Oh Mexico...

I'm back in the states.... Not where I really want to be. I really want to be back in Mexico. But I'm not... I'm here.... in this desk chair... listening to music. Ho hum. Well I'll stop with ho humming and tell ya'll about the trip.


We met up at 3:00 on Friday. (3:00 in afternoon, not morning. That would just be... not cool) We loaded up the van, and Justin's mustang with luggage, boxes, and such as that. We met in the church Sanctuary and Justin did a short devotion, then we took communion. Prayed, said our goodbyes to everyone. And off we went! There were 12 of us. Nancy, Justin, Jessica, Les, Kent and Liz, me, my mama, Blair, Shadoe, Eric, and Nathan. The youngest were, well, me, Shadoe, Blair, and Nathan. So some of us loaded up in the van, some in Justin's mustang. Off down the road we went!


Its a 4 hour drive. Part of that is in the mountains. Us in the van were behind Justin in the mustang. We are cruising along and Justin pulls over..... hmmm... Justin gets out and opens the hood... oh dear. That can't be good. Eric and Les get out and they all 3 stand over the car. Les comes back. He tells us the car is overheating... not good. They do... something. I don't know, I'm not a mechanic. We decide to go on. A few minutes later. He's pulling over again... phooey. They get out and talk again. Us in the van pray. Then Eric and Les come back to the van. Its overheating again. We turn around and head back to Roswell. We are going to go back and get Les's car. So we're going along again. Then Justin turns back around. What? I thought... but... gosh. During this Eric and Justin are communicating via walkie talkie. Well Justin says the car has cooled. So we're going to try this again. Alrighty then. We go on, up and through the mountains. Nothing else happens. Whew. Thank you Lord. We stop... where was it... I don't remember. Some where, in some town at a auto zone. They get... something. I'm not very informative I guess. We use the restroom and go on our way. Later on since everyone was starving we stop at a burger place in Alamogordo. Everyone gets... well... a burger. And I drool over the burgers while I just eat fries and drink a milkshake. Yeah my mouth was hurting a little. It wasn't bad until the pain killers wore off. Well after we're done eating. We load back up and off to the border we go!


I was so ready to get there. I was in the very back seat with Shadoe and Nathan. I was in the middle. I tried and tried to sleep... no luck. It was kind hard to get comfortable. But finally! I see lights! Its El Paso!!! we're almost there! WOOHOO!!!!!!!! We go on through El Paso and come to the border. We go right through. We pull off and wait on Ernesto. Oh I guess I should tell ya'll who Ernesto is. He's the pastor of the Calvary Chapel Las Plamas, where we were going to be staying and such. I'd already mentioned this was our third trip down there. They (He and his wife, and well some workers that attend his church) are currently building a church, we've helped with that the last two times. Right now their church has a kitchen, and then the sanctuary. Which is pretty small. We ate and had our devotions and stuff in there. And they have a upstairs, with two rooms. One for the boys, one for the girls. Its very nice. I'll show pictures at the end of the post. Anyways. So we waited on Ernesto, cause well... we couldn't get to the church by ourselves. We'd probably get pretty lost.


Ernesto shows up in his little white pickup. And off we go! through the crazy streets of Juarez. Driving is... somewhat interesting. Stops signs and stuff are more of a suggestions. It gets a little wild. And there are also a lot of hills. But Eric did good! he's aggressive enough to drive in that place... I personally don't think I'd be able to handle it. After awhile we arrive at Ernesto and Maggie's. Ahhh man it felt good to be back. We meet up in the sanctuary and Ernesto just tells us some rules. Nothing big, just stuff like don't drink the water, how long of showers we needed to take, such as that. Then we all unload our junk. Meet back up in the sanctuary for a bit. Then we get to crash.


Saturday: I get woken up at... 6:30 I think it was. The only people that we awake were me, and Shadoe. Shadoe goes downstairs to take a shower. (There are two downstairs, and then one in each of the two rooms) I take one in the shower in our room. After I get out a few more people have stirred. I blow dry my hair. Then go outside to spend sometime reading the Word, and writing. Then I get coffee... Mmmm. After just a little while everyone gets up. Some shower, just do different things. We eat some yummy breakfast at 8:00. Pancakes, cereal, donuts, fruit, and yogurt. After we're all finished up. My mom does some worship, and then Justin does a devotion. Afterward he gives us some time to spend with the Lord. Its always really nice. You can just go, and sit somewhere with no distractions at all. Well besides to music that is usually blared from a few houses down. But that is just something you get used too.


After awhile we meet back up with Justin and he just opens it up to anyone that wants to share something they had read. We do that. Then Justin goes with Ernesto to get some lumber. And the rest of us put gift boxes together... I'll explain. Well I already mentioned from my last post we were taking gift boxes down to a battered woman's shelter we had been to before. Well we did it to where our church could do the boxes. There ended up not being enough. So Jessica went to shopping (she is the church's secretary) she ended up getting 4 baskets full of stuff. None of it had been put into the boxes yet. So we formed a assembly line and made boxes. Some for the woman, and some for the kids. We had, toothpaste, tooth brushes, shampoo, lotions, candy, hair stuff, coloring books, crayons, and a bunch of different kind of toys.


We ended up doing a lot of boxes. And we had extra!! Which was just the coolest thing. We get all the boxes loaded up in the back of Ernesto's pickup. Then we eat some dinner (lunch) we had tostados... that probably isn't how you spell it but oh well. Mmm I love those things though. We've had them everytime we've gone down there. They are just like a corn tortilla, with beans, hamburger meat, lettuce, cheese, and some kind of other stuff... they are sooo good! After we finish up dinner. We all load up in the van and follow Ernesto to the shelter. We stop first at a lookout point. You can see all of Juarez, and El Paso. You can definitely tell where Juarez ends and El Paso begins. It was cold up there, and windy. Brrrr.


We leave there and go on our way. It was about... a... 45 minute drive... I think. I don't remember I was to busy being nervous. Like I already said I had been there before. And it was extremely hard. Its... you can't really put it into words. The building looks like a prison, its just gray with bars on the window. They have a big yard type thing that just has trash everywhere. And inside it smells, and its dirty... its just a really sad place. Neither the kids or the woman are happy. It is unexplainable. We get there and we all step out. Nobody had been there yet besides me, my mom, Jess, and Justin. We go inside and have Ernesto translate for us. Since none of us speak hardly any Spanish. He just told them where we had come from, what we were doing there, such as that. It was cool though how the minute we mentioned presents those little kids faces just lit up. The minute we handed the boxes to the kids they just ran off with them and opened 'em up. And the ladies all told us "Gracia's" for theirs. It was just really, really cool.


For awhile there we just kind of stood there watching the kids. Then we got to playing with them. And the guys went out and did some work. The first time we had gone down there we started a little shed. Then when the guys had a trip down there over labor day they did the siding. So this time they did the roof. So they did that. Jessica held the babies, she is great with them and that was what she was wanting to do. I played with some chalk with one of the girls for awhile until she decided to wanted to do something else. After awhile I got to playing with a really cute little girl. Her name was either, Sally, or Sarah. We were pretty sure it was Sarah. She as adorable. She had this truck and she put the little dog she had gotton from her box in the truck and she loved to run in between me and Nancy's legs. She did that for awhile. Then we went downstairs to this big ole room they have. She got to chasing me around with the dog. She'd catch me and grab onto my leg and pretend like the dog was attacking me. She got to giggling, she was having a blast. We played some soccer too. Sad thing is she was better at it then I was. Haha. I really, really enjoyed playing with her.


Another little girl came and played with us too. Her name was Leslie. I became attached. I would have brought her home if I could have. I have her a piggy back ride. That she loved. I'd run around, and then spin her and she'd just get to laughing. I asked her once if she wanted down. All I got was her holding on tighter and saying "No, No, No." She liked gum too. She had a whole mouth full of gum. And pockets full of candy, and a handful of suckers. We decided we might have given them a little to much candy... but oh well it made them happy :) Aww man she was just the cutest thing. It was cool that we could make those kids happy. Even if it was just for one day. I wish so badly that we could have done more. But we did make them all happy. And that is a good feeling. It was a good day. It was hard to leave, I felt so sad. Little Leslie was just standing there... and... ahh... it was hard. I pray we'll be able to do some more stuff there. Those ladies need Christ. That is the biggest thing. We want to do some stuff there though. They have a well but its contaminated from the sewer. So they have no running water. They take baths by pouring water over their heads. And they have to haul water back and forth to fill up the washing machine... its hard. That place needs prayer. Definitely.


I could go on, and on about it all. Its heartbreaking it really, really is. Its unfair why it has to be that way. Why those poor little kids have to live that way. They were just born into it all. Its not right how many abused woman there our out there... its all just... AHHHHH!!!! makes me want to scream. Its just not right.

After we get back from the shelter. We do some different things while we wait for supper. I shower, we talk, read, just different stuff. We have some great supper. And we have a reflection time. Justin just asks us all what we thought of the day, what we got out of it, such as that. And after awhile we crash.

Sunday: We do kind of the same thing. Everyone gets up, some shower. We eat. Have devotions, pack, clean up our rooms, and just some various other things. Talk to Ernesto and Maggie. And I err... rope a dog... hey Ernesto wanted me to do it! It was his dog Colby. I caught him by one of his front legs. And man it tripped him. Bad. It was pretty funny though. And Ernesto got a kick out of it. We then all go in and sit in for the church service. Which was very awesome. Even if we didn't understand a word they were saying. The music was great! I loved the music. After its over we say goodbye to Ernesto and Maggie. We load up. Me in the mustang with Justin, Jess, and my mom. Ernesto leads us to the border is his pickup and off we go. Going over the border is up hill and then down hill. Going up. The mustang started over heating again... ohhh goodness... It was boiling. So finally whenever we reach the part that goes down hill Justin kills the engine and we just coast all the way down. It was... interesting. But it cooled down! We get to the American side. And go through... the... thing. Where ya have to stop, and they check you and such as that. We pull up... the lady seemed nice enough. She took our passports, asked out citizenship. And then checked inside the trunk. We make it on through okay. But we were worried about the van. They made it through all right too.

After all that we go on down the road. Stop for gas, get some snacks to hold us off until we stop in Ruidoso to eat at... Cafe Rio! they have the best pizza EVER. Nothing really exciting happened on the way... Justin had us laughing... by just.. being Justin. Oh man it was fun. They even sang. We get back to Roswell at exactly 7:00. Then... we... well... went home. I was sad. I really didn't want to go home. But... I had too.... ho hum.



To sum up the whole trip. IT WAS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm so very thankful the Lord allowed us to go down there. I hope we are able to go again. God is AMAZING.



Well I think that is everything... I probably left something out. If I did... well I'll just... edit later... maybe. This is probably been the longest post I've ever written...
I'll post some pictures now.



Calvary Chapel Las Plamas. A light in a dark place.


Inside. Where they have church, and where we eat.


The kids with their boxes


This is where they get their water now. They is it for everything. Drinking, bathing, laundry. And it has no lid.

Front of the shelter


Me and little Leslie.



All of us in front of the church that is being built.

There are more here.

http://picasaweb.google.com/SaraNoel09

Just click on Juarez November 07. There will be more up later on. Shadoe tooks pictures too but I haven't gotton them from her yet. So now I think I'm going to go read that awesome book Justin is letting me borrow. I'll leave ya'll with one last thought....

Corn on the cob.