Thursday was spent in classes and some of the kids played Scrabble, Banagrams together with their teachers as a group. Hope you were able to see the pictures! We then went home and had lunch, it was amazing once again, we are definitely blessed by Evelinda's cooking! Another thing that is so nice is being so close to school. At 2:00 we met at school to follow a tour guide to San Miguel Escobar, just outside of Antigua to see a school recently built by Common Hope, a nonprofit organization that helps families in the area of education to make it a possibility for their families. What an amazing school and we heard lots of little kids voices saying Hola as we walked through. We them travelled to San Pedro de Las Huertas, where the building Common Hope is. It has a clinic, a library, a Path of Dreams sidewalk with the ne
Ames of graduates from the schools. Common Hope also provide housing for needy families and employs them in order for them to recieve either a one or two room house. Common Hope also provides stoves to families in need of better smoke circulation. Many homes here are equipped with stoves that cause respiratoryoblems because of the amount of smoke that their wood burning stoves give off. The stoves provided by Common Hope are equipped with chimneys on them to imrove ventilation for them while cooking. Such an interesting tour. If you want to hear more about the great things that Common Hope is doing, go to their Facebook page that tells a bit about what they do. https://www.facebook.com/commonhope
There is also a link to a their webpage, http://www.commonhope.org
After our tour, we came back to Antigua and had a nap. It rained a bit, but some of us decided to brave it at the market anyway :) we have our vendors that seem to know who we are and call us over. We are becoming masters at Bargaining, while remaining respectful of the vendors. So much fun!
A few of us took advantage of our time before dinner to visit the ruins by the main cathedral. The ruin s date back to the early 1700's and was destroyed by an earthquake that passed through. The walls and rooms still are there. We had a fun time exploring, taking pictures, and touring the ruins on our own. Hope you were able to see the pictures on this groups facebook page.
Friday was our last day of class, really, it was hard to say goodbye to our teachers. We were stretched, challenged, and had fun while learning a few new things and being comfortable with communicating in Spanish! All the students were awarded certificates of completion at the end of the day that they can take home. During classes, I was able to purchase some garbage bags to put laundry in to take to the laundry that returns our clothes to us washed, dried, ironed and folded in a bag in the morning. They will even deliver our clothes to us tomorrow when done! We brought everything away just in time before it started to rain, and had a hot meal waiting for us when we returned.! Gracias Eva! In the afternoon, we were able to exchange money and spend a little quiet time in the city of Antigua. Some went to Mono Loco, a local restaurant, others went to Cafe Barista, and I went with Glenna, an individual on the team joining us next week, to another market in town and bought some more gifts for our family. We went to a panadería, and talked a lot. Glenna will be a nice addition to
the team!
The weekend will be spent here until Sunday early evening when we plan to go to Magdalena. It is about 15 minutes away from here, where we will love with separate host families. I will live with Mario and Ingrid,;Courtney, Jonna, Erika and Lindsey will live with Veronica; Brian, Cooper, Ethan and Kohler will live with Iris; and Megan, Shelby, Ruby and Lizette will live with Lorena. Mr. Roeloffs ans Mr. Rietema will live with Blanca and her husband.
Tomorrow we plan to visit my friend Hilmar Avila in La Pinada for about 3 hours before we have
lunch here. We are free in the afternoon to visit the ruins and evening dinner will be paid for by
Students International in town. Sunday we will be at bilingual church, and we will pack up to leave and nap in the afternoon. We are so excited to transition to our mission trip and see the 4 others joining us on Monday! No worries, Lindsey, Erika, Dennis and JR I will be at the airport to get you with SI staff on Monday! Can't wait to see you!
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