Also Alabama - Final entry- Meet our homeowners

Also Alabama safely returned to  Rosthern on Sunday May 5th after traveling over 8300 km !  It was a full and busy 10 days.  We spent time serving, learning and having fun! Thanks to Habitat for Humanity, all the chaperones and volunteers who travelled down to be with us.  We appreciated each and every one of you for all your help and special contributions to the trip. We worked on three main locations for Habitat for Humanity this year.  Just thought you would like to meet our homeowners before we sign off for this year.

Nancy Haywood's home was not a new build project.  The roof desperately needed replacing.  The house was given a fresh coat of paint, window casing repaired and the students built Nancy a small wooden bridge to cross over a stream running through her yard.  Our students amazed everyone by finishing the project in 3 days!  

Meet Nancy and Chase.  This is only a small portion of students who worked on Nancy's home.  

Nancy's home nears completion

Finishing touches on the bridge in the backyard.

 Nancy shared a southern favorite recipe with us so we thought we would share it with you too.

Nancy's Sweet Potato Pie
Boil Sweet Potatoes, enough to fill one pie crust, cool, peel and mash.  Mix with two eggs, nutmeg, cinnamon, and brown or white sugar to taste.  Add 1 tablespoon flour to hold it together.  Add 1 teaspoon vanilla or lemon flavoring.  Pour into Pie crust and bake at 350˚ F till set.  Serve with whipped cream.

Henry Hall's home was also not a new build.  Henry was granted a new home but did not want to leave his home and move to a new location.  Henry is 81 years old and is very attached to his belonging and his home.  Habitat  agreed to let him stay and is working on repairing his home and making it safe for Henry to live in. 

Meet Henry Hall, Nick and Brayden spent time at Henry's home building an additional room on the back of his house.

Nick and Brayden at Henry's house.

Shepard Togarepi and Senzeni Dama have 6 children and are from Zimbabwe.  Shepard's home was the only new build that the students worked on during our week in Mobile. He is hoping that they will be able to move in soon! 

The 5 bedroom home is in the final stages of completion.  The students worked on painting the interior and began working on installing flooring.

Shepard and his wife Senzeni and youngest child with our group of volunteers on the final day.

Meeting the homeowners was a significant experience of our students and parent volunteers.  This intensified the learnings and personalized their ALSO experience.  Students were desperate to do a good job and to complete the job for these homeowners.  Meeting all of them was a privilege for everyone.

Thanks to everyone for following our journey and supporting us in prayer!

     Well our final day here was successful in the fact that pretty much everyone blew all of the Quetzelles they had on souvenirs. Now it is time to stuff as much as possible into our bags and hope that it all fits.

     Anyways, looking back on the week it has been great. We have met amazing people, did some hard work and did many fun and memorable things. We recapped in our debriefing today.

     We would like to thank everyone for the support and prayers for this trip. We are flying out some time around 7:00 tomorrow and will be home late tomorrow night. It will be sad to part with Guatemala but it will also be good to be home. Anyways see you all in Canada, or at least family and friends who we see on a regular basis. Anyways, Good night and farewell Guatemala.

ALSO Saskatoon & Prince Albert Finish Final Day of Service Placements

Thursday May 2, 2013

Students finished their service placements at noon on Thursday May 2.  They did a great job and represented the school well!

-Brandon and Kelsey say good-bye to their new friends-

-Students got a bit dirty, but got a lot done at Habitat for Humanity-

-Nicole, Michael, and Phoenix made some new friends at Farm-in-the-Dell-

After finishing their service placements students gathered at The Lighthouse in downtown Saskatoon for a tour of the facility by RJC alumus DeeAnn Mercier (Isaak).  The Lighthouse is a social housing initiative & drop-in centre in the heart of downtown.  After touring the Lighthouse students traveled to Camp Kinasao on Christopher Lake to take a retreat from their hectic schedule and to debrief about what they have seen, heard, and learned.

 -Students gather and can't contain their excitement before they enter The Lighthouse!-

 -RJC Alumnus DeeAnn Mercier gives our students a tour of The Lighthouse-

Out Here Grindin'

     Pollo Chicken!!! Lets just say we all had to get out of the van!!! It was a long drive back here to Semilla. While we were in Santiago Atitlan we had many unique experiences. I'll start at the beginning.

     We started off Wednessday by waking up, eating breakfast and then hopping into the van to drive to Santiago Atitlan. We drove for about 2 hours and then arrived at a harbour. We gingerly stepped onto the boat and were once again on our way. We arrived at the Atitlan harbour and waited a few minutes for our ride. To our surprise we got to use a local form of transportation. Our ride was a quarter ton pickup. We all piled into the Toyota truck and we were driven to the ANADESA compound. The first thing we did when we arrived is went to the site of yet another massacre and were given the information about it. After this we went and helped out in an after school program at a local school. This was a lot of fun as we got to sing and play with the children. We did this until 4:00 and we all were divided up into pair and were taken by our host famillies.

     We all had an alright sleep to my knowledge, except for the fact that there were about 10 roosters that kept Tyler, Larry and me up for half the night. Anyways we all had breakfast at our respective host famillies and then gathered at ANADESA to start our work project. This year our work project was to plant 300 pine trees. We did this so quickly that as a reward they gave us 80 more trees to plant. After lunch we went to ANADESA's work site where we spent an hour leveling off the ground. Then we got to go swimming in the lake. After swimming we had a cultural presentation. Some local people did an ancient dance and then tought us how they traditionally made tortillas, which included grinding the corn and then patting the dough to make tortillas. This was lots of fun. The day ended with the groups splitting off, once again, to thier home stays.

     The next morning came and we gathered at the same plot of land to do even more leveling. That is everyone except for Tyler because he had been diagnosed with sun stroke. After the work we all had a chance to try our bargaining skills at the local market. The market time came and went and we quickly found ourselves on the way back to Semilla. Although this time we took a detour to some Mayan ruins. This was a cool and very interesting experience. After the ruins the rest of the day was spent travelling back to Semilla where we are now.

     Tomorrow is our last day here and it should be good as we are hitting up another market. Then it is back to home sweet snow. Or maybe its just flooding now. Anyways, goodnight and thanks for the support.

Nathan Hebert

Also Alabama - Habitat build Day 4

Habitat build Day 4 - Day Nine! in total

Pretty sure we are all in a semi-state of wetness!  The humidity prevents anything from completely drying here.  We had a pretty extreme thunder shower last night, complete with a light show and sky bowling.  Unfortunately it kept half the group up for half the night, but no matter!  We worked as hard today as every other day.  The crew again split up into 2 main groups, umm one crew consisting of mainly 18 year olds went back to the house they had been working at all week to finish roofing the house.  They also did some sweet painting and built an ingenious bridge to cross troubled waters, (aka. a small stream)!  There also had a small group that split off to help with a different project.  Nick and Brayden had fun dressing up in costumes that the homeowner had from his former dancing days.  The second group went to a new house that was going to a man named Sheperd from Zimbabwe who had six children.  He came by to help with the painting despite having knee surgery last week.  The house was a beehive of activity as we ran from room to room trying to discern whether or not we could paint the next coat of white over the exact same colour.  We got up close and personal as we all crammed into closets trying to paint every nook and cranny.  Cries of "Wally!" could be heard echoing through the house as we all demanded more paint of eggshell and satin.  'Where's Wally?' became a very popular game.  Eventually he would bark out orders and tell us where to put the next layer of paint.  During lunch hour our supervisor, Elizabeth, instructed us in the ways of American accents.  She entertained us in her imitation of Canadian accents and taught us the proper way to say Minnesota and y'all!  Our day was filled with radio jamming and paint wars.  Kenna, Trissy and Gabby went to a nearly completed house close by to put the finishing touches on it.  The workday concluded with more rain and some epic card games.  The night ended with gratis and preparations for leaving for home tomorrow. Tonight is our last night at Camp Christian.  Goodnight y'all!

Mackenzie, Kathleen and Jenae

Liam and power tools . . . is this a good idea?

Landon and Matt working hard to finish the roof before the end of the week.

Sarah working tries her hand at  painting after two days shingling on the roof.

Kelsey completes the front of the porch.

Jaye has a face to face meeting with the man of the house - two year old Chase.

Brayden and Nick work with our bus driver Martin at Henry Hall's house

"Where's Wally?"  Oh there he is!

Mackenzie and Jenae comparing tongues after a much needed popsicle break!

This is what we live for!  Riding in the back of a pick up truck.  Ryan, Matt, Derek and Morgan.

The students are working Friday morning before we pack up to hit the road again.  Some of the students desperately want to finish some of the jobs that they began this week.  They already are attached to the home owners. We will be leaving Mobile at about 3 o'clock Friday afternoon.  We have had a great week!  See y'all soon!

Special thanks to my kitchen crew . . . Diane, Joan and Jenn.  Thanks for all the hard work and great meals we managed to produce!  We had a great time too!

The ladies of the kitchen.

Also Alabama - Habitat build Day 3

Today we went to two different work sites, with two different groups. The elder group to house number 938 was fun. We were working on the roof again, including the front porch this time. Crystal had a really good learning experience from John, but she got "bullied" by Wally most of the time. It takes Wally Funk thirty taps to get a nail in and Crystal only three. Lloyd cut his finger by accident but he's alright. Josef and Matt S. were a good team on cutting wood.  Jaye, Kelsey and Sarah R. worked like superwomen on the roof, too bad Liam, Morgan and Josh I. were too young. Wally Peters and Craig Dickinson were working in the pouring rain even though the day was called off and the whole team were hiding under the leaking roof. It was a productive day but we have to pause a lot. The other group went to a rehabilitation home, which means it had been previously lived in. During the day the girls were talking in a baby voice, Karalee and Derek got annoyed by it. Derek accidentally sat on a bucket of paint. We painted the whole day and ended up finishing the house. All in all it was a pretty productive day until Cheyenne and Ashley decided to paint on everyone's clothes. Wiens rocked he sweet flow.

Crystal and Derek.

Alyssa was part of the painting crew.

Making do with a make shift ladder.

Karalee and Ryan improvise lighting to paint by.

Cheyenne takes the high road while Mieke takes the low road.   Ashley is in a supervisor role!

Roofing project continues with Lloyd's crew.  Racing between the scattered showers. 

Matt and Josh on the power tools.

Morgan and Wally F.  continue the demolition on the pooch roof.

The crew at work.

Two Wally's!  Not really John and Wally think it is Twin Twin Day Day.

Back at Camp Christian where Alyssa and Laura lead devotions.

Josef celebrates his first birthday in Alabama.



** Sorry for the double post.  I have to take advantage of internet service when I can.  It was a very rainy evening.  The deluge drove our work crews off the work site early.  It poured rain and thundered and lightning through the night.  Word on the street is it rained 10.3 inches last night. (Not kidding!!)  (The grade 10 class can convert that to centimeters for you!)

Also-Alabama - Mobile Habitat build Day 2

           

 It was a bright and early 6:00am wake up for us hard working individuals. The sun was shining and the air was clear and HUMID! We had the most amazing breakfast y'all have ever tasted. Thank you Ladies.

            We were split into 2 crews. Most of the girls decided that they would choose to be part of Karalee so called painting crew. Ryan D was extremely disappointed when he was told that the girls crew put their lunches in the red cooler and boys in the blue cooler. Ryan was working in the girls crew so it wasn't the girls crew… The other crew was headed by Lloyd.

            Karalee's crew had a great, chill and fun day! We spent the first part of the day cleaning our home which we were working on. We all expected to be painting and tiling a finished home, but upon arrival we discovered very quickly that the house was not ready for the stage in construction. Painting, cleaning, siding and chatting were our days jobs. We had a lovely bag lunch and a few of us had a quick nap! Our day quickly changed when we had to move sites. Our day's jobs and activities were slim but y'all better believe me when I say we are ready to work!

            The manly crew (plus Jaye , Sarah, Kelsey, and Crystal) aka Lloyd's crew took on a exterior renovation. The eighteen year olds jumped up on the roof and quickly tore off the old shingles.  Once the shingles were off we quickly discovered that there were many boards the needed to be replaced. The rest of us young people took to re-painting the exterior of the house.  When the day started the house was a shade of blue with red trim. By days end the house was a beautiful shade of yellow with blue trim. All day long mother nature was threatening us with the chance of a thunder storm. Luckily the rain avoided us and we were able to turn a three day job into a one and half day job.

            The day wrapped up with a life guard coming out to Camp Christian and we were able to go swimming in the pool here. The day is finishing with Wally F trying hard to get his name in the blog, games, night lunch and an argument on how to pronounce Cheyenne. Hope the day was good y'all!

            By: Matty Stefaniuk and Kenna Forrester  (and Josh Isaak)

       

Demo begins!

Hard but satisfying work.

Morgan, Kelsey and Josh were part of a large painting crew

Josef and Crystal handle the porch.

Matt R. repairs a window.

Mom Nancy and son Travis work side by side on the metal skirting.

Painting was the order of the day for Lauren and Kenna.

Holly on the caulking gun.

Derek and Ryan on grunt labor.

Hard day's work rewarded with a cooling swim.

Josh hits his mark!

Splash attack! 

Games in the common area round out a busy day!

**Apologies for  the late postings.  Internet connections have been hard to come by!  There may be a double posting tonight. All is well and the students are working hard and learning lots! 

Night on the Streets and an Exhausting Day After...

After a quick supper and packing of snacks, we departed from Foothills Mennonite Church for the last time that month. We drove downtown to a place by the river where we met some representatives from Streetlight, which is an organization that helps youth find a place to go other than the street. We were split into two groups for what would be the entire night. 

Each group was led along a different tour around downtown Calgary, showing us different agencies and services available to homeless people in the downtown area. The tour took about four hours and took us to see many different services, from medical clinics to youth drop-in centres. When we arrived back at the place where we had originally started, around 11:00 pm,  we were informed about the competition that was going to take place. Each group had to talk to six homeless people, make inspirational chalk art on the sidewalks, design a plan for the day ahead as if we were homeless, collect bottles and cans in a garbage bag, find a place where the group could "sleep" for the night, and finally, follow clues given to us on sort of a scavenger hunt to find a backpack full of food.

Frustrations ran high as the night wore on. We were tired, we were cold, and there didn't seem to be a whole lot of options available to us. Both groups ended up sheltering at the 24 hour Tim Hortons at some point during the night. By around 4:00 AM, the "Street Survival" ended, and we all met back at the place where we had started, and the winners of the competition were announced. We then piled into the van, made it safely back to the church, and all went to sleep shortly thereafter. 

About six hours later, we woke up and had a wonderful brunch made by Dave and Ashley (The deans/chaperones of the trip). Then, we traveled to the Mustard Seed resource center, where we volunteered for a couple hours. We un-bagged, sorted,and re-bagged clothes that were donated. The Mustard Seed is a shelter that offers a variety of other services, such as housing and counselling. They also function as a mailbox for homeless people, so that they can receive assistance from the government. 

We then went back to Foothills to set up for the evening. Foothills Mennonite Church works with Inn from the Cold to provide about fifteen beds once a month. We  set up cots and made beds, and helped with preparing supper. We then ate with, and socialized with the people who were going to stay at the church tonight. Currently, most people have gone to bed, (right now it's only quarter to nine) and everyone is preparing for a big day tomorrow. 

The pictures in this entry are of the two groups that we were split into for Night on the Streets, and a shot giving some credit to our intrepid photographer, Vichael Ho.

Tomorrow, we're off to Blackfoot Crossing! More to follow...

-Benjamin Schulz

ALSO Saskatoon & Prince Albert Service Assigments Underway

Wednesday May 1, 2013

In Saskatoon and Prince Albert the service assignments are running at full speed.  Students in the Saskatoon Community Schools have had a taste of the vibrant, energetic, diverse nature of Saskatoon's core schools.  Students at Habitat for Humanity in Saskatoon have been busy painting (mostly anyway) the former McNabb Park homes that RJC students began last ALSO.  Hopefully these units are move-in ready by June!  At Habitat Prince Albert, students spent Tuesday at the Restore and today on the build site.  Thanks to Velma Harder for bringing lunch to the group!  Students at Farm-in-the-dell spent the morning working alongside residents and the afternoon bowling with them.  Good times were had by all!

These experiences have shown us a more complete story of the 'single story' that we often hear about the Saskatoon/Prince Albert area or about groups of people.  How is the 'booming economy' affecting people?  How are many of the new Canadians integrating into the city?  What is being done to help those with life challenges?  Who is protecting and nurturing the young and vulnerable?  How are we helping by being good neighbours as Christ has called us to be?

We will continue to learn about listening to both sides of the story as we continue our ALSO week in Saskatoon and Prince Albert.  Thank you for your prayers!

 -Hope and Katie get ready to spar with the wall.  It doesn't have a chance!-

        -Leah, Shenyce, Say Eh Htoo, and Hayley prepare for another day at W.P. Bate School-