A week with a few kids and a Honduran that has been to IWU!?

This was our first week as a team starting our rotation of ministries. The first place I was at was at “Proyecto Manuelito” (Project Manuelito) which is a project from the church “Amor & Vida” (Love & Life). The tagline is, “Un proyecto de… ‘Amor y Vida’. Para los ninos de Honduras” (A project of... “Love and Life”). For the boys and girls of Honduras. You can find more at: www.proyectomanuelito.org

I also started another role that will continue for the next five ministry weeks (I say ministry weeks because we have a few other things planned in which we will not be working with the various organizations.) On Tuesday’s and Thursday’s I go a little bit outside the city in the mornings to help tutor and work with a young man named Tony. Tony is 20 years old and has been confined to a wheel chair for the last two years after a diving accident broke his neck and he cannot use his legs. His arms have limited motion and while his hands can be moved, he has very little to no control of his fingers. I don’t know the details of the accident but hope to continue to get to know him well enough that he is willing to share with me sometime. Basically, my schedule this week was in conjunction with Karen Wilson as she is helping with Tony as well. On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday I will be spending my entire day at the organization in our rotation that week. Karen will then come in the afternoon and we will be able to work together with what each place needs. On Tuesday and Thursday I will begin my day with Tony, then after lunch I will join Karen at the worksite.

First, I tell a little about “Proyecto Manuelito”. This program is meant for street kids and is a way to rescue kids while they are still young. The place I was working with here in Tegucigalpa is called a transition house. The kids that are new and fresh off the streets spend one year at the house before leaving for the main facility several hours away. The main facility houses eighteen kids right now and they learn to care for animals and manage a farm while they are there. It’s really neat to hear about and I am hoping to go next Friday with a group. At this house in Tegucigalpa they get plugged in to school, have a person there to help them with their homework, feed them, play with them, and encourage them in a relationship with Christ. This transition house has eight children now: three brothers - ages 9, and twins that are 13, two older boys that are back from the other facility to study, and three babies - ages 2, 2, and 3. It’s amazing to hear the story of the older ones and what they came from when seeing how far along they are now. The brothers are close and love to fight. They need a lot of attention and soak up every minute of it as they have experienced some very traumatic things in life that I need to keep confidential. As for the babies, we had fun walking through the park chasing pigeons and feeding them rice one day – I bet I had just as much fun and we ended up catching and petting one. The only bad thing, a two year old peed on me to make my week complete.

I worked with Jorge (George) who is 21 years old and pretty much runs the life of the kids. He is the one who plays with them, brings in volunteers to work, helps them with homework, eats with them, and sleeps in the same dorm room as them. He also works with the other staff there to get legal custody of the children. He was fun to work with and believe it or not, he knows some people I knew from Indiana Wesleyan University. In fact, he has been to my college. He saw a shirt I was wearing and told me he went there, I figured he was mistaken but he described it and said he went with his dad he spoke for World Gospel Mission and he was definitely there as he brought up several names I recognized! Crazy, huh?

Now a little bit about Tony though I should be able to say something each week. Tony lives with his family just outside of the city in the same place where we worked with the dental brigade (his house is literally two or three doors down from the clinic). Tony has a laptop and works to put all the questions and answers from his home school program in a Word document. Though this takes a while, sometimes a really long while, it is incredibly good therapy for him. While not being able to use fingers, he can move his arm and use his thumb to push the appropriate key. I am currently teaching English and Math while helping him work though an Art book. Karen is teaching Science and working through a Spanish book with him. Tony likes to talk in the downtime about soccer (I have talked to some other people and I guess he was a very, very good player before his accident) and drawing (which he also used to do and I hear still tries today and can do somewhat). I would love to be able to find and give the Joni Erickson Tada story to Tony so that he could be encouraged with that. He has plenty of time to read and it is good practice for him. Given the opportunities in Honduras for people of his level of disability, he is fairly far behind in school and we would love to help him how we can.

That was the week in review, this next week I will be working at C.E.D.E.R (I don’t know what it stands for) which is a home for older people from the street. There is a lot of care in this and most of the people have mental conditions including a Alzheimer’s. Pray that Karen and I can show patience and love to each one while being able to understand the stories they want to share. Also please pray that we can have ideas about what kind of activities to do with each of them.