2011-The Mission Continues!

On behalf of the 2011 All Saints Belize Mission Team, I would like to thank everyone whose prayers, encouragement and donations will travel with us to Belize in a few days. Since 2005, our annual mission trips continue to build life-changing connections between volunteers from throughout the United States and friends in Belize.

We are looking forward to attending Mass in a church we helped to build in 2008 at Sunday Wood village. Because men spend the rest of the week farming and hunting, Sundays provide a rare opportunity to visit with families.

As trust and friendship with the people of Toledo District grow, so do their requests for assistance. Our construction crew will help to build a concrete-block school library in the village of San Benito Poite and complete a wooden library in the village of Corazon. We also hope to find time and equipment needed to address repairs needed in six elementary schools!

Three nurses traveling with us this year will assist in the hospital in Punta Gorda Town, a clinic in San Antonio, and a few elementary schools. They will also see home-bound patients as needed.

Those working with Socio-Economic Outreach will visit small business owners who have received loans through the micro-loan program at All Saints Parish. Others will document the process of jipijapa basket-making for Socio-Economic Outreach presentations. We will deliver backpacks filled with school supplies to ten high school students sponsored by the All Saints Scholarship Fund.

Our education curriculum continues to grow and serve more students every year. This year we will visit nearly 600 elementary school students in San Marcos, Blue Creek, Santa Teresa, San Lucas, Corazon and Otoxha! Our curriculum includes lessons in math, science, religion, language arts, health and hygiene, art, P.E., and music. We will deliver health and school supplies, plus items requested by principals. Imagine a classroom of children jumping and cheering when you walk in carrying a box of crayons for each one of them!

Our mission team realizes that we are the lucky ones because we get to experience hugs and smiles firsthand, wishing that by some miracle, everyone we know back home could do the same. We feel blessed to represent hundreds of generous friends who reach so many needy people in Southern Belize. As always, we will return having received much more than we delivered. Thanks again for all of your support and prayers!

Ann Lacker

All Saints Belize Mission Team Leader

More pics for Day 4 and 5

Day 4 and 5, Jan. 6-7

Day 4 and 5 were days spent in the villages. We worked with the children on arts and crafts projects...making "googly people" and had them draw and color their favorite things about Belize, and we had the older kids write letters to the students back in St. Louis telling them about life in Belize. We also brought them sidewalk chalk and bubbles and they had a great time playing with them. We also took pictures of each kid with our digital cameras and printed the pictures so each child could keep a photo of themselves...this is the first time many of the children have ever seen a picture of themselves....some don't even have mirrors and had no idea what they looked like!

The kids in our village loved to pick us flowers (which are gorgeous there)...they made me a "wedding bouquet" and asked that I come back to Belize and get married in the village...so sweet!

At lunch, Joanne and I visited one of the homes of the villagers, and the mother invited us over for lunch the next day (quite an honor)...as we were accepting the invite...her young son came into the house carrying a dead bird of some sorts and his mom took the bird and put it on the table. Later, one of the teachers told us it was a pigeon...and likely our lunch the next day! They boys of the village will set up traps to catch birds for meals.

The Doherty family made the very long trek to the villages of Delores and Oxtahas, which we spent time in last year. Delores had started an organic garden and the kids maintained the garden and did much of the farming. In Oxtahas....the school children were still using the rain gauge we had brought them last year....we were impressed.

The construction team worked on the foundation of the church, and poured concrete and added two layers of cinder block to the foundation.

Anne Schappe, a nurse, and Rebecca, a doctor, spent some time at the Health Clinic...it was only four rooms, and the most high tech machine they had there was an EKG machine. They seen 35 patients in 6 hours. The doctors at the clinic are from the US and are on a rotation program.

In our village, we visited a house with a corn mill where members of the village ground fresh boiled corn to make massa for their tortillas.

On Wednesday evening, we were invited to Dorla's home. Dorla runs the socio-economic group in Belize. She made us a lovely meal of fish balls, Kahune stew, tamales, fresh tortillas and split pea tortilla soup...it was a feast. We also had cashew wine...and even the wine drinkers of the group (Carol!) were not big fans...it had a strange taste, but we tried it!

When returning the the convent, we noticed another unexpected visitor on the front steps of the convent...this time it was a snake, not a tarantula...and yes, I screamed again! It was black with yellow stripes and scary!

Also on Wednesday, Fr. Dick presented us with solidarity rings...they are made from the kahune nut and are worn on the ring finger on the right hand as a sign of compassion for the poor.

More pics from Day 3

Day 3 of 2009 Trip

Monday, January 5 was day 3 of our trip and our first day to visit the villages where we would spend our week.

The day started on an interesting note for my roommate Joanne and me...we were getting ready that morning and had a surprise guest outside of our window in our room...a tarantula the size of a hand (not kidding!). We did what most girls would do...we screamed, then we took our camera and took photos of the furry little thing. Then, Dave, another team member came to the rescue and tapped on the window until the tarantula fell to the ground. The rest of the trip Joanne and I checked every nook of our room for spiders!

I was still feeling quite sick on Monday, so I stayed behind at the convent while the rest of the group headed out...but they came back with some great stories...here are a few:

• The corn crops are planted in the shape of a cross, so that God will bless the crops...pretty good planning!

• The construction team who worked to build a church in one of the villages had some pretty strong rain showers and had to wear their ponchos and even wait out the rain in the van. Then had to dig a trench to drain water the foundation of the church.

• Several of our team members visited villages to vaccinate pigs to de-worm them...some of these pigs weighed 250-400 lbs!

• And much of the team spent time at schools in the villages meeting and working with the children. Some of our team went to a village called Blue Creek where they are lucky enough to have minimal electricity and two computers...this is a larger village and not so remote. Other team members visited San Lucas, where our team has been several times. A funny story about some of the children here...when they learned Fr. Don was a priest...they were very amazed and impressed and asked him if he knows how to sing the "Holy, Holy, Holy"...very cute. And, the last village we worked with was Santa Teresa, another village we have previously worked in...one of the students quickly took to Joanne and brought her tropical flowers from the village.

The drive to the villages can be pretty bumpy because the roads are not paved...so Mike got a little creative and used a volleyball we brought for the kids to keep his head from hitting the ceiling of the van. As you drive through the villages, you will often see women doing their laundry, dishes and even bathing in a nearby river or stream.

I stayed at the convent and stuffed hygiene bags all day to bring to the schools later in the week. The bags were stuffed with the items many of you donated. A big huge THANKS!

Later that evening, we went into Punta Gorda to make a few phone calls and update the blog....and I finally got to call and talk to my Doug.

Later in the evening, we packed suitcases full of supplies to take to the villages.

Day 2 of 2009 Trip

Sunday, Jan. 4, 2009...day two of our trip.

After breakfast (at 8am), we started our day with Mass in a village called San Antonio. San Antonio is a larger village, so the church was bigger and made of concrete brick...it looked like a cathedral compared to some of the churches in the villages. The church was decorated for Christmas...they even hung garland on the crucifix that made us laugh. Fr. Murray, a missionary priests said Mass (he is also from St. Louis). Although this is a larger village and a nicer church, there was still only an outhouse as a bathroom.

After Mass, we drove to a nearby village called Crique Jute...All Saints had raised money for the metal blinds that were being used at the village church through the Shopping As Jesus Would program.

Then we headed to the visit some of the Mayan ruins. This particular one has a legend of a crystal skull buried there. I had to take pics, as my beloved Doug is a big Indiana Jones fan. The young girls of the village were set up selling their items. They will say things like "Please miss, buy from me, I need money for my family." You want to buy from each of them, because they are so sweet. We started splitting up so we could each buy from each one of the girls...however, Ann Lacker and I seem to be the biggest suckers and can't seem to say no to any of them...so many bracelets later...

One particular lady had her baby wrapped in a swing hanging from a stick that was stuck in the ground...we are asked to take a picture of the baby, and the mother said yes...but for a tip! Smart business woman,

After the Mayan Ruins, we headed to a local tiki bar to visit our friend who runs the bar...we met her last year. Then it was back to the convent for dinner. After dinner, we headed to Punta Gorda to enjoy an evening of culture to celebrate the Garifuna culture and dance. Local Belizeans of Garifuna descent (Carib and West Africa descent) put on a show of traditional dance using drums and maracas. Very nice evening and they had many of our team members up dancing along with them.

A few additional notes from the day...Fr. Don was sporting his Bob Marley t-shirt! And, the church at the convent was celebrating the Epiphany and we could hear the kids in the choir singing Little Drummer Boy...which was interesting to hear considering it was 90-degrees outside!