And secondly...HAPPY FATHER'S DAY to my awesome husband, Jeff, who is being a great dad all by himself while I am here.
Here is a shot of the ladies in their new dresses and shoes.
And here is a shot of the pastors in our group. The ones on the left are American, the ones on the right are Honduran. And That Guy in the middle is keeping us all entertained with his sarcasm and quick wit. He's been making fun of me and my camera since I got here--and I make fun of him right back. This was his idea of a pose after I was always asking the ladies to put a hand on their hip for their portrait pose. hahaha
Yesterday's trip was, shall we say, interesting. Our van was a diesel and loaded down with people and suitcases. Toss in the need for A/C and our 4 hour trip turned into 7. I.kid.you.not. There were times when we were going up the mountain that we were only going 20 miles per hour. I know this because I was sitting in the middle of the front seat. With no seat belt.
Later, we were told that the driver had been told to drive slowly and carefully through the winding mountain roads because my dad is having some health issues and I get car sick easily. Ironically, my dad and I were probably the most perturbed by the S.L.O.W. driving since we...uh...tend to be slight lead foots. Not only that but we were going uphill in first gear and engine was seriously begging to be shifted. hahahaha It took great restraint not to help the driver shift since my knee was touching the stick for 7 hours straight.
I think I've made it pretty well known how much I love cold Coke in a glass bottle. We stopped briefly and I ordered one but we had to leave right away. The cashier poured my soda into this bag, tied it up with a straw and handed it to me. Um...ok. It worked and still tasted good! :)
These gorgeous trees are all over the place. Love them!
Moooo!
Don't have a clue what this is.
Bananas are EVERYWHERE.
Old and new combined.
Colorful houses on a hillside in Tegucigalpa
We see this kind of exhaust a lot.
Yesterday was supposed to be our R&R day (aka, shopping day for the ladies) but everything was closed by the time we got to Tegucigalpa. Oh well.... We went to church this morning where my dad gave the sermon with a translator. I love worshiping the Lord with people from other cultures. Their music was hand-clappin, toe-stompin' and wonderful.
OK--Jeff--you might want to stop reading right now so that you don't have a stroke, but the translator is an attorney and she facilitates adoptions. She says there are 500 children in a nearby orphanage that are all adoptable. She was asking me if I would be interested in a set of premie twins. I made the mistake of looking at their picture. Don't worry, I didn't make any promises! She will be with us all week so I may see if there is anything we can do to help her with the kids she advocates for.
Today we traveled from Tegucigalpa to Choleteca. It was another drive through the mountains but this time were in a school bus. The mountains were SO beautiful. One of the medical students, Justice, was helping me take...oh...I don't know...about 100 pictures as we zoomed by. It got pretty comical as the two of us tried to figure out when to lower the window and when there would be a break in the trees for me to snap the photo. He would lower the window, I would crawl across the seat and he would watch for the tree break. "Ok--now!" he would say and I would take a ridiculous number of pictures. Maybe we will get one non-blurry one. Surprisingly, I only got a mild upset stomach during all that activity--thank you Sea Bands, you rock.
My dad preaching this morning.
Alter call
Our bus today
We saw a rainbow in the mountains
Beautiful mountains with clouds drifting low
Jerry with a weird pillow donated from the medical team and of course he had to play with it and call it a bedpan.
Accident we saw on the way.
We stopped to use the restroom and a pick-up truck with five policemen pulled around and behind us. I am pretty sure they came to protect us. Sadly, the dr*g cart*ls have been using Honduras instead of some of the other South American countries and things are not as safe as they used to be.
Not a road sign you see every day.
Tomorrow we start up again--two days of clinic, women's conference, portraits, etc. I am trying not to freak out at the bugs on the floor in my bathroom. Eeeek. I hate big bugs. (I'm sitting on top of the bathroom counter and trying to work up the courage to jump down and go to bed.) I can't even think about getting in the shower in the morning! There is also a monsoon sounding rainstorm going on right now so hopefully it will be gone by morning.
