Rainy day

Posted by Brian

Well we are almost underwater here in Puerto Plata. On the main roads there is close to a foot of standing water. The villages are much worse Pancho Mateo's road was a rapidly flowing stream and the village is about ankle deep in mud. We have had rain for about a day straight.

Yesterday we had a group from Santiago Christian School come up to work with us. Lindsay, the third grade teacher brought her class. There were 19 students with her and 5 parents. This was a real meeting of the two extremes of Dominican culture, the Santiago students represent the high class and the Pancho Mateo students represent the side that no one wants to admit exists.
Despite the differences in status, the overwhelming heat and the unsanitary conditions the children played games and read books well together. It is very apparent that the Santiago students have a far superior education than these other children. Hopefully this will make the Santiago students appreciate what they have. They ate lunch together because the SCS students brought 2 lunches each to share. Many of the Pancho Mateo children were not eating much adn some of the SCS students asked me why, I explained to them that the don't always have the luxury of having food like this so they were going to take it home to share with their families. It was a touching experience to see how the mom's were literally reaching into their purses to give anything the had to these children.
Continue to pray for Bethany and I as she has a doctors appointment today and we have some medical decisions to make in the near future.