Helping to shovel
Day four saw most of the team helping to pour a concrete floor in a home. A few others went and did some work on the latrines. Most of the floors in homes are dirt. Adding a concrete floor is a real help and blessing to the household. We gathered behind the house where the supplies were located. We shoveled buckets or rock and sand, added buckets of water and watched the experienced men mix them all with concrete mix and lime to make the concrete. It was great to see the Ariel boys bring their little shovel and help us out. We then formed a bucket brigade to pass the buckets of concrete into the room and the empty buckets out. In the room, Jorge, Luis and Caleb worked on pouring and leveling the floor. They worked from the corners to the door. Later a fine mix with color added was put on top to complete it.
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- Mixing the dry parts
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- Shoveling in the stone
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- Starting the pour
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- Bucket brigade ready for work
After lunch, some of the ladies helped inside the mission layering on moisture protection and plaster on the walls. Others painted in the mission. Five of us guys formed the Manly Cleaning Brigade and headed with Alexandra over to the feeding center. We moved all the things out of the kitchen area. We washed all the dishes and cooking pots. We swept, dusted, washed and mopped. We had a blast doing it and kidding each other about it. Alexandra had fun with us doing it as well.
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- Men’s Cleaning Brigade
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- Real Men Sweep
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- Judah and Rob doing dishes
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- Ladies Mudding the walls
After work, Nate, Rob, Nathan and I headed over to Jaime’s house. He is a local fisherman and craftsman. Nate has been talking with him for a good while and Nathan developed a good friendship with him last January. We sat on his back porch and sipped wonderful coffee (made with sugar in a pressure cooker) and talked. We then looked at and bought some of his jewelry. It was a good time.
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- Samy leads worship
That night the conference continued. Mark taught on men as priests in the home. The turn out was even better the second night. It was a challenging message for many and it encouraged the families to have devotions each day. Mark asked if anyone needed to surrender their lives to Christ and one lady came forward. It was a very good evening.
