Panama City

Looking back the last couple of weeks have been a bit intense. It started in Nicaragua which was a good time (mostly cos my friend Aleeza (who I know from Mozambique) was with me!) but it just felt a bit weird. Nothing bad happened but it felt weird.

The week in Costa Rica was a bit sour with stuff being stolen - 3 girls things. None of my stuff, but not very nice at all. Laptop, ipod, phone, wallet, clothes, Clinique face products (I understand how upset this girl was!). Thankfully no passports went missing. I was then also super sick with dehydration. It took me a while to get over it but my friends took good care of me and fed me a couple of rehydrate satchets which really helped. But overall Costa Rica was very beautiful and I can see why so many Westerners go there on holiday or move there to "find themselves".

Costa Rica

Panama itself is lovely and the YWAM guys have been so welcoming and lovely to us, a downer was one of the guys on our team went missing for 36 hours and that totally freaked me and others out. We had guys in our team looking for him, we put in a formal missing persons report with the police, it was pretty intense. He's absolutely fine and came back on Monday morning much to our relief :)

Gamboa Union Church where we stayed - right across the road from the Panama Canal

The same day he came back (Monday 12th Dec) we'd had so little sleep cos we were worrying about him all Sunday night, we had to take one of our team to the airport as she was flying home to Germany. I didn't go to the airport, but on the way back they guys who did take her stopped at the Police Station in Panama City and our car was attempted to be hijacked while one of our team members was in the car. Not cool. Everything was fine and the car wasn't damaged at all but it's not a nice feeling.

Sleeping in the nursery of the church

We spent the rest of the week trying to figure out how to get us and our cars to Colombia. What a hassle (understatement of the uear). We could fly to Bogota but it's expensive (about $400). So we looked at boat etc options. This is the most complicated border crossing to do! We can't go by land as the Darien Gap (the land between Panama and Colombia)  is basically impassable - no roads, jungle so we'd need to chop our way through with a machete, malaria, danria fever from bug bites (or whatever it's called!), but more importantly the area is controlled by guerrillas and Colombian rebel training camps. So not a good option ;)

After 6 long days at the port dealing with seemingly impossible paperwork to get our vehicles shipped, plus hours spent online and phoning people trying to figure out how to get ourselves to Colombia we eventually got the cars on the ship the week before Christmas (at least I hope we did otherwise I'll be in for a horrible surprise when I get to Cartagena!!) and have flown ourselves to Cartagena (the coastal town when our cars should be shipped to). Due to availability we couldn't all fly together, so most of the team flew on the 20th and 4 of us are flying the 24th.

So it's been a bit rough the last little bit, but it's also definitely had some good points, like last week we went to a family of the church where we're staying for dinner and they treated us to an amazing Indian dinner, it was so good to be in a regular house again! Makes us realise how crazy our lifestyle is and how we really need to get some better more presentable clothes!! We've also been so blessed to have stayed in a surfers missionary base for the last week. It's been AMAZING!!! Our own beds, hot showers, fresh towels and blankets, wifi, couches, AC, such luxury!!! I think my next night of camping is going to be a bit rough!

Panama City

Sat morning (10th Dec) we had a healing ministry time at the Church where the pastor had spent the last week inviting people by word of mouth as well as through his radio station. What a time of ministry, God totally crashed in with people being touched by His Spirit and the power of His love. We had the afternoon off so a few of us did some sightseeing where we went to see a lock in the Panama Canal. That was such a highlight, learning about the history of the Panama Canal, how the locks work etc. Now it all makes sense, what a light bulb moment of understanding!! We're staying at Gamboa Union Church which is right opposite the Canal so we see the container ships sailing past all the time, easily one every 10min.

A few interesting facts I picked up from the afternoon at the tourist centre include: 

Ships pass through the Canal 24 hours a day; there are three locks, the one I'm near is on the Pacific side and is called Miraflores; two more locks are being built to enable more and bigger ships to pass through the Canal, they are scheduled to be completed in in 2014 which is exactly 100 years since the locks first became operational; when control of the Canal was handed over to Panama from the US it was from a Christian president (James Carter); and the cost for a ship to pass through the Canal is between $300,000-$400,000.

YWAM - Panama City (Fri 9 Dec)

Staying at the YWAM base is great, it's good to be settled for a week or so. We're sleeping in a church in various rooms like the nursery classroom and the sanctuary itself. YWAM are so happy to have us with them, it's been so great being treated with so much love. Friday was fun, we went out to look and pray for a hotel they're looking to buy in Panama City. We then went to minister in some slums in one of the poorest and dangerous parts of the city. Plan was to do it in the afternoon so we'd be there in the light which is ok, but we lost our contact in all the traffic (we had 3 cars following him in traffic worse than Joburg in rush hour) so we got there like an hour and a half late. Ministry was awesome, we were in a really rundown barely inhabitable block of flats with really poor inhabitants. One of the social problems of Panama is sexual perversion with it being the norm to have many kids with different fathers and no husbands, take advantage of young girls etc. A highlight of the ministry time include praying for a lady in a wheel chair and her getting up and walking. Yay God.

(PS I'm writing this feedback on this ministry time 5 days later and this is a report back from this night of ministry: 1. The girl in the wheelchair is still walking around; 2. Some of the guys in our team ministered over a gang member. That night he had been planning to do a robbery, but he was convicted of it before doing it so didn't - he had a vision of his destiny in hell right before he would've gone, so he didn't do it but instead gave his life to Jesus. Yay God. 3. The pastor there has been filled more with the gift of tongues so he is operating in more fulness which is great).

This photo is of the nursery room at Gamboa Union Church where 7 of us girls are sleeping. 

Panama City

Calling the mechanics to fix New Wine and all turns out well with just the battery needing to be replaced. I think it was a miracle where God just fixing our car of the other things which were wrong because the problems did not equate to just a battery needing to be replaced, like when the car broke down it was not because of a battery problem at all. 

Anyway, on the road to YWAM Panama City. During our lunch stop Josiah and I sneak out to get some birthday celebrations for Kurt's 30th birthday. We were doing so well until I ran straight into Kurt on the way to picking up the cake at the supermarket. Err. I tried to sneaking off but he came with me to the store, err, I sent him on his way, went quickly to the cake area at the front of the store to find Josiah looking ever so proud of himself having ordered the cake and got "Happy Birthday Kurt" written with icing on it. Quick change of plans, Josiah on a mission to distract Kurt, I do my best to sneak out of a big Supermarket across an open parking lot to our car carrying a big blue cake. Mission successful. Feeling very proud of ourselves we drive off, only to hear a crash as we pull out the parking lot. A sleeping bag fell on our cake, crushing half of it. Aaarrghhh!! Oh well. 

Kurt's somewhat squashed birthday cake

Driving goes well until we hit this rickety old bridge crossing the Panama Canal (it felt like we were driving along railway sleepers). Long story short, we slip and get stuck between two sleepers, cause a traffic jam, have a couple of upset people scream at us, most people were nice and helped us by pushing the car, while another pulled us out, we called for help from the rest of our team. During this time my first thought is we need to hide the cake from Kurt, when who is the first person to help us but Kurt. Half an hour later and we were out with one bust tyre and a bunch of happy people able to drive across the bridge.

Fixing New Wine's very broken tyre

Birthday celebrations for Kurt were a success, even if we gave him a slightly mushed cake ;) The fun of a water pistol fight afterwards certainly made up for it, not to mention the fun of the pinyadas. Let me explain, and then look at the photo to understand the pinyada: it's a 3 foot doll made of paper mache filled with candy and boiled sweets. You hang it from the ceiling, blindfold your mate, spin them around at least a dozen times, give them a stick and then leave them to swing and (hopefully) hit the hanging pinyada. The point is to break the Pinyada down so to get to the candy inside.

Brent giving the pinyada a jolly good swipe

Breck and Josiah messing around with the remains of the Pinyada

Border crossing day - Costa Rica to Panama

So today (Wed 7 Dec) was an interesting border crossing day. It started with 10min into our 20min drive to the border (Costa Rica to Panama) New Wine (one of our cars) had car troubles, turned out a pipe had come loose so we used nearly all our drinking water to refill the radiator. Not having drinking water for a long border crossing is not the best in heat like this. 5 hours of border crossing pain included queuing for 4.5 hours, Josiah (one of our Aussie team members) and I being sent back to guard the cars for an hour or two, which was a good thing as a couple of guys were paying way too much attention to one of our cars and felt obliged to touch one of the RVs... The front of the queue was crazy, people pushing in from everywhere, people being sent to the back of the queue numerous times, and more... I then spent 1.5 hours deboning chicken and cutting veg for lunch while sweating like a crazy lady, dang it's hot here!! 

Panama Border Crossing

On the road eventually and New Wine calls in to say they have trouble with the car, they can't get the gas to go. Turns out it's because they were out of gas! That was a nice easy trouble to solve. And made the rest of us in the other cars laugh :) During this time of checking the car a few of us popped out the cars to go pee in the RV. Picture the scene: run 2 cars up to the RV to pee (in desperate need by this stage). A policeman is checking us at the same time, he asks for my passport, I tell him it's in the other car, he tells me to go back and get it. Aaarrghh. So I run back to get my passport, show it to him and try run back to the RV to pee (time is of the essence before Jesse drives off in the RV), he unfortunately doesn't let me off so easily, he looks at other peoples passports then mine in detail and asks me if I'm married. No. Really? Yes really. Boyfriend. No. Really? Yes really. Can he get my phone number? No. I don't have a phone with me. Really? Yes really. Finally grab my passport (note to self, switch my ring to my wedding finger in this country) and run to the RV. As I'm peeing Jesse starts driving off. Aarrggh. Shout that I'm in the toilet, guys in the RV laugh, Jesse stops, I get out and run back to my car. What a lot of effort just to go to the toilet. 

Later on it wasn't so funny when New Wine had trouble again, this time the steering wheel wouldn't work and the car literally broke down so we had to tow it nearly two hours at dusk to the closest town. The towing went well until we had to pull over as we'd lost the other RV. During this time we discovered that Panama definitely has the highest police presence we've seen for a while. There must've been a cop car on the side of the road every 5 minutes. While we were waiting for the RV police pulled up to see what was wrong. They turned out to be really nice, we explained who we were (missionaries), ministered to them and I gave them a bible. They called a hotel ahead to organise for us to stay there, 15min away. Unfortunately we missed the turnoff to the hotel so we had to cross 2 lanes of traffic and do an illegal U-turn to get back, during rush hour. After spending 10min figuring out the best way to do it, we took so long that more cops came to see why we were pulled over on the side of the road. After a bit of sweet talking they not only let us off but stopped the traffic for us so we could cross safely. Nice :)

The hotel was amazing. We put up our popups in the parking lot and some people slept in a room, we had use of the restaurant, free wifi, a great pool and a hot shower with clean hotel towels. And only $4 each!! 

Costa Rica - Coco Beach

Costa Rica was an interesting week. We spent half our time camping on Coco Beach. It was a beautiful but very touristy area. The beach was beautiful and free which was great, except that not being a campsite we had no ablution facilities. That wasn't as great. We were planning on being there just a night but that one night turned into 3. During this time we did different ministry, like some people went treasure hunting, ministered in close villages, etc. I went with Liz to a beach 2 hours away which is where one of our team members Diane's daughter-in-law Rhiannon tragically drowned a month ago. Liz went with Diane to Costa Rica to support her when the accident occurred, so we went there to pray for Diane, her family and LIz. It was amazing as we found the teenage boy who saved Rhiannon's 6 year old son and hear his testimony of what happened. He was such a hero in saving the boy, but unfortunately he wasn't able to save both of them.

Camping on Playa de Coco (Coco Beach)

It was a special day but unfortunately by this time I was supersonically sick with dehydration which I'd had for a few days. The rest of the day is a bit of a blur but it wasn't pretty, I hadn't been that sick in a really long time. It took me a few days to recover so Costa Rica is a bit of a blur as I really wasn't up for doing much. We stayed at a few more random RV parks on the way to the border before crossing into Panama.

Sun setting over Playa del Coco

Nicaragua - Jinotepe

Family night jamming outside 

Nicaragua we stayed at a town called Jinotepe for a week or so at a church missionary base. It was so great staying in my own bed!! A major highlight was that my friend Aleeza (we know each other from Mozambique earlier this year) came to visit me for a few days so that was so great, we spent a lot of time just hanging out, she really encouraged me and this was a good refreshing time for me. Some of our team were staying at an orphanage close by in a neighbouring village so we went up there a few times to minister and play with the children, held a couple of church services and one afternoon we went into the neighbourhood barrio (township) which was so great, we shared the gospel with so many people and had so many beautiful children hanging onto us. All was well until I saw a lice jump onto my arm, and then I saw all the lice literally crawling through the kids hair. Err.... The memories of our lice outbreak in Guatemala were just too close to home! Another day included taking the bus into Leon, a town 3.5 hours away by bus to see Central America's largest Cathedral. Pretty disappointing if you've been to any Cathedral in Europe. But a good day out. While I was in Leon some other people from the team went to minister at a local seaside village which was a great success.

Nicaragua is a really beautiful country, quite rural in many ways, like the roads are made up of buses, cars, pedestrians, cyclists plus don't forget all the horse and carts as well as just men riding horses! Lots of horses. Kind of felt like I was driving through a big farm which happened to be a country called Nicaragua.

A highlight of the week was a family night where the team hung out as a family. It started with a bit of a dance party outside (see the photo above with Josiah demonstrating a swan dive for us) and finished with us blessing and praying for 3 of our team members who were leaving the group and going home the next day. Maria, Victor and Serena we love and miss you guys! 

To Guatemala and back: 3 countries, 4 border crossings, 24 hours driving time, 36 hours total travelling time

Tanya, Jesse, Zoe, Victor, Melissa and I left at 7am on Sunday to go pick up our car from Guatemala. First blessing was being able to hitch a ride on the back of a pickup from right outside our hotel. Stopped for gas and got American hot dogs for brunch. Lesson for the day: don't try feeding a hot dog with every sauce under the sun (plus carrots and cauliflower as an added extra (FYI not a great addition) ) to a 2 year old in a moving vehicle over bumpy roads.

Jesse, Tanya and Melissa in the back of the pickup

The messy hot dog...

After going past the driver's house, we met his family and then negotiated for him to take us through El Salvador to the Guatemala border.

Crossed the Honduras-El Salvador border quickly and easily, the (local) car was quicker than us on foot. Drove through El Salvador in a matter of hours before being dropped at the El Salvador-Guatemala border. Quick border crossing - crossing on foot is sooo much easier than crossing with foreign cars.

Once over the border we were blessed with getting a ride on the back of another pickup all the way to Guatemala City. It was a pretty crazy tide, driving 80-120km an hour overtaking every car through bending mountain passes with potholes. No wonder I was car sick :( The good part was that we got there pretty quickly! After being dropped off somewhere in the middle of Guatemala City we managed to flag down the smallest taxi in the whole city to take us to collect our car. 6 adults, one toddler plus our bags. Squeeeeze!!!

Collecting our car was fun, even if paying for it made the mechanic laugh - we didn't have enough quetzales (Guatemala local currency) in team money so we all pulled out our own money (which wasn't very much!) plus luckily I had some $'s so that saved the day. Our test drive landed up being all the way to Antigua, a whole other town!

Dinner at Pizza Hut was amazing (we hadn't eaten since our hot dogs for brunch so we were definitely tired and hungry!), but even better was staying at the Holiday Inn, the poshest hotel yet. It was amazing. Unfortunately we didn't get the best night of sleep, even though the beds were amazing - Zoe was restless (she's only nearly 2), Tanya was up with allergies, and I had a bad dream so woke everyone up by screaming in my sleep. Sorry guys :)

Monday was another early start as we made the drive back to Honduras. Driving in our car was definitely more comfortable than the back of a pick up truck, but the border crossings were a little painful getting the car across. BUT so much quicker than taking the 5 cars across so that was good. The afternoon was quite intense as Jesse had to drive as fast as possible to make the El Salvador-Guatemala border crossing in time. Which we did :)

Some funny quotes from the day:

1. Victor: I like driving, it's like being in a video game, dodging the potholes as I drive

2. Melissa to Victor (driving): turn on your headlights
Victor: they are on
Melissa: no, the spotlights
Victor: they are on
Melissa: oh gosh, our lights suck

3. Victor: if I drove with my head torch on I'd have more light

Choluteca - Honduras

Thursday's border crossing day went reasonably well. It only took 3 hours (the quickest so far) and was reasonably cheap and pain free, unless of course you're a registered car owner, then border crossings are always painful - long, hot and filled with chaos and disorder.

The drive was average with a now normal event of the back left tyre in the pop up tent blowing up. It's happened so often we know exactly where the important things like jacks are at all times and I reckon we've now got the changing of the tyre down to about 10min.  What was less exciting were the sparks and smoke that later came from the pop up as the axle final broke. It was beyond repair for that time of the night so we left it beside the road and carried on the remaining 25 miles to our destination. We'd pulled over right next to a house so we'd hardly been there 5 seconds before we had a crowd of 15 local guys helping us.

We're now camping in the football field of a hotel. The hotel is beautiful, a real hotel unlike the last one we stayed in in Guatemala which featured cockroaches, mould and mildew, not to mention the gun shot sounds right outside. Those of us who usually sleep in the pop up tent trailer are now in tents. I think we're enjoying having our own space (sharing the pop up with 5 others is VERY cramped). I for one am grateful I have a great tent :) On a side note this is the first time I've slept by myself in 10 weeks.

My tent is the green one. The car in the background is Jesse and

Tanya's RVwhich we use for cooking in, amongst other things

Word is that the car we left in Guatemala is now ready so Tanya and Jesse will bus it back to Guatemala, pick up the car and drive it back. That should take 3 or 4 days we reckon. In the meantime we're praying and asking God what we should do ministry wise in Honduras for the next few days. The original plan was to head into the mountains, riding donkeys to reach unreached people groups but our contact person for doing that is now in America as we are a few weeks late (with all our car troubles we are behind schedule).

And to end off on a positive note the pop up trailer is now back with us, having being welded back into shape by a mechanic. These pop ups were really not designed for the type of terrain we take them through so we continue to pray that they last at little bit longer...

One of our pop up trailers

El Salvador - some interesting facts

El Salvador has a reputation for violence and drugs so I asked one of the YWAM guys about this. Turns out the reputation is true, El Salvador is the most violent country in Central America. Good to know. Below are a few I interesting facts I've since discovered:

Most of the violence is drug related, so foreigners (like me mom!) don't need to be over scared. The two main gangs are 18th Street and MS 13 (Mara Salvatrucha). MS 13 is the most dangerous gang in the world, they're known for their gruesomeness, like they don't just kill someone, they'll butcher them to death. 

El Salvador had a civil war between 1980 and 1992. During this time the MS 13 gang was formed in Los Angeles - the founding members were children of immigrants fleeing the civil war in El Salvador. When the gang members returned home to El Salvador (after being deported from the USA), the MS 13 gang was brought back to El Salvador. 

El Salvador has a population of 6 or 7 million people, with 2.5m of them being in the capital, San Salvador. It's safer outside of San Salvador, in the countryside, because of the drug and gang related violence in the city. 

Tattoos signify involvement in a gang (people are often tattooed head to toe), so in ministry some of our guys have needed to cover the tattoos on their arms etc before ministering. People can be arrested on suspicion of being involved in a gang.

El Salvador has an average of 13 homicides per day. 

80% of the country has heard the gospel (mostly Catholic), but very few are really walking out their salvation in a true relationship with Christ, so these people desperately need discipling in Jesus.

There is a big divide between rich and poor, with a very small middle class, although this is growing. 14 rich families (and their extended families) control the wealth in El Salvador (through businesses etc). Kinda makes me think of the mafia in Sicilly... 

There are 26 volcanoes in El Salvador, only one is active. 

A difference between Guatemala and El Salvador: at the Guatemala side of the border there was a poster showing photos of 2 missing children; at the El Salvador side there was a poster showing photos of at least 50 fugitives. Yes this is a country of violence.

On a personal note I have not felt any less safe here than I do at home in South Africa! 

Ministering in La Libertad

Sunday I went to two church services. I hadn't been to church for a while (with all our car troubles and ministering to unreached people over the last few weeks rather than being part of organized churches) so it was kinda weird! The morning church was in the garage of a home in a rough neighborhood which had secured entry, like in Joburg where neighbourhoods are cordoned off by armed security guards. There were mostly kids attending the service, the pastor fetches them from rougher neighbourhoods - their parents don't come as they tend to be in prison etc. It was great bringing freedom to this church and seeing the congregation being touched by God.

Victor preaching with the pastor 

The evening service was wild. It was at a different church an hour outside San Salvador at La Libertad (FYI one of the best surf spots in Central America) right near the coast, driving was beautiful and I enjoyed seeing the country - El Salvador is pretty small so driving across it is pretty quick! We lead the service and afterwards had a great time of ministry, praying for people, prophesying, healings, we even did a fire tunnel where people encountered the power of God though the Holy Spirit. It was wild. My nephew had a t-shirt when he was about 2 that said "chaos, mess, mayhem, my work here is done" and I must admit I felt that was appropriate for our team that night. At the end of the night people were thanking us for the fiesta!! In the beginning of the ministry time so many people were weeping with raw emotion, by the end they were dancing out the church with joy. Yay God.

Evening service before the chaos took over...

People set free in the presence of God, I love it!!

Ministering in San Salvador

Tuesday has been another full day of ministry. In the morning I went to minister at a drug rehab centre in the city. It was so fun. Our team shared testimonies and then we ministered to the men and prayed for them. I loved my time with them. The afternoon was good to - we had some homeless men come to the YWAM base in San Salvador where we're staying for showers, a meal and some sharing of the gospel. Plus some fun hanging out loving them time :)

The Drug Rehab Centre

Apart from the ministry, today's highlight was definitely finding the flip flops I've been looking for since mine broke in Mexico (yes, that's 4 countries ago) for only $6 - in South Africa they would've been more than $30. For real. Why I'm so happy is finding good quality shoes (or anything) in Central America can be a challenge - the replacement flip flops I bought at WalMart suck, they hurt my feet. Plus an amazing cup of real coffee, my first in months... How to make me happy :)

Ministering in Pica

Monday was a long day out in a village called Pica which is a couple of hours out of San Salvador. What a fun day of ministry, even if we were super squashed driving there and even more on the way home (10 people driving there in a car that seats 8 tightly, 11 people on the way home as we picked up the pastor to). We went to the church where we were treated to fresh coconuts courtesy of the pastor. He hacked them open himself with a machete for us to drink and eat them. As soon as I'm able to upload photos I'll upload some pics, it was a lot of fun!

We walked around the village inviting people to a service at 2pm, prayed for people and just hung out with them. It was awesome, this type of thing is the best way to get to know a culture. The church was good as in the beginning the people were really reserved and but by the end after we'd shared the gospel with them and ministered to them you could see a tangible difference in them, a lightness in their spirit and hope in their eyes. There were physical and emotional healings to. I spent most if the service playing with the children outside. So fun, especially hanging out and talking to them. I made a little boy cry because I'm white (he was only a toddler and hasn't seen many white people!) and another little boy wiped his nose in my hair. Gross. Even more gross was the outhouse toilet - a longdrop up 5 stairs (so definitely a throne room) with cockroaches. Both onside and outside the toilet. For real. Even the bonus of having toilet paper there already didn't make up for toilet - I would've preferred to go behind a bush but we were at church so I thought that would be rude.

El Salvador - Ooh, this is nice...

Saturday was another entertaining border crossing day. It went pretty smoothly (and only took 3.5 hours in total) until we drove over the bridge (from Guatemala to El Salvador) to hear that Ben was having problems at immigration as he apparently only had a 1 day visa (the rest of us have 90 day visas). Summary of the story is he went back to Guatemala, avoided paying a $140 fine by paying less for a 5 day visa. Now in San Salvador he's been to immigration a few times trying to get it fixed... The 90 day visa is needed for the 4 countries Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua. We're not sure why he only got a 1 day visa, the immigration official into Guatemala must  just being uncool by doing it.

We arrived safely in San Salvador (the capital) in the evening where we're staying at a YWAM base. San Salvador is like America but in Spanish. There's Burger King and other famous American restaurants and stores everywhere. It's because a third of El Salvadorians are in America and when they come back to El Salvador they want the American things they've grown accustomed to in the US. I have a bunch of other interesting facts about El Salvador which I'll put in a separate blog entry.

The YWAM base is so nice, such luxury. Actually not really, but our standards are pretty low so even very small things impress us. Like having our own beds (even though we're in a dorm that sleeps 8), showers (even though the room I'm in is the only room that only has cold water showers), lights in our bedroom and bathroom, a toilet seat (even though the shower, hand basins and toilet are only separated by curtains so not much privacy), plus our meals are prepared for us so no food shopping for me (I go nearly every day usually and it's a long tiring experience). Pretty good for $20 a day. Oh, and they even have a swimming pool, that's pretty cool. Plus having benches to sit on for meals definitely beats eating (from generally dirty plates) standing up while being bitten by bugs which is usually the case for us as we don't have chairs and are usually camping in random places. 

We've split into teams to do ministry every day. It's been so great, having them organize stuff for us to do, plus I've experienced few different ministries which I've never done before so that's been great.

It's a bugs life

Today (Friday) involved 2.5 hours of shopping for team food at a local market. It was chaos. Felt like I was in Delhi, definitely worse than Waterloo train station in rush hour. I was pushed by scary old women half my size, men and boys pushing wheel barrows and trolleys laden with goods, was a total overcrowding. To get through one traffic jam I climbed underneath a table (a mans' store). Yes I did. The good thing was the amazingly good quality of fruit and vegetables, much better than what we get in local Supermarkets, plus pretty cheap, especially as I went with the local ladies who work at the orphanage. No gringo prices for me today. A pound of yummy strawberries for less than a dollar. Nice.

Our car (the Durango) is still not fixed so we will be heading to El Salvador tomorrow without it. Whenever it's fixed Tanya and Jesse will fly back to pick it up and drive it to whichever country we're in, maybe Hondurous. 

One thing I have enjoyed while we've been hanging out in Chimaltenango is that there haven't been many mosquitoes or other critters biting us so this has (finally) given us a bit of respite and allowed my otherwise heavily bit up legs a chance to recover. The bad news is that the mossies appear to have been traded in for lice. Aaaargghhh!!! I can't win. Apparently lice are to be expected if you work with kids or are a missionary, they just come with the territory. The cup of suffering with the cup of joy. After 2 days of delicing ourselves 2 of us in our camper (that sleeps 6) who are (hopefully) clear have decided to sleep inside a room in the orphanage tonight as the girls we sleep next to still have lice. So now I am sleeping in what I guess is used as a store room? I'm on my dad's hiking/camping mattress sleeping on a cement floor with a bag of dog's pellets in the corner. It's days like these that I wonder "is this what my life has come to?" 

Monday we were on the road again, assured by locals that the roads were still bad but not as bad as we'd just been through. This time they were right, the roads weren't as bad as the night before. Looking back I think it's better we drove that patch in the dark, so we couldn't see how bad it really was! It still took us about 8 hours to do less than 80km. That's what happens when you're still driving in first gear due to a broken transmission. We made up for the tiredness from the day before and slow driving by having a great girl jamming day in the car.

We arrived at an orphanage in Chimaltenango near Antigua, which is where Christian's friend Branden and his team are at about 4pm. So we are now camping out in the road/driveway outside an orphanage for children with special needs in a town called Chimaltenango. The missionary team were really cool (they've left now). they're a group of young American people part of the World Race, a missionary team that goes to 11 countries in 11 days. So again we're waiting for the car to be fixed. Plus a few other maintenance things, like more spare tyres... The orphanage has been so welcoming, letting us use their washing machine and Internet. It's the small things that make all the difference... Like having a toilet seat in the toilet... Seriously, this is enough to make any of the girls days.

Possibly the worst thing we've had to deal with is a lice outbreak within the team. Seriously. About a half a dozen of us have had them so we've sent the last 2 days washing our hair with chemicals and de-licing each other. Gross. I really hope we're all clear now, I guess time will tell...

Wednesday was a fun day, we drove through Antigua to go climb a volcano. It was actually quite intense hiking 2 hours up a mountain to the top of the volcano at 2305m. The first half of the hike was great, the second half was a little scary as it was up the side of the volcano - the 60 degree angle with loose stones made it quite a scramble, a definite 2 steps up 1 step back. The view from the top definitely made it worth it, even if it was so cold at that height from the wind that fingers were going numb.

We are still waiting for the car to be fixed. We're hoping it comes back today so we can leave for El Salvador tomorrow but that is looking less likely as it's 5:48pm and no sign of the car yet...

Protected by angels

Now Sunday is where it gets interesting. We started the day with an early morning team meeting of praise and worship as we sought the Lord on what we should do, given the fact that the Durango's transmission was not as fixed as we'd hoped, and at best could only be driven in 1st gear which equates to about 30miles an hour. One of the words we got from God for the team is to "go slow". Which is definitely happening as we are once again stranded with car problems. We decided to head to a town called Chimaltenango which is near the town of Antigua which is where friends of Christian (one of our team members) are visiting missionaries at an orphanage. The first couple of hours went well, but after lunch is when things started to go wrong. First of all, at about 3:30pm one of the tyres in our pop-up tent trailer burst. The whole thing, to the point of us literally driving on the rim of the tyre. Err. So we pull over and put on our spare tyre. Thank you to the guys for being so great at changing tyres on the side of the road. 

On the road again. Yay. Before we start heading up the mountain on the worst roads I've been on since we used to go on family holidays to Namibia and other African countries when I was a child. We apparently were a few villages entertainment. Well I'm not surprised. 22 gringos driving in 1 motor home, 1 camper van, two 4x4s pulling pop-up tent trailers plus a station wagon through rural villages up a mountain in Guatemala. We got such a welcome all the way, people came out onto the roads to wave hello and greet us, and of course laugh at us. The best was someone took a photo of us - I suppose 4 white girls driving the Suburban 4x4 pulling a pop-up trailer with the music pumping is not an everyday occurrence for a quiet Sunday afternoon in a rural Guatemalan village.

We got lost at a few intersections as our car got way behind a few of our cars in front of us for a number of reasons, such as having to stop for a group of cows and calves walking up the road. The cow showed her discontent by mooing loudly as she walked past us. Next traffic jam was an old man crossing the road. That took a while waiting for him to get across. Lucky for us, being the only gringos in town at every fork in the road there was a local outside staring at us and able to point us in the direction of the rest of our other crazy gringo cars. 

One of the challenges was not knowing where we were exactly, how long it would get to our destination or whether the roads would get any worse. The answer to these questions landed up being we wouldn't get to our planned destination, we would get to the town on San Juan de Chol at 11pm (some people said it was an hour away, others said 2, others said we'd not get there so should turn around), and yes the roads would get worse. Much worse. One of the challenges with driving on these roads is that they are barely wide enough for one car to drive on. So when a truck comes from the opposite direction. Well... 

It kinda went wrong at about 18:30 when half way up a ridiculously steep rough road we hear the dreaded "ssshhh" as the air went out our recently replaced tyre on the pop-up trailer. Yes our second flat tyre for the day. Drat. Double drat is that we didn't have another spare. Our plan B was that hopefully we could use the spare from the other pop-up trailer. Unfortunately the other 3 cars were way ahead of us (oh ja, with flat radios so we couldn't radio them to stop for us). So off Taylor ran to catch up with them and bring back a spare. So there we were, 2 cars and a bunch of peeps just hanging out on the side of the mountain as the sun starts going down. And of course that would be a great time for a car to come from the other direction. Err, so we had to drive the trailer (with the wheel on it's rim as the tyre was blown) out the way. Did I mention the road was steep, rocky and barely wide enough for one car let alone two??

Taylor eventually comes back with Jesse and Victor (great) but no spare tyre (not great). Turns out the other pop-up trailers tyres have a different tread or something to our trailer. Ok, this was not good. No spare, needing to fix the tyre in the side of a cliff, the rim of the tyre was bent (we think that's how the puncture came about). Victor and Taylor were absolute troopers using some seriously creative techniques in fixing the tyre which involved tying a string (which happens to be Rowan and Gillian's washing line) around the tyre, pumping air into it, using grease to get the tyre back onto the wheel, pumping more air, using tyre silicon to fill the tyre, pumping more air, and by some miracle this actually worked and an hour and a half later we were back on the road. 

So 8pm, we met up with the rest of our group, put the car in 4 wheel drive and off we went. 10min into the drive and we start driving past some of our team walking up the road. Turns out it was safer to walk than to drive in the motor home as things were flying out the cupboards in the motor home - Natalie got hit in the eye with the shampoo bottle, Roberta somehow has a massive bruise on her underarm... So I took Zoe (she's only 23 months old) so she could sleep on my lap (easier than her mom carrying her while walking up the side of a mountain pass and safer than being in the motor home at that moment). 

10min later we start sliding, lose complete grip of the road and part of the car starts being a bit too close to the edge of the cliff. Before we knew it the guys from the cars in front come running full speed towards us to help us. I guess that's what happens when Gillian runs to the cars shouting "the Suburban's going over the edge of the cliff". We weren't. We were fine. But good to know that the others will come running in a heartbeat when needed. To get going we had to dislodge the trailer from the car, have a dozen people push the car to get it to more firm ground, push the trailer to, and reconnect it to car again. 

Off we go again. We then get to some water across the road so we stopped the cars to check out the best way to navigate the road ahead. Turns out we had to drive fairly quickly through the river, but not too much as there was a 90 degree turn right after. All passed through successfully but boy was it stinky!! A little while later I see a metal pipe hanging underneath the motor home. Later on Jesse gets out to see what the metal pipe is, rips it out and hooks it onto the ladder on the outside of the motor home and carries on going. It turns out it was the poop pipe from the motor home (it has a toilet in it). So the stinky part we'd been driving through was our sewage. Gross. 

We finally arrived (exhausted but in good spirits) in the town of San Juan de Chol. The final straw was that to get to the hotel (this was not a night to find a campsite) the road dropped at a 90 degree angle onto a dirt road, like you were driving down a step. Not cool for the station wagon which has such a low clearance. Taylor (the station wagon is his car) provided us with great entertainment as he got out the car and started getting rocks from the side of road to build a "ramp" to soften the angle for the car. He suddenly stops, removes the rocks, gets back in his car and floors it to rather try clear the ramp as best as possible. It was so awesome to watch.
Unfortunately the hotel was less awesome (seriously budget), but we were so exhausted I would've slept on the floor, anywhere. 

Looking back on this day, all we can say is that we were protected by angels. Lots of them. There is no way our mottly crew of cars should've made it through that mountain okay.

Mechanics...

Sunset over the lake

Soo.... Saturday got off to a good start with us heading out from El Remate towards Guatemala City. Until we had to pull over numerous times to restart the the supposedly fixed car which apparently is not so fixed. Result was having to drive the car in first gear for the rest of the day. Actually the next 3 days it turned out. We landed up staying the night up a mountain at a supposedly camping place called Playa Escondida (means hidden beach in Spanish) near the town of Mariscos. The name is very apt as it was pretty hidden. The beach was actually Lake Isabel which is the largest lake in Guatemala City. Quite beautiful. Especially the sunset.

Thank you

To the person who deposited some money in my bank account, thank you so much, it is so appreciated and needed :)

God's provision

We have needed quite a lot of money for car issues. One being to fix the transmission in the Durango, the other is to transfer ownership of the Suburban (it's currently in our team member Maria's name, but because we've been so delayed, and she's going home to the US for Christmas, we'll be getting to Panama without her, and we can't cross borders without the owner of the car being present). Being missionaries living by faith (this means most of us are supported financially by friends, family, local churches etc), we don't have very much money! Well, long story short, but the summary is we didn't need to get the transmission part from the States, the mechanic got it from Guatemala City, which means it'll be sooo much cheaper. Plus we have received money as a gift from Bethel Church and an anonymous donor from Australia, just the right amount to cover fixing the car and to change the car ownership, so praise God for providing for us.

Our team had a cultural evening last night watching the movie Apocalypso. I wasn't able to watch it as it is very gruesome (maybe I'll be able to watch it in the daytime rather than right before bed!), which is a pity as it's set here in Guatemala where I am. It's about the Mayan people. Of particular relevance is that it shows their human sacrifices which took place at the Tikal ruins, which we went to on Sunday. To counteract all the blood and human sacrifices which have taken there historically, we took communion on the highest ruin to symbolically demonstrate the sacrifice of Jesus' blood. If we did nothing else in Guatemala other than this spiritual warfare, our whole time would be worthwhile.

Mayab ruins

Guatemalan ladies in traditional dress

Rose, me and Caitlyn standing on one of the ruins

Our team taking communion on top of the highest ruin

Being flexible includes taking communion with whatever we have... 

today this included tortillas and Gatorade!

The team has spent time during this week ministering to individual people we've met in the village, ran a children's program in the playground, went to San Jose (a town about an hour away) to minister, plus other stuff. San Jose was fun, it completely poured with rain, we got soaked, had to wait out the rain, plus ministered to a few people and a lady's headache was healed.

Unfortunately one of our team member's has left the trip suddenly due to a family tragedy. Her daughter-in-law drowned in a rip tide in Costa Rica last week. We trust she'll be able to return to the trip when she's ready, but for now she'll be taking care of her 2 grandchildren in the States.

Plan from now is to head off towards Guatemala City in the next day or two once the car is fixed, do some prison ministry there, and then head to El Salvador on about Tuesday. But this plan could change at any time!

Guatemala

Thursday (27 Oct) was a successful day of crossing the border into Guatemala, but very sad saying goodbye to Godfrey. We set him up with a place to stay for a month in San Ignacio and we trust God will provide him with a job soon. He was our treasure we found in the dark in Belize. We trust that he will continue to walk strong in the Lord and that God will bring him more people to teach him how to walk with God.

The border crossing was interesting. Apparently paying the entry fee into Guatemala is optional. Some of us were charged, others refused to pay, to which the official said ok, so those who paid went back and asked for a refund, which they got. Hmm. So we are witnessing the corruption of Guatemala first hand being barely 2ft over the border. Guatemala apparently has 40% evangelical Christians but the country is still pretty broken, lots of drug related issues. Plenty of ministry opportunities available here!

This is where our plans have gone a bit haywire. Plan was to stay here 5 days before heading to El Salvador 1 Nov. The first contact where we were supposed to stay on the first night fell through on the day. Then our other contact fell through the next day. So we're here with no contacts or plans. Hmm. Which is actually a spot of luck as after the border crossing the transmission in one of our cars broke. So we had to tow it to a mechanic in the next tiny town, and that's where it's been since Thursday 27 Oct. We couldn't get the part here in Guatemala, so a couple of guys on the team went back to
Belize on Friday to try get it there, no luck so it has to be ordered and imported from the US, which is going to cost a lot and take how long... On Sat the mechanic went to Guatemala City where he'd look for the part so we hope he comes back with some good news...

The original plan was to spend Thursday nights at Tikal National Park so we could go see the Myan ruins on Friday. Staying there was expensive and we didn't like it all - sooooo many bugs and snakes in the grass so we headed back to camp in the nearby town of El Remate. The campsite was too small for us so we landed up camping for free for 2 nights in a parking lot next to the lake. Classy. The good thing is that it was free, not so cool is that there was no electricity, water or bathrooms plus kids around us all the time, sunrise to bedtime, selling us stuff.

Because of having to look for the car part in Belize in Friday, the Tikal ruins were postponed till Sunday. So the last few days, and for as long as is necessary, have been free chill and ministry time. I for one have really needed and enjoyed having time out, free to press into God and get refreshed.

We have now moved down the road where we're camping at a hotel, between the hotel and the beautiful big lake. Definitely an improvement as we now have access to a bathroom (no shower though) and electricity. There is a makeshift shower outside which we can use so that's good, we just need to wear our swimming costume as it's out in the open. When we arrived here on Saturday I was so desperate for a shower I didn't wait for the shower but just used the garden hose! Yes it was so worth it! And needed ;)

View of the lake from where we camped at the end of the hotel

Divine God appointments through chocolate cake

Wednesday we've driven to San Ignacio where we're spending the night before we cross the border into Guatemala on Thursday. Well that's the plan at least, anything could happen as our plans change all the time... A highlight for the day was homemade chocolate cake for Natalie's birthday. Amazing. What's more amazing is the testimony of how we got the cake. In the morning Liz (a friend on the team) asked Jesus for a great cake for Natalie's birthday. Later that afternoon when driving into town a man rode past on his bicycle selling cake. After sampling the cake and deciding it was amazing, there wasn't enough cake for all 24 of us so the man rang his wife to ask her to make us a (big) cake. Which she did. 3 hours later and we went to their house to pick it up. Chatting to the wife we discovered she's a Christian to. Liz shared how she'd asked God for a cake that day, and how this lady was an answer to that prayer. The lady was so moved she was speechless and close to tears.

Anthony

Tuesday's plan was to go minister on an island, but due to hurricane warnings (the island was warned to evacuate) we changed our mind and a group of us drove south to the town of Punta Gorda to minister there. This was probably the best unplanned day I've had in a long time. We arrived at midday so stopped at a restaurant/stall on the side of the road next to the sea for a plate of rice and beans and chicken. While speaking to Joy, the owner of the restaurant, about where to go from there, we landed up spending 2 hours ministering there. First lady we prayed for was healed of her bad eyesight. That was awesome, seeing her not need to wear her glasses. Plus it was her birthday so what a great gift! Their faith was of course stirred after that so they asked if we could go to some of their friends houses and pray for them. So some of our team did that.

The roadside restaurant

I stayed behind as I was ministering to Anthony, a friend of Joy's who is an alcoholic. We first prayed for him to be free from his alcohol addiction. After speaking with him a little more we prayed for restoration of his brain. He'd suffered some brain damage as a result of all the alcohol - it was hard keeping him focussed while we were talking, his gaze was all over the show plus we needed to speak simply, using small words. I stayed with him to continue ministering to him, sharing Jesus with him, giving him tools to overcome his drinking. I even called Godfrey over to share his testimony of how he's been clean of drugs 8 days now. We also prayed for his eyesight which has been deteriorating over the last 2 months.

Anthony and Joy

Turned out he had a knowledge of God, having read the bible, when out he popped with he wants to be baptized, he was baptised as a Catholic as a baby but now he wants to be baptised of his own accord as an adult. So I shared with him what it means to be baptised, and then asked him if he wants to be baptised today, which he did, so he was, by some of the guys on our team. Amazing. The transformation in him was incredible, he looked so different when he came out the water. A life transformed indeed. It's moments like this that make what I do worthwhile - $20 petrol money to drive to a town 2 hours away to minister to one man, yes it was worth it.

Brent, Rowan and Godfrey baptizing Anthony

When the others were finished ministering to other people we headed to another village to minister at a primary school where there's been a lot of dark things happening. As far as we could gather, it seems like one school class was cursed (we don't know why), but these kids have now moved away. We visited the kids in the classrooms. It was so cute, I went into the kindergarten class of 3 year olds. They're so sweet! It was challenging sharing Jesus with them as they don't speak English or Spanish, but rather a local dialect (which their teacher doesn't speak either!). They learn English at school. It was fun hanging out with them though. We read them a bible story and then prayed for them and their teacher.

On the way back to Dangriga we stopped at some Myan ruins which was ok, more a pile of rock ruins though! But the colouring in the sky was beautiful as the sun was setting...

Dangriga

The drive to Dangriga was beautiful. Belize is a beautiful country, kinda has a mainland island vibe, maybe it's a preview for Jamaica. Ja man. The people here speak English and Spanish generally, and Creole or other local dialects. An interesting fact is that the people can't write in Creole because they speak it at home but then school is in English.

On the way we stopped at the Blue Hole, a big cave with a great swimming spot a mile away. The cave was average if you've been to the Cango Caves in Oudshoorn. Plus we were eaten alive by mosquitoes, it was horrible. But walking to the cave was good, felt like I was walking through a jungle, bugs and all. The swimming was fun (mostly to relieve to the bites!), even though I had to brave touching the little fish in the water, and the boys (being boys) felt obliged to jump into the water (above the no jumping sign) from 30ft. High.

View looking up out of the Blue Hole

Dangriga has a different feel to Corozal, not as nice and safe. But ok :) We've spent the last 3 nights sleeping (in the pop up trailers) in the driveway of a hotel, plus a few people in hotel rooms. It's been nice, the owner (Phillip) has given us a great rate plus we've had wifi. Well most of the time (wifi is always sporadic I've found!).

Monday was a great day of ministering in the town. But first we went to the beach after breakfast to baptise Godfrey. What a special morning, so amazing baptizing a brother in Christ. We baptised another man Kareem we met in the morning after Ben lead him to the Lord. He'd arrived where we were staying somehow, I invited him to come watch Godfrey's baptism, Ben lead him to the Lord and then he asked to be baptised. Yay God.

Baptising Godfrey 

Ben leading Kareem to the Lord

Baptising Kareem

Christian with our newly baptized friends, Kareem (L) and Godfrey (R)

After lunch we went to visit various people in the town at the leading of Charlie, our self appointed tour guide who'd found us and attached himself to us the first night we arrived in town. It was good going to specific people who we knew needed prayer for specific things (they were friends and family members of Charlie's). A highlight was praying for Ms Dimples, a quirky 84 year old lady in a wheel chair (still living alone) who don't take no $&*€ off nobody. Man. (said in a Caribbean islander's accent). She made us laugh with her directness and no nonsense attitude. An interesting observation was how many people are in wheelchairs in Belize from having limbs amputated as a result of diabetes.

Ms Dimples

Monday evening we had a party in the park where we entertained the children and told them about Jesus. It was a little wild but lots of fun, except being eaten alive by mosquitos and other little critters. It was intense.

Leading the kids through a Holy Spirit fire tunnel