Quebrada Grande, Day 3, February 7, 2015

Early wake up call from our now familiar sounds of crowing, braying and sugar train rumble. Dogs are owned only to bark at people and cows. The dust from the sugar trucks has given us all sore throats, nasal congestion and allergy eyes. That's aside from the smell, a brackish odor from the sugar processing plant in the town. 

The weather temperature has plummeted. It's actually cold and not the warmth we expected. The beds in the hotel only have a top sheet and no blankets so sleeping in our clothes is now the norm.

On the way to breakfast a chained monkey falls from the tree and appears to be strangling itself. You step a little closer and BAM! I do not like monkeys on my head thank you. Generally we have a shared sense of kindliness towards the local animals - we feel the need to fed the strays - but I still do not care for monkeys!

Innkeeper Samir and Marie have produced yet another excellent meal - breakfast pancakes, frittata, local honey, cream, papaya, banana served in a melon bowl.

On site at QB we all start the day with our new recruits. Mary, who is helping Marie cleaning the five gallon bottles and adding the Living Water labels. She is soon joined by two boys. A great job and well done.

Marie and Mary

Leigh welcomes her group back and tells them that we will start every morning with a spiritual lesson so we can create a play. This requires costumes and props for Moses's exodus from Egypt. This is always a great fun project. Everyone is relaxed as the story is narrated by Leigh, reading in English, with Nineth reading Spanish. After Moses attempts three times to let his people go our Pharaoh sends them packing. We have children lined up to become the Red Sea, all holding their water wands with much swishing and our major drama concludes. We recap on all we have learned. Leigh then arranges charades and singing Spanish songs with actions. It's been an extreme busy morning.

Meanwhile, the water project needs sand so Pastor Enrique, Marie,Bob and two fellows go to the local river to fill buckets with sand. The water tank is now on the roof. A request for missing supplies that are urgently needed. So Robert and Marie, who have just finished sand banging, are off to the hardware store for a chisel, drain, screws, two faucets, tape, and elbow parts. 

Lunch is a true delight. Alex's wife, Selenia Ordonez, and his sister, Eli, make us soft corn tortilla filled with chicken and beef, freshly made salsa avocado sauce, cilantro and for dessert, locally grown banana. 

The best lunch

Leigh's new teachers take the afternoons class so we can sit back and watch. They have bought all their children with them so we set up coloring tables for at least thirty children. Class begins with glitter handshaking - a demonstration of how one handshake can travel and end up on everyone in the room. The glitter is on their hands,shoulders, faces and even clothes. Spreading germs is too easy. Next the taste test experiment. Muddy colored water flavored with chocolate cookie and another with salt water. Both look bad but neither in this experiment will make you sick. You would think we had added poison, not salt, to the water. 

Wearily we return to our hotel. At dinner we have a guest, the mayor of Villa San Francisco, Janio Borjas. He has invited us to join him at the rodeo on Sunday night. The town is celebrating a weekend carnival. We have missed the crowning of the carnival queen, but we will all go to the rodeo. Nineth has taken our coffee orders - 60 lempiras or around $US 4 per pound. It is from her home town of Santa Barbara and has won awards for the best coffee in Honduras. The coffee will be delivered to us in Tegucigalpa when we leave.