From Karen 17 November 2004
Everything continues to go well here. The girls are drawing near to the end of the first quarter in their home schooling. It’s quite a challenging program and it takes up the better part of their day. All three will be involved in giving weekly piano lessons to some children at the church. Last Sunday, Gabrielle and Michaela helped out with Sunday school. There were amazed how LOUD the children were. When asked to recite different scriptures the teacher kept saying, “mas fuerte”, that is “louder!” Gabrielle said she now understands why the music is so loud at church. The people start to abuse their hearing at any early age. Bethany stayed with us in the meeting because the pastor really looks to her to play the piano before and after the Word. She does an excellent job creating impromptu melodies as background music while the pastor brings the meeting to an end.
Since my first cockroach sighting, last Sunday, I’ve already seen two more. One was a good 3 to 4 inches long. It just appeared one night above the back door in the kitchen. Ed wasn’t home. The girls and I monitored his/her exact location at all times. Gabrielle was going to walk through the door underneath it, but she said it looked at her, so she walked out the front door and went around to the back of the house to get a bucket of water from the cistern to flush the toilet. Ed finally came home. He walked right in under it. Of course we asked for it’s death, but Ed got a cup, captured it and released it outside instead. Its antennae were as long as it’s body. As Chaela says, it was disgustible! My only comfort is, I’d rather have a cockroach than a tarantula or a poisonous snake in the house.
Last night, I went into our bedroom, and turned on the light to see another moderately sized (2 ½”) cockroach on the table. I tried to hit it with a shoe but it scurried too quickly. I thought it went into my toiletry bag so I picked it up with a shovel and carried it out to the back porch where I emptied out the entire contents. It wasn’t there. I don’t like knowing there’s one in our bedroom. I hope I get another opportunity to do him in.
The Engle family left for the States yesterday.. In their absence Ed and I are to carry out Katrina’s plans for three groups of children who need get to Tegucigalpa or La Ceiba for various surgeries. One group is comprised of burn victims, another group is children with cleft palates, and the last one is a child in desperate need of back surgery. Katrina took one girl with them yesterday to go as far as Tegucigalpa. Her left leg is severely deformed from the knee down. The gospels speak of “withered “ limbs, and that’s an apt description of this girl’s lower leg. Her left foot is about half the size of her right one and is curled around like the letter C. This foot only comes to the mid-shin of her good leg. She’s never walked without a heavy wooden crutch. In Tegucigalpa she will have the left lower leg amputated and be fitted for a prosthetic limb. This will enable her to walk for the first time in her life.
Our other responsibility will be to disseminate baby formula or boost. The doctor at the local hospital will give those in need of supplemental nutrition a piece of paper , which they in turn give to us in order to receive a week’s supply. Katrina has found that if she gives more than a week’s worth at a time the likelihood that it will be sold for money is much greater. When Katrina had received a big donation of powdered milk and put out a call for all malnourished children and orphans to come to her for supplements, she had 70 year olds coming to her claiming to be orphans. In their culture, if both parents are deceased, you are considered an orphan no matter what your age.
Through Katrina, we have been exposed to some shocking physical conditions. In our high tech, medically advanced, US of A, we’re insulated from the crude and shocking physical deformities and abnormalities we see here. There was a small child at her house with her mother awaiting transportation to Tegucigalpa (the only way out of here is by plane). This child was born without an anus. Katrina took off a patch that was on the little girls left side so we could see the raw opening that had been made in order for her to eliminate her wastes. This is the second child born with this condition we have met here. Another little girl had a huge tumor growing out the side of her neck. Katrina told us that before her first surgery it looked like a tire around her entire neck. The surgeons were able to remove it but it has now started to grow back. There is nothing more the doctors can do. We laid hands on her and beseeched the Lord for His mercy. The babies with cleft palates are also a heart-wrenching sight. Some of them die of starvation before Katrina can arrange for help. Visiting charitable groups like Operation Smile perform many of the surgeries. A lot of the children needing medical help live in outlying villages with names like, Tuburus, Koraswatla, and Warunta. Some even come from as far away as Nicaragua. Ed and I will use the local radio station to contact these villages and let the families know when they have to be in Puerto Lempira so they can get the medical attention they need. Please pray all the details work out and we don’t mess up in a way that may cost someone their life.
The Miskito language was given an alphabet that corresponds phonetically with our English alphabet. To get a sense of what the language sounds like, here are verses 10 and 11 from the gospel of Mark, chapter one-
“Bara kais, li wina taki aula kan bara, Jisas kaikan kasbrika pura ba kwawan, bara Spirit Hulikira ba, butku baku ai purara bal iwan. Bila baikra kum sin kasbrika pura ba wina naku wisata: ‘Man ba yang Luhpi laitwankira sma; man ba bak saki mai briri’.”
A Miskito (the people call themselves Miskito, not Moskito) woman came to our house last Saturday asking for something. She spoke more Miskito than Spanish so I was at a clear disadvantage. I gathered that she was from Cauquira and hadn’t eaten for three days. I wasn’t sure if she had no food or couldn’t keep it down. Hesitant to give her money (you hear some very creative stories requesting money, which is then used to buy crack or alcohol), I decided to give her a Ziploc bag of rice. She looked a little disappointed. I later found out from Laurel, that most every Miskito household has rice and beans on the stove at all times. They let it cool then just reheat it for the next meal. The rice I gave her hadn’t even been cooked yet. Oh well, I tried.
Ed has found his beloved mandioca here at the local markets. He fell in love with it in Paraguay. It’s also called yucca (here) or cassava. We’re all converts now (except maybe Bethany). It’s a tuber with brown skin and a dense white flesh. You can boil it, or boil and then fry it. It tastes like french fries, only better. The ketchup here is, in my opinion, much better than Heinz. It has a sweetness to it, and is delicious with some salted fried mandioca. Maybe now Ed will stop losing weight!
Speaking of food, we went out to dinner with the Griggs last Saturday night. When you order, you’re often told they don’t have this or they don’t have that, so you should be prepared to order a few different things. I ordered a chicken and vegetable shish kabob. I’d ordered it one other time there and it was delicious. This time however it came with only two vegetables-beets and beet colored cauliflower. Not only were there some blobs of chicken but also many blobs of steak fat. At least the french fries were good. Ed however had a delicious meal of grilled fish, rice, French fries garnished with a tomato and lettuce.
The bank in town always has one or two guards at the door armed with rifles. The bank isn’t open all day like at home. When it is open you can stand in line for hours. The currency here is the Lempira (our city’s namesake). Eighteen Lempiras (or “limps” as the locals call it) are equivalent to one US dollar. I have the multiples of eighteen written down for easy reference. Food is pretty expensive here. I spend just a little less than I do in Syracuse for our family to eat here. Ippolito’s Nicaraguan restaurant charges just 15 limps per bag dinner. I can’t feed the family for less than that. The high cost is due to the fact that most everything has to be either shipped or flown here to sell. The only exceptions are rice, beans, plantain, mandioca, bananas and oranges. These items are very cheap.
Next week is Thanksgiving. Hope you all have a wonderful time with friends and family. We’re going to try to celebrate with as many of the traditional foods as possible. You’re in our thoughts and prayers.
To Him alone belongs all thanksgiving and praise!
Love,
Karen and family
Since my first cockroach sighting, last Sunday, I’ve already seen two more. One was a good 3 to 4 inches long. It just appeared one night above the back door in the kitchen. Ed wasn’t home. The girls and I monitored his/her exact location at all times. Gabrielle was going to walk through the door underneath it, but she said it looked at her, so she walked out the front door and went around to the back of the house to get a bucket of water from the cistern to flush the toilet. Ed finally came home. He walked right in under it. Of course we asked for it’s death, but Ed got a cup, captured it and released it outside instead. Its antennae were as long as it’s body. As Chaela says, it was disgustible! My only comfort is, I’d rather have a cockroach than a tarantula or a poisonous snake in the house.
Last night, I went into our bedroom, and turned on the light to see another moderately sized (2 ½”) cockroach on the table. I tried to hit it with a shoe but it scurried too quickly. I thought it went into my toiletry bag so I picked it up with a shovel and carried it out to the back porch where I emptied out the entire contents. It wasn’t there. I don’t like knowing there’s one in our bedroom. I hope I get another opportunity to do him in.
The Engle family left for the States yesterday.. In their absence Ed and I are to carry out Katrina’s plans for three groups of children who need get to Tegucigalpa or La Ceiba for various surgeries. One group is comprised of burn victims, another group is children with cleft palates, and the last one is a child in desperate need of back surgery. Katrina took one girl with them yesterday to go as far as Tegucigalpa. Her left leg is severely deformed from the knee down. The gospels speak of “withered “ limbs, and that’s an apt description of this girl’s lower leg. Her left foot is about half the size of her right one and is curled around like the letter C. This foot only comes to the mid-shin of her good leg. She’s never walked without a heavy wooden crutch. In Tegucigalpa she will have the left lower leg amputated and be fitted for a prosthetic limb. This will enable her to walk for the first time in her life.
Our other responsibility will be to disseminate baby formula or boost. The doctor at the local hospital will give those in need of supplemental nutrition a piece of paper , which they in turn give to us in order to receive a week’s supply. Katrina has found that if she gives more than a week’s worth at a time the likelihood that it will be sold for money is much greater. When Katrina had received a big donation of powdered milk and put out a call for all malnourished children and orphans to come to her for supplements, she had 70 year olds coming to her claiming to be orphans. In their culture, if both parents are deceased, you are considered an orphan no matter what your age.
Through Katrina, we have been exposed to some shocking physical conditions. In our high tech, medically advanced, US of A, we’re insulated from the crude and shocking physical deformities and abnormalities we see here. There was a small child at her house with her mother awaiting transportation to Tegucigalpa (the only way out of here is by plane). This child was born without an anus. Katrina took off a patch that was on the little girls left side so we could see the raw opening that had been made in order for her to eliminate her wastes. This is the second child born with this condition we have met here. Another little girl had a huge tumor growing out the side of her neck. Katrina told us that before her first surgery it looked like a tire around her entire neck. The surgeons were able to remove it but it has now started to grow back. There is nothing more the doctors can do. We laid hands on her and beseeched the Lord for His mercy. The babies with cleft palates are also a heart-wrenching sight. Some of them die of starvation before Katrina can arrange for help. Visiting charitable groups like Operation Smile perform many of the surgeries. A lot of the children needing medical help live in outlying villages with names like, Tuburus, Koraswatla, and Warunta. Some even come from as far away as Nicaragua. Ed and I will use the local radio station to contact these villages and let the families know when they have to be in Puerto Lempira so they can get the medical attention they need. Please pray all the details work out and we don’t mess up in a way that may cost someone their life.
The Miskito language was given an alphabet that corresponds phonetically with our English alphabet. To get a sense of what the language sounds like, here are verses 10 and 11 from the gospel of Mark, chapter one-
“Bara kais, li wina taki aula kan bara, Jisas kaikan kasbrika pura ba kwawan, bara Spirit Hulikira ba, butku baku ai purara bal iwan. Bila baikra kum sin kasbrika pura ba wina naku wisata: ‘Man ba yang Luhpi laitwankira sma; man ba bak saki mai briri’.”
A Miskito (the people call themselves Miskito, not Moskito) woman came to our house last Saturday asking for something. She spoke more Miskito than Spanish so I was at a clear disadvantage. I gathered that she was from Cauquira and hadn’t eaten for three days. I wasn’t sure if she had no food or couldn’t keep it down. Hesitant to give her money (you hear some very creative stories requesting money, which is then used to buy crack or alcohol), I decided to give her a Ziploc bag of rice. She looked a little disappointed. I later found out from Laurel, that most every Miskito household has rice and beans on the stove at all times. They let it cool then just reheat it for the next meal. The rice I gave her hadn’t even been cooked yet. Oh well, I tried.
Ed has found his beloved mandioca here at the local markets. He fell in love with it in Paraguay. It’s also called yucca (here) or cassava. We’re all converts now (except maybe Bethany). It’s a tuber with brown skin and a dense white flesh. You can boil it, or boil and then fry it. It tastes like french fries, only better. The ketchup here is, in my opinion, much better than Heinz. It has a sweetness to it, and is delicious with some salted fried mandioca. Maybe now Ed will stop losing weight!
Speaking of food, we went out to dinner with the Griggs last Saturday night. When you order, you’re often told they don’t have this or they don’t have that, so you should be prepared to order a few different things. I ordered a chicken and vegetable shish kabob. I’d ordered it one other time there and it was delicious. This time however it came with only two vegetables-beets and beet colored cauliflower. Not only were there some blobs of chicken but also many blobs of steak fat. At least the french fries were good. Ed however had a delicious meal of grilled fish, rice, French fries garnished with a tomato and lettuce.
The bank in town always has one or two guards at the door armed with rifles. The bank isn’t open all day like at home. When it is open you can stand in line for hours. The currency here is the Lempira (our city’s namesake). Eighteen Lempiras (or “limps” as the locals call it) are equivalent to one US dollar. I have the multiples of eighteen written down for easy reference. Food is pretty expensive here. I spend just a little less than I do in Syracuse for our family to eat here. Ippolito’s Nicaraguan restaurant charges just 15 limps per bag dinner. I can’t feed the family for less than that. The high cost is due to the fact that most everything has to be either shipped or flown here to sell. The only exceptions are rice, beans, plantain, mandioca, bananas and oranges. These items are very cheap.
Next week is Thanksgiving. Hope you all have a wonderful time with friends and family. We’re going to try to celebrate with as many of the traditional foods as possible. You’re in our thoughts and prayers.
To Him alone belongs all thanksgiving and praise!
Love,
Karen and family
posted by Eric Stephens at 22:26
<< Home