Missions Report - Letter from Belize (from Rebecca Tremblay)This week, for March break, I am in Belize with a team from Christ Church Cathedral. We are building a bathroom, helping in classrooms and performing daily puppet shows at three local schools in San Ignacio, Eastern Belize. It's amazing. Here's what I've been up to: Belize is great! Our puppeteer/mission team left on Friday morning at 2am from Fredericton and we arrived in Belize city at 5pm on Friday. Then we took a yellow school bus to San Ignacio and unloaded and climbed a large flight of stairs with our luggage up to our rooms. I'm rooming with Katie, a fellow puppeteer who goes to STU as well. The next morning after an early breakfast (I had a breakfast burrito: yum!) we visited the 2 rural schools to check out what work we'd be doing. The construction team started that very day at both schools with their projects of tiling a classroom floor and digging a pit for the foundation of a bathroom. I was at St. Hilda's school for the day, meeting teachers, the principal, and some kids who were there for the day. Some girls were listening to Beyonce and singing along, and then they asked me if I liked to dance...well, YES! So they showed me how to dance 'punta,' then when I tried, they cheered!! It was fun! One of the teachers was only 20 years old and very friendly. We talked about many things as he BBQ'd the chicken we were going to have for lunch. It was delicious! The languages that are spoken here are english, spanish and creole...which is a 'broken-english'...and the most popular. kids speak this among themselves and with their families, but they speak and learn english in school. An example of creole is: "What you name?" or "Me be 7". It's hard to catch at first, but it comes. On Saturday, a few of us also met a family living right beside the school. There were 10 small children playing there and 2 puppies, and the mom of 3 of the kids and a grandma. They were very welcoming and friendly, and we took pictures with the adorable children! i have many great pictures! Sunday, we did our puppet show at St-Andrew's anglican church for the regular congregation, during their church service. That afternoon, we went to the Tikal Mayan site in Guatemala. It was a very bumpy drive (all 4 hours of it) over the border and to the site of the ruins... the most impressive of Central America supposedly! There were sooo many! There were many steps to climb to see the views and to get to the top of the ruins! i really enjoyed it! We also saw quite a few spider monkeys up in the trees and some tropical birds. Monday morning, we were up at 6am again, and this time we went to st. Barnaby's school to perform our puppet show and the "wash your hands" song (It's pretty funny!...it begins: First comes the water, then comes the soap, then come the scrubbies to wash away the buggies...etc.). We crammed into a very small classroom and all the kids of the school went in to watch. After the show, I was assigned to two young boys from Guatemala who had arrived in Belize two weeks ago, and they could only speak spanish, so were having a hard time in class. Antoni is 8 and Raul is 6. they are adorable!! Antoni is getting really good at english. The teacher gave me flash cards to show him, and he knew how to pronounce the words, but he didnt know what they meant, so I translated them all for him. And I brought a "Unicef" game that mom used to play with Eric and I, called Lingo, which is like bingo, but the cards have an image (of something nutricious to eat), like a pig, or corn, and the word is in english, french and spanish, so I would get them to say the word in English. They absolutely loved the game, so we played over and over!!! Then more little kids joined us (equivalent to kindergarden age), and they were sweet children! Raul, the youngest, is hilarious! Always putting on a little show and being funny and dramatic! he makes the best faces!! But he doesnt know any english- his brother is doing a little better. Today, we did a puppet show for St. Andrew's School (one set for the younger kids and one set for the older kids.) I did the scripted part with Justin as the puppet, so they got to know my face and all called to me afterwards: "Hello Miss Rebecca!" So cute! And after lunch, i helped at St Andrew's school in a grade 3 class, correcting their math homework, and then I read the whole class (of 30 kids) 4 story books, then we invented a story together, and I told them about Canada, and snow and snowmen, skiing, etc., but they knew a lot about snow already!! And I got them to guess which animals we have in Canada, and they were pretty good! Very intelligent and great kids- very participatory. Every evening, we have team time to worship in the church, and debrief about our day and pray. It's a great group. Take care and God bless. Rebecca |
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