Great Memories

The mission to Nicaragua was a memorable one. Hope this video reminds us all of the people, places, hard work and fun times.

Home Again

The mission is over and we are back home again, but it lives on in our hearts. It was an amazing week of hard work, touching moments and new friends that will live on as we return to our normal lives. Many thanks to Bill and Teresia Cox and the staff of El Ayudante for helping in every way possible. Thank you to the team for an outstanding week of unity and blessings. Thank you to Aldersgate for your love, prayers and support.

Closer to Home

Our clinics are over and we're close to coming home. Today, we left El Ayudante at 9 AM and headed on the old school bus for Managua. Two hours of travel brought us to a mall much like the ones at home. Lunch in the food court was a real treat--Burger King, Pizza Hut and McDonalds!

Then, on to the Artison Market and more fun. Purses, pottery, wooden bowls, xylophones (yes, xylophones), jewelry and coffee--we all bought something. Only Frank, Brad and Dr. Joe missed out on the experience. They claimed that they needed to guard the luggage, but we found them in the pool. Uh oh--busted!

Tonight is our final banquet here at the Camino Real Hotel. We leave early in the morning and hope to be home tomorrow afternoon by 6 PM. Hasta luego!

The Final Day of Clinics

The crowds were waiting on us to arrive

The pharmacy hard at work


Dr. Joe and Karen working hard!

Today was another awesome day! We saw over 300 people! The week averaged out to about 56.3 patients per hour, almost one person seen per minute! This weeks total came to almost 1300 people seen in the medical and dental clinics! Gloria a Dios! We are heading to Managua in the morning. G' Night!

Back to the Clinics!

The Dynamic Dental Duo!

Today was another awesome day of clinics. The medical clinic saw 195 people and the dental team saw about 97 patients (and a few good extractions). The little town we worked in had very little electricity, aside from the little bit that we were able to use at the school. A few years ago a German university came through the town and put solar panels on many of the houses to give them some light for the night time. There was also one large panel that helped to pump their water supply. The people we saw today were alot healthier overall than those we saw on Tuesday in the city. Their dental needs were quite large, though. Our three dentists performed non-stop extractions in incredible heat during the day. The best dental case of the day was when our husand and wife dental duo, the Thomas', had to remove some impacted wisdom teeth with a chisel and hammer. Frank called their action "chiselin' and sizzlin' ". One more day left of clinics tomorrow :( We are headed to the salt flats. They say the temperature could be in excess of 109 degrees. Whew!

Landfills and Seashells

What an amazing day! Gloria a Dios!

We visited the villlage at the base of the landfill where we handed out 50 food bags, some vitamins, and various little treats such as hats and stickers. Everyone was very moved by the experience. We prayed with each family that we saw, asking God to provide them comfort. Most of the men asked for us to pray for jobs, because the landfill had recently been closed.

The team also had a wonderful time letting the kids at the center here at El Ayudante

show off their new bicycles (which we at Aldersgate purchased for them). Their smiles were as big as the state of Texas.

We ended theevening with a wonderful dinner at the Pacific Ocean, where we enjoyed the scenery and delicious seafood.

We head back out into the villages tomorrow for more clinics!

Awesome Day!

What an awesome day--a total of349 people were seen in the dental and medical clinics. It averaged 56.5 persons per hours, which means that the doctors and dentists were working hard. The rest of the team were right there with them. It was hot, but well worth the effort. The people we saw today were alot more sick than those we saw yesterday in La Ceiba. They were just as warm and gracious, though! posted by Frank

The site where we worked today was at a Catholic church/clinic. The sanctuary of the church was absolutely beautiful! The decorations were very ornate for such a poor community. One of the really inspiring things I saw in this church was the congregation members coming together to clean their sanctuary. You could tell their immense pride in their church from the detailed way they cleaned every little thing.

We spent the first part of our nightly team meeting tonight filling food bags to hand out tomorrow. Our good ol' team leader Frank decided we should try to break world records with how fast those bags could be filled, and turned the event into a race. I think it took about 5 minutes for everyone to fill about 50 bags with things such as rice, oil, soap, etc.

Tomorrow morning, we visit that live at the base of the landfill to bring them food and treat their medical needs. We're tired and so its time to say good night.

Posted by Laura

First Day at Work

What an exciting, satisfying and blessed day! We started early this morning. At 7:30 we left in the trucks (as you can see in the photos) for a 45 minute drive to an area near

the small village of La Cieba. As the crow flies, it was only 6 or 7 miles from El Ayudante, but traveling on Nicaraguan roads can be a challenge. This was a very poor area, but the people were truly beautiful. They were respectful, appreciative and open to receiving treatment and hearing about how much God loves them. Sister Joan had made signs to put on the walls to tell them that we were there to help them because Jesus loves them and cares for them. This was a good reminder for us to present that message to them all day. Serving Him through serving the people was a powerful blessing for us all.

Dr. Hardy and Dr. Sayers were pleased to see that their patients were healthier than expected. They suffered from many of the same ailments that are found in our community, but they normally have no resources for treatment. They treated 210 patients in a six hour work period--truly amazing. The nurses, pharmacists and staff worked hard to help make happen.

The dental team was busy giving much needed flouride treatments to children. It was remarkable to see how trusting these young patients were of the dentists. It is a testament to their gentle and spirit-filled bedside manner that very few tears were seen in the 105 children that were treated. Seventeen people were relieved to have very painful decayed teeth removed. For years, Frank has teased about wanting to deliver a baby. Well, today, he did not get to do that, but Dr. Stephen allowed Frank to deliver a tooth! He pulled a tooth--with a lot of supervision. Fortunately the patient did not understand English as he asked "Which tooth do I pull?"

The day ended with a powerful devotion from Stephen and Shannnon Thomas. Although the Aldersgate gang just met them on Saturday, we all feel they are now part of our family. After a discussion of the day's events, we finished with door prizes (yes, a mission trip with door prizes!) and the Puzzle of the Day winners. Tonight's winners were Laura and Brooke. This is a repeat win for Laura. They received fabulous prizes chosen especially for them!

Buesnos Noches from Team Aldersgate.

posted by Genie

A Day of Worship and Preparation ( a.k.a. Day 1)

Two girls from the church singing a song

Brenda and the interpreter Louis

Joan blessing the congregation with a lovely song

Hello all! We had an excellent day of preparation today, our first full day here in Leon! We started the morning off with a nice breakfast and some relaxing down time before heading to church. We attended church at the Evangelical Methodist Mission church just down the road from our campus. The cool thing about this church is that it was founded by the team from Norcross, GA who are also staying at El Ayudante with us this week. The service was an awesome 2 hours of worship, with Brenda from Norcross preaching an awesome sermon on David and Goliath (she is one of the associate pastors at Norcross UMC). After church we came back to campus to enjoy a delicious lunch of chicken kabobs, rice, and fresh fruit (yum!).

After lunch we split into our 2 teams (Medical and Dental) to get prepared for the week ahead of us. The medical team labeled and packaged medications and separated everything into bins for each day. The dental team spent their time discussing procedures and protocol and packing supplies. After the packing and preping we spent the rest of the afternoon just hanging out and fellowshipping. After a lovely dinner of Nicaraguan spaghetti and fresh fruit, we had a team meeting with Dr. Medina (a local doctor who will be working with us some this week and who also set up our locations for us) to discuss what we should expect this week. We are very excited about what the Lord has in store for us. We are going to some awesome places and are going to get to see alot of people.

Be in prayer for us as we start out our week tomorrow in the village of La Cieba!

God Bless,
Laura

We Made It!

Praises for an incredibly smooth day of travel yesterday. We left the church on schedule at noon, stopped in Greensboro for lunch and made it to the Atlanta airport at 3:00 PM. We met Stephen, Shannon and Janie for the first time at ticketing and checked-in all 37 suitcases and crates with no problem.

It may seem hard to believe, but out flight was not on time. No, we were not delayed--we left earlier than scheduled! A miracle at Atlanta-Hartsfield! The flight was smooth and we landed around 7:20, Nicaragua time. Customs was a breeze, all passengers and luggage arrived intact. Bill Cox met us at the airport, loaded us all in the school bus and we were off for El Ayudante. After a long day of travel, we were all in bed by 11 PM.

Nicaragua Bound

In Nicaragua, we will be partnering with El Ayudante in the city of Leon. Check out their website at http://www.nicamissions.com/.

Final Preparations

All the crates are packed and we are set to go! Nicaragua here we come!