In the Midst of Chaos, Life Goes On - Part 1

I haven't posted on the blog much during the political crisis in Honduras. This is partially because I don't blog anonymously, and with such extreme uncertainty in the country right now it doesn't seem to make sense to announce my personal political views. Also, we have a limit on our daily internet usage, and I've gone over my limit several times in the past two weeks. Going over the limit means that I lose my internet access, almost entirely, for 24 hours. Because the internet is my main source of news during the crisis, just about anything not related to gathering news has been deemed "non-essential."

Things are quieting down here, for the moment. Now that a mediator has been brought in to try to resolve the situation diplomatically, I expect -at the very least- that things will be less exciting in Honduras for a few days. I certainly hope so! Because of this, I'm taking this opportunity to use some of my valued internet time to post here on what we're personally doing these days.

Although our thoughts have never been far from the political situation, the work we do has continued, with very little interruption. A major ongoing project is helping with the reconstruction of the houses in El Tablon which were destroyed by the earthquake (remember the earthquake? - seems like a lifetime ago).

The earthquake reconstruction is complicated by the fact that the damage was related to the poor construction practices in the affected area. These villages, until recently, had no usable road to the outside world, so their houses are constructed of earth and wood, and not much else. It turns out that the dirt in that area doesn't consist of the right proportions of sand and clay to make good strong adobe bricks, which was part of the reason the damage in this one area was so severe.

In addition to distributing cement and rebar for the house reconstruction, we have had to instruct the homeowners in new (to them) construction methods, to help ensure that their houses will not fall down again soon! Alan Hayes handled the creation of instruction sheets which were handed out along with the materials, and he and Allen spent time explaining the needed construction methods in detail to the community there.

Now, the first houses have begun pouring their concrete footers, on which they will be building their walls. Here are some pictures:







Oh, and one more neat picture coming up. Remember the pregnant lady who lost her house in the earthquake? Well . . .