What an amazing experience Honduras was! It’s not like any place I’ve been before or anything I’ve ever done. Tuesday, we flew into San Pedro Sula, which is a fairly large city. The 4 hour ride from the airport to the Mercy International Mission Center in Yamaranguila takes you from a very gritty urban area to a rural setting near the Opalaca Mountains. The roads go from okay to absolutely the worst I could ever imagine. It is a jarring experience that must destroy vehicles in a very short time. We arrived at the mission center, or the Farm as they call it, around 8 pm. Our group of 15 guys from the Vineyard West Side got acquainted with the 11 guys from Parkway church in Victoria Texas.
The Farm is staffed with several full time people and a number of interns that stay for several months at a time. It’s a very beautiful setting, but surrounded by fences, gates, barbed wire and some pretty mean German Sheppard dogs. Every home, property and business in Honduras seems to be fortified with such extra security measures - yep, walls and barbed wire around most of the homes. Men with shotguns are on guard outside of most gas stations and convenience stores.
On Wednesday, we did work projects around the farm – post holes for a fence, an awning for a building, clearing some land for a future project. We also were briefed on the task ahead, what had to be done, and what to expect.
Thursday, we packed our gear for a ‘hike” up into the Opalaca Mountains. Along with the 26 guys from Cincinnati and Texas, we had 3 interpreters and 4 other guys from Mercy International, so 32 in all. It was another rough 4 hour ride to where we would begin the hike. The hike began around 12:30 pm and would cover 12 miles in 6 to 8 hours, depending on the individual. This hike took us from a road like path, to a woodsy trail, through the “jungle” rainforest, numerous towns and villages and finally to Los Crossidos. I don’t know how to spell it, but that is how it sounds.
My “amazing adventure” began about the half way point of the hike. I stopped to take some photos and never saw my comrades again. I waited for folks behind me, but they never appeared. It turns out several were not doing well and become dehydrated. Mules had to be brought in to take them the rest of the way. Yes, it was an extreme hike. The most difficult any of these 26 men had ever experienced. Back to me, lost and alone in a foreign country – a third world country at that! (are you feeling the drama?) Yes, all sorts of scenarios began to play out in my mind. What if I am lost and don’t make it back. What if I live amongst the mountain people for weeks or months? I might be an international news story. In this region there are NO phones or cell phones, NO electricity, TV’s etc. How could I contact anyone, even in an emergency? This is like living 300 years ago. I’m not kidding.
I came upon a village, Santa Maria, where some kids were playing. I spoke to a man named Arel, who was there as a social worker. He had lots of questions about where I was from, where I was going, what we were doing etc. The kids were all quite interested in my gear – walking sticks, camera etc. Arel took the picture I’ve enclosed. As I went on my way, two of these kids followed me. We came to a fork and I really had no idea what to do. The two boys seemed to think I should go to the right, but I wasn’t sure. They spoke no English, and I basically don’t speak any Spanish. They seemed to think I was quite hilarious because they sure laughed a lot. They got me to lighten up and laugh a bit too. A third boy came along with a very large machete. I laughed a little less and thought I’d better make a decision sooner rather than later. Like I said – the machete looked quite large. I finally took the road to the right and went on my way.
The next town I came to had a group of about 12 kids that flocked around me. Again, they were all smiling and laughing. I strained to remember some Spanish words. I remembered two. I told them I was “loco” and “stupido” – they laughed even more. I got my camera out and showed them pictures I took of my fellow hikers to see if they had seen these other gringos come through. I still wasn’t sure I was on the right path. They just laughed like I was “loco” and “stupid”. I began to hike ahead and they followed. I was getting very tired and my feet were feeling quite sore. I groaned, the kids groaned. I grunted, they grunted. I went “whoo”, they went “whoo”. This made me laugh. I threw more out on purpose and they mimicked everything – and laughed. This made me crack up laughing. I began to make the sound we all made as kids where you cover your mouth off and on like an American Indian on the war path. They went nuts and all started doing it too. It was hilarious. In that moment, I think I fully entered into my Honduran experience. I wasn’t worried about what was going on at home, were they making it without me at work, when will I see my emails and facebook page, etc. I wasn’t worried about surviving the hike, being lost, or what was ahead. It was a beautiful moment and that’s all that mattered. I think it is known as “present centered living”. It’s a beautiful thing.
The kids finally went back and I continued on. It was getting darker and I wondered if I might have to ask some locals if I could stay the night with them. Now, I haven’t mentioned this guy yet, but several times on the hike a guy on a moped mountain bike passed us back and forth several times. The weird thing is that he had a cooler strapped to the bike. I had no idea what he was doing or what the cooler could be. He spoke a little English, and he seemed to think I was on the right path, but I still wasn’t sure. I later found out that this guy had ice cream in his cooler that he sells in the villages. I guess he’s quite the entrepreneur.
The final hour of my journey was excruciating. The entire route is nothing but uphill and downhill. You would think that downhill would be great, but too much downhill is a bad, bad thing. My toes were getting jammed into the fronts of my shoes. At this point I had to walk like a 90 year old man. Every step was painful. The final stretch was a HUGE, rocky downhill. This was like a trail that only a mountain goat could love. At the bottom of this, it then went straight uphill – and finally to the town of Los Crossidos! I yelled to the tiny figures still far ahead “Amigos, I made it!”
After finally meeting up with those that “left me behind”, I learned that those yet behind me had serious issues and were coming in on donkeys. Frank was the worst. He arrived around 8 pm, dehydrated and delirious. We made him drink some Gatorade like energy/recovery vitamin supplement that one of our guys had. It took a few hours, but Frank finally came around. Other guys were extremely exhausted and had minor knee and foot injuries. We all prayed for God’s strength at the outset - to do what had we had to do. He got us this far, and we knew we had to trust him for everything.
Friday began at 3:15 am, because of roosters crowing. There were three roosters strategically placed all around us that would call to each other. I fought to get back to sleep, but the snoring around me made it very difficult. That’s what happens when you get 20 guys in one room sleeping on a concrete floor. Most of us were in a government built school house. As Honduran mountain structures go, this school was quite nice – concrete block construction and concrete floor. There is no electricity or running water in this one room building. There is a pela(?) outside, which is a concrete water station put in by the Peace Corp a few years ago. This is where they wash up and get water from. There are also two out houses behind the school that have toilet like commodes, but no toilet seat and you can’t flush toilet paper down them. In fact, there wasn’t any place in all of Honduras where you are allowed to flush toilet paper down a toilet. Oh, the things we take for granted. The rest of the guys stayed in a house where a local family gave up a room for us to prepare meals in and to sleep in. This house was an adobe brick building with a tin roof. The windows are open air – no glass, shutters or screens. The floor is like a packed dirt floor.
In the daylight, I could now see how the village was situated into the side of a mountain. It was spectacularly beautiful (check out my facebook page for photos). The most beautiful setting of any town we had come to. The bad news is that nothing is flat. Everywhere you walked, you had to go uphill or downhill. Each morning we would head to the house where Ryan, our pastor, would cook up fabulous meals from food we brought along. He did an amazing job and we were well fed. All of our water was from the local source, but had to be put through a filtration machine we brought. The local water could make us “gringos’ quite sick.
Our work project was to build a church. Our job was to dig the footers, pour the footers, and pour the concrete slab for the floor. The Texas guys were to build the trusses that would support the roof. The walls of the church will be made of adobe bricks that are already made on site and curing all over the village. They are all sitting outside under tin panels. Future mission teams will build the walls out of these bricks and install the trusses and roof.
The basic site for the church was already dug out of a hillside by the locals, but it needed even more work. The Hoduran guys started this at 6:30 am. They had to chop away at the hill. The rest of us began to level the grade more and build up the soil on the part that drops off. This was all done by hand with shovels and picks. There were about 10 to 15 Honduran men and boys who worked like I’ve never seen anyone work before. The people that make up these towns and villages in the Opalaca mountains are descendents of the Lenca Indians. They are very hard working and self sufficient. They speak Spanish, wear western clothes, farm and raise chickens and turkeys. Unlike many of the other towns, this town has about 30 people that are a part of this church. They are very excited to have a place to meet together and worship. One of the objectives of Mercy International is to teach a local church like this how to do such a project and then go out to other surrounding villages, bring the good news of the gospel to their neighbors and initiate such building projects. The goal is that they are less dependent on outside resources and more dependent on each other. This is just such a group. Women and children carried bags of cement and sand up and down hills to the work site – like it was nothing. Unlike us, they never groaned and complained about anything.
We dug the footer 2 feet wide and 26” down, filled it with some rebar, concrete and large stones from the area. Crude by our standards, but it’s the way they do it in the mountains. Except for the bags of cement, all the materials and wood are from the surrounding mountains and forests. A local man cut the lumber from trees in the forest. This same man used to persecute the local Christians. Now he is a Christian and providing the lumber for the church. God does amazing things.
The Texan’s did an awesome job on the trusses. They systematically cut, nailed, built and stacked the trusses. We had to bring a gas generator up on a mule to power the power tools that were used. I really need to pause here to say a word or two about those wonderful creatures - mules and donkey. What extraordinary animals! They carried 400 lbs of food, packs for those that couldn’t carry their own, a gas generator, a water filtration system, gas stoves, pots and pans, and the broken bodies of those that struggled. Thank you God for mules and donkeys, without whom, none of this would have been possible.
This first day was longer and more difficult than anyone expected. At mid day, did not look like we would get it done – but we did. And when we finished it was great, but everyone thought “how can we do this again tomorrow?” This is one of the many times God answered our prayers – He truly renewed our strength each day and provided what we thought we didn’t have. It was awesome.
Saturday was the day to mix tons of concrete by hand. The Texans finished the trusses, so now they got to help with the real workJ We would dump 12 wheel barrows of sand in a pile, pour on two 92 lb bags of cement, and dry mix it all together with shovels. Next, we would hollow out the center of the pile like a volcano. Water was poured in and the wet mixing would begin. Soon, we’d have a nice pile of “mud” that would be spread for the floor. All the women and small children of the town looked on as we did this. You could see just how excited and interested they were in all this. As I would go back to the sand pile to fill up my wheel barrow, there were 4 girls looking on, always smiling. I asked their names and they were embarrassed as can be. Finally, I coaxed their names out of them - Alba, Trixy, Dilcea and Maria. So each time I came back, I would say their names, and when I got to Maria I would sing “Maria” from West Side Story. They were quite amused and embarrassed.
Pouring the concrete floor seemed to go on forever, but we finally finished. That evening we had a joint dedication service with the Honduran folks. We stood in a huge circle outside as it was getting dark. The Honduran’s provided the music – two guitars, a large acoustic bass guitar like I’ve never seen, and a little kid playing a ukulele. These people sang, worshiped and prayed passionately and loudly. We couldn’t understand fully what they were saying, but it was clear they were praying for us. Everyone in our group was truly moved by this. This is one of those times when it is clear you are receiving and getting more than you feel you brought or contributed. To see people who have so little by our standards, so happy and joyous is life changing. They work so hard just to survive and never complain. Seeing this first hand, and living just a little bit of their life is an eye opening experience.
But back to complaining – the last night in the mountains, I wanted to go on a hunting expedition for the local roosters - if not to kill them, at least to but rubber bands around their beaks. Oh well, I guess it’s just a part of the total experience.
Sunday was Pop Tarts for breakfast and the hike out. Vince Gramaglia, our fearless leader, gave us all a very impassioned and memorable “pep talk” about the need to carry our packs and hike out. Some in our midst wanted to go out on donkeys. I wish I had this speech on video. If we made a movie out of this, it would be right up there with Braveheart, Remember the Titans, and Lord of the Rings. It definitely inspired those that were on the fence. As a result, fewer went out on donkeys than would have otherwise.
We stopped at Bernardo’s house, the pastor of a church in another village. He has a wife and 4 little kids. He asked for prayer and a visit to encourage him in his work. From that town, we hiked out a different route than we came in. This was far steeper and more challenging than the hike in – lots of switch back paths that seem to go straight up forever. Vince stopped us at one point and put Matt in the lead to take us the rest of the way out. Matt struggled significantly on the way in. Unlike the hike in, we were all to stay behind and with Matt. If he stopped, we stopped until he was ready. It was a great personal lesson for each of us to support one another and function as a team – a band of “brothers”. Vince calls everyone “brother”. Everyone should get to know a “Vince” in their life. He’s pretty awesome.
Matt led us out to the road portion of the trail and everyone couldn’t be more proud of him. Vince then had Frank, who got dehydrated on the way in, lead us the rest of the way out and down the long gravel road. On the final 100 yard stretch to where the vehicles were, we began to sing “No Worries’ by Bob Marley. Another missed video moment, but it was the perfect ending as we emerged on the main road and saw the Texans there waiting for us. Yep, they were just sittin and waitin there after their long donkey rides.
We got back to the Farm that evening feeling amazingly good – a harder hike, after days of work, but feeling better than ever? Thanks God!
Monday was the drive to Tela, which is on the ocean and only 1 ½ hours from the airport. This is where we got to sleep on the beach for the flight out on Tuesday. Sixteen glorious hours with the finest sand fleas in Central America! Thanks God for DeetJ
Thanks again to all the generous folks who blessed the Lenca Indians and made this possible for me to experience.
Gracias and Adios Amigos!
Greg
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