A Day Without Electricity

I was excited for today...Sunday's finally here!  A day to go to church and possibly have the chance to hear David preach (since there isn't a group here right now...the Maryland team left yesterday morning).  As we were getting ready for the morning, POOF!...the power went out.  We were told later that they had shut the power down in town to work on some "fixes" and it would most likely be out until about 4pm.  Our bathroom has no windows, so gets pitch black when you need to use it and prefer to shut the door.  No power means the fridge went out, so you need to make sure that you're not opening the doors to just "look inside" to see if you're even hungry, like we do back in the States.  You see, in these 3rd world countries, sometimes the power can be out for days (even when they tell you it'll only be for a few hours).

We headed to church and although last night you could hear the music group practicing and rehearsing, today it sounded completely different since there was no electricity - acoustic only!  This also meant that there were no words to songs showing up on the big screen in front (like we have at New Hope), so you either knew the song by heart or you didn't.  David did preach today and it was powerful...about being careful not to choose the paths that lead to darkness, about being able to decipher God's voice and not go against it to follow your own.  I've heard David speak a handful of times through the years and he has a way to his approach that is so powerful!  I'm also in awe how he can speak what would probably be the equivalent of 2 typed pages in Spanish before reverting back to English to translate it verbatim...with none of his sermon written down!  I've heard this year that when he dedicated his life to God, he begged God not to make him preach.  More often than not, there are pastors here from groups or pastors from town that come in to preach so that David doesn't have to...but it's interesting how God can take what we see as our weakness and the things that we SO don't want to do and use them for His Glory.

After church, Alina & I asked permission to take Yency, Coco, and Michell to the tienda (store) to buy them some lunch.  Tuesday is Yency & Coco's birthday.  They're twins, although you'd NEVER guess it by looking at them.  They are the most non-look-alike fraternal twins I have ever seen!  Again, I wish I had a working camera to take a picture each day and post it with this blog so that you'd have a visual to the things I'm mentioning along the way.  Lunch for the day at the tienda consisted of rice, a tortilla, fried chicken and potato salad...yep, you heard that right - potato salad.  Alina & Coco didn't really care for the potato salad, so the rest of us finished it off for them.  The girls at the chicken right down to just the bone, which is something you don't typically see in the States.  I think the thing that struck Alina the most was that when they were done eating, they packed up ALL the scraps that were left into the saran wrap that had covered their plate, so that they could either save it for later to eat or take it back to their friends in the yard to share with them.  They threw NOTHING in terms of food away!  This is very typical for the people here (and I'm talking about in the entire country, not just this orphanage).  They do not waste food like many of us Americans tend to do.  They know SOMEBODY will eat it.  They KNOW what it is to FEEL HUNGER, rather than just be hungry at the moment and run to the fridge to grab a snack like we do.

After lunch we first walked Michell & Coco back to the medium girls' house (the girls were in the dining hall eating), then we walked Yency back to the big girls' house.  Along the way, Yency pointed out an enormous toad to Alina.  It was dead, but enormous nonetheless.  I had completely overeaten & my stomach wasn't feeling well.  I headed back to the house to rest a bit.  The power was still out and Julieth (one of the staff here who lives in one of the 4 apartments in this quadraplex) said something about music.  I got my computer and MP3 player and connected them so she could listen to Christian music as she passed the time without electricity.  She brought it back a couple of hours later saying she was SO SORRY that the battery went out.  I just smiled at her & reassured her that it was okay, because it really didn't matter to me that much when we don't have electricity anyway.

Kimberly & I had a really good chat about her post-Honduras plans.   She's preparing to head back to the States for a bit on August 15th - the same day Pastor Jeff will return to the States from his short visit here.  Please pray for her and for strength in her journey, both while she is travelling to the U.S. and also during her time here.

In the late afternoon or early evening, Alina & I went for a walk back past the toddler house.  We chatted quite a bit and on our return, stopped at the toddler and baby house to chat with Brandy.  I'm excited for her to get a chance to go back home this coming weekend.  It'll be the first time she's been back home in the States since May of 2012!  I've known Brandy for 3 years now and what a sweet person!  She always has a smile on her face and is always very intent on listening to what's going on.

Alina & I climbed up to the water tower, so that I could show her what it looks like to look at the entire orphanage at once.  It wasn't yet sun-down, which I hear is a really beautiful time to be up there...but it was pretty nonetheless.  On our way back to the apartment, we stopped at the medium girls' house to chat (Alina played a bunch of games inside).  When we finally got back to the apartment, the electricity STILL was not on.  Julieth said that with all of the rain we had today, a pole fell down in town and now the prediction was that it would be on by 8pm.  By 7:00, the apartment was completely dark.  I sent Alina to bed.  We had one of those crank flashlights that only work as you are cranking it.  I also discovered there was a miniature flashlight on the end of my Honduran cell phone...but that my battery was close to dying.  Julieth brought a candle and some matches over to us, and after quite a while of trying to figure out what exactly to put the candle in (and coming up with an "odd concoction" of a canning jar, the top of an air freshener and tissue paper) we finally made it work and had some light in the apartment.  Kimberly & I had a good chat at the kitchen table before turning in for the night.