BUSY Week!

This past week was a long week! I feel like I was able to get a good insight into the different ministries my teammates have here and understand better what they do everyday and help to discern what I will be doing everyday. This week the drop-in center for the streetkids opened! Right now the center is opened 3 days a week. The kids are able to come and have a hot lunch and hangout and play board games or soccer and receive positive attention from adults and experience the love of Christ. This week the center averaged between 6-10 kids each day. These kids come from all different backgrounds. 2 boys wash windows at the stoplight to pay for their school. Their family is just poor and can't afford to send them but they have a dad who is very involved and was waiting with them when we picked them up on Monday. Another boy literally sleeps on the streets. He has a grandmother who he sometimes stays with but he hasn't been there for a few weeks now. Pray for these boys and pray for Kate and for Hector (a Honduran who works with the streetchild ministry here) that they can reach them.

 Lunchtime at the drop-in center

An Uno game at the Streetchild drop-in center

The second half of my week was spent with Shannon at Puerta de Esperanza, a home she started for young single mothers and their babies. Currently 2 girls and 3 babies live at PDE. C is 19 and is in college. She has a 10 month old little boy, W. Y is 16 and is in beauty school. She has a 2 year old little girl named J. C is in college and is taking an English class I have been helping her some with her homework the past 2 weeks. This week Y decided she wanted to learn English, so twice this week I met with her and we learned some basic English. The first day we met it took her 30 minutes to say a single word in English. All she kept saying was "I can't", "I'm nervous", "I don't even know the letters, so I can never learn English". And while this speaks volumes about her self-esteem the even sadder thing is that she has a 2 year old little girl who is watching her and taking cues from her. 2 days later J was sitting in my lap playing with a toy. The toy was sticking and all of the characters wouldn't function correctly. After trying a few times J said, "I can't". She refused to even try any more she just kept whining and saying she couldn't. She broke my heart. It was something so simple, 2 words she had heard her mother say over and over again, "no puedo". Pray for these girls and these sweet babies. Pray that they would understand and experience the grace of Christ.

J playing with a toy at Puerta de Esperanza