Apawas

Ok, I know I've been terrible about posting. Sorry about that. You know how there is either nothing interesting to post or your doing things that are too interesting to have time post? Anyway - here is something interesting that I did.

I went on a trip to a remote part of Nicaragua with a group of youth from my church here and also a small short-term group from a Korean-American church in Atlanta, Georgia. It was a grueling trip - 14 hours there and 17 hours back. The town, Apawas, was only accessable by a 3 hour canoe ride (with a motor). I almost died a couple of times, particularly on the aforementioned canoe ride, but what else is new? (I mean really, enough about me, what's new with your guys?). The good part was I got some great field data for my study on short-term missions.

Here are some pictures.

This is the town of Apawas. It has sprung up in just the past nine years to provide merchandise for the farmers who are taming the "agricultural frontier of Nicaragua." Land is extremely cheap in this area. Most of these shops are owned by people who go to Managua once a month or more to buy wares and return to sell them here. People walk into town from hours away to buy necesities. Because no roads lead to Apawas, there are no cars here. Only horses.

This is my host sister Wendy. I was blessed to get to know her better on this trip. Wendy loves children. I know a lot of girls say, "Oh! I LOVE children!" but really if you leave them with a group of kids for more than 15 minutes they get tired and annoyed (I am one of those girls. Except I have reformed my word choice to "like" in recent years). But Wendy really does love Children. I see the Lord shine through her when she is with them. She is going to Iowa next month to study Special Education at Dort College. I will miss her dearly.

This picture was taken at the exact moment that this cute little parrot pooped on my leg. There is nothing posed about that face...

These are the beautiful women of Apawas. Shop owners, mothers, some victims of domestic abuse. Alcoholism is very prevalent among men in Apawas. We held a little gathering for these women where we served them refreshments, played ice-breaker games, Joy (Korean girl on the left) shared her testimony, and I gave them massages while they shared prayer requests. When asked what they like to do in their free time most women resonded "cooking and house work." When asked what their favorite food was the most common response was either "chicken" or "rice and beans." We prayed together Nicaraguan style, all of us holding hands and raising our voices together to call on the Lord to meet our needs. I was very blessed by this time.

This is the well in Apawas. During winter people mostly collect rain water, but in the summer they have to rely on this highly contaminated water source. It runs low so people crawl into it and dredge it with buckets. There are holes in the sides so river water sloshes in bringing along not just mud, but also soap from washing laundry, and other even less pleasant things. In the short time we were there David, the pastor of the Atlanta church, and Sarah, his Nicaraguan wife who is studying development, managed to form a plan to build a new well which will be directed by the local church, contributed to by the town council, and funded by their church in Atlanta. Pastor David told us that just as James said we cannot just tell a brother he is loved but leave him hungry, and thirst, is an even more basic need than hunger. However he was also careful to ensure that this project will be known as primarily coming from the local Baptist church in Apawas and will be supported by their effort and initiative. It was really refreshing to see people doing things with a good heart AND a well thought out, culturally sensitive approach.