Really, it's only Saturday? It kinda felt like a couple weeks have gone by in just the past 3 days. Sigh. This has been one very crazy week. Where do I even start?
I guess it's only been quite this level of crazy since Wednesday, so then I guess.
A shipment arrived in San Salvador a couple weeks ago full of stuff for the church, the school, the orphanage, and whatever. Dad and 12 other guys loaded up into a couple big trucks Wednesday morning and headed to the military base in S.S. to put all the crates onto their trucks and bring them back up the mountain to La Palma. Meanwhile, we lose internet in La Palma. A little while after they leave, we get a phone call, and there's been some mix ups and they have to go somewhere else in that area. The internet comes back sometime that afternoon, and then we run out of water. The filters got clogged with dirt within two weeks, and no water had gotten to our tank. Look at the before and after of these:


So, snaps for Teresa who was willing to hop over the bars on the walk way onto the tank and take the lid off so we could run a hose into it! And thankfully, Anda water came back on Friday morning.

We got a couple calls from the guys like the first one, and they didn't end up getting back until 8 that night. By this time, it was too late to follow through with the original plan of unloading and organizing everything that day, so we just took all the crates off the truck and piled them into the compound and church building to unload Thursday.




Once Thursday morning came around, we all gathered in the compound and started working hard. The sun was pretty intense, too. Just look at the pictures.







A lot of the process wasn't just unloading and putting the stuff away, but the disassemblement of the crates. We had to take them apart and get the nails out. Once that was done, half the crates were given to San Ignacio members and the other half to La Palma. The wood is a great resource for them.

Here is one little table of toys. On the other side of the room were bags and bags full to give away to the sponsor kids here.


And here are some pics of the medical supplies. The little pharmacy room was jammed full of walkers, canes, crutches, and, of course, medicine. And the one of the wheelchairs is really only half of all the ones we were given. So. Many. Wheelchairs.



But, that was only part of the reason the week was so long. After all the unloading was done, Teresa, Mom, Dad, Nathan, and I went out to lunch to sit down and cool off. On our way home we stopped by the little ice cream place for a treat. While we were there, Dad's phone rang. He couldn't understand it and gave it to Mom. It was Andrea's grandmother, frantic, telling us that little Andrea passed away that morning.
Andrea was born with heart problems, and doctors said she wasn't a candidate for surgery. They said she wouldn't make it long, but she outlived their expectations. Two years ago, a team took her to the beach near San Sal as a "make a wish" kind of trip. Andrea was 7, and she was going to be graduating pre-k this upcoming Tuesday. She was excited about it, and already had her dress and little shoes and head band picked out.
When we got home, Teresa and Mom and I left to go to the vela with Jose at their house. Culture is so different here... The day before the funeral, they have a vela, where the body is basically displayed in the home with candles and flowers. She was wearing the graduation dress and holding her Barbie doll. People here take pictures of the funerals and the bodies, and people were snapping all sorts of pictures with their cell phones. At one point, they even brought out a hanging lamp to put over her to make the pictures come out better for everyone. Mom's blog has a better description of the whole experience Here.
Yesterday was the funeral. People gather at her house, and the casket is displayed in the back of a pickup and everyone walks behind it following it to the church building. At the church was the actual funeral. They sang all of Andrea's favorite children's Sunday school songs. Her Sunday school teachers talked about her, and even her grandmother talked about her. She said that the Bible tells us to always be thankful, and that even though it's really hard to be thankful in the death of a little girl, they were happy that God had loaned Andrea to them for these 7 years.
After everything at the church was over with, another procession to the cemetary starts. Again, the casket was in the pickup and people walked and followed it all the way there. A few words and songs were said and sung there, too, although we couldn't really see or hear from where we were. Please please keep Andrea's family in your prayers. It's a really tough time for everyone.
More to be posted soon!
Su amiga,
Erin <3