, unknowing what experiences lay before them this summer, I was reminded of my intern experience in Mexico. As I thought more and more about how Rick and Tammie poured into us as interns, challenged and corrected us, I realized that God was now handing me an opportunity to be used as they were. I recognize that God gets the glory for all change and growth in me in my time as an intern, but I also recognize that God used two very useful tools in the form of the Romanos. My heart is humbled and elated at the same time, knowing that God has awesome blessings, growth, challenges and joys in store for these interns, and realizing that I get to be a part of that process!

For all intents and purposes, I am the interns' "boss" in so far as their experience pertains to camp. As I looked at them, I realized that God was not giving me an opportunity to have authority over people, but to walk along with them and be used by him as he stretches and molds them more into his image this summer.

The word stewardship keeps coming to mind as I think about what lies ahead. Stewardship of blessings, stewardship of skills, stewardship of gifts, stewardship of what has been entrusted to me. My prayer is to be a good, wise steward of this task that God has entrusted to me. I don't take this lightly--there are people's lives and God's plans involved.

Please be praying for me as I step into this new role (really starting tomorrow). Pray that I would lead with the heart and mind of Christ and that I would be willing to be molded and stretched along with the team of interns assigned to me.

happy birthday doña maría

carla (on the right) and her family live across the street from our office. carla is a "host mom" for students who come to copan to study spanish and also runs an informal catering business out of her house (two weeks ago i went with her to serve meals to a WorldVision group who was doing a training here -- reminded me of serving food to the groups with Tomasa in Mexico). almost every volunteer who has come through copan to work with UPH has stayed or eaten at carla's house. she has a mothering spirit and loves having people in her house like a revolving door. she teases and jokes and just plain has a good time when people are around.

doña maría (on the left), carla's mom, turned 64 today. she lives with carla and is an opinionated, hard-core catholic, hard-working, wonderful woman who speaks VERY quickly. just about all the gringos i've talked to say that they never understand her. for some reason, she's taken a liking to me. she gives me hugs and kisses when i see her and calls me chula and preciosa (both very nice things). today she turned 64 and she is sporting a new dress that her son sent her from the US. I must say, she looks pretty sassy!

both of these woman make my days here happy. they show me love and i am thankful that God placed them right across the street from the office so that i get to see them almost every day. it's nice to have these lovely women around.

animalito

The rainy season has commenced. in rainy season, the frogs and toads of Copan and the surrounding area come out to play. Because EVERYTHING is wet after it rains, they can go virtually anywhere and be safe. Unfortunately, though, they have a tendency to get themselves into places when it's wet, the places dry, and then they have no way of getting back to water.

Last night, we got back to the office after 8 from a youth event. It had rained cats and dogs earlier. I walked into the front room to turn on the lights for a friend. I switched the light on and turned around, greeted by this little frog staring at me from on top of Rachel's travel mug. He was so still that I couldn't figure out if he was plastic and a practical joke. BUT, a friend decided to try to TOUCH him and wound up jumping off the cup and onto the wall. He wound up on the screen of another friend's camera... which is how this picture came to be.

All in all... it was interesting and something I had never seen before! OH... and we got him back outside to safety. Fear not.

cafe yat b'alam

on a semi-regular basis, the electricity in Copan Ruinas goes. sometimes it's due to rain and storms, sometimes it's due to scheduled maintenance, sometimes no one has any clue as to why we don't have electricity for days at a time. today is one of those days.

days that i work, this causes a bit of a hardship, so most of the staff packs up and comes to yat b'alam. here, they have a generator (so we can plug in our computers and their router works, so there's internet capabilities) and just as important, their internet company has a generator (which means they are able to transmit the internet here... to the router here... to my computer here...). it's amazing how many things need to come together in order for internet to work. so many things that we take advantage of in the US.

the cafe is "open air", as most places are here in Copan. there's a nice balcony/patio area that's right on the street and a VERY friendly staff who I think I am beginning to regard as friends. :)

the UPH team has off this week and everyone (except me) went home to the states or canada. in all honesty, i have mixed feelings about being here "on vacation" by myself, but i'm hoping to take full advantage of the time to get settled in my new apartment and relax before the craziness of summer and bilingual camp descends upon me.

this afternoon i'm heading out to a "free garage sale" as the bilingual school teachers are heading out after their year of service. they leave behind all the things they either don't want, don't need, or just plain can't fit in their suitcases... us UPH-ers get to pick through for things we need. this comes at an especially convenient time for me since i'm just setting up shop. i'm sad to see my new friends depart, but i'm VERY thankful for their generosity!

[currently reading] Utopia, Thomas More

One of the blessings about being in a small town with few options for social night life is that I catch up on reading I've been meaning to do for years. I picked this book up from a second-hand book store, or maybe even a rummage sale years ago and I've carted it around with me from place to place, promising myself I would read it. I have a secret love for it borne out of my love for the movie EverAfter (Drew Barymore quotes this book and my interest was sparked). So yesterday, after the usual Saturday cleaning, I cozied up with Utopia on my couch, enjoying a nice cross breeze between the front screen door and back door.

Now that I'm an adult and read for pleasure and not because my Hon. English III teacher is telling me to, I took the liberty and risk of reading the introduction. I'm not an introduction kind of person. In high school, when it was our assignment to read it, I never did because I thought it was a waste of time. I'm also the type to not read instructions before putting things together. If it looks easy enough, I just start piecing (I'm a hands-on learner).

This is what I've learned: READ THE INTRODUCTIONS! Although it was a good 30 pages, I enjoyed every moment of it. It included historical background and theory on the book. It explained the nomenclature and satire behind a great portion of More's work. It delved into what other books came to be that are similar to this, books that I would have never guessed to be a part of the same genre, books that I now also want to read. My understanding and appreciation for the actual book itself has been heightened exponentially because of the background information the introduction afforded me.

It's a wonder to me that I'm just now figuring this out. I am deeply sorry Ms. Gellar-Clark (Hon English III teacher) for not participating in that portion of the reading and lesson. I would have been a far better student had I read the introductions.

The funny thing is that I know I am the kind of person that likes background. When listening to sermons, I greatly appreciate it when the preacher puts the story or biblical passage in CONTEXT. Context adds volumes to understanding and analysis. Why should these books be any different?

Thank you Paul Turner (author of intro and translator of text from LATIN). I am a smarter person for having read your introduction. You are quite an intelligent human being.

pila [PEE-lah]

Here in Honduras, I have three options when it comes to laundry: 1) take it to the laundry lady [she weighs it and charges by the pound], 2) let it stay dirty [not the best smelling option], or 3) wash it myself by hand in the pila.

When I was here last year, I looked at the pila, recognizing it because we had one on our back porch in Mexico, but I had NO idea how to use it, nor did I know what it's called. Thankfully, Rachel, one of my co-workers, had lived in Ecuador for a number of years before coming here, so she knew quite well how to use a pila and graciously taught me.

Coming back to Honduras 3 weeks ago, I was planning on washing my own clothes. So far, my Saturday mornings consist of washing all the clothes I can fit on my two little clothes-lines on my back porch. Normally, all the clothes from the week don't fit, so I wind up having to wash Saturday night or Sunday morning as well, once the first round dries.

I've had a few adventures with my pila, even in the short time I've been using it. The first week, as I was getting used to the whole routine again, I wound up splashing water all over my back neighbors. The next week, as I was filling the basin, about a thousand small ants came pouring out of one of the corners. I'm guessing the basin hadn't been filled for a LONG time and the ants had happily set up their colony within the concrete. I wasn't sure whether to be disgusted at the sheer number of ants, or simply amazed. Either way, it was memorable.

getting cozy

i've hit the two-week mark, and yet it feels like i've been here forever [in a good, comfortable way]. i know where to shop, i know the names of the store owners. people know me on the street, and we greet each other as we pass.

i've been working on getting information, curriculum, and registration together for the two bilingual camps for UPH. youth come in and say hello, start conversations, ask questions. children stop by to visit after school before they head home for lunch. they give us bone-crushing hugs, and it's great.

my desk has my fingerprints all over it. i've made it mine. i gaze up at pictures of family, friends, and fiancée. i have it organized in a way that makes me comfortable. i'm getting cozy.

there have been quite a few days, while "taking care of business" that i stop short and think "this is my job. i'm working right now." and then i am exceedingly grateful that i get to do this. PRAISE GOD! He has blessed me immeasurably more than i deserve.

contrast

There's a big difference between life in Copan Ruinas, Honduras and life in Philadelphia, PA. I've been trying to mentally prepare myself for a while, but adjustments are never without their challenges.

Here, instead of battling with landlords about moldy bathrooms, the whole town battles with day-long power outages after storms so the electrical company can fix the lines (apparently this happens once a week). Instead of learning local highways and street names, here I'm learning the locations and main points of reference to be able to follow people's directions to a new place. In Philly, your water gets turned off when your landlord decides not to pay the bill, here, the water comes and goes without warning, having nothing to do with whether or not you paid, but more the whims of those in charge of the water. The contrast is stark, but anticipated, which makes it easier.

I've hit the ground running with the UPH team and will be working on a pretty steep learning curve as I prepare for two bilingual camps set to run in July. I'm excited to be here and the team of UPH staff and volunteers is a great, God-seeking, people-loving group. They know what it is to work, live, and play in community, not being perfect, but working things out in love. I know that being a part of this group will force me to grow in a million areas.

In an effort to keep posts consistent and short, I will give you more details about life and work in Copan Ruinas another week. :)

mom's surprise :)

On Friday night, we surprised my mom with a party for her 60th birthday. Anyone who knows my mother, knows that she looks AMAZING for 60, and therefore I have no qualms about openly sharing her age. [I hope she feels the same!]

We children had been planning this event since January of this year and felt quite proud that she had NO idea that we had planned it. We told her on Friday when she got home from school that she wasn't going to be working at Sal & Joe's and that "we kids wanted to do something special for her". The look of shock on her face told us that it all came as a complete surprise. There has been so much going on lately with family parties, Kristianna's return to the US and my upcoming [tomorrow!] departure, that she was way to preoccupied with all that to even begin to suspect anything was up.

It was a lovely evening of eating, songs (written for my mom), laughter, reminiscing, and making new memories with family and friends. My mom is pretty awesome. I'm really glad we were able to pull this off for her.