Annual review and resolution
At the beginning of the new calendar year 2018, we held workshop, during an afternoon, with our children. We first looked back at the year 2017. Everyone named their positive personal events and then tried to let go of the "negative" moments. As a result, each child has personally cleaned up the 2017 in order to tackle the New Year with good intentions.
Our teacher who plays the guitar musically accompanied this afternoon. Symbolically, each child gave water to his inner life-plant to make it grow and flourish even more during this New Year, with the hope to harvest fruits of their own success at the end of 2018.
Theater week
School holidays are already coming to an end. From the remaining weeks we have transformed two of them into theater weeks.
The children were divided into groups and each group received different topics, which they then had to deal with in order to recite scenes in theatrical form.
The topics of the first week were "Jesus is ....", "Divine Attributes" and "Living with the Faith". In the second week, there were also scenes and Bible themes such as "Noah's Ark," "The Death of Jesus," "Peter denies Jesus," and "Jesus Appears to His Disciples."
The children have selected the clothes, stage sets and materials themselves, either crafted or simply improvised.
On each Friday afternoon the theater performances took place. All employees were invited. It was incredibly nice to see how everyone got involved and enjoyed the spectacles. But also what creative ideas the individual groups developed to perform their scenes.
School preparation
As nice as the holidays were, it was high time for the school year to start again. After all, 3-month school holidays are a long time and everyone seemed excited to go back to school.
The school preparations ran at full speed. It is always a complex organizational task and highly time consuming until each of the 34 pupils has the complete and appropriate school uniform and all their textbooks and books wrapped and labeled. We are very fortunate to be able to afford all the necessary utensils, clothes and materials needed for school.
In Honduras, for many parents it is unfeasible to provide their children with the required school supplies or it means a proper struggle combined with unimaginable sacrifices. That’s why we gladly accept the work, which goes into the preparations.
It is the heart that gifts. Hands only give ...
It is not always easy to live in a country where poverty is omnipresent and where we are daily confronted with people in greatest need. To deal with the thought that we are not capable of helping everywhere and every time is at times hard to accept.
Sometimes you find yourself in situations where you can not just say "no", even though rationally viewed you know you have only limited means. Your instinct and your heart lead you towards a helping act.
That's how we started collaboration this year with the nuns of Mother Teresa of Calcutta to support families in need. We bought staples, cleaning supplies and school uniforms, filled the children's school bags with all the necessities and handed them personally over in their living environment, the slums of San Pedro Sula. The joy and gratitude of the children and their family was unbelievable, words cannot describe. For the first time in their lives, these children were allowed to wear a new school uniform. They could barely wait for their first day of school.
Floor ball Tournament
To make a change in the everyday life of our children, we have organized a floor ball tournament on a Sunday afternoon. All the kids were ready and full of energy when they were split into three groups. Each group had a captain and their motivation, to leave the tournament as the winning team, was huge.
Even without being familiar with the rules of floor ball or the game in general, the tournament was carried out with a lot of anticipation. Everyone gave his or her best. For some, it looked more like wiping the field with a broom others managed the challenge like pros. In the end, only one thing counts, being active and full of joy.