$1 a day?

About half of the population of Nicaragua lives on $1 per day or less. This is considered to be extreme poverty. I cannot imagine how someone would be able to survive on this amount of money.

Let me preface this blog post by saying that I’m not writing this to complain but to hopefully share with you a lesson or growth experience that I hope to have. Due to lower support received this month I am faced with a challenge. After paying my tithe (a must no matter how much or how little is given), and setting aside the money that I know I will need to pay my bills (rent, electricity, water, etc.) I will have just one US dollar per day, or approximately 22 córdobas, to cover my eating, transportation, hygiene, entertainment, and miscellaneous expenses. Here’s what I hope to learn through this experience:

1.) Humility – I will need to rely on those around me to help me out from time to time to make it.

2.) Trust – It was always extremely easy for me to trust God with my finances when I knew exactly how much I was going to get payed from week to week. Since relying on the monthly support of others, I have been learning how to trust God with my finances in a whole new way. He has been more than faithful, so having this challenge ahead of me does not worry me because my faith is in Him.

3.) Frugality – Since moving to Nicaragua my view of money has changed dramatically. I find it hard to spend 100 cords (approx. $5) at one item or for one meal. I feel that this month will change my view of money even more.

4.) Empathy – I hope to come to have a new understanding of what life is like (to some extent) for a lot of the people who surround me daily.

How will I make it? I don’t know but here are some small things I am going to change. I will ride my bike to and from work or walk daily instead of taking the bus (approx. $0.25 round trip). I will bring my lunch to work, which although will still cost something, I will not be spending 40 cords (approx. $2) each time I eat lunch. I will continue to look for other ways not to spend money and will have to continue to rely on the generosity of those around me. Thankfully I am surrounded by a lot of generous people!

Anyway, I hope to share regularly how this goes for me, and I hope you’re able to, through my experience, learn to trust God more as well. I share this with you, not because I want you to think better of me for having to go through this, nor to make you feel bad if you’re not going through this, but because I know that through it God will be glorified and His faithfulness will shine through!

But that’s not how it was supposed to work!!

Living in Nicaragua things often don’t go as planned. On Sunday evening Yeril and I left his house and walked to the bus stop like we do most Sunday evenings so he can accompany me back home to make sure I get there safely. We got there with what should have been plenty of time (45 minutes or so before the buses stop running) to catch the last bus back to my house, but after waiting for about a half hour we decided that maybe the bus wasn’t going to come and that we would take a taxi instead.

Yeril stopped a taxi and negotiated the price and we got in. There was already another young lady in the taxi and she was dropped off first. After the young lady got out of the car the taxi driver made a comment about the place where she was dropped off so Yeril started to ask about the place. It turns out that it’s a home for at risk street kids! I had no idea that this location existed and in all of my research on human trafficking and homes in Nicaragua I had never heard of this organization. So Yeril and I started talking about how it would be good for me to try and talk to them about The Refuge Project and I said “I have to remember the name of this place” not thinking about the fact that I had pen and paper in my purse! Although I normally have a fairly good memory I, of course, forgot the name, however, Yeril, who normally has poor memory, didn’t. Praise God that the bus didn’t come Sunday night! I’ve already tried to make contact with this organization and am hoping and praying that it will be a good contact and resource for us.

Newsletters: 2010 July/August

To read my latest newsletter, click here: July/August

2010 Trip to the States

Here are the pictures from my trip to the states in July.

Quick Re-cap

So I’ve been really slack on blogging the last couple of months, here’s a quick re-cap of what I’ve been up to:

June: We had two short-term missions teams come down to work with us. One from Wildwood Church in Norman, OK and the other from Woodcreek Church in Richardson, TX. The Wildwood team helped us by painting our offices, being involved in our kids and youth services and a couple special events. The Woodcreek team worked with House of Hope, but also helped us with several ministry events. Both teams blessed us by bringing extra donations.

July: At the end of June and the first two weeks of July I was in the states doing more support raising as well as taking time to visit my family and friends. It was fun to get to spend time with my family and friends as well as share updates about the ministry! If you’d like to see our latest video update, please check it out here. Our whole missionary staff actually spent these three weeks in the states, when we came back we were all ready to get going and excited about the future!

August: At the beginning of this month another short-term team from my home church, Discover Church, in South Carolina came. They’re still here right now and it’s great to have friends around helping us out! They’ve been painting the outside of our building as well as doing various ministry events with the kids and youth. It’s always a blessing to have familiar faces around!

Other News: Some other exciting news on a more personal note is that I’ve been dating a great Nicaraguan man, Yeril Lozano, and we’ve decided to get married next year. We’re both really excited about what the Lord has planned for us to do together as a couple in the future working with One by One and The Refuge Project. We both know that there is great potential in this ministry to do amazing things for God and that is what motivates us! I hope you will all get the chance to get to know him at some point.

There’s my quick update, I’ll try to be more diligent about my updates!

Newsletter: 2010 May/June

To read my May/June Newsletter, click here

Matagalpa trip with Friends

Last weekend I went to Matagalpa with my good friends Oscar and Arlen and their kids, Oscar also invited another friend of ours, Yeril. We’d had the trip planned for a couple months because there was going to be a birthday party for one of Arlen’s nieces, but they decided to change the date of the party. Arlen is 8 1/2 months pregnant so we weren’t sure if we should still go, she’d been feeling like the baby, Sindey Kathleen (named after me), would come soon. We risked it and went anyway.

We left early on Sunday morning, so on Saturday after the youth service I went and stayed at Oscar and Arlen’s and we left at 6 am to take the bus across town to meet Yeril and take another bus to Matagalpa. We mostly spent our time relaxing at Arlen’s sister’s house drinking coffee, watching TV, and talking. But we also took a walk to Arlen’s brother’s house across town. About half-way there I thought were were close so I said to Jacksel, the oldest child of Oscar and Arlen and the only one who went on the walk with us, “let’s run” so we did that a couple times. Little did I know that we were going to climb to the top of the mountain! It was well worth it in the end. We also got to visit Arlen’s grandmother, and spend some time in a central park afterwards. It was a great trip and we took a ton of pictures, mostly Oscar took pictures like a tourist.

To view the pictures click here

A New Perspective

I guess it’s no surprise that since moving to Nicaragua I’ve gained a new perspective on life, love, poverty, money, language, and God to name a few things. The other night I was watching the movie “Finding Forrester”, great movie, anyway it’s about a kid from a poorer family who is really talented at writing. During the film there were a lot of scenes of the neighborhood where the kid lived. I found myself wondering “is this supposed to be a poor neighborhood?”. I honestly couldn’t tell if they were trying to show that where he came from was really a sad place, or not. Even the apartment where he lived, I wasn’t sure if it was supposed to be in the projects, or if they were doing alright. I’d be interested to hear your perspective. But that’s when it hit me: my view of poverty has dramatically changed. Now I look at a house in a friend’s neighborhood and think about how fortunate that family is to have a fruit tree in their yard, or to have walls that aren’t tin, or have running water, or a refrigerator. Life can be lived well with so much less! It’s not about what we have, it truly is about who we are and what we do with what we have.

Taking the Bus

First you have to determine where the bus stop is. Sometimes this is marked by a sign or bench, other times you can tell where it is by the group of people standing around all looking in the same direction every now and then. After that, if you don’t already know what route you need, you can ask someone which bus, or combination of buses, will take you to your destination. Then you wait. The bus that I normally take from home to work, the 119, doesn’t come by as often as other routes. Sometimes I’ll see the 114 route pass by 3-4 times before my bus will come.

When you do see your bus coming you need to flag it down by sticking your arm straight out at shoulder level and waving your hand in a downward motion, because they don’t always stop at every bus stop. Sometimes, even when you do try to flag the bus down they’ll keep going. Other times, they’ll stop and wait for a couple minutes and read the news paper. When you enter the bus you give the driver your 2 cords and 5 centavos (approximately 12 cents), if you don’t have exact change you keep your hand out until he’s able to make the change and give it to you, then you find your seat, or place to stand depending on how full the bus is.

The majority of the buses are old US school buses, but the bench seats have been replaced by seats and or benches that you might find in a fast food restaurant. Sometimes the floor boards have patches that are secured well, and other times they aren’t. Sometimes the chairs are broken and if the bus accelerates or stops too fast you might fall over, or into the lap of the person behind you. There are also times when the window panes are only held in by a couple of screws so they rattle a lot, and other times when they have taken the window out altogether. You never know what kind of condition the inside of the bus will be in until you get on. I’ve also seen buses with completely bald tires or loose tires, so it’s always a risk that something could go wrong.

On top of the possible bad condition of the bus, there is the driving. Driving in Nicaragua is scary in and of itself, but the bus drivers can be some of the most aggressive and scary drivers of all, dodging around cars, horses, people on bikes, carts in the road, or whatever else might be in the way and then diving into a bus stop to pick up or drop off people. Since they have a lot of metal and “weight”, they’ll push out into traffic or make their own turn lanes, they’ll do whatever it takes to get you to your destination in the shortest amount of time possible.

When you’re getting close to your stop you need to get up and move towards one of the doors (front or back side door), when the bus driver stops and opens the door you need to get off the bus as quickly and safely as possible so they can keep moving. If the driver doesn’t open the back door it’s common to bang on the bus, whistle, yell out “door!” or do something else to get the driver’s attention.

All that being said, I absolutely love taking the public transportation, although I appreciate any prayers for my continued safety as well! It’s cheap, and once you get the hang of it, it’s easy as well. I really wanted to have pictures to be able to share with you, but it’s not the best idea to wip out my camera in the middle of the bus and take pictures. Maybe I’ll be able to covertly get some pictures in the future so all of you who won’t be able to experience the public bus system in Managua first-hand might be able to get a better mental picture of what I’ve tried to describe for you today.

Newsletter: 2010 March/April

Here is my March/April Newsletter