1st Week

I apologize for the briefness and/or lack of thought that went into my last post. I felt like I needed to write something to let you know I made it ok, but couldn’t think of what else to write. I was also kind of overwhelmed with the newness of everything that I didn’t know where to start. I will try to make this one more informative. I will tell you a little about what I’ve done since I’ve been here.

I arrived on Thursday morning. The flight in was interesting…or let’s say adventurous. I had heard that it would be, but didn’t know really what that meant until I experienced it myself. We circled the city a few times in our descent, complete with lots of turbulence, and finally hit the runway where they immediately hit the brakes. When we turned around to go to our gate, we could see the end of the runway very close outside the window. It’s apparently the shortest international runway at a major airport in the world. Everyone applauded when we came to a stop. We were all thankful to have landed safely. We made it through customs and everything fine and met Kymm, the ranch hostess and her husband. They took us to lunch in the city, a nice American meal at Church’s chicken and then headed to Rancho Ebenezer, about an hour drive from the airport up a windy mountain road full of potholes. That night we, the new teachers, had dinner at Kymm and Eric’s house along with their 5 kids. It was a great time to get to know each other and find out about how we all had ended up working with WGO.

The next few days involved unpacking, having dinner with the 2 girls that live above us, touring the ranch, meeting the families, getting to know each other better, adjusting to the lack of power (a transformer blew the first night we were here so we ran on generator power in the mornings and evenings and didn’t have any electricity during the day), adjusting to the slowness of life, the speaking of Spanish, lots of rain, and lots of flies. As you can tell, there’s been lots of adjusting.

On Sunday we went into the city for church and shopping. I enjoyed getting to talk with one of the girls that will be in my class at lunch. She is the daughter of one of the missionary couples that work here on the ranch. She told me all about her family, extended family, pets, etc. I was impressed how mature and grown-up she sounded. She’s only 8 and will be in 4th grade, but it seemed like I was talking with another adult.

The other day, I had the chance to meet the other 2 kids that will be in my class. The 3 other new teachers (Jae, Jesse, and Jenny) and I went hiking on a trail that’s on the property to find the pond we’d heard about. I was pretty exhausted from the hike (it was really steep and I’m out of shape), so I was planning on heading back to my apartment to shower and take a nap, but ended up hanging out at the soccer field for a while. It was there and on the playground that I met my other 2 students. One of them, Kevin, saw me and said “Are you Miss Hannah? I’ve been waiting and waiting for you to get here!” He ran and gave me a side hug. He talked pretty much nonstop for the next 20 minutes telling me all about himself, school, a little bit about his background, etc. After asking if he could call me “Ms. Han” and introducing me to Julio, my other student, he asked it was ok if he went to play with his friends. Julio wasn’t as talkative, but it was fun to talk to him too. All 3 of my students seem very full of energy, so they should keep me on my toes J. I was very excited to finally meet these kids that I had heard about and had been praying for over the past few weeks and months.

I’ve enjoyed getting to know everyone here. They are all so nice and welcoming. Today, the man that does a lot of the maintenance work around the ranch and who is a houseparent to 5 Honduran girls with his wife came to finish up some work on our apartment. When he was finished, he invited us over to his house to let us try some Honduran food that he was telling us about. He ended up giving us several things including a loaf of bread, chips, refried red beans, and this stuff that’s very similar to sour cream. He said that he didn’t want us teachers to go hungry. The first day we were here, he was also doing some work here in the bathroom and invited us over to meet his wife and girls. They were so nice and gave us cake and coffee and we talked about a lot of stuff. We went to church with them on Sunday. They are the only North American house parents. There are 4 or 5 other houses that all have Honduran house parents. There are several other North American families here, but they have other jobs around the ranch.

2 more teachers arrived yesterday, Abby and Jennifer. Abby is a new teacher and Jennifer has been here for a few years, but had been home on furlough for a few weeks. It was fun getting to meet them. Now we are just missing 2 teachers. They both arrive in August.

We start our teacher training on Monday and the kids start school the following Monday. I can’t wait!

It’s been amazing to be in the midst of the peace of God’s creation.

Sorry this has been so long, but I felt I should account for the last week of “adventures” in this new place.

Thanks so much for your prayers and support. Please keep praying for this transition period and the kids here at the ranch. Hearing some of the kids’ backgrounds breaks my heart, but makes me thankful that WGO has taken them in and they are now in homes with loving families.

Thanks!

i'm here!

I made it to Honduras!! Everything is great and I love it! Umm...more details and pictures later. It's beautiful and everyone is really nice! We went into town today to get groceries, etc after church. It takes about 30-45 minutes to get to Tegucigalpa from where I am. I'm close to San Matias on a mountain. It's pretty cool. We have this next week to get settled and don't really have any set plans and then training etc, starts on next Monday.

Please continue to pray for transitions, etc. It's taking a while to get used to everything...trying to find things in the grocery store was challenging with everything in Spanish, but I made it!
Thanks!

Oh...and about the mailing addresses. IF you have a large package (bigger than a shoebox) to mail, it has to be sent to the address in Conroe by the 15th of August. Everything else small packages, envelopes, etc can be sent to the miami address to get here the fastest. See "Mailing Addresses" post for the correct miami address.

Bye for now!

Mailing

I think I may have sent the wrong addresses for mailing things. I'm sorry. I'll look into it and let you know when I have the correct ones.

I have my passport!

I got my passport today! I've been in Houston for the past 2 days at the passport agency. Yesterday (monday) involved waiting in line for about 3 1/2 hours, but it wasn't bad because everyone was really nice and I talked to a few people in line with me, so the wait wasn't too bad. So, after the wait, I submitted my application. When I got to the window the lady told me she had some bad news. I was afraid she was going to tell me that she couldn't give it to me for some reason. The news was just that I would have to come back the next day to pick it up. This wasn't bad news at all to me because my mom and i already had hotel reservations b/c we were originally planning to come on Tuesday to start this whole process.

ANYWAYS, today I was expecting to wait a long time to actually pick it up, but i didn't have to at all! I just walked right up to the window and handed it to me! It was a huge blessing. Now I can leave when I'm supposed to (On Thursday)...if I pack...haven't started yet!!

Thanks for all the prayers about my passport and please continue to pray as we leave and transition into the new culture! Thanks!

Passport

So it looks like I'm going to Houston to pick up a passport...and by pick up I mean reapply with all of my new forms and pics and fees. They said to go 48 hours before my travel date...which means July 10th and they would get me one and refund my other fees, etc that I paid. Thankfully, we have other official records of my birth at my house because my original birth certificate is with my passport application in New Hampshire. I'm glad they told me this about going to Houston when I called instead of just telling me it was still in New Hampshire being processed. The girl I talked to was very nice and very helpful.

At least I'll have a passport!!

Please be praying for the other teachers that I will be traveling with as we all prepare to leave and adjust to the new culture in Honduras. 3 or 4 of us will be traveling on the 12th and a few others will be traveling in the next few weeks.

Thanks!

Mailing Addresses

*****UPDATE**********************************************************************
Please don't send anything to these addresses yet. I may have mentioned the wrong ones. I'll change them when I find out the correct ones. Sorry!
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Hi Everyone!
Many of you have asked what my address will be while I'm in Honduras. I'll actually have two...
The first is for letters, cards, and small packages (no bigger than a shoebox):
Hannah Dakel
World Gospel Outreach
TGU 144
PO Box 02-5387
Miami, FL 3310-5387

This second one is for larger packages. Please keep in mind that it could take several weeks for me to receive the package, so please don't send any perishable things:
Hannah Dakel
World Gospel Outreach
c/o/ F. Lynn Clough
18728 Hurley Lane
Conroe, TX 77384

You may have noticed that neither one of them is addressed directly to Honduras. That's because the mail service there isn't very reliable, so they use different services. It should get to me! I would also love to get emails (or facebook correspondence) from you and I will try to respond to all of them (although I can't promise how quickly)! My email address is hannah.dakel@gmail.com. Please email me if you'd like to receive my newsletter.

9 days (maybe)

I'm supposed to leave in 9 days and my passport is currently being processed in New Hampshire...

I'm hoping and praying that it gets here in time for me to leave on the 12th like I'm supposed to, but I'm also strangely ok with it not being here yet. If it's not here on the 12th, maybe there's a reason I'm not supposed to leave on the 12th. I mean, it would be a mess to change my travel plans and everything, but I'm ok with God's timing :).

In other news, I was introduced at my church in Ft. Worth on Sunday. It went well and was encouraging to have people pray for me and meet some new people in the church that have been to Honduras. One of the men I met said the flight into Tegucigalpa is all worth it. He said the plane tilts and you see thatched roofs out the window, then you go around a mountain and you hit the ground with the brakes put on immediately because the runway is so short! That should be fun! I'll be introduced at my home church this Sunday.

I can't believe that these last few days are going by so quickly!