On to new adventures

Welp, the time I've been anticipating has finally come.

We had our closing program yesterday morning, and I was able to say my last goodbyes to the children and fellow staff. I'll miss them all so much!

Last photo opportunity of the year.
Left to right: Beatriz, Eduardo, Samuel, Paola, Teresa.

This is the group of people I've had the pleasure of working with this year.
Left to right: Liz, Samuel, Paty, David, Bethany, Verónica.

The typical knot in the stomach hasn't hit me yet, but I expect it will after I settle in at home for a while and realize I won't be able to listen to my students' stories and sign to them, or that I won't be having any more rice, beans, and tortillas (sorry Mom) for supper along with a healthy measure of Marie Sharp's habanero hot sauce.

At the same time, I'm really looking forward to what lies ahead. I've been looking forward to going home for a while now. I haven't seen my family yet, since I'm staying in San Salvador until it's time to fly out, but I'm really excited about that prospect. And I can't wait to go back to church, the youth group, and my job.

You know, it's a blessing to be able to have two homes and two groups of friends, but that feeling is bittersweet sometimes. But it's worth it, and I thank God for having given me the opportunity.

I can't wait to see what the future holds, but whatever it is, I'm sure God has a lot to teach me! These three years in El Salvador working with the deaf have taught me many valuable life lessons. Granted, I'm stubborn and it's taken quite a few lessons, but God has been good and I feel like I've been learning about as much or more as my students have.

And to all of you faithful supporters, thank you so much for praying for me! I wish I could thank each of you personally, but I guess this will have to suffice. Thank you for your support and prayers. I couldn't have done this without you. May God abundantly bless each one of you!

That said, I don't mean to say that I don't need prayer anymore. As friends have reminded me, coming home doesn't mean I'm done being a missionary. I can be a missionary to my family, my friends, my church etc. I don't need to be in a foreign country or even another state. So please continue praying for me. Pray that God would continue to work out his plan for me in my life. Thank y'all so much!

Trying to get all our "teacher stuff" done before the end of the year.

Enjoying some quality staff game time that had
been seriously lacking at times.

Solomon anointed as the new king.

Solomon and his faithful servants/soldiers.

Solomon's dream.

"This is not my baby!!"

"No, don't kill the baby! Give it to her instead..."

The queen of Sheba decides to visit Solomon.

A short update

Hey guys! I know it's been a while, and I do apologize. I just wanted to let you know what's been going on recently.

Since I wrote at the August we had our interviews with Nata and Becky. I informed them that this would be last year and that although I enjoyed my three years working at CICS, I wouldn't plan to work next year.

So this month is not just the last month of this school year, it is also the last month of my work here at CICS. I'm going to miss El Salvador and the deaf a great deal, I'm sure, but I feel like it is time to let others continue the work I'm convinced God will find others who can carry on the work at the deaf school. Right now, I'm really looking forward to going home more than almost anything, but ask me next February, I'll probably be wishing to come back. But all good things usually need to come to an end...

Pray for all of us staff as we get closer to the last days of this year. Pray that we could finish strong and do our best. These last weeks are usually terribly hectic, and sometimes it can be hard to stay focused on God and not let our to-do lists beat us over the head. Thank you very much for your support and prayers!

Busy bees

I had visitors again! Unfortunately, they didn't stay for very long, but they sure accomplished a lot of work while they were here.

The group consisted of Lavelle Beiler, Jonathan Peachey, Matt King, Steven Glick, and Darren Stoltzfus. Earlier this year, Nata (our director) had wondered if some guys would be willing to come down and work. This was the group that volunteered.

They arrived last Monday night, the 15th of August. The very next day, after a brief visit to school, they set to work on cleaning up an area out past the school. (For those of you that have been here, it's the place where Daniel and Orpha Lapp used to live while the property was being used as an orphanage.) The place is separated from the rest of the property by a field and has been largely untouched over the years, except for expeditions to gather mangoes from the numerous trees that have grown quite tall.

Recently there have been a lot of people loitering there because it's so secluded with all the tall trees and underbrush, so we decided to clean it up.

Earlier this year, Shawn and Ivan had started by chopping away at the weeds and underbrush with machetes. The next step was chopping down some trees and knocking down the old buildings that served as a house and barn for Daniel and Orpha many years ago.

The guys worked hard every day in the sun and heat and probably changed clothes and showered more often than they had anticipated. :)  I was proud to say they were from my youth group and we are all very grateful for all the hard work they did.

Free ride, why not take advantage.

I some students out the first day to see what was going
on. Of course they, being the energetic boys they are,
wanted to help too!

Trying to pull down the re-bar reinforced concrete posts. They all
got pulled down after breaking the rope at least once.

Breaking down walls...

I think almost everyone added a few arm muscles after the week was over. :)

And the walls came tumbling down...

Another stubborn post. And yes that is me helping with the work. Hard
to believe I know, but office boy that I am, I do have a few muscles that
come in handy sometimes.

Working on tearing down the house. We had a real system with this. Once
you weakened a wall a little, it was pretty easy to push it down with a good
pushing rhythm if everyone helped.

After all the walls were knocked down, we started on clearing a few of
the trees as well.

And these were not little trees...

Barn before and after. All the weeds (that aren't there) had been cleared by
Shawn and Ivan when they were here.

House before/after.

At around five close to the end of each day we usually did something together. We went out for pupusas one night, and then went to see the volcano where we again ate pupusas. Pretty sure the guys all loved our national food!

Nata had told me that if they guys work hard, we can take the school van (usually reserved for school purposes) to the beach on the last day and stay overnight. Since the beach is close to the airport we then planned to go directly there afterwards. 

So that's we did and they all earned it, too! It felt so good to relax at the beach with sand in our toes and salty water washing away the sweat. The waves were high and wild which made it even more fun. I think we all got bowled over at least once by some rogue wave we never saw coming. And since we were there overnight, we also got to see a beautiful sunset in the evening.

The next morning, we got up fairly early (for a Saturday morning anyway) and had some more leisure time on the beach and in the pool until the time came to leave for the airport.

And then they were gone! I was very glad for an (albeit brief) increase in male population here at CICS. :) Don't worry, I'm fine. I can hold my own most days. :) 

The guys worked extremely hard in the hot weather and accomplished a lot in the short time they were here. I was blessed by their hard-working attitudes and also how they interacted with the children. After the first couple minutes, the boys were constantly asking them for piggy-back rides or baiting them into a tussling match. So thanks guys for coming! Can't wait to come home soon and see y'all again!

Speaking of which, as the year winds down, please continue to pray for me as well. I want to finish strong and do my best until the end.

A new friend for Joel.

Pupusas!

Paola trying her best to outrun speedy Darren.

Someone has met his match with JP.

Steven and JP submit to being tagged by Teresa after getting caught.

A view of San Salvador from the volcano where we were eating.

A beautiful sunset on the beach in Costa del Sol.

Goodbye!

Home stretch

Whoosh! There went three more months!

Two weeks ago, we held our second spelling competition of the year. Each trimester, we plan out a list of vocabulary words for our students to learn for the competition. All of my students that were present did very well, although I was surprised at the final result. Teresa, usually the most accurate speller, made two mistakes which put her in third place this time, behind Paola and Beatriz.

Paola and Beatriz both worked very hard on memorizing the words and did very well. All it took was one mistake from Beatriz to put her in second place since Paola finished without a single one.

I mentioned that all my students that were present did great. Well, Eduardo wasn't present. His excuse was sickness, which I'm still skeptical about. Sadly, you can't always believe what students say or even what parents claim about their own children.

When Eduardo was sick the first time, I didn't think much about it. But then it happened again and again. Excuse? Sickness/coughing. However it was mighty convenient that it also just happened to be test week. School isn't the easiest for Eduardo, and instead of doing what's necessary to learn, he would much rather go the easy route of not learning at all!

The week following the spelling competition--the first week of August--was vacation week! Ahhh... a week of mornings with no electronic machinery getting me up with it's much-too-loud *beep* *beep* *beep*. (Can you tell I don't like heeding alarms?) :)

During vacation, there were only a few of us here at CICS. Nata had gone stateside to bring back cars to fix up. Everyone that could (Paty, Verónica, David) went home to be with family. Which left us three Americanos and Zulma who has been staying with us for a while now, while her grandparents are in the states for a visit.

So what did I do with all that free time? I would like to tell you I used every single moment doing something productive, but I didn't. And you know, I don't seem to regret it that much. :) I did get a lot of things done, though, make no mistake. My to-do list shrank considerably, for one. I gave my school room a good cleaning, fixed a hole in the trampoline, etc. And I made and ate a lot of french fries!

But I was glad by the time it was over. I had been looking forward to vacation, but then I was anxious to see the smiling faces of my students again.

Please pray for me these last couple weeks (about 10). Satan is very good at making me feel like I can't do teach well, or that I should just coast until October when I can go home again. I want to stand up and do the best job I possibly can and make the last weeks of this year count!

One night we all decided to color for a while. It was really relaxing, and it
is one of the few things that can keep Miguel quite and interested for over
five minutes. :)

My students saw my finished page and wanted to do
the same, so we had a coloring class.

Giving and receiving back rubs.

Trampoline is back! Everyone was excited to exercise in a novel way.

Joel practicing that front flip...

And Miguel now wanting to be outdone.

Something interesting is happening on Bethany's laptop.
Not sure what, though.

Who can pick up the most sticks?
(a certain way of course)

Everyone was excited to meet our newest staff member,
Rocky. (It's a dog) :)

Are you daddy?

Cliffton, the self proclaimed protector of Rocky. :)

I know it doesn't look like it, but Miguel is sleeping
in this picture. Just couldn't stay awake in
church anymore. :)

Hit that one dead, Zulma! When Zulma hits an insect with a fly swatter, it's
not dead straight away, even though its insides are spattered all
over the place. It's not dead until the insides inside those insides are
splattered all over the place. :)