Taking a break...

Although we love it here, it can be stressful at times because it is difficult to take a break. We live in a neighborhood with A LOT of children, and most of them are very needy… both financially and emotionally. Most people here have a lot of kids, and don’t have the time to spend individual time with each child. One neighbor has 41 kids and another has 25! Granted, a lot of those kids aren’t in the same home at the same time, but there are several homes with 8 or more kids, and most of them live in one bedroom homes. These kids love spending time with us because we listen to them, hug them, and show them love. When we are home, there is almost always someone at our door wanting something from us. For this reason, we thoroughly enjoyed last weekend because we were able to get away to El Progreso, Honduras!

El Progreso really isn’t that exciting of a place – there is a small mall that is pretty nice, a Wendy’s, Burger King, Pizza Hut, and a few grocery stores. We enjoy going there because there is a comfortable hotel with a nice pool, hot showers, low prices, and lots of quiet. This time we were also able to go to the beach at Tela, which is on the Caribbean Sea, and since there was a hurricane brewing out in the Caribbean, the waves were incredible. We enjoyed playing in the warm water, and met some really nice missionaries from California who were in Honduras building wells. This was Efren’s first vacation, and he really enjoyed himself.


In our last post we mentioned that we were going to be having Fatima and Efren living with us for a month and then seeing where we should go from there. It turns out that Fatima did not like living here with our rules, and chose to return to her former home. Thankfully, her aunt, who is her guardian, has finally found a job and is better able to support the family. Efren has really adjusted well to our family, and we have all decided that we would like to make him a permanent part of our family. He loves having a family, and is always quick to give us hugs. He loves spending time with Gordon watching sports and playing the Wii, and fits in really well with our family. He had never been in a family where he was wanted, and his life has been in danger many times in his short life; he was stabbed in the heart when he was younger, but thankfully he survived the attack. We are all really thankful that God placed him in our family.


We would really like to find people to sponsor kids who want to go to high school (colegio). If you are interested in helping, please let us know. You can also donate by clicking on the buttons on this page. It is actually very inexpensive to attend school, but for people here, it is difficult. If you would like to sponsor Darwin or Jessica, we can arrange skype calls or an email relationship. Darwin is 12 and Jessica is 14, and both live close to us and spend a lot of time with us. They are both very intelligent and are learning a lot of English. It only costs about $25 per month per student to attend school, so it’s a pretty good deal!

Darwin

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Jessica

Thank you for all of your prayers. We are all currently feeling pretty good for a change, and are really enjoying cooler weather.


Specific Needs:


*Rosetta Stone English – we are trying to save enough money to buy this program so that Efren can learn English…


*Efren – that if we are supposed to adopt Efren legally that everything will go smoothly for us and that we will be able to raise the money needed to do this.


*Efren again – That we will be able to find someone to stay with Efren while we are in the states in January.

Life Lessons

Today when I was doing our laundry at the pilla (it’s basically washing clothes on a washboard, but the washboard is made of cement and built into the house), and was scrubbing a particularly dirty pair of socks that I thought would never get clean, I was struck with a thought. After briefly scrubbing the socks and not seeing any improvement, I was considering giving up, but I remembered that Karlenis had been able to get some really filthy clothes clean, so I kept on going, and surprisingly, I was able to restore the socks to their previously white condition. I got to thinking that people are like dirty socks, and when we look at other people who seem like they are too far gone to ever be cleaned, we can remember that we also were filthy, and Christ cleaned us, and remember that we are never too far gone for redemption. This is so important to remember so that we are able to show everyone the love that Christ has for them.

Before we came to Honduras, we had a very different idea of what our mission here would be. We had planned on coming and getting the feeding program started through our church, but so far, funding has not been available, and we are currently only providing one meal per week. Although the meals are going well, and we are reaching people through them, it seems like God has a different agenda in place for us! We are living in a small town called Los Naranjos, which is located about 2 miles from Pena Blanca, and we chose to live in a Honduran house surrounded by Hondurans. My cousin, Chris, prayed and searched for just the right house for us, and finally located this house, and we feel like we are right where God wants us to be. We have A LOT of children living around us, and we spend a lot of time with them, and it turns out that our main ministry has been with our neighborhood children and their families. We take about 20 kids, ranging in age from 5 to 15, to church every week, we are teaching English classes twice a week, and we are trying to teach the kids how to love each other and treat each other with kindness and love. A lot of these people have never really experienced love and affection, and consequently, don’t know how to express it to others.

We are the only “gringo” family in Naranjos… there are a couple of single guys here, and also a bar/restaurant/hotel that is a hot-spot for backpackers, and we are really forming some great relationships with the people there, which has been fun and interesting. I don’t think any of us thought that we would be coming to Honduras to reach out to a bunch of fellow gringos at a bar, but that definitely is part of our ministry here, and we are really enjoying it. Backpackers from all over the world come to D&D, and we have a unique opportunity to meet a very interesting range of people. The owner, Bobby, has told us that we can come any time we need to get away, and stay in one of their cabins, swim, and have breakfast for free! The people there have really invited us into their lives, and we are building some great relationships with several people there.

This past week we were able to help one of our neighbors who is being forced to move into a different house, which is very small, and when we first went to look at it, it literally made all of us cry (the neighbors too…) because it is tiny, filthy, and lacking the most basic essentials. The walls were very dirty, there was no kitchen, no running water, overrun with trash, and to top things off, there were bats living inside. We were able to pull our neighbors together to help clean up the house, paint the interior and part of the exterior, put in a cooking stove, make and install curtains, and install a pilla. It was exciting to see so many neighbors working together to help a fellow family, and now the house looks like a home, and the family is excited to be moving in tomorrow. I think that the most exciting part for us is that so many people were able to help and to realize how much fun it can be to help someone else without expecting anything in return. Often times, the mentality here is to only help others when there is a direct benefit to oneself, so we are trying to show them a different way.

Fatima, Lisa, & Efren at church

We have been asked to take in two of our neighbor kids, Fatima (11), and Efren (14). These kids don’t have parents who are involved in their lives, and have been passed around to various family members, never knowing what it feels like to be really wanted. When we first came, we found Fatima scrounging through the scraps we had for the stray dogs because she would rarely have a meal. We have made it a point to make sure that Fatima and Efren get at least one healthy meal a day, and we are keeping Efren in school, with the help of some wonderful sponsors who want to help us help him. We have agreed to have the kids live with us for a month, and we’ll see what to do after that.

Please continue to pray for us, and if you would like to partner with us in our work here, we are really in need of people to monthly sponsors so that we can continue our ministry here. If you would like to be partnered with a child here, we could arrange a way for you to communicate via phone, email, &/or letters. We would also really like to have a team come out and help fix up homes & help with the ministry here, and if anyone would like to come for a visit, we would love to have you!

Communicating

Living in a country where the primary language is not your own can be very interesting at times, and we have all had some issues communicating. Whenever Gordon introduces himself as “Yo estoy Gordo” – he gets some funny looks because he is saying “I am fat” and people don’t realize that Gordo is his name. Chantalle has decided to go by Nicole because the way people were pronouncing her name meant “piggy”, and she didn’t like the giggles that often accompanied her name. I thought a lot of people in one town were named Lisa because I kept hearing people saying my name, but then Chris told us that Lisa means “slippery”. Natalie’s name doesn’t appear to have a double meaning, but she has had her share of communication mishaps nonetheless.

Natalie seems to have some trouble when it comes to discussing relationships. We were in San Pedro and someone asked Natalie if Gordon was her “novio”, and she smiled big and said, “si, si”. The man gave her a funny look and left. Later she realized that he had asked if Gordon was her lover, and she had said that yes, he was… therefore the funny look! Another time when we were talking with a young man, he asked Natalie if she had a boyfriend, and she started giggling. He asked why she was laughing, and she meant to say that she was embarrassed (embarzoso), but unintentionally said that she was pregnant (embarazada). He asked her if she really was, and Natalie, still thinking he was asking about a boyfriend, replied, “no, not right now, but it’s possible in a short time”. He looked VERY confused!

A couple of days ago, we went to Siguatepeque with Chris, and Gordon and I dropped Chris and the girls off at a market and went to tour a cemetery. (They have some of the coolest cemeteries here! Very much like New Orleans…) We were walking around, and a man asked us if we needed help finding anything, and we said no, but he continued walking with us. After awhile, he asked, “do you have family here?” I thought that he was asking if I had family in Honduras, so I said yes, and he asked what the family name was, so I told him “Rivera”, and he nodded his head, and took us to a different section of the cemetery. After about half an hour of walking around and reading tombstones, I realized that he was looking for the grave of Chris Rivera, which, of course, was nowhere to be found. We did find four graves of people named Rivera, and he told us that he would look for the grave of Chris Rivera and if we came back, he would show us where it was.

So far, it has been a really interesting experience living in a different culture and standing out wherever we go. Natalie and I went to the doctor, and Chris called the doctor, who said that he would send someone out to get us, and I wondered how he would know who we were, but everyone knows who we are here! It’s a little strange when we take a taxi home, and the driver, whom we have never met, knows exactly where we live. Sometimes we feel like aliens, and sometimes we feel like royalty around here. All of the attention can be very tiring, and it’s nice to take some days off to spend with just our family. After this experience, we will all definitely have more compassion for foreigners in our own country!

In spite of all of our mis-steps, overall we are having a good time here, and I think that our impact overall is a positive one. We enjoy the natural beauty of this amazing land that God created – it is absolutely breathtaking here, with a lot of waterfalls, lush greenery, amazing animals, and beautiful people who love to smile. As with any place, there are people who try to bring us down and discourage us, but we are trying to keep our eyes on God, and realize that ultimately He is the only one we have to please, and that relieves the negative pressure.

Matthew 11:28-30 “Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

Two months and counting...

Whenever we cook anything and have leftovers, we have a tiered system of getting rid of our leftover food. We give our best food to our neighbors, then sometimes we slip Conan a tortilla or two, and if there is food we don’t think he would like, we give that to the starving neighborhood dogs. Well, one day I had a bowl of food that was going to the dogs, and one of our neighbor girls came over and started eating it like there was no tomorrow. I stopped her and told her it wasn’t good to eat, and she insisted that it was “muy rico!” (very rich or decadent). She told us that she hadn’t eaten for almost two days and was very hungry, so we ended up giving her some chicken, which she ate at record speed. It is still difficult to fathom the sad fact that people here are literally starving to death.

We did a trial run of our feeding program for one month, and are planning on resuming the program in a couple of weeks, if we are able to get enough support raised for it. The program was a big success, and a couple of people came forward to receive Christ, which was really exciting. We are excited to be able to expand the program and for our church to grow. We also take children with us every week to church, and afterwards we go to a restaurant for lunch, which the kids LOVE. Before we got here, most of the kids had never been to a restaurant, so it’s a fun treat for them.

Thankfully, we were finally able to get a car! Eulogio drove Gordon and I to San Pedro last week and we looked at a bunch of cars with him and Roberto, and Gordon and Roberto returned to San Pedro the following day and purchased one of the cars. After being without one for the past two months, we really appreciate having the freedom that a car offers. The day after we got it, we were able to take our neighbor who was suffering with a high fever to the doctor! (She ended up being diagnosed with bacterial pneumonia) We are still waiting on our internet – the necessary equipment is being delayed in customs, but hopefully we will have internet in our home very soon. As it is, we go to one of Chris’ good friend’s place of business, where he graciously lets us sit in the air conditioned room and use his Wi-Fi, so we really can’t complain.

We are getting pretty good at making tortillas, after helping at Sister Maria’s every week, but the Honduran women are still able to make about 3 tortillas for every 1 that we make. Most people around here eat a lot of tortillas, and they are mostly made of corn flour called MaSeCa. We are not big fans of these tortillas, mostly because we have been fed too many of them, but there is a lot of other food here that is really tasty. The neighbor girls and our housekeeper have been teaching us how to cook some classic Honduran dishes, like Chicken with tomatoes and fresh limeade. We feel a little bit inadequate when we have to have the 10 year old neighbor girl show us how to properly cut up a chicken, but we are learning to set our pride aside and learn some new skills.

This week some of the neighbor boys have offered to take us out on the lake and teach us how to fish “Honduran style”. We’re looking forward to another adventure, and it is fun to get to know the boys better. It is really impressive how much these boys are capable of, and at such a young age. We have hired the boys to do a lot of random things around our home, like repairing our fence, digging a trench, fixing the kitchen cabinet, and cleaning our windows. I don’t think most 10 year old boys in the states would know how to do most of these things! There are some benefits to not having TV available!

It has been a big adjustment for us to not have Jenn with us! She was an enormous blessing to everyone here, and we are all sad that she had to go back to the states. We are praying that she will be able to return again before too long. In order to help her with a return, she is selling COFFEE that is grown right here in our little town. If you want to buy some wonderful Honduran coffee, please let me or Jenn know, and she can hook you up!

We all hope you have a wonderful week, and if you are led to come see what we are doing here in Honduras, we would love to have you come for a visit. It is more breathtakingly beautiful than you can imagine here, and you can’t help but fall in love with the people!

(both of our cameras are broken, so presently, we can't take pictures...)

Crazy week!

Talk about a crazy week! This past week was filled with many highs and lows for us. We started out the week finding out that our neighbor had cut most of his hand off with a machete while working in the field across the street, and was fighting for his life in a San Pedro hospital. As we were driving into town, we passed an accident site where a man and his nine year old son were struck by a car as they rode a bike, and both were killed. Unlike the states where bodies are moved immediately, the bodies were left on the side of the road for hours, and it was pretty disturbing to see that. When we got to Sister Maria’s place, we were told that we wouldn’t be serving food that day because one of the children had died of cancer. That was a pretty low day for us… topped off by the girls seeing a mangled dog on the side of the road as they were walking home. Thankfully, Natalie and I missed that one.


We were able to take a day to go to a place called Pulhapanzak Falls that is nearby. It was pretty incredible and very beautiful. The girls were able to do a zip line over the falls, but it was a little too high for me. The girls and I did go on a very exciting hike that our guide told us was “an easy hike for ANYONE”. Well, apparently the guide is accustomed to different people than us, because the hike was anything but easy. We realized that we were in for an adventure when the guide told us to follow him, then jumped off of a ledge into a swirling pool of water below. We couldn’t see where we were going when we walked behind the falls, and it was difficult to breathe with the water falling on us. We had to alternate walking and swimming to get behind the falls, and then we were led through a narrow opening up to a little cave. We ended up going into several small caves, and it was a pretty cool adventure. Chantalle and Jenn also took a hike up the mountain by us and took some beautiful pictures of our neighborhood.

Jenn and Chantalle on top of Mount Nalgas

Pulhapanzak falls!

Zipline over the falls!

Jumping into the swirling water - not quite as scary as it looks

We are thankful that my cousin Chris returned safely from the states, but are sad that the wonderful team from Albuquerque and Jenn only have one week left here. It has been such a breath of fresh air to have them all here serving alongside us. Jenn is really spunky and encourages us to do things that we probably wouldn’t try on our own, which has helped us adjust to life here. There are definitely going to be some big holes left when they all leave.

Our neighbor, Mario, took us out on the lake in a rowboat

We are forming closer relationships with people here, which has been really cool. The kids take turns going to church with us every Wednesday and Sunday, and we all pile into a taxi. Last week we had eleven people in a taxi the size of a Ford Taurus! We have to regulate how many kids we have over at a time or we can easily get overwhelmed by the children. We use the same taxi driver every day, Alexander, and he is really friendly and helpful, coming to our house whenever we call, and taking us all over town. He invited us to his house to meet his wife and daughter, and we really enjoyed meeting them today.

We have started the feeding program at church, but need more financial support to expand the program, so if anyone would like to help out in that way, it would be greatly appreciated both by us and by the local people who will benefit. Many of the people here only have one meal a day, and some go days without any food, which is such a foreign concept to us Americans, who have more than enough to eat and don’t really know what it means to be hungry. It breaks my heart to see children with tummy aches because they haven’t eaten that day, and they are so excited to get some good nutritious food in their bellies. We never throw any food away here – between the starving children and the starving dogs, someone is always happy to get any food that we can’t use.

Neighbor kids, Cindy, Otto, & Franklin

Please continue to pray for us as we are working with Sister Maria and our church family, and also as we get to know our neighbors better. We have been blessed with pretty good health and feel safe in our home here. We are thankful for good relations with our neighbors, and can see God working here – the people are very receptive to us and to God, and we are really encouraged about our future here.

Honduran neighbor in need

We are so thankful to God for giving us such wonderful neighbors. All of our neighbors have been a big help in our adjustment to our new home. They have told us which areas of town are dangerous, and which people we need to look out for. They’ve stood up for us when scary people have confronted us and are constantly looking out for us. Recently, an opportunity presented itself for us to return the favor. Last week one of our neighbors, Jose, was working, hurt his arm very badly, and now needs several operations to try to save his arm and hand. We are asking for help from you to raise money for the operation and household expenses while he is in the hospital and in recovery, which is estimated to take six months. This family has ten children, and is supported solely by Jose, who works really hard. Our community here is very close, and everyone around here is working hard to raise the money for the family, but resources here are very limited and most people can barely afford to put food on the table for their own families. We are trying to raise $1100 as soon as possible. If you are able to help in any way, please send the money via paypal, and we will give the money to the hospital. If you prefer, you may give money through our mission’s organization, Shepherd’s Staff, if you need a receipt. Thank you so much for your help and prayers for this family!


Paypal: jesushelovesme@hotmail.com

Shepherd’s Staff: www.shepsstaff.org/eytzen.aspx

Quick update!

This has been a pretty fun and exciting week for us. We decided to be brave and take a bus to a nearby town called Las Vegas, and we were all a little nervous about riding the bus since we had been warned that they can be unsafe. Just as the bus pulled up, one of our taxi friends pulled up in front of it and told us that he would drive us to Las Vegas, so we saved the bus for another day. Yesterday we went to San Pedro on a bus, and it wasn't nearly as scary as we had thought - we had a great time there, and saw a movie - in English!  When it was over, I think all of us forgot we were in Honduras, and were confused when the attendant came up and talked to us in English. We have had a great time! We also had a neighbor take us out on the lake in a rowboat, and were able to swim there, which is really refreshing! We live in a really beautiful place!

We have been going to Sister Maria’s place, “La Casa de Angeles” (the house of angels) where she feeds 130 children every day. We help make a bunch of tortillas and feed the children and play with several of the kids also. The first week, they sang a special welcome song to us and it was a lot of fun. After the kids left, we went with Maria to see her cows, pick some plantains and oranges, and got to see the view from the top of one of the mountains. It was absolutely breathtaking to see the villages from that vantage point! We plan on helping Sister Maria every week, and are looking forward to building relationships with the children there.

We officially started the feeding program with a spaghetti dinner, and are excited that it went well! We invited some of the families who live near the church, as well as our church family, and had food, singing, and a short service that some visiting missionaries helped with. Two ladies came forward to receive Christ, so that was an extra blessing! The English classes that we are giving are going really well, and the children seem really excited to learn. When we are out on our porch, neighbor kids are always asking us what different words are in English, and they write the new words down in their notebooks.

A few days ago, Gordon and I went for a walk with Conan and some neighbor kids, and a vicious dog attacked us. It was pretty scary for all of us, but thankfully one of the older girls quickly got the younger children to safety, and the dog had a thick chain still on him, so Gordon was able to pull him off of Conan and I and tie him up. None of us were hurt badly, and none of us even ended up getting bit, which is amazing! Conan has a little scratch on his ear, my skirt got torn, and I hurt my ankle, but we’re glad that it wasn’t worse. We’re going to be a lot more careful from now on!

I went to the eye doctor again and found out that I have lost quite a bit of the peripheral vision in my right eye, but the doctor thinks that the eye drops will stop the progression and possibly even reverse the damage that is already done. We are all really thankful that I went in when I did, and that I was able to find a good doctor here. Everyone is healthy again and adjusting well to our new life here.

We are enjoying trying lots of new foods here, and really enjoying our housekeeper, Karlenis’ excellent cooking. We found a couple of restaurants that we love, and the prices can’t be beat. One of the local places is owned by Americans, and we can walk to it from our house. We are getting to know the people there, and enjoying getting to know fellow Americans. It’s a nice place to go when we get homesick for America!

Please continue to pray for us here, and if you feel led to come for a visit, we would love to welcome you to our home! I forgot the camera today, so no new pictures… next time, though!