Carnival at Camp Hope

Yesterday was, for most of us, our last day at Camp Hope. Camp Hope is on the outskirts of Copan and the hike to get there is through a very poor neighbourhood, across a trickle of a stream and up some very steep, jungly hills. Most of the youth love this walk and we are greeted by small children along the way. When we arrived we set up our carnival while being surveyed by small kids hanging on to the outside of the fence watching our every move. Some of us have struggled with the fact that many of the children who aren't registered in the camp come to watch the festivities but aren't able to join in...for various reasons. It's hard. But lots of things have been hard here and we are learning that our views of the world may, in fact, be undergoing some major shifts.

Some of the children at Camp Hope are malnourished and all are certainly impoverished..it was our great privilege to run our simple carnival for them. They cleaned us out of candy in no time flat and then we went off to the local soccer field, soccer ball in hand, and played a game while the surrounding neighbourhood all came out to watch!! It was hilarious! In our defense we aren't used to the heat!! When we finished we all hiked back down to town, handing out our leftover Canadian pencils along the way....We'll show you the pictures of that when we get home.

A few of our group continued to work on the playground we are building. I think it is a little bit of a lesson in patience. There is no hardware,  are no swings and no instructions! If the team needs lumber then they walk in to town to go and find it, and then walk back to use it. It's slow work but we are determined.

I had sent you all a previous blog but it has disappeared into cyber space...If anyone has any ideas how I could find it I would love your input?! I've got to run now but I'll continue later!

lots of love from all of us to all of you!

Gillian