Hello from Honduras!

I was surprised to come back to the house one day and discover there was a green parrot in the kitchen. Sarah and Andrea bought it from a peddler that came to our village. Unfortunately, we had no cage so the parrot was free to entertain itself by chewing on books. It is a young one and seems very tame. It is beautiful. Its vocabulary is not much more than “Hola” (hello in Spanish). It laughs and cries like a small child throwing a fit.

Lenita’s services are in demand. Ladies come over, wanting her to make and decorate cakes, to show them how to decorate cakes, make rolls, sew, or use her kitchen equipment. She enjoys working with them.

We were about to get our first large cluster of ripening yellow bananas from a tree here in the yard, but I notice someone else beat us to them. The cluster was cut down with a machete and taken away.

My pig is growing. It prefers sugar cane, bananas, and boiled crab bodies over its regular pig food. One rainy day the rain water in the gulley washed a large enough hole for the pig to escape. Its freedom was short-lived.

Schools are out all week leading up to Easter Sunday due to Easter holidays. Easter is celebrated in a big way here – with people traveling to be with families, feasting, drinking, and spending time at the beach.

We invited the congregation to come roast hot dogs and enjoy homemade ice cream. Ice cream is a treat that we rarely get.

If animal cruelty bothers you too much, skip this next paragraph:
A boy that lives nearby spends much of his time playing with chickens and getting his rooster to fight. He is 15 or 16. He doesn’t go to school or have a job – he idles his time away and goes to the bar on the hill to drink. He was upset that Brother Dennis’s dog killed a chicken and threatened to poison the dog. Brother Dennis offered to pay for the chicken, but the boy’s mind was set. We found the puppy dead shortly after that due to poisoning. The next day we found his other dog and a cat dying. They had eaten food with ground glass. I will spare you the sickening details. Later we found out the chicken didn’t even belong to the boy – it was borrowed.

Violence is a way of life with some people. Not many Sundays ago, spectators at a baseball game here in Roatan had a confrontation. The man wielding a knife and the man’s brother were both shot to death. Someone tried to get the knife bearer to back off, but he reportedly asked, “Why? All they can do is kill me.” They did. It shook up a lot of people.

Oak Ridge School
Our pilot program of having the ACE English curriculum in the government school is underway. The school officials set aside a class room, which we converted into a setting more suited for individual learning rather than a lecture environment. The class room was painted and new lighting was installed. We built cubicle style desks areas for the students.

The pilot school is in the nearby fishing village, Oak Ridge, on the south side of the island, about a 10 minute drive from Politilly.

The school officials are pleased with our English program at Oak Ridge, but they want more of it. They would like more students enrolled in the program.

There is still enough religious freedom here to not only mention God in school, but to actually lead the children in prayer. Furthermore, the school officials are pleased!

Sis Judy and Sis Bonnie have a problem with some of the children coming to class and then not returning for the next two or three classes. Sometimes new students will come to class wanting to learn English, even though they are not enrolled. There are just so many students the class will hold. As of now, they only have classes there three days a week. We are short of teachers here. When Sis Judy and Sis Bonnie are at Oak Ridge, that leaves Lenita with the help of one or two local girls in the Politilly school. One girl has finished English up to third grade and the other to the sixth grade.

Mission House Progress
The downstairs kitchen is functioning now. It is so nice to have a place to ourselves and for the teachers to have their own place downstairs rather than sharing a kitchen. It was the first time for me to build cabinets, and I was surprised at how complicated it was. I forgot to put in any drawers, so perhaps I can put some in another cabinet I plan to build by the stove.

We need to seal the upstairs kitchen and bathroom floors badly. The floor is tongue and groove. Dirt and grit sift through into the kitchen below. If we spill much water or the toilet overflows, it will drip through into the kitchen and entry area below.

We also need additional storage space badly. The table saw, air compressor, building materials, mission supplies, furniture, and boxes are filling the living area downstairs so there is no room to use it. I am hoping we can build something that can be used for storage and a work shop.

Some sights you see here-
- People riding in the trunk of a car or taxi with their feet hanging out the back.
- A cow being led down the village road to be slaughtered.
- Cows and horses grazing along side the main highway and wandering into the highway.
- A man pedaling a bicycle with his wife riding on the bar in front of him and the baby in her lap. The hills are steep, too!
- Road work being marked with piles of rock or natural vegetation rather than cones and saw horse traffic barriers.
- Asphalt being heated in a barrel over a wood fire for road repair.

Definitions:
- Sea Cat: octopus
- What a Ting (thing): wow!
- That’s mighty: that’s great.
- Ching CHING: a noisy black bird with yellow eyes. Very common here.
They have a lot of other terms for things in the sea that I could not tell you the biological names, including “worms” and “sea eggs”.

Mary, a single mother from Milton, sought salvation a few months ago. She recently had her fifth child, a tiny girl. The baby still has no name. It may take a few months to get her named. She needs prayer and we need wisdom. She is still living with her shack up boy friend. We would like to see him get saved and for them to make a family for the children. Her only son is faithful to come to service. Doug still drives over five times a week to pick up any who want to go to service. There is still opposition to us there so the numbers of people wanting to come has dropped.

There are many services here in Politilly that are so full that we don’t have enough song books or Bibles to go around. Very few of the young people have their own Bibles. We feel that is a hinderance to their spiritual growth.
We have been told that some international investors plan to build a casino here on the island. That added to all the corrupt influence of the tourist (at least the younger set) is bringing the morals of the natives way down. It is sad to watch.

Please take a look at our updated web page: www.ChurchofGodMission.com

We appreciate your prayers and support.
Doug and Lenita Wall