Packing and luggage are such a pain. I, for one, hate to pack. I always wait until the last minute (right, mom?) and always try to fit way too many things into one bag. And paying for luggage on airplanes? Terrible. The rules are always changing, the allowed-poundage is always changing. Now people are just starting to bring suitcases as “carry-ons.” I did not want to bring a bag back with me when I came back from Christmas. I packed a HUGE one leaving Copan full of things to leave in the States. I told Allan I was doing it so I would have less luggage to deal with when our time was up in Copan and plus “I’m leaving all of this stuff…so I won’t have a bag when we come back after Christmas!”…………….well……
About a month before Christmas I emailed my family and told them about this family with 5 sons and one mom. All of the boys go to Mayatan. They are in the 8th, 4th, 3rd, 3rd, and 1st grade. The ones in 4th, 3rd, and 1st grade are all almost the same height. Their mother works at Mayatan as a house cleaner. She cleans my classroom everyday. She gets to school early in the morning, and stays later than us, cleaning. She makes less than half of what we make a month…and has to feed 5 boys. They live in a 3 room house (kitchen and 2 rooms.) They also live with their grandfather. The boys don’t wear shoes. Allan teaches one of the boys (“Beto”), and this boy just adores Allan. He stays after school every day in Allan’s classroom talking with Allan and not letting Allan get anything done :). Allan doesn’t mind though, which is why I think this boy loves Allan. One day Beto didn’t come to school, which we later found out was because his shoes were broken and they couldn’t afford to buy more shoes. I emailed my family asking them to gather clothes, shoes, anything really that I could maybe bring back for this family. What showed up AMAZED ME!
My mom emailed my email to my Aunt Sharon, who teaches 5th grade at a school in NC. She told her class and WOW. The piles of clothes, underwear, shoes, socks, pants, blankets, etc. that showed up at my house left my breathless.
So much for not taking a suitcase back….and so much for only taking one suitcase back! All of the clothes were too much to fit into two huge suitcases! WOW! I had to leave some of it behind for my parents to bring in March! I have never been so excited to pack a suitcase. I actually started packing it 3 days early!
Delivering the suitcases was an unreal experience. I had to fight off tears about 4 or 5 times. The boys just kept pulling things out of the suitcases, showing me, showing Allan, showing their mom. They were so excited, so proud to have something new. They were so pumped about socks and underwear! Can you imagine? They kept trying on the shirts and pants…over their old ones! The oldest held up a pink polo shirt and said “I’m going to look sexy!” That made me laugh. It was just so awesome to get to be apart of that. I bet the boys have had some new things in their life, but I think it has been a long while. It was just so awesome. The next Monday, Marlon came to school in his new turtleneck, Memo came to school in his new shoes and, the youngest, Victor, showed me his new socks at school…accompanied by a huge smile! It was awesome.
So thank you so much to those of you who donated clothes, or anything. These boys were so excited. Seriously. I wish I could fully explain it and I wish each one of you could have been there to experience it. I left their house on cloud nine and in amazement of our Lord and how he does provide. Thank you so much for your willingness to love others that you do not even know. Thank you for being the light of Christ for those boys and their mom.
James 1: 27 “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.”
AWESOME! Seriously, awesome!
ReplyDeleteIt was great, and to be fair, Beto was just getting over the chickenpox, so he was feeling a little under the weather.
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