Una semana llena

It's been about a week since I posted, I think... and what a full week it's been.

On Saturday 5 gringos from Tennessee arrived, and we had a welcome dinner for them at David's. So I was introduced to them, we chatted for a little bit, then they got settled in and we went to bed. The next day, we left for what would be a full and fully blessed week.

I wish I had the opportunity to post every day last week... each day was certainly an adventure. But I think I'll just give a few words and let the pictures do a lot of the talking... I'll put those up within the next couple of days.

The team came to do a medical mission; we went to three different villages (Monday-Wednesday) to give medical clinics for about 35 people in each village. These usually took about 3 or 4 hours... the rest of our time was spent visiting different villages where David has programs and praying for the villages and the pastors there. We also got to do a few cool touristy things that were kind of off the beaten path. We went to a river that had carved out a canyon... it was absolutely beautiful (again, I'll let the pictures do the talking). We also went to one of Guatemala's many places called Agua Caliente (hot water)... this one had a stream coming off a volcano or some other sort of natural heating mechanism, and fell into another stream by way of waterfall. It was beautiful, and was also one of the few truly hot showers I've had here... a great place. We also got to take a boat out to the Caribbean, to a town called Livingston (the town wasn't my favorite, but it was cool to see a little part of the Caribbean). Thursday, on our way home, we stopped by some Mayan ruins that were pretty sweet. And then we spent Friday through Saturday morning in la Antigua, and I got to walk around and see a good bit of the city.

Of course, all the touristy stuff was great, but there was some stuff this week that was tough and some stuff that was encouraging. Most of the medical issues were aches and pains, maybe a little malnutrition (but nothing very severe), and the occasional case of worms. But there were two people that really stick out in my mind. One was a woman we saw on the second day... we had to make a house call because she was too weak to go to the school where the clinic was. The prognosis of the two people with us who had medical experience was that she had tuberculosis... serious stuff. This was a pretty remote village, too, and the medical help she needs is pretty far away. We talked to the woman and her husband, and it turns out they are the only Christians in this village, so we prayed for her, which was a very powerful experience in a bamboo hut with about 4 or 5 people praying out loud at the same time in different languages. The other person that will stick with me for a very long time is a girl of about 3 years who had a mess of problems that I won't go into now. But she is certainly not cared for well, and isn't in a good situation. Ingrid is her name, if you wanna pray for her... she needs it.

And of course, a grand blessing of this week was getting to know the 5 great gringos who came from Tennessee. They're a fantastic group of people, and their visit was a huge blessing for me. If you guys are reading this now, I want to tell you thanks again for including me as part of your group and praying for me on multiple occasions. I'm keeping you guys in my prayers, and look forward to seeing you again down here soon and hearing about your continuing work for Christ's kingdom.

In other news, I moved homes today. I'm now in David's brother Claudio's house. He's got a wife and one son, Josh, and they've been very welcoming (of course, I knew Claudio before coming from talking to him at church). His house is also really nice, and I think I'll have consistent hot showers here which will definitely be a nice change.

Well, I think I'm of to bed. I'll try to post pictures in the next few days, and if you have questions about my week or just wanna hear more, post a comment and I can expand a little bit in my next post, which should hopefully be in the next few days.

And for you Carolina people: have fun on Spring Break! Miss you guys (and the non-Carolina people, too).

-Daniel