We arrived in Choluteca, Honduras last night. It was a two-hour flight (plus an 1-1/2 hour delay) from cold, icy Detroit to Miami. Then we barely caught our connection (after fervent prayer) for the two-hour flight to Tegucigalpa, the capital city of Honduras. It took us about 1-1/2 hour to get through immigration and customs, and boy were we hungry (only one bag of pretzels total for the two plane rides, although I also ate half a protein bar)! Bill Trout from CedarCreek, plus a local church leader named Levi and a professional bus driver also from the local church named Luis, picked us up and took us to lunch at a fast-food place similar to KFC, except more colorful and interesting. The food tasted just like KFC. We enjoyed cokes with lunch, but without ice because gringos can only handle filtered water/ice, or else we will get Montezuma's Revenge (a nasty bacterial flu that lasts two weeks if not treated with an antibiotic like Cipro). 

Today we are playing tourists, seeing the different community projects that the local church here is doing with the help of money from some American churches. Very hands on, getting involved in lives one family at a time, helping with employment (literally starting businesses to provide jobs that pay four times the going rate) and education and child care and providing/teaching proper nutrition and
hygiene. This afternoon we will see the orphanage and learn everything about AIDS in this region. Tomorrow we start working ... with our first two days spent building a house for a mother and her children that have been members of the church for a while. She has been evicted from her current house ... I can't remember why, but I think maybe she had trouble meeting the rent.

It is hot, hot, hot, but fortunately there is a pool to look forward to this evening, and best of all our bedroom is nicely air-conditioned. The hotel probably like most of the motels in Mio, but it is luxury compared to anything else down here.

JJ seems to be enjoying himself. One of the ladies (Ann)  has a digital camcorder and a digital camera, and she has been very glad to have JJ do all the camcorder filming for her so she can focus on photos ... and of course he is loving that. I am trying not to limp too much or sweat too much, but I am learning a lot and enjoying the people we are with.