Today was “un buen día”..a good day! It rained all night and i just kept worrying about dragging all of our luggage (HEAVY luggage still laden with supplies) through the back of the property to the dock! It has been a swimming pool all week! The rain did lighten up significantly about the time we had to load the boat up!
This adorable little man was our boat driver, and he was also gracious enough to load our things too. He grabbed my suitcase and tugged at it…realized how heavy it was and said “Ayyy.” Then with one swift movement, that suitcase was perched up on his right shoulder, he bent sideways and got a second small bag and away he went!
He built us a makeshift bridge of bricks…which made me think of the karate kid for some reason…I think because of found myself having to balance the entire load I was carrying just so, in order to get the front foot to the next brick without tipping over!! At any rate I ended up in the boat with dry-ish feet!
Some of the house we saw along the way out! Most were covered with corrugated tin!
As we came around the one of the last docks on the island, a trio of people were waving…which apparently, in La Calzada, means PULL OVER. So he did and we gained 3 new riders with us!
Shortly after they got on, I saw the man pointing to the sky and talking to one of the ladies. I looked up and saw a large pink bird in the distance!! A PINK FLAMINGO?!! In real life. Not at the zoo!! Incredible!! It was an exciting find for me…especially after getting all excited that I was watching a monkey in the distant trees yesterday, only to be told that they don’t have monkeys here…maybe a squirrel 😳
These women were cracking a whole bowl of little hard shelled mussel like things that they just call Conch.
The crew from CFCI was at the dock to take us to Pedregal…a small impoverished community. We attended church there a couple years ago when I was there! It was fun to recognize a few more faces!
People were lined up in the chairs waiting for us to start! There are about 800 houses that are inhabitable in the neighborhood and many more that have been abandoned because they are in such bad shape! This church does an outreach to the kids every day after school, and the pastor and his family have been pouring into this underserved community for years!!
A common thing for the patients to do is to come to the free clinic and then ask for their regular medications to be given to them…but generally they don’t know what the name of the medicine is!! So it makes it a bit tricky to get all the information in order to be able to help them!! I took care of a farmer today that grows maize and plantains. He was going to be out of medicine tomorrow and didn’t have enough money to buy more! Many of the people work in agriculture or construction or are street vendors. And the street vendors are everywhere here! They sell sacks of fruit or fresh bread or pupusas or drinks!
This little guy had an infected fungal rash scattered quite a few places on his body! One of many of the things I haven’t seen in the past!
After clinic, we loaded everyone up into the van and headed to the CFCI office where we dropped off the team. We then headed for our own lodging in Ilopango, a suburb of San Salvador. We parked at the church and then walked to our little casa. The tiny little streets were SOOOOO sweet!! Beautiful flower and fruit trees.
After settling in, we left Monica there since she wasn’t feeling well, and the rest of us met our friend Little Larry and our driver Ronald for dinner. Dr Larry had gotten his shoes wet while we were on the island so Monica suggested he microwave them. He told us that he hesitated on that, but decided to do it anyway. Apparently when you microwave wet shoes, they shrink, curl up into a little deformed ball, and the glue comes off. Sooo, he wore some old flip flops all day and we got to go to the mall so he could buy some new ones!! That was exciting!! They had a sketchers store ?…and he was able to find a pair in an 11. El Salvadoran men have small feet, so he wasn’t sure he was gonna find a pair large enough!
Little Larry and I took a fast loop thru the mall while he tried on shoes and then we ate at a restaurant that sold all types of dishes!! I had 3 different kinds of pupusas with curtido (a fermented vegetable and cabbage topping) and a red sauce! Little Larry got tamales that he chopped up for us to taste! They were wrapped in plantain leaves and seemed to have more masa and were more moist than the Mexican kind we are used to eating!! The others had chicken or pupusas! We got home late and I was finally able to get the WIFI code, but didn’t have the energy left to journal.
Tomorrow (which was today as I post) we leave early for a 2 ½ hour drive to Santa Ana. Here we will take care of women in a prison! They were arrested for protecting the gang members. Last year President Bukele ordered that all gang members be arrested and imprisoned. He also ordered that if anyone who helped hide them out, would also be imprisoned… which is how these women came to be here. The sentence was for 2 years!!
Our people are falling ill now, and we pray that God will keep us together until we finish this mission!!
As I reflected on the day, my biggest lesson came from a precious hour long conversation with Little Larry on the van ride home…
When we focus on the things that seem impossible…like the magnitude of the problems here and the many people that need resources and don’t have them…and then feel discouragement and frustration about the lack of fairness in the world…we put ourself in Gods place…
But when we work in obedience with the gifts He has given us, then we glorify Him best because we are showing up and making a difference in the only realm He ever intended us to make a difference in!! And when you look at life that way, Gods plan offers freedom! A freedom from doing that which He never intended you to do…or even to stress over. It doesn’t feel like enough…and a little bit overwhelming, like..if I can’t do more…why should I bother at all…like patching a boat hole with a bandage…it seems like a hopeless situation. But the situation isn’t mine. It’s Gods! And what I have to do is show up…ready to exercise my gifts and talents for His glory! Little did I know how much I would use today’s lesson in tomorrow’s agenda!! Only God can orchestrate the details in such an amazing way!!
💕❤️💗
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