Belize Mission Trip

June 21-29, 2008

Culture, the word carries a lot of meaning.  To some people, culture is a heritage, to others, it is a way of life.  The people of Belize have culture - they have a way of life.  From the moment I arrived in Belize things changed.  People were laid back, no one rushed around (except maybe us) and everyone appeared happy.  This could not be truer in the village of Silk Grass and Sittee River, two beach towns a few miles away from the city of Dangriga where I spent one week in missions.

Just two short weeks before I landed in Belize, ten feet of water engulfed the small town of Sittee River at 1:30am.  In most countries, this would be devastating, and I am sure that Sittee River is no exception.  However, unless I had been told about the damage that occurred only a few weeks earlier, I would not have known.  The people of Belize found the will power to recover from the natural disaster and restore order to their lives.  To them, as should be the same for us, life is not about what you have but who you have.  Life is all that mattered, and fortunately for them, they were blessed to be alive and well.  Life is a gift, one I take for granted far too often.

Children are naive.  Children are open-minded.  Children are accepting.  Children are loyal.  For many, the sight of ten strangers entering into a village could be overwhelming and daunting; to the children of Silk Grass, we were a gift.  For eight days I played with the kids and taught them about love and friendship.  However, in the end, it was them who really did the teaching.  Despite the bad weather and the start of the summer holidays, the children surrounded me with their friendship for the entire week.  At 7:30am on Friday morning, five brave kids helped finish the project at their school and spent time with me, soaking in all that they could from their new American friend.

I am still not fully acclimated back into American culture, the American way of life.  I still find myself longing for a few hours without anything but the sound of my friends' voices engaged in conversation.  During my short time together, I embraced the Belizean Culture as much as possible and shared my love and friendship with my friends.  As friends, we ate every meal together, spent nearly every minute of every day together, and, in the end, even shared in communion together.  I might one day forget the faces of the children in Belize, but I know I will never forget what they taught me: life is a blessing - enjoy it.

Truly Blessed,

When I signed up for Belize, admittedly on a bit of a whim, I didn’t know that it would end up being one of the absolute most amazing weeks of my life.  While I knew that we would do great things during our days there, I had no idea that we would fall in love with the children of Silk Grass.

It’s amazing to look back on our week now having been back in the States for over a week and realize how deeply intertwined God was in getting us there – and in all the changes of plans throughout our nine days in Belize.  What was supposed to be an intense construction project changed to a much smaller scale project and a whole lot more Vacation Bible School.  Yet, God ultimately knew their needs more than we did.  Those precious children needed us to sing worship songs with them each afternoon, to swing them around in the air, to let them play with our digital cameras, and to just love on them way more than they needed us to build them a covered picnic area.  And, I think we needed that even more than they did.

The joy and renewing of spirit in me that happened on this trip is still overwhelming to think about.  I feel so selfish that I got so much from those children when I was supposed to be giving to them, but their beautiful and joyous faces renewed in me a passion that all people – whether cute, young Belizean children or young adults in Houston – know how deep God’s love is for them and what great promises of abundant life and fulfilled dreams He makes and keeps.

I will forever be grateful for this trip, for the Belizean children, and for my nine amazing teammates and friends, many of whom I barely knew in the beginning.  Every face throughout the week was the face of Christ to me, and I pray that each of us is able to carry these lessons of deeper, joyous Christ-like living into our every-day lives and into the Table.    J-May

Having the opportunity to go on another mission trip, the first in almost 10 years, and the first ever international one was not a chance I wanted to pass up. Little did I know it was going to be one of the best weeks of my life, despite not meeting my expectations going in. Going in we were expecting to work on a construction project at the school in Silk Grass. As it turned out, the project itself changed to a somewhat smaller one, and everyone in the group could not work at the same time, so we also did a little VBS for the kids at the school for 3 days. That was a big change considering we thought we might only be doing that for 1 day.

              Getting to the school Monday I knew something special was going to happen that week, I just could not point to it just yet. The first day at the school took me way out of my comfort zone as we split into smaller groups of 3-4 to teach the kids VBS. I was not comfortable in front of the kids at first, but then realized I was exactly where I needed to be. The kids were very attentive to us, and respectful to each other. Most of the kids I was with were 5-6 years old, and since we were not fully prepared to do lessons that day because of the last minute change in plans for construction, they had to share supplies for coloring, and did not even argue over who colored what part of the picture that they had to share. I don’t think many kids that age in America would have acted the same way. The first of many times the kids at the school would make an impact on me.

              After starting construction of a new canteen for the school (the old one blew down in a recent storm) I felt for sure we would finish by the end of the week, and maybe even a little early. Then “it” happened- it being the rain. The first day was not too bad, and a good thing because pouring concrete would be kind of hard to do in the rain. Through the next 4 days it often seemed the rain would not stop, and it kept getting more and more likely that we would not finish the canteen, though I was optimistic until Friday morning. Not finishing what we started would have to be the only negative, as well as wondering who and when someone would have time to continue the project to completion. The one negative gave us the opportunity for the unexpected positives- the kids.

              Despite not having many earthly or material possessions, the kids seemed genuinely happy every time we saw them. Even after school had ended for the year on Wednesday at lunch, a small number of them kept coming up to the school to hang out with us until we left Friday after lunch. Being around them that much was relaxing, and made me both appreciate what we are blessed with in America, and wishing I could go back to that age, not caring about the Americanized world we live in, and go back to trying to appreciate the small things. The things that money can’t buy are easy to overlook, but the week in Belize they were in the forefront, and you had to try hard to look past them.  Not even going into the R&R days at the beach and Cayes, the trip was more than I could have imagined. I was looking forward to working on the construction project at the school, and thinking it best to stay as far away from VBS and the kids as I could because I could not see what connection I would ever have with them. Turns out they are just like any other kids, but maybe not having the material things. They still like to play games, joke around, and have fun in the same ways we did growing up. The week we were gone I did not think about what I was missing not being in Houston even for a few minutes, a first for any trip I have taken.  I was so engrossed not only with helping with the construction, but also playing with the kids at the school, that the outside world seemed truly a world away.    Greg

“Service without spirituality is exhausting and hopeless. But in the same respect, spirituality without service is barren and selfish. We need to unite the two and do it all as unto the Lord…the key is not in our activity, but in our receptivity to God’s voice – and in our willingness to be used in whatever ways he rings to our attention…” Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World by Joanna Weaver

I have survived the sunburn and am currently surviving the 200 bug bites...per leg...oh so itchy and I am back in the States. Belize was a wonderful experience made even better by the amazing group that I was able to travel with. I was one of 10 on the mission trip – we are all about the same age ranging from 23 – 31 which I think really helped us to relate to one another. I knew Audrey and Matt well, but the other 7 were only acquaintances when we left last Saturday. I have to admit I was nervous to spend 9 days with so many strangers. Especially, since I knew they had the opportunity to meet on previous occasion in preparation to the trip – working and living outside of Houston made it impossible for me to get to know the group beforehand. It is hard to summarize such an amazing roller coaster trip – but if you are so inclined you can hit J-May’s Picasa site and check out the 3000 pictures took – I know … its borderline ridiculous!

The trip was a bit of an emotional roller coaster for me. I was prepared to get hot and sweaty, working for the Lord. I knew there would be opportunity to get to know the children of the Silk Grass Methodist School through VBS (Vacation Bible School) but I expected the majority of my time to be spent working on the project that had been assigned to us. The expected project was to tear down some old post that held up an awning over the classrooms and replace the posts. When we arrived, the pastor and contractors decided the proper way to replace the posts would be to remove the old post as well as the existing roof and reconstruct the entire awning. With 5 days and 10 people, it became quickly apparent that the change of scope was a bit out of our league

Pastor Angus, who was our team’s mission contact in Dangriga, came to the Hummingbird Inn on Sunday night to let us know that instead we would be assigned the project of building an outdoor cantina for the students to use during their lunch period. They currently had a cement top area large enough to hold 2 run down picnic tables. We were told to extend the cement slab and build a 3 foot wooden wall around the area, screen the remaining parameter with screens and build a tin roof. We paid for a Belizan contractor to assist us on the project as it would require a lot of planning and construction knowledge. Willy, aka Clydesdale, worked with us each day. He was a man of few words, consisting of “Right Now” and …. “Right Now” Needless to say, one of the largest challenges of the work project was understanding Willy and getting inside of his head in order to know what steps to take next.

“Rather than picking and choosing ministry opportunities based solely on our talents and interests,” Jack Hoey writes in Discipleship Journal, “we are directed, ‘Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord’”

After our week in Dangriga and Silk Grass we headed down to Hopkins which was a bit farter south to spend a 1 ½ days relaxing and reflecting over the past week. To be honest I was ready for the R&R, but felt it was undeserving. My idea of a job well done would have been sore muscles and a complete work project. My muscles were sore, but from the beds at the Hummingbird Inn, not from the work project…and the cantina was not complete. We had to leave the work for Willy and additional contractors to complete. The change of scope, constant rain, and communication challenges made it impossible to fully complete the cantina. We left Friday afternoon after only doing 2 hours of work that day due to the rain. When we headed to Hopkins, the cantina had an extended cement floor, 8 tall pine posts, a 3 foot wood wall that enclosed the cantina, a frame for the roof, and a jungle gym of wood planks allowing us to climb to the top of the cantina to continue the roofing. The kids enjoyed climbing on the wood planks some even making it to the top of the structure. It just shows you the difference of our world and theirs…could you imagine the angry parents and law suits if we had let children climb our work project in bare feet!

I looked forward to Hopkins, even though I felt a bit unworthy of the rest. The Caribbean Sea we saw in Dangria was very dirty and there was little sand between the Sea and the City. I was ready to see images that you see in the tourist magazines. At this point in the trip I was baffled by the idea of visiting Belize for vacation. All that we had seen of Belize at this point was beautiful, but very poor. The people of Dangria, Silk Grass, and Sette River were living in homes on silts with a collage of wood planks patched together and topped with thatched roofs - no A/C and dirty water. Why would anyone want to vacation in Belize…I had heard there was good fishing, diving, and snorkeling, but looking at the water in Dangriga after the bad storm it was hard to imagine.

We arrived in Hopkins and I remained concerned as we drove through a flooded road that turned into gravel and then dirt and then an array of potholes and road bumps. I concentrated with all my might not to be the first on the trip to get sick from the bumpy ride. We drove through Hopkins and were surprised by its lack of beautiful resorts and tourist. I guess the area we choice to stay was a few miles away from the tourist spots – but I was happy when we arrived at the Tipple Tree Banya. It was facing the beach and was a quaint wooden house with 4 bedrooms for our group of 10 with the landlord living on the second floor. My favorite part of the Tipple Tree was the large front porch which faced the palm trees and sand yard of the Caribbean. Our neighbors were every day residents of Hopkins – which added to the realness of the location. On the porch were about 6 uncomfortable hammocks. It was picturesque and perfect for our group to sit together and gather as we sang to the guitar, read, journaled, and shared in our memories from the past week. We finally saw what a Belize Resort looked like when we went to dinner at Jaguar Reef – it was a beautiful place with thatched roofed white adobe bricked bungalows facing the water. The sand was nicely raked with a stone pathway around the resort to keep people from getting unwanted sand between their freshly manicured toes. The hammocks looked perfect and the volleyball court inviting. Inside the main building was a gift shop, spa, restaurant, and front desk which sold over priced excursions to the surrounding Keyes. It was exactly what I expected Belize to look like, right out of the tourist magazines. The funny thing about it is I felt bad for everyone there. They missed Belize! The children were Belize – the children of Silk Grass which we served were Belize. These resorts were beautiful, but they did not represent the beauty of Belize. I’m not saying I wouldn’t not stay at a resort if I had the opportunity, I’m just thankful for the opportunity we had to see the REAL Belize. I have a much greater respect for the country then I would have ever gathered at a well landscaped resort.

We worked out a deal with the resort to allow us to ride to one of the Keyes (pronounced Keys) - instead of purchasing an expensive package we used an outside service, which picked us up just outside of the Tipple Tree with two small boats…boats is really a generous term. We fit 5 in each boat and were warned that the Sea was extremely bumpy and it would take about 45 minutes to arrive at the island. We all look at each other; smiled, and jumped in…I didn’t even know what island we were going to! But I could not turn down the opportunity, and I am so glad we went. It was b-e-a-utiful. The clear water was unreal and impossible to describe in writing. We spent the day playing in the water, laying on the beach, and enjoying a light lunch on an outdoor deck. It was a great, cheap way to see the beauty Belize has to offer. I have never seen a beach so beautiful. There were very few people there as it was off-season for tourism, but that made it even more special as it felt like the island belonged to us for just a short time. It was a great way to end our trip. The beauty of the country had washed away any feelings of disappointment or frustration I had left after the week in Silk Grass and left me feeling completely filled and blessed. The entire team was ecstatic – everyone came together in the short week and we all really enjoyed each others company.

The next morning we were up by 4:30am – before the sunrise…but not before the stinkin’ rooster – who woke us in Hopkins each morning at 4:00am. We were on the road by 5:15 and had a 3 hour ride ahead of us to get back to Belize City. We made a quick stop at the Silk Grass Methodist School to see how our work project was progressing. The majority of the roof was up and the next step would be screens before the project would be complete. Principal Jackson promised she would put a plague on the cantina so that the students will always remember the 10 individuals who came from Texas to build them a place to spend their lunch. It is a very humbling thought to think my picture will be there for the children of Silk Grass. We made it to the airport in Belize City with plenty of time to share one last meal at the airport before boarding the flight back to Houston.

It is strange to be back – Belize is so poor and America is so rich. I thought I might be a bit shocked to see the huge homes and interstate highways after a week of watching children playing in their one pair of school clothes ripped and tattered from wear and tear. But, I guess a week was not long enough to really feel removed from the States. I also think it is a state of mind. I cannot change where I live at this point of my life, but I can change how I live as well as be thankful for the blessings in my life.

I am now on my flight to DC. Once I arrive, I will have been on 2 planes and in 5 cities in 48 hours. It is very strange to think 48 hours ago I was lying on the Beach on Salt Water Keyes in the Caribbean Sea. But, I am thankful for the time of reflection I had during the week that allowed me to slow down and really soak in the experience. I spent hours reading and journaling this past week and I feel like I have learned more about myself, my faith, and my friends. I hope the friendships made will continue to grow despite the distance and that the Table will continue to breed a place of vulnerable community which was so truly displayed in the team that traveled to Belize. It is so important to have a vulnerable and welcoming Christian community. A place where we can go and remove the masks we wear that makes others believe we have it together. I place were we can talk about our struggles and be encouraged and held accountable. I think that’s what made this group of individuals so special. We were strangers when we arrived together, but by the end of the trip we were vulnerable servants of God – willing to share life with one another and willing to lay it all on the line to receive the love and support of our Christian brothers and sisters. I hope and pray that the Table can continue to challenge itself to become a vulnerable place. It is already a beautifully welcoming community – it will take brave and humble individuals leading the way, sharing their stories, and encouraging others to leave the masks at home and come as you are to a place that supports and encourages.

My favorite Christian quote is by DC Talks and says “The number one reason for atheism is Christianity” similarly Mahatma Gandhi once said “If Christians lived according to their faith there would be no more Hindus left in India” The great leader of the Indian nation was fascinated at the thought of knowing Christ. But when he met Christians, he felt let down. This week we were 10 individuals who imitated Jesus – my prayer is that we can continue to do this at the Table and in our every day activities.    Cat