I hope you are enjoying our little journey in the Caribbean Islands. It was such a healing experience for both of us that we will never forget the experience and how much it has helped us. I am not one to go very far all at one time, usually if we have traveled, my husband and I always did it in an RV and our feet on the land, but this time it was an air journey and something very exciting to look forward to. Flying frightens me and I usually cry when the plane lifts off, it is a nervous reaction. Then when the plane touches down I am so happy, just the opposite feeling. I got over the crying feeling but always happy when we touched down.
The first time we rented a golf cart we toured the whole island except for a little arm that we went out on later. The island is only 5 miles long and half a mile wide, I think I mentioned that earlier, so it didn't take long to do the whole length. On the way down to the point at the other end, we stopped in the only town other than the one we were staying in. They are not big towns, not at all just a wide place in the road with lots of shops and dwellings. This place had a little park in it and there were ladies in the park with heaps of used clothes that they were selling. My daughter saw a couple of children on the sidewalk across the street from the park and so stopped to share some color books and crayons that she had brought with her purposely to share. When the ladies in the park saw what she was doing, they surrounded her, all wanting color books and crayons. She didn't bring near enough but it made a lot of little ones happy and mammas too. It was such a good experience that we took the ferry to Cancun and bought more crayons and books, for another trip down the island.
Well, this first trip we went clear to the end and as I was in the wheel chair, we got out and she took me to the very tip of the island and she left me up on the point as she went down a path by the water, the ocean wasn't beaches there, it was rocky and she enjoyed her little hike down there which was not my thing to do, I am terrified of high places. On our way back to the other end where we were staying, we noticed a little settlement of shacks, and I mean shacks. Made out of whatever they could find and probably some even had dirt floors. Well, we couldn't get that out of our minds, we decided we had to do something for these poor people.
We got acquainted with a man selling tours, snorkeling, scuba diving and the like and he was pastoring an Evangelical mission down the island a ways and we became good friends with him and decided to take him with us down to his mission. So we went through our suitcases and took out all the clothes we thought we could do without until we got home and took crayons and pictures to color and two bags of fruit juice candy and some book marks and guess where he took us, your right, down to the poor settlement. That's where his little mission was and we had so much fun, his sister helps with the mission and they were so glad to see us and so friendly. We gave away all the crayons and pictures to color and all the candy and his sister kept pointing at the bag of clothes and so we opened the bag and tried to give the clothes to those who wanted them, and then we gave her the bag to distribute at the mission. There were three rutty roads with dwellings on both sides, I couldn't tell you how many homes but very many. We also gave away some book marks but they were in English and I don't think many of them spoke English so we didn't give all our book marks away but we did give the pastor some to use at his mission.
I have to say that that trip was a very healing trip, just seeing the joy on the children's faces and on the mother's faces too and how happy we made them that day, was so healing to both of us. My daughter was so happy to help them that we decided to take the pastor to Cancun or meet him there and take him shopping. Well, I guess I should wait until tomorrow to tell you about that trip. It was worth it's weight in gold. We had to cross in a ferry to go to Cancun and it was an extremely enjoyable day that I will tell you about tomorrow. So, don't forget that another healing element in our lives is helping others, find something to do for others, if you can't give things away, you can give yourself away to the needs of others. May God help us to always put others first in our lives and our reward will be in heaven. We may never see results here but we may see lots of results there.
See you tomorrow. Grandma Joan
No comments:
Post a Comment