The Southwest

We went to Santa Fe NM for our 2 year wedding anniversary. It was really neat. We stayed at a very homey and warm bed and breakfast. We also went to the historic plaza and went in art museums and visited some really old churches. One church has the infamous spiral wooden staircase that defies all science and logic. I was built by a mystery carpenter in the 1800's with just simple hand tools. It does 4 complete spirals before reaching the loft above. There is no center support pole and nobody really knows what holds it up and gives it strength. We also visited the historic Scottish rite mason temple museum, which was cool and weird.

porque yo tengo freezing

We have landed in the mother country. And its cold. The nature is somewhere near Santa Fe, look not one singe palm tree.

Party Time!!!

Its Party time in Caraballo. The kids had a special day they will never forget at our school Christmas party. We had an extra scoop of food and it had lots of meat!!! yum! We also had soda and the kids got a Christmas gift bag full of cake, candy, fruit and other yummies. They also put on a play inwhich they acted out scenes from the bible and recited verses. I'm afraid to say it but these kids have more scripture memorized than I do.

Our teachers also had a specail day. We suprised them with a evening of fine dining at a hotel resort and afterwards had a gift exchange. It was really neat being able to be with them on this special night.

El dia de Accion de gracias

We had thanksgiving too!! Wow it was amazing. We even shared the expirience with our closest Dominican friends. Alberto (our director) and his wife were there as well. It was a grand expirience for them. We had turkey, ham, real mashed potatoes, green bean casorole, carrots, corn, cranberry sauce, stuffing, home-made rolls, and pumkin pie, apple pie, and chocolate cake for desert. In the gringo picture from left to right is, me, Weston(from Vacarrios ministry) Candace(Kids Alive), Jessi, Rachel, and Jonathon(Runs the Art co-op), and Caitlin. Our friends pictured are Josue, Ben Hamin, and Perla. Josue learned English at the Univeristy of Kentucky. He is really good to practice English with.

A day in the village

While our friends the Youngs were here we went walking around the village visiting friends. Around lunch time our friend Santre invited us into his house for lunch. It was really good, and very gracious for them to share what little food they have with us.

Move

We moved down the street. The apt. we were in was HUGE. We went from 10 total rooms (including bathrooms) to just 4 rooms total. Wow its a big change. We are learning to simplify our lives in so many different ways. You don't really realize how many clothes you have untill you don't have space for more than half of them. Caitlin does laundry in the shower. The little boy is our friend. His name is Jaun, only we just call him little fat naked boy. He is almost always naked and running around. He was our little helper during the move. Please note that Jaun is NOT one of the children that our organiztion resucues. Ha, I think he is doing just fine. Caitlin has done a wonderful job picking out colors and decorating it and keeping it nice and homey.

Where does all the poop go?

So septic systems are a bit different here. A lot of times if the people actually have plumbing, the pipes just empty out into a river. A really really good septic is a hole dug all the way down to the water table, yum! But if your professional like we are, you build a 15'x15' two part decomposition chamber completely water proof. These guys dug for about 2 weeks what a back hoe could have done in a couple of hours. So... this is where the poop goes. Everything empties out into this tank which is right next to the bathrooms and into the first chamber where it sits and starts to decompose. Slowly the sludge enters into the next chamber and settles at the bottom while the liquid then passes through pipes run in the ground and empties into another hole where it will sit and filter into the ground. The other pictures are of our progressing classrooms and our beautiful gazeebo. The next two classrooms are under way!

Going to church

Most people get up Sunday morning dress up and get in their cars and drive 5-10 min. to church. This last Sunday Caitlin and I had a much different expirience. We have a group in for the next couple of weeks called Mercy Ships. They are an organzation that sends a ship around Africa with missionaries that minister mostly in medical areas. They have been coming to the DR to train their new ship crew members for the last 8 years. The same leaders come with new recruits every 6 months. They are a huge blessing each time they come. They have partnered with a church in Puerto Plata who have connections with a tiny mountain community in the middle of the country. The road ends at the foot of the mountain and you begin your couple mile hike that crosses the river 4 times. It was absolutely beautiful at the top. It's just a small community of about 4 houses and they hold humble gatherings every Sunday. The host family is a sweet little old couple in their middle 70's who have huge servant hearts. Our feet were caked with mud from the hike and our hostess humbly washed Caitlin's feet. They live off their land, and have fruit trees that they harvest and have their grandchildren ride down the mountain on a mule to sell in the near towns. A little different from the "normal" church services held in our "normal" million dollar facilities.

Please Read

Dear Friends and family,
I write to you as hopefully a humble servant of Christ trying to meet the needs of the Body. Many of you know after just 2 weeks of being here my life was changed. God continues to break down walls, walls of pride, selfishness and greed. I have still yet to fully understand, and for that matter not sure if I ever will, how to live my life in light of my brothers and sisters suffering immensely all around me. Words cannot explain the confusing feelings of my rich American heritage and life, and my best friends and family here in the DR that live so far away from the poorest I will ever be. Why was I so blind to the rest of the world for so long? Why was I not taught the injustices of our one sided wealthy society? Why was I not told that I was in the top 2% in the world’s wealth? And that most of the rest of the world lives closer to the way our friends here who live and work in the garbage dump? And how do I harness my righteous anger and passion to break down those walls and open the flood gates of reality so that my family, future children, friends and American church body not only can see, but can be moved, as we are demanded to in scripture, to do something about it?
Ruben and his wife Juvie are very special people to Caitlin and I. If you have read our blog, or heard us talk you know how precious they are, to not only us but to the school we labor in each day. Ruben’s house is located near the river. Land and homes near the river are very cheap and very poor. Ruben lives in a house framed with tree branches and covered with scrap metal. His House floods and his belongings are ruined every time the river rises. Even right now as I write this we are praying that the weeks rain doesn’t flood his house. It’s rained for about 5 days strait and the river rises every day.
The Spirit heavily convicted me to do something about Ruben’s house situation. The house they live in is about the same as the living conditions of the children we rescue. Our most important teacher needs to be taken care of. Rueben is a very rare kind of Dominican in that he is giving up money for the service of God, and we want to make sure he is taken care of and remains as a prominent figure in our school for many years to come. I say with great boldness that our school WOULD NOT function without his leadership and service. We have seen God already bless in a huge way through many of you giving and praying over this. We were able to have many of you be a blessing in helping out with the work this summer. Rubens house is not only under way, but almost finished!! It’s still so hard to believe that in no time at all Ruben and his wife will have a beautiful home that they will be able to raise the family they want so badly.
Right now family, I humbly plea with you to join with me to pull together, and meet the need that is at hand. Ruben’s house is almost finished and so close to them moving in, but right we are at a stand still. We have a floor, walls and roof, and are only lacking the finishing touches. I have estimated about $3500 to finish and get Ruben and his wife in the house. Please join with us as we strive to help a friend, teacher, husband, leader, and fellow believer in Christ. Ruben is someone I would die for, let alone serve. Please help me serve Christ as I seek to better the life of my friend, his wife, future family and the children of the school. Please pray that God’s provisions would overwhelm all of us involved and only draw nearer to him. You can email me if you would like to help out at laynebeller@hotmail.com. Please help…
-layne

We're in the dry!

The roof is finished!! Ruben's house is now dry, we can start working on the Panete inside. (the inside finishing coat for the walls, kind of like stucco). I have learned a lot so far about building a house in this country. It's quite different and follows the same simplistic rules the rest of life seems to follow here. There is no OSHA (communist US govt agency designed to steal money from the working businessman). No city inspections or codes to follow, and generally you have only about 3 or 4 materials that are needed, the main being concrete. Even the way in which things are built are quite different. Decisions on structure or durability is generally decided by whoever knows the most that's working that day. There are no subdivision covenants that say you can't park a boat or RV in the driveway. (Not that they would ever have any of those things, including a driveway). And putting in a yard is somewhat foreign. I've had to convince everyone to save the good dirt we are digging up to use it for a top layer to grow grass, otherwise your yard is usually all the scrap block and concrete from the construction. All in all we are on our way to a beautiful house for our friends in need. What do your friends need?

The children eat again

School Started back yeah! We are back in business at the Park Care Center for this fall session of school. Caitlin is hard at work with planning as she will be teaching English, first to the older kids, later to all. I spotted one little boy at the lunch table with a goldish color tint to his hair (malnutrition). I patted him on the head as I walked by noticing. Jesse followed with a smile and said, "oh but we're feeding him now". You need not blink twice to understand why we are here. Pray for Caitlin and I, tomorrow we start our intensive language training.