Unexpected Guests to Decorate Our Tree

Sulmi and I agreed that Sunday afternoon would be a good time to put together our Christmas tree and decorate it.  They don't have cut trees here in Belize so we have always had one that comes in a box with branches labeled and color-coded to match the proper hole.  The whole experience is of amazing transformation because it looks pretty scruffy in the beginning. It's just a bare metal pole with evenly spaced green plastic circular rivets. Positively ugly, actually, but by bending a few of the branches and adding lights and ornaments it becomes eye-catchingly beautiful. It's a fast transformation, too.  These days when I'm praying for faster, permanent, holy transformation, tree decorating is comparatively very rewarding.

Manuel texting or
checking the internet or both

Well our "just us" plan became just us plus Manuel  He didn't have anyone to eat with and we invited him back to our house after church. When he stayed to use the internet, I sent Sulmi to invite Kristel to come help us decorate.  


We were just opening the box and laying the number 3's on one chair and number 4's on another when Juan and Angelica came to the gate.  Juan was offering to help me get rid of the huge leaf cutter ant colony that I have in the back yard.  We put that off for another day but I invited them in to join the growing decorating "party".  What fun!   With six of us, the tree went up very quickly and created a great memory of the day.

Gabriel likes to be in the middle of any gathering.

After the tree was finished, Juan asked to see the old photo albums that I made the first two years I was  in Belize (2005-2007).  It was fun to reminisce about friends in the photos.  Some used to live in OW but have moved away.  Many others are still with us but have become much older.  We laughed and laughed about how cute the now 15 and 16 year olds looked way back when they were 6 and 7.

















I thank God for blessing us with this Deaf community and Christian friends who just drop in now and then.

Note: A big thank you to Kristel for being the photographer!

December Family Night is MOVIE NIGHT!

Dinner and a Movie 

 Every month we do something for family night.  For some reason I told them...this time I will serve dinner.  The nice thing is the eating gave us a lot of time to fellowship....to just talk.  That kind of event helps bind us together.

So we ate and talked and then I fired up the projector and plugged in my computer. Whoohoo.  I was pumped to show this really sweet movie called The Christmas Angel (starring Della Reese ...with the theme of trusting God to work miracles.  It was sprinkled with Bible verses.  It got something like 65% NOT-rotten tomatoes.  No angels...just humans trying to do Kingdom work. Awesome!) So I'm pumped and giving them a quick synopsis and push "play" and the movie Left Behind comes on. ???? What?
I try it again...same thing.  So far nobody knows that it's the wrong movie but...I think they are starting to wonder why the movie comes up on the screen and then I turn it off.  Hmmmm
I pray.  "Jesus, please, do something!"  I breathe (giving Jesus a minute to make a miracle) and...
Left Behind comes on again.

The weirdest part for me is that I "tested the link" in the afternoon.  I wanted to make sure it worked...and it did. ??? Puzzling.  No I don't think Jesus wanted us to see Left Behind.  It's too scary a movie for our age group.

We don't have internet at church so I couldn't live stream the Christmas Angel.

Well, I did also download a movie last week that I thought Sulmi and I might watch sometime during the holiday called Beethoven's Christmas about that big Saint Bernard and some antics with an elf.   Yes an elf.  sigh... The last thing I wanted to do was show a Santa Claus movie.  BUT...
It was show time.  NOW!   And all 35 people had eaten and talked to their hearts content and were starting to wiggle, switch seats and stand up.  Hmmm.  I could swear the temperature in the room had risen 10 degrees in the past 3 minutes.

So I clicked the Beethoven movie and we went with that.  They loved the humor and action.  They laughed at the right points.  It was a good family movie...just not a good church movie.

I don't know how to prevent this kind of thing from happening again. If it was a "test" of my patience in a "crisis"...I hope I passed.  I really don't want to take this test again.

In the end I was thankful God had nudged me to download an extra movie even if I thought it was intended just for Sulmi and me.

The National Spelling Bee for the Deaf

The annual spelling bee for the deaf was held on Thursday during "Disability Week".  

(What an oxymoron...some of these kids were brilliant!)

This year the children had four weeks to learn 250 words.  Not only did they have to spell the words, but also learn the signs that the people in Belize City used for the words. Over half of the signs distributed on a DVD were different than what we were used to.  It was a mountainous task.

The children in the picture above were ages 8 and 9.  I withheld Morine this year because of the short time to learn the words and because she is only 7.  It was a good decision because a week after we got the words, she got sick and was out of school for four days.  It's ok.  She will return next year and give it a try.  This year I was invited to be a judge. I enjoyed it.

Morine, in pink, loved being at the competition.  On the bus ride home she was signing, "They all signed...all the people!"  I think she had never seen so many deaf people in one place.  She loved it.

This is the older group ages 12-15.  St. Peter's Anglican School had two contestants: Elizanie Reyes and Gineli Novelo (Yeah, both names were spelled  wrong on their papers).

The winners of the Junior group won ASL dictionaries and a basket of cool things.  The winner got a tablet (!).  The second place winner got a new bike.  Thank you to Crystal Beverages for sponsoring the Spelling Bee.

Gineli won third place.  Unlike the other children in the competition, Gineli and Elizanie are mainstreamed full time in a regular classroom.  The other children are in deaf classrooms and spent the last 4 weeks focused on the words, but Gineli and Elizanie had to go to school and do their Standard 5 classwork, reserving only the time after school to practice.  I was so impressed by Ginell's good effort and the time she spent practicing on her own at home!

The event was held in the gymnasium of Belize High School.  Many people came from all over the country to watch and cheer.  You can see lots of Mennonite folk.  They are from the Cayo Deaf Institute (CDI).   In the back left on the bleachers you see some of the older Deaf who themselves participated in the spelling bee many years ago.  (There are about 10 more off the picture to the right).  It s a gathering that always draws Deaf people together.  Thanks Yosselin Rosemery Lara for sharing this picture.

Saturdays

I like how Saturdays begin slowly.  Sulmi usually sleeps until  10 AM giving me a relaxing contemplative two cups of coffee morning to have devotions and plan my sermon before everything starts buzzing. When Solana isn't walking across my computer and trying to lay down directly behind it, she's on my bed, sleeping.  This cat can sleep 22 hours of every day which doesn't help her girth, but she's a cuddler.

Last week I was blessed by Juan who came to help weed my garden (Yes!).  It needed a dramatic overhaul.  He also helped trim the bushes.  I wanted to trim everything so we could put on Christmas lights with a tidy background.  Juan and all of the caneros in Orange Walk have been out of work for two months because the Sugar factory is arguing with the cane farmers union about who gets the profit from the discarded cane pulp (bagasse). It seems clear to me that the farmers sell their cane to the factory and if the factory is "green" enough to learn how to re-use the waste, good for them, but I must be missing something in the details, because the fight continues.  As a result of the fighting, none of the cane has been cut or processed that should have started in October.  All of the caneros are trying to find other work like roadwork.  Juan goes fishing and sells what he catches.  He fishes with a hook and a line....not a net, or pole, reel, or spear.  He just wades out and tosses the line in the water and the pulls it up.  That brings in varying amounts of fish from 5 to 40 which he eats, gives away to family members, or sells.  So it's a win-win...I needed help and he needed a little pocket money to pay the shop bill.  In the meantime I am thinking, why doesn't everyone want to hire this guy? He works so fast!
                                         

One of the great things about Bishop Martin High School is there are a lot of group projects.  I love that Sulmi gets to work closely with several different people from her class.  It's a direct answer to my prayers that she would feel included and not left alone or pushed out of the way because she is deaf.  So often on Saturday afternoons we are working with one of her groups.  One of the groups is 6 Freshman working together to select a science fair project, write it up in a journal, divide the work evenly, do the experiment and display the results.  They've met about 8 times already and the  project is not due until January.  

Recently 6 others met several times to practice the Mestizo dance.  They had so much fun practicing that they begged to not go home when the practicing was over.  It was a GREAT group of kids and they won the competition!

This Saturday she had a creative Spanish project with Carolina.  It's so much fun to see that her friends in her class are children of the parents I am friends with.  I've known Carolina since she was 7.  Wow, if I could hand pick someone for Sulmi to be friends with from her new school, Carolina would be at the top of the list.  She's so calm.  Sulmi kind of messed up part of the project and Carolina said nothing.  Sulmi was frustrated so I made a suggestion how it could be fixed, Carolina very very gently helped to soothe Sulmi's hurt ego and guided Sulmi to fix the picture and then let it go.  She let Sulmi finish fixing it.  In the end it looked fabulous.  After I took Carolina home, Sulmi also commented on how easy she is to get-along-with. We both are sort of the excitable types (smile)...Carolina's pleasant "cool" was amazing to us.

A Very Successful Game Night!

Family Night this month was an assortment of games

We had a record 45 adults and children.  The games included relays, speed and creative games.  One game ran the whole night.  It was a clothes pin game  Each person gets one clothes pin at the start of the night.   If you catch someone crossing their legs or their feet you can "steal" their clothes pin.  The person who has the most pins at the end of the night gets a Snickers bar.   So through out the pictures you will see people wearing colorful clothes pins :-)

We ate the usual: Belize cheese dip with chips and veggies and brownies for a sweet desert.  It was a blessing to have Carol Rhodes here for the game night.  Many of the children and adults remember her fondly.  I appreciated her help !!!

This is the shoestring licorice game. Without using your hands, you have to nibble on the licorice to be the first to gobble up the lifesaver in the middle.

Several people didn't play games...they just had fun hanging out and talking.

This is the large t-shirt relay.  

 A marshmallow construction where each participant is given 10 marshmallows and raw spaghetti.  The winner creates a tower that is the tallest and remains standing.

and more marshmallow construction

A potato relay (You have to carry the potato under your chin without using your hands.)

Ginelli and Kristel are posing for the picture.  (Note Juan and Angelica cleaning up in the background!!! Hooray for cleaner-uppers.  Kristel and Gineli probably helped before or after the "photo shoot" ;-)

Morine and her hearing sister Adrienne make me smile. 

God Is Blessing Our Bible Study!

Whoo-Hoo!  Go God!

Last night we had a full house!  For about a month now we have combined "Girl's Night" and "Boyz Bible Study" because no one was coming to the Boyz Bible Study.  I'd make an annoucement, I suggested other times to meet, and asked "why?" but the young men were not showing up...week after week for about a year.  Then Juan said, "Can I come to the Women's Night?"

Hmmmm.  I thought about that.  Do we really want men at our women's Bible study?  At least one woman is nursing.  I asked the women what they thought.  They said, "Sure."  I prayed about it and beginning with September 5, men and teen boys were invited.  At first only Juan came.  One time Manuel showed up. Then this week Kristel invited Jaheed, Raheem, and Misael!  We had a full house of 16 adults and six little children.  

Kristel and Lupita volunteer to help take care of the children in the apartment.  Because most (if not all) of them have not eaten the evening light meal at home, their time together begins with a sandwich and some apple slices and a cookie.  When they are done eating, they play.  The apartment provides a great setting for them.  I am so thankful for Lupita's and Kristel's help.

The verse we studied tonight was Jeremiah 29:11
"I know the plans I have for you," announces the Lord.
"I want you to enjoy success. I don't plan to harm you.
I will give you hope for the future."

When we trust God's plans for our lives, we know that God will take care of us and make His plans fruitful. God is faithful.

What Do I Do All Day?

I have at least three hats that I wear here: the pastor of our Deaf Church, Sulmi's mother, and Morine's teacher.

I wish I was running from 5;00-6:00 AM but I can't seem to get up.  (Someone can pray about that for me :-). By 6:00 I'm in the shower.  Sulmi is up and ironing her uniform then a shower and we eat breakfast. Sulmi leaves at the house at 7:15 on a bike for a little over a mile ride to school.  I do devotions until about 8:00 when I leave for school in the van.

My classroom is in the library,  It's great to be in the library.  It's airy and clean.  I like being surrounded by books.  Because I am in the library I open it about 8:05 and let the children come in to browse.  This year we are not loaning out books yet.  We lost about 200 books last year that were borrowed and never returned so we have to develop a policy that's stricter than "You can't borrow any more books until you bring back the last one" because that basically lets about 200 books disappear. I love having the socialization with the students first thing in the morning.  It means lots of hugs and smiles and I can take an interest in them and show them they are important.  Some drop in just to chat.  It's a good part of the day.

At 8:30 the bell rings and I teach Morine Ayuso until 11:30.  She is a deaf 7 year old.  Last year she was in the class where Chelsea interpreted. Unfortunately she failed.  Her sister is in the same class and passed. Ouch!  That is a difficult situation.  I asked Mrs. Briceno, our principal, if I could teach Morine 1:1 and try to bring her up to the level of the other children who were promoted.  Also I want to teach her to read the deaf way through sight words and repetition vs. a phonetic approach. So Morine and I spend the morning reading High Frequency word books and practicing spelling, writing stories with the words she knows, learning to add, subtract and tell time (and other basic first -second grade math skills), and I read/sign lots of books to her, trying to increase her signed vocabulary.  She likes to take the books home and retell them (explaining the story but not reading the words) to her family.  By doing that her parents and her grandma and aunt also learn the ASL vocabulary that Morine is learning.  She also takes the High Frequency word books home and practices the words she is learning to read.  She's doing fabulously and it's so crucially helpful that her family is practicing ASL with her. 

In the afternoons Morine goes to the mainstream Infant 2 (Second grade) class with her sister.  There she learns PE, social studies and science.  She doesn't have an interpreter.  It would be nice to have one, but we don't have one.  So she tries to learn what the other children are learning and the teacher tries to explain and include her with visuals.  I will be giving Morine her Social Studies and Science tests so I will see what she needs to learn and try to fit that into our morning as needed.

My afternoons are free until 3:15 when Sulmi comes home from school.  I do lots of different things with the afternoon...catch up on paperwork, go food shopping, help someone from church.  Yesterday I helped Veronica work on her application for Belizean nationality and took her to the Social Security office to learn what she needs to do to get a Belizean social security card since she is a Guatemalan national but married to a Belizean (Mario).  I also do various tasks in order to satisfy what is needed to adopt Sulmi.  I think we are on the homestretch.  All of the court papers have been signed.  Now I am praying the court accepts our request. Thursday afternoons I spend preparing for Friday evening Bible study.

When Sulmi gets home from school we chat a bit and then start on her homework.  She continues working while I cook dinner.  Some nights she is done before dinner and some nights we work until 9 PM.  Why am I helping her with her homework?  Sometimes she did not understand the explanation in class.   Sometimes it's just nice for her to have the support.  Most of the time, reading the text book is very, very hard.  So I try to provide the vocabulary that she does not understand and then re-explain it in ASL until I see the lights in her eyes showing understanding.

In the evening we usually relax with TV or facebook or a book....sometimes doing our own thing.

We both are in bed by 9:00 and sometimes earlier to read and unwind.

God Does It Again!

     It's time to update you again regarding who is interpreting for Sulmi.  We had two interpreters lined up to come through VMM but God had other plans.  Both interpreters backed out in June.

     By Mid July, I still dd not know who would be interpreting but had a promise from the Ministry of Education that they would have someone for Sulmi.  Who?  They didn't know.  They knew all of the interpreters (all 2 of them) in Belize were assigned to a placement in Belize City.  In my desperate prayers I thought I heard God say, "I have someone for Sulmi."  That gave me some peace that I could not account for otherwise.

Kathy Miller interpreting for Sulmi at St Peter's.

     During that time Kathy Miller was interpreting for Sulmi while she attended the mandatory summer school for new Freshman.  The classes were three weeks long.  In the middle of the second week Kathy developed a problem with intestinal worms.  It's pretty uncomfortable: indigestion, vomiting, diarrhea. The easily available de-worming med was not working.  Afraid that Kathy would become dehydrated, I took her to the clinic and they diagnosed her with worms.   They kept her in the hospital for about 24 hours with an electrolyte drip and other meds.  Fortunately she recovered by the weekend.

    When Kathy first became sick, she still went to school to interpret, but on Tuesday night I told her to stay home.  Who would interpret for Sulmi?  My first thought was to call Miss Mesh.  She is the woman who used to interpret for Manuel.   We agreed to meet at the bus stop and then I would drive her to school.  The next morning as I waited at the bus stop I got a text. "Im sorry but my brother was in an accident I need to be with him,"

Sulmi in her Bishop Martin uniform on the first day of High School.

    Now what would I do?  School would start in 5 minutes and Sulmi did not have anyone to interpret for her,  The only other people I knew who could hear and sign were the Jehovah's Witnesses.  So I drove to a house where I knew some of the American JW missionaries lived. That woman said she could not sign well enough but suggested Cathlene Wallace, a Belizean, who happened to live near the school.  After calling Cathlene and getting a "yes", I drove to pick her up and drop her at school.  She interpreted for Sulmi the rest of the week.  Sulmi liked her and understood her signs.

     The next week I asked Cathlene if she would be interested in applying for the job through Ministry of Ed.  So we did all of the paperwork and got the necessary documents copied and sent off to Belmopan and they said "a definite maybe".   Throughout August we waited for a yes. A few days before school started they called Cathlene and asked her what pay she wanted?  She replied but then they did not respond.  School started.  When the orientation began, there was no interpreter.  I called Cathlene and asked her to please come.  She said she didn't have a contract yet.  I assured her that I would pay for her to interpret if the Ministry of Ed did not come through. (!!!???)  She came right away.  Two weeks into school she still did not have a contract.  Finally someone from NaRCIE (special ed. office) kindly made a trip up to Orange Walk with the contract in hand and Cathlene was employed.

Praise God!  

Cathllene is 27 and has been signing for eleven years.  I love her big smile.

    Now a month into school, she hasn't been paid, but, this whole experience has taught us to trust God and know that somehow He will work it all out.  God's plans are always better than our own.  Hiring a Belizean is better than my plan to bring in an American for 10 months. Why?
     * I want to help Belizean signers improve their skills
     * It's never a good idea to have an American take the job of someone who can do it here.
     * More experienced Belizean interpreters means people who are here for the long haul who will help train the future interpreters here.
     *Sulmi is confident enough in her faith so that neither the Catholicism that she is learning in school or the influence of a JW will shake her,  But it is good to be in dialog with both...rather than project fear or hate.

It's a good thing, a God thing.

    This was clearly a lesson in learning to trust Him.  We got confirmation not at the last minute but two weeks into the school year!  God wanted to know if I would trust his promise that he had someone.  If God considers that we passed this test, I wonder with a bit of fear and trembling what the next challenge will be.