Jeff got to go to Guatemala to a couple orphanages March 27 - April 3. It was a challenging time since he knew very little Spanish, but he learned that the love of God is powerful.

The first place was in an orphanage in Antigua. It was actually a catholic hospital which had all handicapped and mentally challenged children and adults. Our team would take the children on walks in their wheelchairs around the courtyard in the hospital. A couple times we took them out to a fast food chicken restaurant called Campero. It is like a Kentucky Fried Chicken in America. Other times, we would unwrap the sheets used to tie the children in their chairs and tie their hands down. We would lay them out on blankets on the ground. The nurses are so few and have so many children and a few adults, that it is all they can do just to feed them and change their diapers. It was a very heavy area to be, so depressing. They said that most children there never lived past 20 years of age. A couple kids, one that is sitting in my lap called Gloria, and another child probably wouldn't make it another year. It was a very sad situation.

The OTHER place was Casa Bernabe. This was an orphanage and taken care of much better. There was one adult couple in each house of 15 - 20 children. There was very few disabled kids here and if they were they could still walk nearly normal. There were a lot of kids here of all ages. The biggest detriment was not enough adults again. The children loved our attention. One boy called Manuel helped me carry all the wood I chopped to another building. He was a hard worker. I also worked in the kitchen washing dishes. I found out when we were leaving that nobody had ever helped them wash their dishes. They had some huge pots and pans which I was gladly helping them wash the weekend we were there.

It was a great time to serve others and that was why I went. Mary Ann and I had talked about going and it seemed to work out for me this time. We are praying for Mary Ann to get a chance to go soon, too.

Thank you all who gave financially and prayed for me. We had no money to go on this trip so thank you so very everyone.