This morning several of us went back to the flood zone in Chalco to serve hot breakfasts to a few of the flood victims. Refried beans, eggs, bread, hot coffee, and water.
Just getting started, serving breakfast in Chalco
Quite a few people came, but it’s difficult to get to a lot of people because of the water.
Fortunately, there were people in boats coming and going that helped us out. We served out the food, covered it up well in bags, and they loaded it onto the boat. Then they would go to houses, climb ladders or send up buckets with food and supplies.
We hope to be able to serve breakfasts for 10-15 days, so we’ll see how it goes. So far so good. Later on we’ll also be giving out more necessities.
This afternoon I went to SAM’s Club and picked up 279 litres of bottled water to bring down to the flood zone in Chalco. I followed our co-worker, Rod, who had some clothes, some water, a grill, and some other odds and ends.
The plan is to set up a headquarters where we can serve breakfast to people for a couple of weeks. This should be a tremendous help in a place where people have little left, including food and clean water.
We’ve been able to make some contacts there, and so are building relationships so that we can make sure the help gets to people who need it most. And that means a lot of people.
People wait for a boat on the sidewalk, by what should be a normal street, not a river. Many are taking supplies back to their families in the flood zone.
We walked along the highway in the late afternoon, and I was able to get some pictures and video. Since we didn’t have access to a boat, this is only the edge of the flood zone you’re seeing – there’s much, much more. But the video will give you an idea of how bad the flooding is, even if you can only see a bit of it. You’ll also see some of the work being done to try to stop the flow of sewage water.
Here’s the video from today:
You can help by sending a few dollars in as a donation. Just contact us, and we’ll be able to go ahead and purchase what we need – as long as we know the money is coming. Lord willing tomorrow will be the first breakfast. Thanks to the two couples who have already donated!
I’ve posted some photos as well in our Recent shots… album.
Amigas del Alma…
Sorry to mix topics here, but both of these things are important! Thanks for all who prayed for the Amigas del Alma Valentine’s Event. It was this morning, and it was a big success! About 50 people came, and heard about unconditional love and about the Gospel. Please continue to pray for the relationships made with many new people.
Taking a break from flood news, Shari actually has a very big event going on this morning.
The Amigas del Alma baking experts are going to be putting on a very public event in Jesús María. It’s themed around Valentine’s Day (also called Day of Love and Friendship here).
The women who come will enjoy some wonderful cookies made by the baking class, and there’s a guest speaker speaking on unconditional love. See the poster below (designed by our friend Samuel).
There’s still a lot to be done this morning – setting up and all stuff like that there. It starts at 9:30am (Lord willing!) and will go into early afternoon.
I know that Shari and the other two Amigas would appreciate your prayers – this really will be (Lord willing) a BIG event.
I won’t be going (since it’s a women’s event) – I’ll be doing something even more fun than eating cookies – getting a blood test and doing errands! 😉
The flood waters are still high a few minutes down the road. Because the sewage water is still draining, it’s been hard to make much progress getting the water out of the buildings and streets.
The President recently toured the area, which has been declared a disaster zone. Apparently, many hundreds of homes in other parts of Mexico City were also flooded. It adds up to several thousand homes in our state.
Obviously there is concern about the spread of disease in these areas. And again, with sudden flooding like this, many people have lost everything – furniture, appliances, clothes, computers – everything awash in sewage water.
As a group here we hope to get some relief supplies tomorrow, and start distributing as soon as we can. Obviously, it’s been hard thus far to get organized, with water levels still rising (although thankfully we haven’t had any more rain).
Cold and wind is also a concern – though hopefully the wind will help to dry things up.
If you’re interested in helping us provide relief supplies – even a few dollars will help – feel free to contact us by phone or email. Thanks to those who are praying, and the couple who have already donated.
On the 17th and 18th of January we had a visit. Some new friends from Christ Chapel Bible Church (Fort Worth, Texas, USA) came down along with our mission‘s director, to investigate how they could be involved in the things God is doing in Mexico.
This gave us an excellent excuse to go out for tacos. Oh, and also to show them around Ixtapaluca! And what a beautiful clear day it was.
We went up to the local ancient ruins, looked out over the thousands of houses in the town and many housing developments. We visited Jesús María, the new house we’re renting there, and of course the building where Sendero de Vida (our church) meets here close to where we live.
So I put together this brief video with some views of the area that you may not have seen before. It was a windy day, so there was a lot of wind noise, but you can still hear some of what our pastor Martín and Rod Fry had to say about the area and ministry here.
Tonight we made it through the first keyboard (piano) class without any deaths or major injuries. There were a handful of students, and a few added lookers-on… it was fun.
We only have 9 weeks. Today was mostly theory; next week we’ll be getting more into actually playing.
I played a few examples of different kinds of music – different types of scales – even some microtonal music. Some music from the UK, some Canadian music, and a whole lotta Mexican music. 😉
Here’s some piano playing for you – one of the songs I used this afternoon as an example. I expect all my students to be doing this after 9 weeks. All right, maybe not quite….
This is a song played by the composer. The composer is Mexican Consuelo Velázquez Torres, and the song is Bésame Mucho….
