by jimmy | Feb 9, 2009 | buildingaboat, missions, Uncategorized |
Well I am hanging in the Houston airport with all my fingers and toes. I am sitting with Peggy Jenkins one of the women that went on our trip. She is one of the “chicas de concreta” she lives in Austin and we are waiting our flight. We had another great day with work in the AM and a tearful dedication service for the Hart’s. The day started with our “reverse migrant worker” van ride, that is 16 gringos in a 12 person van. When you open the doors one falls out. We started out at Casa B with concrete again and except for the 30+ mph winds it was pretty easy. We had lots of people helping and was a lot of fun because we really got to joke around and razz each other. We got to see walls rise from the ground, pipes laid in the trenches and of course lots of floors. You know I am not sure I have really described the concrete process but it is not “pull concrete truck up and dump concrete on ground and spread” it is far more painful. First you take 10-12 large wheelbarrows of the grey sand and dump them on the ground in a large circle. Then drop 6 100 lbs bags of concrete on top and spread out. Next you shovel everything into a big pile and then spread it back out. Are you having fun yet? Next come the rocks, the stuff like on the train tracks, and shovel 10 wheelbarrows of rock into the wheelbarrows and dump into the circle. Just add water. Maybe...
by jimmy | Feb 8, 2009 | buildingaboat, missions, Uncategorized |
Day 3 Ouch. Well I was introduced to an old enemy today no it is not the Devil but it is definently a tool straight from you know where. It is called the tamper. It is a tool that we use to tamp down dirt before we pour the concrete floors of the houses we are building. It is about 15 pounds of steel with a flt bottom that you just lift straight up and slam to the ground over and over and over. We poured the floor foranother house today I got some great pictures of the family we built the house for. They were so excited the kiids hung around the house all day and played. Their current house has a rubber tarp on the floor and I cannot help but think about how excited they must be to get a concrete floor. Their are three kids and the mom all living together in one room. After those floors we dug more trenches and this time we found the rocks not so much fun. We dug these for all the plumbing for huge addition to the Casa B clinic. Trenches had to be 24 inches deep and we probably dug 150 feet of them. The highlight of my day and maybe this trip was this evening and a celebration taking place across the city. I am not sure what it is called but all the churches have some services and then parade to a larger central church. Now this is not the normal US parade this is mostly on foot. Well except for the band playing out...
by Hampton | Feb 7, 2009 | buildingaboat, missions, Uncategorized |
Buenos dias amigos. Yo soy muy cansado. That means I am beat. We had a great day today and I am meeting many new folks. There are 19 people on this trip and we are really having a great time laughing and joking around. There are both men and women on this trip and we mixed up some serious concrete with the ladies today. I like to call them “las Chicas de Concreta”. We put concrete in a house for a family today and they were so much fun. We had two of the kids helping us today. a girl and a boy (5 and 6) it was great they were.shoveling concrete and just covered in concrete dust. We passed out a bunch of candy to kids all day long. Our hosts down here are a couple named Larry and Dr nancy they have a clinic and hospice for many people. There are a couple of guys in wheelchairs with CP and a little girl named Lupita also with CP. They are truly inspiring folks and really dedicated to their clinic Casa Bugambilla. The donations that the Harts made has almost doubled the size ofthe clinic and they are hoping to have room for 20 One of my favorite parts of today was a bit of time we spent with one of the guys that we work with down here named Roberto. He lives here and works with and for Larry. He took us to see his family and we had a fun time talking amd laughing with his kids. He has twins and little...
by jimmy | Feb 7, 2009 | buildingaboat, missions, Uncategorized |
Buenos dias amigos. Yo soy muy cansado. That means I am beat. We had a great day today and I am meeting many new folks. There are 19 people on this trip and we are really having a great time laughing and joking around. There are both men and women on this trip and we mixed up some serious concrete with the ladies today. I like to call them “las Chicas de Concreta”. We put concrete in a house for a family today and they were so much fun. We had two of the kids helping us today. a girl and a boy (5 and 6) it was great they were.shoveling concrete and just covered in concrete dust. We passed out a bunch of candy to kids all day long. Our hosts down here are a couple named Larry and Dr nancy they have a clinic and hospice for many people. There are a couple of guys in wheelchairs with CP and a little girl named Lupita also with CP. They are truly inspiring folks and really dedicated to their clinic Casa Bugambilla. The donations that the Harts made has almost doubled the size ofthe clinic and they are hoping to have room for 20 One of my favorite parts of today was a bit of time we spent with one of the guys that we work with down here named Roberto. He lives here and works with and for Larry. He took us to see his family and we had a fun time talking amd laughing with his kids. He has twins and little...
by Hampton | Feb 6, 2009 | buildingaboat, missions, Uncategorized |
Here’s Jim’s first note from the airport heading out to Mexico again. He is texting through transitions, like crossing over the border, letting me know they’re safe and all is well. He’s excited for another mission and excited to hear about his journey there. I’ll be updating the blog with his posts as he emails them out. Here’s his first note from yesterday: I am sitting in the airport about get on a flight headed to Harlingen to join up with the group that got me hooked on this mission work. I am excited to see these guys because I have not seen most of them in a year and lots of things have happened in my life and theirs since then. I have to be honest this trip has been different in that I am finding myself truly caught up in our world and where the future will take my family and I have not had time to reflect on the trip and focus. For example, every time I have come I asked the kids to donate a toy and this time it slipped my mind. I know it is a silly thing to be concerned with but some times I wish we were all required to take some quiet time and reflect on the lessons of life. Man pretty deep considering I am still in the airport. Take some time over the next few days to get quiet and just listen to that voice in your head. It is the truth inside.
This will be the first mission for the Custer Road church since they lost Matt Hart...
by jimmy | Feb 6, 2009 | buildingaboat, missions, Uncategorized |
Here’s Jim’s first note from the airport heading out to Mexico again. He is texting through transitions, like crossing over the border, letting me know they’re safe and all is well. He’s excited for another mission and excited to hear about his journey there. I’ll be updating the blog with his posts as he emails them out. Here’s his first note from yesterday: I am sitting in the airport about get on a flight headed to Harlingen to join up with the group that got me hooked on this mission work. I am excited to see these guys because I have not seen most of them in a year and lots of things have happened in my life and theirs since then. I have to be honest this trip has been different in that I am finding myself truly caught up in our world and where the future will take my family and I have not had time to reflect on the trip and focus. For example, every time I have come I asked the kids to donate a toy and this time it slipped my mind. I know it is a silly thing to be concerned with but some times I wish we were all required to take some quiet time and reflect on the lessons of life. Man pretty deep considering I am still in the airport. Take some time over the next few days to get quiet and just listen to that voice in your head. It is the truth inside.
This will be the first mission for the Custer Road church since they lost Matt Hart...
