Monday - Sept 29th

Today was our first real work day, and was spent on-site by most of the team. Each day we’ll start with breakfast at 7:30 followed by some worship and group devotion. One of the verses for today was revelation 5 about glorifying God and giving Him all praise and honor. It served as a great reminder of my intent with this trip. I was challenged to make a ‘bigger deal’ about god – his greatness, both internally in my mind and heart, but also externally in expression to others. He is truly is worthy and deserving, but I think I sell him short in this area a lot.
After this time we spent about 3 hours on site before returning for lunch. The site is only 10-15 minutes away, so the clinic offers nice access back and forth. I was on my own which gave me a good chance to do my thing – walking the property and trying to get an unbiased perspective and feel for things. The weather today is so greats. I feared and expected really hot temps, but it’s actually not bad. It’s still hot and there is definite sweating going on, but there is a constant north to south wind which helps so much. I spent the morning walking the front part of the site, and the longest property line running along the southern edge of the site. A lot of it is open meadow, having been cleared in the past but views and ability to walk can still be limited by tall grass and brush. With the survey crews needed lines of sight, many paths have been cleared by local farmhands. Working my way along the southern boundary meant crossing 3 large ravines and creeks, and scaring off quite a few lizards. I thought they were fairly big (8 inches or so) but I’ve since learned there are actually 2 ft iguanas so I guess it’s a matter of perspective! I set an alarm to be sure I would allow enough time to get back to the van for lunch – but as it was going off found myself in grass over my head. I thought there was a path nearby, but it was dead end. It didn’t take long to decide to turn-around and find another way!
At the rear of the site I caught up with the survey crew and Miguel (a local). I did my best to converse, but only understood some of what he said. I did get to use a word I learned yesterday – viento – to say it was a pretty day and the wind was nice. He agreed. While waiting for the rest of the team at the van some of us talked with other locals, Luis and Luis - father and son farmhands. Jonathan – a civil engineer – was asking them about their experience with the water levels in the creek we need to build a bridge across. I was trying my best to listen, but really was just hoping to get some photos – particularly with their old school john deer tractor Luis senior drove up on. It was parked in the shade, but hopefully they turned out good! I feel like the culture will offer the most unique photos, but I’m hesitant to the ‘tourist’ with my camera out taking pictures! In this case I specifically asked the, and they seemed to have fun posing for them.
Lunch was a spaghetti-ish dish, and while it was OK, it wasn’t as good as the food we had the past couple days at the orphanage. As much as I was nervous about the food, I missed the authentic cuisine.
The afternoon was spent on-site doing more explanation. I was trying to take a step back and look at the big picture in regards to building locations, but my outside the box thinking wasn’t producing many worthy options. I did however get a vision for a significant part of the design – organizing the homes around a recreation field and orchard area which would serve as a buffer to the most private areas of the site and provide a cool transition when walking back and forth to school. Towards the end of day the engineers were digging across a lot of the site and running into a high water table, so we’ll see what input they have for these ideas.
Dinner was sandwich stuff (again missing the cook) but fine by me. After dinner a few people shared their testimony and then I went to work on MP concepts as people are waiting for my design. I talked with Jane about the progress her and Tom made on the school design. They had accomplished a lot, and we began trying to visualize how the main cluster would be laid out with the school, admin building, and a multi-purpose pavilion.
I’m a little disappointed that we won’t be spending the nights with the kids at the orphanage, but it’s just as well because it would be a lot of driving and we need the time to work. I’m getting tired, and tonight is my latest night yet, but overall it was a good day. I’m feeling like I need to push the design to keep others going and hope my workload will lighten up as the week goes on. I’m praying that God will give me some inspiration, solutions, and endurance. Tomorrow morning will be here soon!
While out of site, I was looking all around at the mtn views that surround the site. I quickly realized that it wasn’t the highway overlook, but the ranch property that was the palm of God’s hand. It was cool to think about that, and kids being delivered into His hand in the future!