“If you can't feed 100 people, then feed just one."
- St. Teresa of Calcutta (Mother Teresa)
As I sit down to write this blog post, my adrenaline is still pumping from having watched Pat and our groundskeeper Osman kill a 5-foot boa constrictor less than an hour ago.
Last week Helen got stung by a scorpion (and the next day Pat killed one on our bed) and Bernadette got stung by a jellyfish. We've had multiple encounters with tarantulas, gorobos (large iguanas), and we regularly have geckos crawling up the walls inside our house (but that's actually a good thing because they eat mosquitos and other bugs!) We've experienced intestinal parasites and Vivian had Dengue Fever. And yet we're still here. A lot of people thought we were crazy to come here, and I'm sure more will think so now after reading this! So why in the world do we keep coming back? I'll show you why…
Each person has a story. And I'll be honest, at times it can be overwhelming because how can you possibly help everyone? You can't. But what you can do is help the one person in front of you. When someone comes to us needing help, we try our best (with our own resources combined with donations from others) to do what we can. And that has taken many forms over the past 14 months…
We started out volunteering in a residential facility for abandoned children, we've taught music classes, offered adult English classes, mentored teens, assisted humanitarian and medical brigades, partnered with Operation Backpack Honduras on numerous education initiatives, hosted mission groups, and we've managed a seaside resort/retreat center in order to have a place to live and volunteer… all in an effort to find our niche and define our place here.
A lot of people who want to effect real change will focus on education, which really is the only proven way to lift people out of poverty. That is 100% true, and fortunately, there are a lot of generous people working on educational initiatives here. But when a child goes to school hungry, he cannot learn. Period. Sometimes we tend to focus on the bigger picture, but we're ignoring the back story and not meeting people's immediate needs. Like food.
I can already hear the naysayers saying, “But if you're just giving people handouts, what happens when you leave? And if you give them everything, they won't be motivated to work.” Having lived here, I can refute both of those arguments.
First of all, our goal is to make the Food Pantry self-sustaining - funded partially by North American donations, but mainly supported by local citizens and the municipality as well. And we're not talking about fully providing all the food a family needs. We're talking about bridging the gap and providing additional help for a family - in order to make it to the next paycheck, or get through a death in the family, or when they take in ailing relatives and have extra mouths to feed. It's about not just talking the talk of being pro-life, but walking the walk and providing support to struggling young single moms. I've worked at the Food Pantries in both Spotsylvania, VA, and Harrisville, NY. And those efforts are not intended to be a long-term permanent solution. It bridges the gap. The problem is that no such programs exist in Honduras. There's no welfare, public assistance, or even local Food Pantries.
And as far as people becoming dependent on the help in lieu of working, someone who would make that assumption has clearly not met the people we've met here. I would like to profile just 2 examples…
“H.” is a mother of 5 whose husband died a couple of years ago. She lives about 5 or 6 miles outside the city of Trujillo, half of that distance being a dirt road up a mountain. She walks 3 hours to town and 3 hours back every day, to work washing clothes for other people. She does that day after day, in an effort to support her family. But it's just not enough. And she doesn't have a support system. I challenge someone to convince me that if she has a little extra help every month from a Food Pantry that it's going to make her lazy and not work.
“D.” is a 17-year old girl who is raising her older sister’s baby (who joined the military in order to try to support the family.) Their mother has to live and work a half hour away so D. basically runs a household that includes herself, her 14-year old brother, and her sister's 1-year old baby. Their mother works hard but it just isn't enough. And every time there is significant rain, the river overflows its banks and the house floods. With the most recent storm, there was a foot of water in the house. When I brought them food last week, the couch was still up on cinder blocks because they never know when it will happen again. When you barely have enough to buy food, how do you even think about a housing solution? By helping this family periodically with food, do you think they are going to lose their motivation to work? That argument is just ridiculous.
So it's with people like this on our minds and these experiences on our hearts that we have decided to really focus our efforts in the area of food insecurity and establishing the Cumbre Food Pantry here. The good thing about having lived here for over a year is that we have formed relationships with many people here on the ground, both locals and ex-pats. So we are very confident that even when we're back in the US, our team on the ground is very capable of managing this ministry in our absence.
Here are just a few of our food pantry team!
LINDA
Linda is a retired nurse from Canada and has lived in Honduras for 16 years. She is the founder of Operation Backpack Honduras and in addition to all of her education and medical initiatives, she has been helping to feed people here for years. Out of her own resources (and those of close friends and family), she often delivers food to needy moms and babies, and puts together Christmas food hampers for local families. She's very excited to be collaborating on the Food Pantry.
BETH
Beth is also a retired nurse, and has worked with Linda for years, and divides her time between Honduras and the U.S. You can see her big truck filled up with food, diapers, and baby formula for delivery.
VIRGINIA
Virginia is a local Honduran who has worked at Tranquility Bay for years. She is a key component of the Food Pantry for a multitude of reasons, one of which being that she negotiates the best deals on fruits and vegetables at the street market so that us foreigners don't get hosed! She also knows so many people in the community, so she is a great resource as far as identifying people who are most in need. And she knows her way around all the neighborhoods without named streets and she can also navigate to those remote homes up the mountain.
JACOB AND ANNIE
Jacob and Annie are Florida-based missionaries who have been coming to Honduras multiple times a year for over a decade and are building a permanent mission home in Trujillo. They run a non-profit called Grace Overflowing Ministries and in addition to their thriving prison ministry, they have been very involved in Feeding Stations for children in Tocoa and throughout northern Honduras. We are very excited to partner with them and draw on their experience as we work toward launching a similar program in Trujillo.
CHLOE
If you ever want to come to Honduras to help us with a project, we will put you in touch with Chloe who is our US-based Mission Trip Coordinator. Chloe is a bilingual registered nurse who served with us at a home for abandoned children here in Honduras and is currently working at Boston Medical Center Pediatrics. She previously spent a year in Colombia, a year in Honduras, and has traveled extensively throughout Central and South America. She has one of the biggest hearts we have ever seen and will help you with all of the details that go into making a mission trip possible.
We're so thankful for this team, and excited for it to grow!
So… what's something super easy you can do to support this effort? If you are a current supporter, you should've gotten an email about our Christmas ornament fundraiser. We have partnered with a local Honduran carver named Luis, and we have commissioned him to make hand-carved jade Christmas ornaments based on our Cumbre Family Missions logo, as a fundraiser to support the Food Pantry here.
The purchase of each $25 ornament not only provides work for Luis to be able to support his family, but the rest of the proceeds go directly to the Food Pantry and associated food insecurity initiatives here in Honduras. The next big project will be Christmas food baskets that will be delivered to local families in need.
So order yours today and we will ship them the last week in November from within the U.S. - in plenty of time to give as gifts or adorn the Christmas trees of all your friends and family!
ORDER HERE:
Helen and I trekked up a mountain and through a river to bring food and supplies to a local family.
Thank you for your support and prayers! As always, we're praying for you too.
xoxo
Shannon
P.S.
Lastly, please pray for the repose of the soul of Gladis Oralia Fuentes Guevara who passed away unexpectedly on October 23, 2024. She leaves behind her husband of 60 years, many children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. She was a friend and support to everyone, often taking in children from the neighborhood as her own. She will be greatly missed.
Pat and Gladis earlier this month
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