Goodbye San Juan, Hello Alotenango!
As a team we have had the last week off to rest, catch some rays and get sunburnt! However before we got to enjoy all that lovely aloe vera we had to say goodbye to San Juan. I donât think any of us were ready to say goodbye to such a beautiful place full of such welcoming people! Since the day we pulled up in San Juan we were overwhelmed with generousity so as you can imagine the last couple of days were quite sad. Not everyone will admit it, but there were definitely a few tears as well.
Our first proper goodbye was to the school were we performed our last drama of Jesus calming the storm. We were surprised that even teachers who had seemed disinterested in our performance over the last 8 weeks came up to us to share how impacted they had been and how important it was that the children heard the good word. The head teacher also came up to us to give us gifts and say how thankful she was. She then continued to say something else for 5 minutes that no one understood but we all just politely nodded.
We managed to finally host a womenâs pamper afternoon (nothing like leaving it till the last minute) before we left! At first they were quite shy and thought it was maybe all a bit weird but towards the end we couldnât paint their nails quick enough!
Some of the music students that we had been teaching, within the youth group, also got the chance to lead worship on our Friday service. It was hard saying goodbye to the youth group but we had a great last evening of playing games and most importantly eating burgers!
Overwhelmed is a good way to describe our last Sunday service. Itâs hard to explain why you would miss getting next to no sleep on a church floor thatâs surrounded by aggressive dogs and mosquitoes, but it really felt like home. We sang Cuan grande es El (âHow Great Thou Artâ) as our last song to the church and the youth group learnt â10,000 Reasonsâ in English specially. Spontaneously, after church, we were invited round one of the families in the church to make tortillas and sing. Our tortillas skills were laughed at and we were constantly reminded that their 5 year old niece could do a better job, but it was a lovely evening and a great end to our time.
We really did meet some amazing people and we all feel so blessed to have had that opportunity.
You will now find us situated in Alotenango for the next 2 months where we will be starting the whole process all over again, doing a lot of teaching.
Prayer Points:
- Prayer for the youth group in San Juan; that they would continue to have opportunities to serve within the church.
- There are definitely some apprehension about having to settle into a new town so we would really appreciate prayer for that.
- We start classes this week for kids in the town that canât go to school, prayer that this can go smoothly.
Answered prayer:
- We had some illness in the group towards the end of our time in San Juan, however we are all now pretty much healthy and feeling a lot more energetic!
Last Drama at the School
Womens Pampering Evening
With the Head Teacher
