A few days out of Teguz and a very Merry Christmas to all!

Thanks to everyone for being patient for this next update. I have been so busy with travel that all communication has been very difficult recently. Here is a brief rundown of some of my recent travels:

Monday (17th) - We left for Copan (Ancient ruins of an indigenous group of Honduras - the Mayans). This was a long van ride that ended up being 12 hours long with stops - this included a stop at a beautiful waterfall.

Tuesday (18th) - We spent the day learning about and touring the ruins, in the evening we travel about 3 hours to San Pedro Sula.

Wednesday (19th) - We toured one of Dole's banana growing farms and then traveled back to Tegucigalpa (another 6 to 8 hours) with a stop and tour of a cave.

Thursday (20th) - We had Spanish and culture class as we normally do on weekdays. As well as much sleep recovery and a lot of laundry.

Friday (21st) - Andy and I left with our host brothers (Carlos and Lemuel) and a friend (Mike) to go to the island of Roatan (part of Honduras) where Mike's family lives. We stayed there until the 24th and then made the 2 hour boat ride and 8 hour bus ride home. One of the beautiful things about living with host families is that when they leave for a vacation, we go with them, so Andy and I had two days on the island (the other two were spent traveling) which was relaxing, although Mike tried to show us the whole island in two days which kept us very busy and less like tourist on the beach!

Christmas has past and for me it was not terribly dramatic or anything like I had expected. My family, save my host brother Lemuel, does not really celebrate Christmas much (I haven’t figured out why yet) so after I ate with my brother and gave some gifts to my family on Christmas Eve, I ventured out with Lemuel to make stops at random houses. I gave the gifts on Christmas Eve because most families here open their gifts at midnight when the day changes to Christmas. Tradition here is to continually eat on Christmas Eve and Christmas day, but when the clocks strikes 12:00am and it is Christmas, there are fireworks all about the city. There are usually small firework shows leading up to Christmas but at midnight Christmas Eve, people set off personal fireworks in the street. I was absolutely shocked at how little attention was paid to safety and how few precautions exist. Fireworks would go on roofs, in bushes, and some kids (they looked to be about 8 or 9) started a newspaper fire on their porch. I guess it’s not uncommon for people to get hurt and for problems to arise, but like all traditions it won't be broken any time soon. My host brother is a fairly cautious person so don’t worry, I was never in harms way as far as I know.

I have to admit, I had thought there would be more focus on the Christmas story and the true meaning of Christmas that seems so forgotten in our culture, but it seems even less focus is here (according to what I saw). Since I didn’t have a traditional Christmas, I had to rely on my teammate’s experiences. Most people said they ate at midnight with extended family then opened gifts, everyone at the same time as fast as possible, and then everyone left abruptly. I hope I can be a part of that sometime just to see the difference from what I am used to generally. In my real family, we always open gifts slowly and take our time so it is obviously very different than what I think is normal. The manger scenes here are very different as well. All the traditional components are there, but then they add everything else they have. For example, its not uncommon to see the shepherds, wise men, Jesus, Mary, Joseph, angels, and animals in a manger scene with Buzz Light-year and a GI Joe present along with a stuffed bunny (or any other toy or figurine they may have laying around). As Rachel said, “Everyone was at the birth of Jesus.”

I was able to read most of the Christmas story myself and reflect upon it personally which was a great personal experience and had a new meaning this year as I spent Christmas away from my family for the first time. On Christmas day, the team got together and did our little gift exchange, ate traditional U.S. Christmas food, and had a good time of reflection together. Rachel did a great job planning all and the girls made marvelous cookies while Andy and I were in Roatan.

A brief update on the team (for more information you can visit our team blog at www.step0708.blogspot.com). We are continuing to settle in and adjust to the lifestyles and families we are part of now. The biggest frustration I think we have is we feel somewhat idle. We study the language and culture a lot and definitely have very full schedules, but we don’t feel like we are “serving” per say. I think that we are all looking forward to language and culture study coming to an end because we are getting antsy to help out and continue to learn from persons in the church. That will be here soon enough so we are just clinging to the fact that we are where we are for a purpose and that we need to continue to focus on our current responsibilities. I’m sure our time to give back will come soon enough, but for now we will continue to learn and absorb as much as possible. My goal here is to learn about another culture, give where needed and when needed, and develop a closer walk with the Lord.

Since they say that a picture says a thousand words, I figure I will add about 11,000 more words to this blog. I hope you enjoy them and I will try to keep pictures coming!

This is the Dole banana factory we toured - yea, I know, that's a lot of bananas! But at least you can see that they clean them real well.

I’m staring down one of my favorite foods in Honduras, a wonderful fruit called "Licha" (pronounced, Leecha).

This is the STEP team at the ruins listening attentively to our excellent tour guide who was partially Mayan. I think Andy’s getting ready to wipe his face as it was pretty warm.

This is the team along with the two nationals that went with us (Angela and Jairo).

We stopped to eat by the only lake in Honduras. I like this picture as it has the rustic feel of clothes on the line with the lake and mountains in the background. The fish they served was fresh from the lake we ate beside.

This is the story of the trip, we had to change two flats during the journey (same tire) and make stops each time at a “llantera” to get the old tire patched – I think it’s up to eight patches in total. This only delayed us a little as Andy and I were able to manage the changes efficiently.

Here are few pictures from Roatan. There is a beautiful sunset and another picture of me in a locals boat with the sunset in the backgroup. The other picture is of me and Lemuel (my host brother) and Carlos (Andy's host brother) in the Carribean Sea at West Bay - and yes, the sea is as clear as the commercials and pamphlets show.