We just finished a muy delicioso dinner of carne asada, fresh avocado, pico de gallo, beans and corn tortillas. The trip has been "interesting" to say the least. We all met last night at the airport in Sacramento. What an amazing sight to see 56 of us in our bright green shirts!! During the first leg of the flight most of us were too excited to sleep even though it was midnight when our flight left Sacramento. What a diverse bunch we are - young, old and everything in between - we took up most of the back half of the plane. We landed in Houston around 3:30am and had a four hour layover so most of the group took off to explore (aka find coffee!!!). Some ate breakfast, some slept on the floor with their pillows, and the rest just relaxed or talked but you could feel everyone's excitement and joy at being on this mission trip.
The flight from Houston to Tegucigalpa was another story. I think most of us slept during that leg of the trip. We had a little bumpy landing and by the time we got through customs and into the luggage area - most of the bags were already waiting. I have never seen a sea of luggage like that before - all with green FBFCO tags on them. Brent, Dr. Gates' friend, was there to meet us. As we walked out of the airport and to our 2 old school buses what is the first thing we see - Burger King, Pizza Hut and Little Caesar's!!! It's like we never left home! It was warm when we got outside - probably around 75-80 degrees. About 7 or 8 ladies did a quick change out of their long sleeve shirts - of course they had their green t-shirts over the long sleeved ones so it was a comical sight to see them doing this and being modest about it at the same time.
We then boarded the 2 buses and embarked on a 3 hour adventure (ride) to the camp. They served us lunch while we were waiting for the bus to take us to the camp. Guess what they served us? What every American loves - McDonald's!!! We had Big Macs, fries and Coca Cola light. It was just like home.
Along the way one of the buses had a mechanical problem. Those of us on that bus could tell from the smell of the burning clutch that something was going on. Most of the way to camp is uphill and that poor bus was struggling. But our driver was able to fix the problem in no time and we were back on our way after 15 minutes. I think we traveled maybe 50 miles from the airport to the camp but it took 3 hours because the bus couldn't go much faster than 20 mph!! Several people were asking "father" Wayne" Stacks "are we there yet?, are we there yet?". I felt so sorry for him being on that bus with 25+ badly behaving children. We saw all kinds of new sights along the ride like bulls grazing in backyards of homes, burros on the hillsides, and homes made of all kinds of different materials from concrete to sheets of aluminum siding. We arrived at the camp around 5:30pm and unloaded both buses of their luggage. After separating the suitcase into medical, construction, and VBS groups we got our room assignments. Some are staying inside in very nice accommodations that have bathrooms and showers. The other 30+ are staying in cabins that just have beds. Only 5 of the cabins were ready so a group had to scavenge from others to get bedding but it all worked out in the end.
We met for dinner at 6:15pm and heard from the camp director and Brent. We found out we can drink the water from the main dining building but nothing outside of that building. For those staying in the cabins there are 2 showers for the ladies and 2 for the men. That is going to be an interesting exercise in sharing between 30+ people!! After eating we went over the week's schedule and headed to our rooms to unpack, unwind and get some much needed rest.
I have to say we are such a positive group. Even with the problems with the bus, the lack of bedding in a couple of cabins, and no real sleep for the last 20 hours no one got upset or lost patience - we smiled and laughed through it.
That's all I can think of for now. I'm not sure how much detail you want so please let me know if you want more or less or if this is just right. Tomorrow I will give my input from the construction team and I will get a person from medical and VBS to give me their perspective to add so you have all the pieces you need. Buenos noches from Honduras!
Aprill Edwards