Two Hail Storms Later...

The internet was out since last night...but it's working again, so this is a recap of tuesday!

Today was another event filled day. I got to the orphanage around 8:00. I walked into the nursery and the 5 kids in the room had big smiles and big hola’s for me. Marita (as I was listening to the workers talk to her, I realized that I had written her name down) wanted to be held all day. Her real name is Maria, but she is the cute little baby in the orphanage that everyone adores and wants to play with and hold. It was an eventful day though. One little boy, who I’m still trying to figure out his name, I think it is Nigel, fell and hit his nose and it started bleeding, leaving a pool of blood on the ground. The 4 other ones were walking around/crawling on the ground so to keep them away from the blood while holding Nigel’s nose was very interesting. It worked out okay though!

I got to go outside with Marita and the other little ones with the other American group that was from Dallas Baptist College. They came down for ten days and spent their time playing with the kids in the orphanage. It was helpful because I got to ask them some questions about the orphanage. I found out that not all of the kids are parentless. It is a government run center for orphans but also for children who’s parents cannot take care of them and opt to give them over to the facility with the ability to come and visit. One father came today to play with his two sons for about an hour, and the kids sobbed as the worker brought them back up to the nursery.

While out on the playground, one of the little boys had the seesaw land on his foot, so he was being taken to the doctor for an x-ray, his name is Luis. Luis was abandoned in a junkyard at 10 days old. He has a lot of spunk! I think that he is three, and he can stand his ground for a three year old. It is so interesting to see how these kids fend for themselves and how protective of the few things they have. I watched a couple of other boys, Esteban y Manuel fight because Esteban got a new pair of school shoes. I guess it isn’t too different from any other kid not wanting to share a new toy, but each personal item is that much more precious for these kids. It is a relatively clean environment that seems to have sufficient funds for clothing for the kids. A couple of the kids go to school in the afternoon and so they change into their school uniforms after taking a shower and get ready to go right before lunch time. Although, one little girl wet her pants right before lunchtime, and was going to have to wait until after lunch to change. I think there are a lot of kids and not enough help. A lot of the kids in the home seem to have special needs, and after a couple of weeks, depending on how things are going, see if I can help out in that class.

After work we came home and had lunch, and got ready to go to the indigenous village. It was a little bit of a drive, but well worth it. The streets are busy in Xela, and so the village we went to was a little more peaceful and a little less crowded with cars. We went to a huge market with so many different food options, clothing, pottery, and other trinkets. The people are just beautiful here though. Walking through the market was just amazing to see the differences in faces and smiles, and how each one is so uniquely beautiful. The dress is so colorful, a long and skirt/wrap, with what looks like a long apron over top and then a wool cardigan. The market was a neat experience. After the market we went to a local pottery store where we watched the owner spin 3 different things (cup, pitcher, bowl) in about 10 minutes. His speed in spinning the pottery was amazing! The finished and painted products were so unique and so cheap. It cost $3 for a custom mug with a saucer. They took us to a café of sorts that had amazing bread and a specialty hot chocolate drink that was extremely rich. That concluded our trip to the village, but we were bombarded with hail a couple of times during the trip. Of the 4 days I’ve been here, it has poured every single day!