Last Day of Work

Today, we finished our work. I was on the crew that finished putting all the ceiling tiles in the rooms. We finished remodeling a few old classrooms into Sunday School rooms and offices. We got the computers and everything moved to the new computer lab, and while we got all the computers set up, the Internet is not working in there yet.
After lunch, we finished moving some stuff around and remodeling the rooms, and then we packed up all our tools. We had dinner, then returned to the hotel.
This will likely be my last post. Tomorrow, we head for the island of Roatan, where we will spend the day and the night. On Saturday morning, we will fly back to San Pedro Sula, and will stay at the airport, as we will get on our plane to Atlanta in a couple hours. We will fly through Atlanta, and arrive in Cincinnati around 11 PM.

Wednesday

Today, we got a bit of a later start: we left the hotel at 7:00 instead of 6:30. Once we got there, we picked up right where we left off. My first task was to go with a few others and walk up to a nearby hardware store to get some paint supplies. I was supposed to do some painting, but when we got back, I was reassigned to help put a drop ceiling in a storage closet in the church building, which they hope to turn into an office someday. There were three of us doing that, which we worked on until lunch. After lunch, the other two went back to work on that, while I was reassigned to help unload our third container, which we FINALLY got hold of. It took all afternoon to do that, and all I can say is that God has ben very good to us. It was overcast outside, with fairly low humidity, and the temperatures were probably in the 70s. I was in that container for a while, handing stuff out (including loose ceiling tiles, which produced a LOT of dust). Had it been very hot, it would have been even more miserable than it was (it was tolerable, but not whast I would have called optimal working conditions).
It was nearly quitting time when we got that finished. I helped a little more with the drop ceiling in the storage room, and it was soon time for dinner. After dinner, we waited for the bus to come, and then we headed back to the hotel. Tomorrow is our last day of work.

Tuesday

Today, we finished the ceiling tiles in the church building. We started at about 6:30 AM, and with four people working in there, we got it done by lunch. Well, all except the last tile, which we had everyone sign the back of, and then we put it in the ceiling right after lunch.
In other areas today, we finished all the floor tiling. We have all the inside walls done except for parts of Room 7...we ran out of vinyl soffet, and are waiting for more. We have a container of supplies that we sent down a few weeks ago, and are still trying to catch up with it.
We also worked on remodeling one of the old classrooms into two offices. Hopefully, we can finish that task tomorrow.
We finished work early and went to a market to do some souvenier shopping in downtown San Pedro Sula, and then we had our traditional Tuesday night dinner: Pizza Hut. Once we were (supposedly) done eating, we were given more food, just like the Chinese restaurant on Friday night. After the pizza came our dessert: it was plates of a large chocolate cookie with chocolate syrup. Like the pizza, they brought us a few too many of them.

Monday

Once again, we got up at 5:30 AM (well, we were supposed to. I actually woke up around 3 AM, 4 AM, and so on, whenever the air conditioner in my room turned on). We went to the school around 6:30 AM, and after our morning devotion, we started work. Today was the first day we worked while school was going on. The kids seemed to be happy to see us.
Today, we finished the floor tile in Rooms 6 and 7. We also finished the walls in those rooms, and waxed the floors. We only have one room left, and hope to complete it tomorrow.
My main job today was to help put ceiling tiles in the church building. We had a couple guys up on scaffolding, and had a few others cutting ceiling tiles and handing them tiles and insulation. We got most of the ceiling done today, and hope to finish by lunch time tomorrow.
Once finished working, we had dinner and then returned to the hotel.

Sunday

Today, we worked for only half a day, but we still got a lot done. My job this time was working with four others to relocate a couple classrooms. We moved the 5th grade class from one of the older buildings into Room 3 of the new building (Rooms 1 thru 5 are downstairs. Room 6 is upstairs, above Room 1. Room 7 (above 2 and 3) is the computer lab, and Room 8 (above 4 and 5) is the library). We numbered all the desks (in order to try to keep the same seating arrangement) and moved them over. We then took the bookcases and the teacher's desk over, followed by everything that was on the walls. A lot of things were fastened to the wall with thumbtacks. In order to pry them off the wall without ripping their decorations (all of which were either paper or cardboard), I ended up prying the thumbtacks loose with a straight-edge screwdriver, then gripping them with a pair of pliers and yanking them out.
We got the old 5th grade room emptied out and completely cleaned, and then we moved the class that was next door into the now empty room. We did not take anything off the walls, for the sake of time, but we got all the desks, chairs and bookcases moved over.
Meanwhile, in the new building, we got all the vinyl soffet up in Room 4 and have just begun on Room 5. We got the rest of the drop ceiling tracks put in upstairs, and we have installed all but a few lights.
We stopped work at noon, and after lunch, we came back to the hotel. We hung out here and rested in the afternoon, and after having a chicken dinner brought to us, we went to church. It was a great time, even though I barely understood anything that was said.
After church, we came back to the hotel, got pictures up on the website (www.disciplemakers.org) and posted some good comments.
I am tired and going to bed. Talk to you all tomorrow.

Saturday

Today was our first full day of work. The Plum Creek group handed the baton off to us last night, and spent today at the beach. We started our day by loading their tools onto the bus, then setting up a place to keep our tools. After a brief devotion in the morning, we got to work. I was working on getting the ceiling lights up. For the most part, I was drilling holes in the light fixtures so that we could hang the lights from the ceiling. We got all the light fixtues up and wired on the lower level. Two classrooms, in fact, are completely finished. The kids will begin to use these rooms on Monday. We got all the wall paneling--white vilyn soffet--up in a third room (of five, on the lower level), and started on a fourth. We got all the floor tile down on the lower level. On the upper level (a classroom, a computer lab and a library), we hung most of the track for the drop ceiling, and got some vinyl soffet up in the classroom.
Some of the kids from the school came to see us toward the end of our work day. They really enjoyed seeing our pictures that we had taken, and we let a couple of them take pictures for us. They really enjoyed that.
Some women who are members of the church here cooked us lunch and dinner today. We had spaghetti for lunch and breakfast burritos (eggs, sausage, bacon, and refried beans on a tortilla) for dinner.
We had a very good first day and got a lot done. As the Plum Creek group goes home tomorrow, we will work for a half day, relax in the afternoon and attend church in the evening. I will update you all on that tomorrow. I am tired and am going to bed. Good night.

Dinner

Both groups went out for Chinese tonight. We successfully squeezed 61 people onto the bus, and we headed for a small Chinese restaurant in downtown San Pedro Sula. Apparently, we had rented out the place. We started out with some eggrolls, chicken cabbage soup and a couple plates of fried rice (per table--about 8 to a table). We thought that was it, but after I had three helpings of rice, a plate of chow mein chicken arrived, eventually followed by four more servings. I probably gained about five pounds tonight---I have a week to work off those pounds. The food was very good, though. There was just so much that we could not eat it all. Stuffed full of Chinese, plus two bottles of banana flavored soda, I am now going to sit down and play a hand or two of cards, and then go to bed, to get up at 6 AM and prepare to work tomorrow.

We Have Arrived

We have arrived in San Pedro Sula, Honduras. We arrived at the Cincinnati airport at 4:30 Am. We departed at 7 AM, and arrived in Atlanta around 9 AM. We landed at one end of the airport, and then went straight to the other end. We spent time at the food court, and then headed for our gate to board. We departed at about 11:30 AM, and arrived in Honduras about 2:00 PM their time (they are on Central time). All our bags made it, so we collected them and headed outside to wait for our bus. We took it to the hotel, where we are now. Tonight, our plan is to head to the work site for a couple hours, and get situated. The group from Plum Creek leaves tomorrow, so they will pass the baton off to us, have dinner with us tonight, and then they will go home tomorrow, while we start working.
It´s time to head out, so I will update you all either tonight or tomorrow evening. Any questions, ask me and I will answer them if I can.