"Culture Shock"

Cultural Stress Model

Stage 1          FUN- Honeymoon Stage

Stage 2          FLIGHT- Avoidance

Stage 3          FIGHT - Anger/mockery

Stage 3          FIT- Tolerance/Understanding/Creativity

I really thought the idea of culture shock was great but that it wouldn't apply to me. I must have had a really idealistic idea of missionary life. To me it is something you don't know you are in while you are in it, and it is hard to explain exactly what happens during it. Not to say I am over the "hump", but I do admit that the flight mode sounds pretty accurate considering I have tried to quit my job twice in the last two weeks... but it didn't take either time. And this week, maybe I am understanding a little more because I have not once had the desire to turn in a third notice!;) Hopefully I will skip over that third stage!! What has made it 4 times as hard is that we all 4 have been going through these same feelings in our own unique ways. 

All of this mostly to say, while in these moments of, "WHAT HAVE WE DONE??????" It has been very hard to blog. I will also say that God has been incredibly graceful with all four of us. He has continuosly gently reminded us that He has been with us every moment of every day. I am pretty sure he has been knowingly giggling at us a little too... like a parent does to a toddler who is throwing a funny little tantrum.

Some awesome happenings that have kept us so excited and encouraged to be here:

• Travis and many guys at the seminary harvested over 700 ears of corn that have been distributed in several ways. Some have gone to the garbage dump where many families live. Some are going to be used in the seminary cafeteria. And they have been planting beans! That is exciting!
• Travis and Phillip have been making fun and growing relationships with many of the young men who work on the seminary property. They all joke with Phillip even though they don't speak the same language... much. They have Tuesday afternoon baseball and all seem excited about that.
• Travis is going to be helping to build a garden at CEE, my school. He is super excited about this. He is also going to start some extracurricular sports... baseball and basketball after school, open to the neighborhood. The school is very open and welcoming to this idea! AND Travis is going to help and probably convince others to let him take over devotionals at the school. All of this means that he will be at my school more often which also makes me VERY happy!:)
• I have been teaching and helping Ivis' with Sunday school in the 5-9 year old's class. This has been SOOOOO fun to me. They don't speak English so I get to practice my Spanish to little sweet ears. A lot of them don't come with parents, but walk to church by themselves. That makes my heart happy and sad for them all at the same time! We learned, "Yo Tengo Gozo en mi Corozon"... "I've Got Joy in my Heart," at church on Sunday. One little girl, Gabriela, just couldn't stop singing it. SO sweet.

A few things we would like prayer for:

• We WANT to learn MORE Spanish!  We are all trying but please pray that our brains will be like sponges!!  Knowing more language would open SO many more doors and we both feel a real sense of urgency about this!
• This weekend people are coming from all over Honduras and other countries to the seminary for a conference about business and missions.  Pray that it goes smoothly.
• We have to take our first Visa trip Oct. 29 - Nov. 2.  We are traveling to Antigua, Guatemala.  Pray this goes smoothly. 
• Please pray that financially God provides for us.  We came with savings and money from the things we sold, but beyond that we are just trusting that the Lord will provide the rest.  Travis, my entrepeneur of a husband always has ideas of ways to make money, but I would really like his focus to remain on people for now and not turn to how to make money for ourselves at this time. 

I promise to TRY to be better about blogging... but in the inbetween times, please stay in touch through facebook.  You would not believe the encouragement and excitement we get over a small red dot indicating we have a message on facebook!  We love our family and friends a huge amount and you all continue to remain very important to all of us!  Let us know how we can be praying for you!!

Love,

Julie

A few pictures to catch up...

Here are a few pictures... I'm pretty sure I left my camera charger at my mom's so these are phone pictures... bummer. Oh well!  These are lemons from a tree right near our apartment!!  They are huger and yummier than they look!!

This is precious Ivis... I love this lady!  I do not know anyone with a bigger love for Jesus, a bigger heart to serve, and who is fuller of JOY than this woman!  I wish I spoke more Spanish so communication would be easier, but her English is good enough that we make do... What a wonderful woman and family.

And this little ball of wonderful energy is Natalia.  She is Ivis' adorable 3 year old.  Olivia has a lot of fun with her. 

Comunidad Educativa Evangelica... the outside of our school!

Olivia all dressed up in her uniform.  She almost looks like a little Honduran!

I think she deserves 2 pictures...

Olivia and her friend Sylvia... or Rosalie... not sure, she is called both here.  We have learned many Hondurans have several names and they use them all, so it is hard to learn anyones name!  This is a precious young lady who is very kind to Olivia and teaches her many Spanish words.

This pineapple may not look impressive, but it was HUGE!!  The kids were so excited to buy it at the market!  (Travis was in charge of picture taking at the market, so you will not be seeing market pictures this time...;) I love Travis but picture taking is not his strong suit!)  Anyways, I think we got 'gringoed' by the pina... it was too big, with not much flavor, but it was exciting to buy it anyway!

Last Tuesday we were JUST about to sit down at the table for dinner when we heard kids outside knocking and saying HOLAAA!!!  We answered to find 8 kids outside playing in what was about to be a large storm.  Their parents were in classes at the seminary and they wanted to know if they could come in when it started to rain.  Of course we invited them in right away, shared our pina with them and broke out the 3 toys or so we have in our one bedroom apartment.  It was funny and fun and crazy altogether.  I taught the girls to play 'pescado???' or Go Fish and the boys played with Dominoes... 

 They were very creative and had a blast... here are a few of the pictures of the boys.

Friday, September 9, we celebrated Dia del Ninos... YES, Children's Day!!  How fun is that!?!  We had a party at school with lunch provided, skits, music, pinatas, Tres leches cake, etc.  It was a lot of fun.  The kids even got to wear regular clothes.    I was only able to grab a few pictures of my 4th grade class.  I will work on taking a few more pictures at school.

This ia Ethan playing with some of the boys at one of the 4, yes 4 recesses.  The yellow house behind the boys is where we are hoping to move later this week!! :)

 Here is the Comedor.  Just showing some decorations for the Dia del ninos.

Ethan with 2 buddies on Saturday.  He is really working hard to get some American Football started up.  Pray for this!  We would love to ge a sort of Upwards program started here.  We think we could create a lot of interest with great opportunity to share Christ's love.

And the festivities of Dia del Ninos continues to church on Sunday.  The clown, Ivis, with the clown Olivia!!

Olivia and sweet friend Sarah.  This is the pastor from Rocas De Los Siglos,  oldest daughter.

This is all for now.  Travis has a BUNCH of farm pictures to post soon.  Love you all, muy mucho!!

Getting Started

 
The Seminary campus here is all together about nine acres. I would say about a third of this space is taken with buildings another section with a soccer field and another small section is to be reserved for milking cows. I think that leaves me with about 4.5 to 5 acres to work with. The idea is to convert this area into a working sustainable organic farm. Providing food to students through the cafeteria, providing an income to the seminary to help fill in revenue shortages and to provide food as an outreach tool by working with local churches.

Step 1: Inventory:

Soil type: The soil to be cultivated consists is loamy clay, chocolate in color. The land hasn't been worked in a long time so there is a good amount of humus in the top layer and fortunately no chemicals have been used so microbial activity should be high. Honduras has very high rainfall totals, so without lab analysis I suspect that many rock minerals have been depleted by wash out. I.e. calcium. Calcium is incredibly important in the cultivation of food crops because it facilitates the amount of protein nutrients available in the plant for consumption either by person or animal, and persons eating animals as the quality of the animal being eaten is determined by the quality of the food it eats and that food quality is determined by the quality of the soil it is grown in. I am hopeful to find a soil lab in Honduras but if not I will act on my assumption and add lime to my soil additives.

Equipment Available:

Tractor: On the campus there is a 1967 Ford Tractor it is in very rough condition. When we arrived it really wasn't usable because of a bad oil leak coming from a missing bushing on the rear end. The parts are not readily available so I improvised a solution to stop the leak until the proper parts can be obtained.

One Way Plow: In addition to the tractor I found a one way plow in trash pile it was rusted up pretty bad and needed a little bit of welding but it is now in good working order and will be put to good use.

Disk Plow: Recently someone donated a disk plow to the seminary and I am so thankful for it, the fields are grown up with different native grasses and by turning those in we are adding valuable organic matter to the soil.

Cement Mixer: A very large hydraulically driven cement mixer was donated to the seminary and is only used a couple of times per year by a mission team from Indiana. This mixer is large enough to hold at least one to one and half cubic yards of material. I am going to put this thing to work by using it as an in vessel compost digester. Compost is the most beneficial amendment that can be added to any soil type, this digester will shorten the time it takes to produce the compost allowing us to constantly transform the livestock waste into a valuable soil amendment. (Much more later on compost)

Barn and workshop: You simply don't realize how much you take concrete for granted until you are lying in mud under a tractor trying to keep parts clean. Fortunately there is a covered barn here with a concrete floor. Unfortunately it has become sort of storage and junk holding facility since it was built long ago. Fortunately no one seems to be too attached to any of the junk, so we cleaned for three days and got at least enough room to work on things and as time progresses hopefully we can get it all organized and able to use.

Junk: Growing up around a sand pit gave me a great affection for junk. I mean MacGyver would have been almost useless without a good assortment of junk, a piece of tin here, a pipe there add some wire and a little duct tape and the skies the limit. We have no shortage of good junk which I intend to use any way I have to, the other day I attempted to melt an old trombone to fabricate a tractor part and I was almost successful, maybe next time, but I am very thankful for the trombone and its valiant effort.

On a more spiritual note: On Thursday morning I was so excited. The tractor was in working order and the first small field was waiting. I slowly navigated the old thing down to the plot and began to turn the earth, with each pass a tiny bit of progress was made. Slowly the excitement was replaced by sweat and the anticipation was replaced by a sharp pain in my back because the old tractor (who has been affectionately named Lazaro or Lazarus because of its resurrection from the dead) simply doesn't have power steering and driving the thing is like a bout of Wrestle mania.

I began to think about Genesis chapter 3 and God's curse upon the Earth Gen. 3:17 "Cursed is the ground because of you. In toil will you eat of it. All the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it shall grow for you; And you will eat the plants of the field".

Here I was in a field trying to plow under weeds and reeds and a few thorns, sweating doing hard work and I realized that for most of my life I haven't done this. I have worked gardens and turned ground but I have never worried that if it didn't rain I wouldn't eat or if I couldn't control weeds or pests that my family would starve. In the U.S. we have food available in stores and cans and packages all at our convince. I think as a result of this convenience we have overlooked this passage of scripture and its significance in our lives. The results of sin are devastating! To Adam and Eve life got a lot harder. To the following generations famine often meant death or at least extreme hardship. Today we try to overcome the curse of sin with chemicals and technology and who knows what diseases like cancer we have fed in the process. God's word is final and next time you think that a sin is insignificant or just a small matter that really causes no harm, grab a shovel and hoe and go break some ground, plant a crop, keep it watered, fight the insects the weather and the weeds, and remember that there was a time when the Earth just gave to man what he needed.... The only difference between then and now is sin and its devastating consequences.

-Travis

Mailing Address

Some of you have asked and this is probably the best mailing address for us. 
Travis and Julie Hester
Escuela Bilingue Siguatepeque
Apartado Postal No. 52
Siguatepeque, Comayagua,
Honduras, Central America

17 days in...

17 days... in some ways it feels like we just got here and in other ways it is like, is that all?? 17 days??!!  At the moment I would have to say we are a mix of emotions.  It is honestly hard to sit and write a blog because I want to say, "We are doing amazing things to the glory of God!"  But in all actuality, right now it is making relationships, getting to know people, Travis spending time going different places to see need and really just being open to where God is leading us here. I am going to try to hit some highlights of what has been going on:

• The kids and I started school.  Ethan fits right in with the boys.  He is really enjoying it.  His class is small and I am his teacher.  Olivia is loving having someone other than me as her teacher, and in fact loves her teacher.  She is having a little bit harder time making 'friends,' but overall is getting along great.  The kids have actually been such little spirit lifters when we feel discouraged.  Olivia has been making up praise songs, and Ethan sings worship at the top of his lungs in the shower... and they truly have a heart for being here.  I LOVE the other teachers at CEE and my classes are going to be good. 
• Travis has done a lot around here to get things going.  Right now it is just hard work, but the pay off is going to be great.  He got the ol'tractor, that didn't look like it would ever run, running and got a field all plowed up!  It is almost ready to sow some seeds!!
• While Travis has been working he has been getting to be good friends with Roger, who is in charge of the farm project here.  In fact, today Roger has taken Travis to Yoro, a few hours aways, to see a man who wanted to meet Travis.  Not sure what will come of this meeting, but we shall see! Roger has been great because he knows so many people around Honduras and he has been great about taking him around introducing him... And he has been trying to teach Travis some Spanish!
• We have been going to church with Roger and his adorably precious wife, Ivis.  We really like the church and hope to really get involved.  Ivis has been so kind to us.  She has made us dinner, made me lunch for school one day, made us breakfast on her gas stove when the power was out one morning, taken my laundry in before the rain has come (several times), and is just always a smile and a hug.  We truly love this family and are so incredibly grateful to them.  They are so Christ-minded and they have been constant encouragement.
• We are still looking for a house and a car.  Our budget is very small and we are pretty sure right now, being new 'Gringos' they are thinking we have loads of money.  So for now we are borrowing a car (praise God for that!!) and taking taxis when we need to, and we are living in a one bedroom apartment on the seminary property for the amount we have allotted to housing... and for that we are very thankful too. 

Please pray for my aunt Kathy... not sure on the updates, but I know she is very sick and in ICU.  Last I heard she had fluid around her heart and lungs and they were pumping it out.  And pray for her daughter, my cousin Courtney.  She is an only child and that would be a lot to shoulder. (I love you both very much and my heart is hurting for you.)

All for now!  Hopefully Travis will have something more inspirational for the next blog post...;)

Love you!
Julie

Introduction

I am writing this blog in order to explain and keep you informed on what and how we are doing while we are serving in Honduras. I hope to write in a way that is informative but hopefully not monotonous or even narcissistic like diaries and journals can sometimes be.  Some entries might be technical explaining the methods of composting or cultivation to be used on the farm project. Many entries will be spiritual because while we are here we expect God to work in a powerful way through this project. Some entries will just be telling the story of our lives as God uses and guides us through life here in Siguatepeque, Honduras. I hope you will follow along with us as we experience all God has laid out for us, pray for us as we will be praying for you at home, and write to us with words of advice, encouragement and even criticism of a constructive nature of course.  And if you feel like visiting the door to our tiny apartment is open anytime.

We are here!!

Travis is going to update the blog soon... hopefully today.  Just a short note to say we are here, we are good, and we are excited to get to work!