Wellshire Group in Guatemala: Post 6 from 3/26 and 3/27

I want to begin this blog post with an apology for not updating the blog yesterday. Our days are so full, and I am so profoundly enjoying spending time with this group and with the Guatemalan people that I just ran out of time yesterday to update the blog.

Thursday 3/26 was our final work day. Half of the group was back at the school painting while the other half was working fast and furious at the Habitat site trying to get as much of the house built as possible. Around 3:00 in the afternoon, the teams reunited on the Habitat site for a final look at our house and a closing ceremony put on by the Habitat Chimaltenango affiliate.

Emy, the director of the Habitat affiliate for the city of Chimaltenango said some very nice words and handed us all certificates and a bracelet as a way to remember Guatemala and feel a sense of solidarity with the people here. We also gave small gifts to the masons we spent the week working with as well as to Esther, the woman who is receiving the Habitat house.

Emy, the Chimaltenango affiliate and Casey Leo, the Habitat employee that accompanied our group all week, speaking to the Wellshire team with the house in the background

Casey translating for Esther, the woman who is receiving the house. She was sincerely grateful to the group for the work we did, and we could hear it in her words and see it in her face.

Janie Johnson presenting some hand knit hot pads to Esther as a "House warming gift."

Jay Allen and Ted Griffith, who worked as the masons' helpers all week, presenting a soccer ball to each mason signed by the whole group. (We played some fun soccer games in the street with the masons while taking a break from working on the house.)

Emy reading the certificates she presented to each member of the team

The masons in front of the house, proudly holding their soccer balls.

Pattie and the pastor from the church in Chimaltenango talking and praying together. Giving thanks for the friendship that is forming between the two churches

Our van had some power issues and went really slow up the hills every day between Chimaltenango and Antigua, so we took this fun photo on the last day we drove between the two cities. The sign on the right says "This is not a high speed road."

Friday, 3/27 we started the morning with a debrief of the trip led by me and Daniela. After that, 16 members of our group loaded in to the two vans to head off and climb the volcano Picaya. It was an incredible experience as you can see from the photos below:

The group getting ready to climb the volcano

You can see the steam and smoking coming out of the cone of the volcano here

Rivers of red hot lava. We were standing less than 50 feet away from this!

Some of the group posing in front of the freshly formed rock at the top of the volcano

Roasting marshmallows over a heat vent from the volcano, we started to melt our shoes! By the way, a marshmallow roasted over lava tastes better than any other roasted marshmallow I have had.

After we got back to the hotel from climbing the volcano and got cleaned up, Pattie Kitchen led us in a closing ritual. We had all drawn names earlier in the week of someone in the group that we would pray for each night and give a small token gift to on the last night. We went around the circle and it was clear that authentic relationships were built and strengthened over the course of the week, not just with the Guatemalan people, but within the group as well.

There is a sense of melancholy as the team prepares to leave this morning. We all eat breakfast out in the patio of the hotel, and usually the conversations are load and jovial. Today they are being had in hushed tones.

We will drive out at 8:00am and stop by a Healing Waters International system on the way out for one last look at the work that is being done in this country and to motivate all of the group to take this experience home and let it transform them, just like Healing Waters works to transform the communities where we work.

I will write some follow-up blog posts when I get back to the states next week. I promise to post more photos and reflections from the trip and the group. Thank you for following along on our journey. LET THE CLEAN WATERS FLOW!

These photos are from the closing ritual that Pattie led us in, you can see the joy and exhaustion in everyone's faces