A Little Helpful Dose

This past month we went over 2 weeks without the city turning on the water to our neighborhood. The transformer blew up that runs the pump connected to the well for this area. The town normally turns the water on twice a day for a couple hours. Everyone around here uses an outdoor sink with a cistern in the center that probably holds about 15 gallons. They usually just leave the facet on all the time and if water overflows it isn't a big deal since it is outside, but that way they never miss an opportunity to fill up their cistern when the water comes on. (This cultural trait of always leaving faucets on has flooded things in our life more than once, haha!) If someone has a little more money they have an additional barrel that they keep full for incidences like this one!

Our neighborhood looked like the photo above for awhile. After about a week, the town started hiring a water truck to come around and fill up everyone's buckets about ever other day or so. People kept their front yards lined with every empty bucket they could find. The one above even put their wheel barrel out there.

 

 We have a spare cistern (110 gal), that is 1/6 of the size of the one attached to our house. In our world a spare cistern gets used a lot! Plus we had a 55 gal barrel. The first week Jimmy was driving to a well and filling up this spare cistern in the back of his truck when we would run low. Just to put it in perspective, the average family of 4 in the States uses almost 400 gallons of water a day. Jimmy was sharing this water with our neighbors too because they don't have pickups to go get water, let alone a large cistern to put it in. Are you seeing how hard it is to complain in this country?! Once you leave your gate, you look around and can't really say anything. Even silent I feel kind of like a spoiled brat for getting frustrated. Petén is like an instant cure for the grumbles, just go outside and let reality slap you around a little bit.

{Jimmy would pump the water from outside into our house cistern.}

So Jimmy was burning hours on this water situation, hours that he did not have because it was going on the same time as the new students were arriving and classes were starting. One Saturday he made several trips right in a row so that I could catch up on laundry. See... I am spoiled. 

The power company would have immediately been able to come and fix the problem, but the town was several months behind paying the power bill. Then to fix the problem they would have to purchase a new transformer plus wire. Once I heard that, I figured it would be months until we had water again. How were they going to get that money?

Then one day Jimmy got a call asking if he would help pay for the new transformer and wire. We have been paying our bill, but we didn't want to set a precedent that we would pay to fix problems, so Jimmy said "no". So then I REALLY thought this situation was hopeless.

And then the day after the phone call, SURPRISE the water came back on. I have no idea how, but I am SUPER thankful that we have water again. Each time I do laundry I remember just how thankful I am! Water makes me smile just looking at it coming out of the tap. 

Poor Silas. I had been on him about flushing the potty for that last several months and he was getting really good about it, until this water situation. Each time he would flush we would all yell, "NOOOO!" So here we go again, from scratch!

Power Troubles

So some group decided that they could go around in different poorer neighborhoods in Guatemala and get people all riled up about how much they are paying for power. They give them numbers about how rich people pay less than the poor people for power. (Actually in our specific case we pay 33% MORE per Kw than our low-consumption neighbors)

Different parts of Guatemala do pay different rates. It depends on how close you are to whatever power plant you are using. We are 500km away… at the very end of a long extension cord. We pay more and our power is out very often for long periods of time, but living somewhere rural was our decision, so we pay the rates. Our water and rent is cheaper (when we paid rent). Prices fluctuate inside a country based on your location, like anywhere else in the world.  

The more illiterate a society is, the easier it is to manipulate them. They just have to believe whatever they are told. This group told them that they are being persecuted because they are poor. "Politicians in Guatemala City are paying less than you hard working poor people." They told them that they could pay this group $4 a month and they would attach their house lines directly to the pole, bypassing the meter and giving them unlimited power. So they are stealing all of their power from the electric company, but they are calling it a protest because they are being taken advantage of since they are poor. Whenever the power company comes out and cuts their lines, someone from this group hooks it right back up that same day… so they say. Of course the power company can't keep up.

The power company is reporting that 2 million people are stealing power. Those part of the revolt claim the number to be more like 6 million, almost 50% of the households in Guatemala. Either number is too many for them to arrest or put in prison. (Not that any laws are actually enforced here anyway.) 

This affects those who are paying for their power because a whole lot more households are hooking up to the grid and all those who were hooked up before are using as much power as they want… power that they would never have been able to pay for otherwise. So, if you are at the end of an extension cord, there is hardly any power left because it is way overloaded. Our water pump keeps overheating.

 

It burned up our first pump a couple weeks ago and melted some of our pipes. Our new pump just turns itself off when it gets overheated which is turning out to be every couple minutes when the water is running! There are other things that just won't work because there isn't enough power to run them. (Like the air conditioner unit in our guest bedroom and we have guests with us right now.) On top of that the power company is turning off entire cities and even counties for weeks at a time to punish the people stealing power, but those who are paying for power lose theirs too, so everybody suffers.

Anyway we keep losing power too. It has been over a hundred degrees each day and trying to sleep without a fan is pretty miserable for my children. They are exhausted and their necks and scalps are covered in itchy heat rashes. Trying to run the generator to keep your food from spoiling is expensive anytime, but when it is becoming longterm like this, it is not sustainable. Think about the businesses around here who don't have a generator and wouldn't be able to afford the gas to run it anyway. It is just all sad. Sad for everyone. These people who are stealing power don't realize it, but this is not going to end well for them either.

Who knows when or how this will end. The government wants to nationalize the power grid here, so this might all just be a big political move. Things always work better when the government runs them, right? Jimmy reported our power issues to the power company, but when they come look at it, they will probably see that we are the only ones in our neighborhood that are paying for our power and will cut the whole line. Yippie! 

A Prayer of Dedication

Yesterday we all went with Jimmy to the monthly Kekchi pastors' meeting in Sayaxché. Usually Jimmy goes by himself, but this month was special. Since we work in missions every weekend and aren't a member of a church here (soon it will be the church in San Pancho), Jimmy asked if the pastors would have a prayer of dedication over Eden.

{Domingo giving a report about his missions work}

This church in Sayaxché is the same place Jimmy holds the KBI modules. I would say it could possibly be one of the hottest places on this earth. I think it's only competition would be our current rental house. It has the same itty bitty windows and for some unknown reason half the time they are closed... why people... why?!

The high yesterday was 104 degrees. Luckily today the high is only 102. This kind of heat makes you crazy. You just walk around drenched and stinky all day and sometimes all night. Since our windows are so tiny, no breeze gets in. We have window air conditioning units in the boys bedroom and in our room that we run at night to be able to sleep, but when it is this hot, the concrete block heats up so much, that the air conditioners can't keep up. While we were in Guate, they must have hooked up more people to the transformer we are on because there is not enough power now to even run one unit in our house. My washing machine trips our breaker half the time. The wires get so hot in our roof that they just can't handle anything. Jimmy hoses off our roof every evening. This makes me even more thankful for our forever house where we have more windows than walls!!! I just have to make it a month and a half to rainy season and this should be our last dry season in this house. I am SO thankful.

So for now we drink lots of water and pray for rain!

We are so thankful for the friendship and partnership with these national pastors and missionaries. We were very honored to have them pray for Eden and for us as parents.

Pastor Mateo led the prayer. He is the legal representative for the Association of Kekchi Baptist pastors in Petén. He is also on the board of directors for the institute. (This is not the same Mateo that pastors in Poptún.) When the Kekchi pray they all pray out loud at the same time. It is a beautiful thing to hear and it is encouraging to us to see their love for our family.

Forever House #6: My Scavenger Hunt to Find Electricity

...our journey to rent free living, all the entertainment minus the headaches.

Sometimes we feel like we are living one big scavenger hunt to get anything done:

Last month a technician from the power company stopped by our land and told Lico that they were putting up posts in our neighborhood. We are not connected to the grid yet but were told by the Mayor (who we just happened to meet and become friends with) that everything was paid to bring in posts all the way to the corner of our property. This technician told Lico that it wasn't coming all the way to our property, but that if I would go to the power company office and pay Q80, they would put in a post just for me.

So the following Monday I headed off to the office. I wasn't sure what paperwork they would need, but I took everything I had: passport, DL, Deed to property, water bill, receipt for property tax payment... anything that had my name attached to the property. I arrived on Monday to find a line all the way to the street. After 2 hours of waiting I finally made it inside the building where after waiting another 20 minutes the nice lady told me that I didn't have what I needed. Apparently, in addition to the paperwork I had brought with me I also needed to go to the Mayor's office in San Pancho and get an authorization for right of way for the company. I also needed to find the closest neighbor with electricity and bring a copy of their bill.

So the next Wednesday I set out to do all of this. First I went to the Mayor's office (a new Mayor since our friend is running for congress now). After waiting in the land development area I was told to go talk to the Secretary. He told me he could write up what I needed, but first I had to get authorization from the Mayor. Once I was finally able to speak to the Mayor, he had no idea what I was talking about and just flipped through my papers. I told him that the Secretary knew what to do so he said, "Ok, tell him it's approved." I walked back over to the Secretary's office and said, "He said it's approved." He didn't even get up from his desk to check. He typed up my letter to the power company and 15 minutes later signed it and I was on my way.

Then I had to find an electric bill from my closest neighbor. This I did by driving around looking for wires hanging off of a pole. It's farther away than you would think. They didn't even know who I was nor where my house was, and EVERYBODY knows that. The problem here was that they didn't want to give me the bill because they hadn't paid it yet. They didn't have any past bills apparently because their power was cut off for a few months and this was the first bill since they reconnected it. This bill also included the cost of installation. I offered to pay it for them if they would give me the money, but "fijese" their check hadn't come in yet this month. So the only way was to offer to pay it for them and let them pay me back later. This cost was $40 and I hold little hope of getting it back.

With all of my paperwork now in hand I headed to the office where the wait was only 40 minutes this time, but with only one lady working everybody behind me had to wait another 20 minutes for my paperwork to be done. The truth is that very little of what I had was necessary. They took down the client number from my neighbor's bill, glanced at the right of way permission, took my name off of the passport photocopy and asked me for $10. Then I was told that within 3 months they would hook up my electricity but since the guys were there working already it shouldn't take that long. We shall see.

Update: As of last week the guys installed the posts. We are going by our land today on the way to meet Domingo for a new Kekchi village outreach. We will see if there are any wires yet!

Plumbing and Power

Somehow our pipes got stopped up. Maybe there was stuff in them that dried up while we were gone, but since we got back every time you flushed the toilet the shower would burp and sometimes even toilet paper would come up. It was worse if somebody was IN the shower and then another innocent person out of habit flushed the toilet. That was gross. Finally last Friday we got the plumber to come down from Santa Elena to check it out. I don't mind doing all the plumbing for water coming into the house and have repaired and replaced many of those pipes, changed the kitchen and bathroom sink drains, replaced faucets, replaced our pump...etc, but I do not work on toilet drainage pipes. I let the expert handle this very gross and very important job. Because of the way the pipes would slowly drain out I thought it was possible there was a problem with the septic tank, but thankfully that was not the issue, there was just a big back up.

The plumber arrived at 7:30 am on his nephew's motorcycle ready to get to work. They quickly cut out a section of pipe and using a 1/2 in. pipe flushed water up the pipe and broke up the plugged area. They had dug a hole where the pipe exited the house and let everything dump into that hole. Then they scooped out the paper into a bucket I provided, and got to work fixing the pipe.

I thought they were going to need money to go buy some connections, but instead the plumber asked for newspaper. I don't have any laying around so then he asked if he could use our gas stove top to melt the replacement section of pipe to make his own connection. I found some printer paper instead and he got to work on that.

I'm not sure how plumber's do it in the States, but I can't imagine too many of them starting a fire in the customer's backyard to fix their pipes. Either way they got the job done.

After the pipe was repaired they dug a hole in another part of yard and filled in the hole around the pipe with the new dirt. Of course our dogs were right on this new disgusting smell and wanted to dig down to find the source. I sprinkled some chili powder around the area and they haven't messed with it since.

Total time: 1 hour 20 minutes. Total cost: $30. Not having the toilet flush into your shower: priceless.

Update on the power lines drooping at shoulder level in our front yard: They came about a week and a half later to fix our power lines the right way. We had been bumped to the bottom of the list since we actually had power, which I understand. It turns out that it was the metal pipe where our wires leave the house, which all of the houses around here have, that was causing the problem after all. They circumvented it, so maybe our wires won't melt again anytime soon.

Since we have been back our breaker kept tripping if we had more than one large item on at a time during the day. (Everything in our house is on one breaker.) At night when we were running the window units in ours and the boys' rooms we couldn't turn on any lights. This seems to have helped with that problem.

Wire, Rats, & Rain

Friday morning when I was in the shower, the power went out. This is the 2nd time this has happened to me in the last 2 weeks. (We lose our water when the power goes out too since it is on a pump.) This time it sounded different than normal. I thought I heard sparks. Then the guy driving by out front campaigning for the Patriota political party turned of his recording and said over his loud speaker, "Be careful your power lines just fell, there is fire and sparks!" I though that was nice of him.

At first we thought maybe the neighbor's overgrown weeds pulled it down. The wires kept touching, sparking and bouncing around. All the neighbor kids came out to watch the show. I quickly called our dogs and got them in the house so that they wouldn't go check it out. We were very thankful they weren't in that side of the yard when it fell.

Jimmy called the power company and told them that a live wire was down and that we were without power. They said that they would come out between 1 and 48 hours to fix it. Last time we had a problem with our line (because they cut the wrong house) it took them 9 DAYS to come fix it. Our power goes off all of the time. During rainy season it's almost every day. The quality of the power lines just aren't good. I do appreciate the men trying to fix the problems though, in the middle of a storm even. Our poor service is due to what the service guys have to work with, not the men themselves.

So Jimmy was stuck at home waiting on the technicians to get there. No one ever comes to your house to fix something with all the tools and supplies they need, so we weren't going to risk it. If we missed this opportunity it could mean days without power. Anyway so there we were, all stuck in the house together... a little sweaty, but still a forced family day isn't all that bad!

It's hot without fans, but thankfully is started to rain.

Jonah and Silas got to cool off playing in the rain!

Another wonderful event of our day happened while I was sitting at the kitchen table. I had been painting a flag for the 4th of July when all of a sudden I saw a rat walk by me on its way to the dishwasher. And by walking I mean that it was moseying on by, like "Go ahead lady, what ya gonna do about it." These are some ornery rats!!! I hadn't seen a rat or rat droppings in over a week, so actually seeing one was disappointing, I had been hoping they were all gone.

In the afternoon I set up the boys' play hut.

That's the first time we done that since being back. They were thrilled.

José had given us some coconuts, so Jimmy drained a couple of those.

Later we had some pineapple/coco water smoothies. They were delicious!

Our poor doggies had to be tied up all day. They did not appreciate that.

At about 6PM the technicians showed up. They were the emergency response team, which meant they really only worked with the large power lines. They had come out since there was a line on the ground.

{There is a flat Stanley in this shot because of a project we are doing for a SS class in Japan}

They found out that our wire had burned up. None of us were sure why, but one guy said that it might have gotten too hot in the metal pipe where it comes out of our house, because of the sun. We aren't really thinking that is possible, but who knows.

They don't carry any house wire with them, so it looked like we were going to be stuck. Thankfully they were very nice and Jimmy was able to convince them to just rig something for now so that we could have power and then send the other guys later to fix it right. But we still didn't have any wire. One of the technicians had the idea to go and find a house that had had their electricity cut and we could use their wire and whenever they paid their bill the guys who would hook them back up carry wire with them, so they could replace it. So that is what they did. Jimmy had to go to the hardware store to borrow some power lines wire cutters and then the guys fixed us up.

It is definitely rigged! The lines are hanging twisted together at lower than shoulder height, but... we had power! And we are thankful Jimmy waited for them, or they would have just left. The guys that work on the smaller lines called and said that they would be by on Monday... that would have been 3 more days without power.

The technicians were really nice, even when Lucha chewed through her leash and showed up at the bottom of the ladder they were coming down! We appreciate them trying to make this work for us. They laughed since it was so late and said, "Well now you have light for when you sleep!"

CRAZY ITEM OF THE DAY: We found out how the rat got in. We replaced the windows in our kitchen with industrial screens and hopes that it would at least slow the rats down. We close the glass at night, but figured we were ok with the windows open in the day. Without the breeze you just melt. Anyway these jokers chewed through our screen in broad daylight! Like I said, ornery rats!

A Funny Place

So we woke up this morning to no water and realized that a pipe had broken outside. This has happened before since they built this whole house and then thought, "Hey... we forgot the plumbing." So all the pipes are in a shallow trench outside. This is just one of the many reasons this house requires almost daily repairs.

All of our water from our cistern drained into our yard, although it didn't look like a very big puddle (we later found out why). Our water pump had been running dry for who knows how long, so it needed to be primed and then fingers crossed, it would work again.

Good Morning! Jimmy was off to the hardware store before he finished his coffee. By the time we normally would finish breakfast he had the pipes fixed (which included breaking up some concrete), pump primed and working, and some water in the cistern. Ya know... water makes a day much easier. I was so thankful.

Jimmy rigged up our rain cistern again since while at the hardware store he found out that they hadn't turned on the water in this town for 3 days because of a... wait for it... broken pipe. Water isn't a big deal in this place for some reason. So all that hoping that today was our side of the streets' day for water was in vain, neither side was getting any. Who knows when they will get the water on again. And I'm blaming this next part on our town too (because it's the company you keep), it didn't rain today. It has poured every day for the last 2 weeks and there was not ONE DROP today! (Probably only in our town.) No... I know who is in charge of the rain and we're good. We had plenty of water today, it was like the widow's oil!

There were a couple other blips before the day was over, but we still had a good day. I think we have lived this day before... several times!

Before Jimmy left for the discipleship class in SR he fixed this plant up for me. I had seen this stump in a wood pile outside someone's house the other night while leaving Santa Rita. I casually said to Jimmy, "Ooo, I want that stump," and to my surprise he went and tried to buy it. The lady didn't want him to pay her for it, so he gave her Q10. Then he cleaned it up with a metal brush, lined it with plastic and put my plant in it. I love it! Jimmy's this sweet every day to me.

CRAZY ITEM OF THE DAY:

(This was the funny in our September update, so sorry if you read it twice.)

There is a big holiday here called Kids’ Day. We took Jonah and Silas out for some ice cream to celebrate. The restaurant gave them balloons and stickers. The stickers had Spanish phrases on them like, “Hello”, “Please”, “Thank you”, “May you have good digestion”, but the sticker that made us laugh out loud was the the one that read, “Can you loan me some money”! We had to put that one on them!

Ladies Outreach

Last Wednesday we had a ladies outreach in Santa Rita. Some of these ladies we already had a relationship with, some we only knew through a family member, and others we met for the very first time.

Becca brought down beads and I had some leftover from other outreaches, so the night before we sorted through hundreds of beads and organized pairs by color. If you have a personality like mine, it's a great stress reliever, you should try it!

The ladies were very creative. I think they really enjoyed making them.

The woman in the white is José's wife, Maria. They are the couple who just lost their son Lucas. José comes faithfully, but this is the first activity she has ever been to.

I am talking to Maria in the back. I have been trying to get to know her for a while now. I love her daughter Vilma. Her entire family comes to our Bible studies, but she has just started to get involved!

We passed out invitations in the adult and kid's Bibles studies and told them it was for ladies 20+ or ladies with their own families (some start very young here). Many of the teens and kids proudly brought their moms!

I met Mercedes mom for the first time. She has been in Mexico for several years and had just returned that day!

Auda with her mom Sophia!

Ana with her mom, Cantalaria! She comes to the adult Bible study with her husband sometimes. She doesn't speak much Spanish.

Jonah and Silas were there with their Santa Rita "nannies"! They love Mercedes and Blanca, I am so thankful for them. They are always a big help and the boys are very comfortable with them. (You can tell Jonah propels himself pretty good in his bouncer, he is a blur.)

Bernabe showing off her finished earrings.

Albina and Cantalaria... Albina is very shy!

Here is Marta, Marcos' wife. She just gave birth to their 9th child! It was a girl, but they haven't named her yet.

CRAZY ITEM OF THE DAY:

Our 3 interns left this weekend. During the month that they were here, the power was off a lot. The most frustrating thing I think though was the fact that the water pump broke at their hotel. They went without running water for 3 days.

The hotel was very concerned... they let them dip gallon jugs and buckets out of their pool to flush the toilet and to wash with. Here is what their pool looked like at the time:

News From Home

We talked to Quincho today. The water on our side of town had been off for 5 days and he didn't realize that he was supposed to turn off our pump. Jimmy had told him to if that happened, but he forgot. We figured it was burned up and that Jimmy would have to replace it again once we returned. Today Quincho said that it started working again. I'm not sure how that is possible, but we're are thankful! But, we traded one problem for another. In Petén you have to pay your electric bill in person and you cannot pay in advance. Jimmy was able to pay in September when he was there, but a friend of ours was suppose to pay for October and November. He is trustworthy with the money, but he just hasn't done it yet, he probably lost our bill number. If you wait too long they will cut the line to our house and then we have to wait 2 weeks+ for someone to come hook it back up. Please pray that this friend will go ahead and fulfill this favor! It would not be fun to be finally home with 2 babies and not have power.

Please continue to pray for Quincho. He is rebuilding his life and plans on buying land when we return. He is not getting support from his family. Some of them look to him as their meal ticket (since he is working for the Gringos) even though they could support themselves. Pray that God will encourage him and send him some strong Christian friends.

Family Photos, Gofers, & 1,000 Liter Cisterns

We were very disappointed that we did not get to go to Santa Rita on Saturday. Please pray this will not put us behind next week. A man that lives across the street from our Bible study named Blas road his bike down to the scene of the accident just to watch after he heard us talking about it on Saturday. (That is a very Guatemalan thing to do!) He said that the Public Minister came and arrested the drunk driver.

Mateo is Gerardo’s brother. He told Jimmy that Gerardo was having nightmares. He heard him in the middle of the night yell, “The car... the car...” We were hoping that maybe this event would have made some of our teens stop and think. Mateo still has not accepted Christ. The Bible study Sunday night in New Horizon was on Heaven and Hell. Right before it started I told Mateo that he still needed to accept Christ. I said, “I want to see you in Heaven too.” He always gives an adamant “NO” when we ask him if he is ready. Later during the study he was part of the discussion. He seemed shocked that Hell was forever. Then he asked, “Well what if your name is in the book of life?” Please pray that God will continue to work in his heart. He is 13.

We passed out the family photos in New Horizon today that Jimmy’s mom took while the team was here. That was a lot of fun!

While we were at Anabella’s house, Olivia came running up with a gofer. She had technically found it on Anabella’s property and she wanted to make sure that she did not want it. I love Olivia, she always makes me smile! She was nice and posed the gofer for me! She later took it home to skin it and eat.

While we were at Aquilino’s house he told us that his family went to a special service the Catholic church had on Christmas Eve. (His family comes to our Bible study every week, but we do not tell anyone not to go to the Catholic church. We just teach the truth. This allows us to stay in the village) Anyway, he told us that they said that he was “in the shadow of Jimmy” and that Jimmy has bought him with a cookie. They said that only people who are starving come to our Bible studies. Aquilino said that made his “temperature rise”. He then told them, “The things of God are not talking bad about other people. This (the Catholic church in NH) doesn’t have anything to do with God. Jimmy never says anything bad about you.” And then he left. When they understand the truth, the Lord leads them down the right path for us!

Sunday was Ernesto’s last week at our Bible study. He is moving to Coban to go to school. He still had not accepted Christ. He has heard the Gospel over and over again. Please pray that he too will come to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

Well we are out of water for the 2nd time in the last month. Our town only turns the water on twice a week normally. Our cistern holds 1,000 liters, so who knows how long it has been since the water had been turned on. Our shower has been leaking, and that helped drain our cistern. So Jimmy started breaking concrete to fix it tonight at 9:45! He finished it in about 2 hours. He poured the last 3, 5 gallon jugs of pure water he could find in our town, into our cistern to take a shower afterwards.

CRAZY ITEM OF THE DAY:

In the States you might see this:

This is what you see here: