Guate '12 Day 6

We woke up this morning and had breakfast at our hotel in Panajachel at Hotel Dos Mundos. They served eggs, black beans, toast, fruit, and coffee. We then headed to the zipline AKA Cables Extremo. The scenery was amazing, overlooking the beautiful Lake Atitlan, the mountains, and the volcanoes. The rides were thrilling - some were very fast, up to 60 mph, and some were long, about 45 seconds long! All were awesome!

Then, it was a rush to the van so we could begin our 2-hour drive to Antigua for shopping. We grabbed a quick bite at McDonald’s before attacking the markets of Antigua, searching for deals and enjoying bargaining with the local vendors. Among the items purchesed were bracelets, bags, purses, backpacks, bracelets, keychains, knives, necklaces, earings, t-shirts, bracelets, pants, headbands, coffee, and more bracelets. After a few hours, we loaded up the van, and there was barely enough room for us and all of our new treasures.

We traveled an hour to our last game - a rematch against CSJ, the team we beat by 2 points on Day 1. They welcomed us into their very nice gymnasium, and the principal even came to watch and greet us. Everyone was very friendly, and some of the younger students at the school gave us bracelets and keychains, as well as some greeting cards with pictures they had taken from our first encounter. The game itself was very intense and physical, but we managed to maintain an 8-14 point lead most of the game until the fourth quarter. They cut it to 5 at one point, and knocked each of us down at least once with few fouls called; however, we prevailed and secured a 6-point victory. At halftime, Georgia shared her testimony with the other team and the crowd and did a great job! After the game, we were serenaded by one of the girls from CSJ with the Guatemalan national anthem. After many more photos, we were headed back to the hostel.

We were welcomed by a wonderful meal of spaghetti and bread, with fresh pineapple for dessert. Over dinner, we discussed some of our fav moments during the trip. They included our visit to Precious moments, our spending time playing with and serving the children at the HIV orphanage, connecting with the students at Colegio Lehnsen, and seeing some familiar faces at church from last year’s trip. We are truly thankful for the blessings that we have and are eager to continue using them to bless others in the name of Jesus. We want to continue to pray for those in Guatemala who are serving: Betty, Jaime, Marta - that they would be encouraged to persist in their ministries; the orphans in Guatemala - that God would find families for them and that they will seek relationships with Jesus; and for everyone that we were able to speak to or spend time with and give bracelets to - that the Holy Spirit would move in their lives and they would receive salvation.

Morgan’s Final DCOTW: 11

Guate '12 Day Cinco

Hola! This is Morgan....blogging by myself until Georgia came to the rescue. Parents you can thank me later because this blog is now going to be super spicy. Jk. We’re really tired so this blog may not be great. anyway. Very early this morning(around 12:30), all of the girls were slightly on edge. Many of us were completely creeped out by the non-existent ghost murderer in our shower. Coach Hatch, only putting gasoline onto the buggin out fire, decided to search our upstairs home with the deadly weapon of.........wait for it........... Madeline’s hair brush. After the search came up inconclusive, Coach Hatch went to sleep. Within 10 minutes our door slammed shut and suddenly all of the girls were in one bottom bunk. These freaked out actions continued until about 3:30 in the morn. Clearly waking up this morning was not an easy task. So apparently if you don’t open your eyes when Coach Hatch tries to wake you up, you get cold water poured on your head....that would have been useful information for Falon and Morgan.

Anywayz, the rude awakening was made up for by the marvel of the glorious ride to Eagles Nest. We went to this orphanage last year and to our enjoyment, we were not greeted by a mudslide this time. After taking many scenery pics, we served the kids lunch and also helped them make friendship bracelets. FUN FACT: Maggie took over 200 scenery pics on the way to the orphanage. After the bracelets, we played basketball and soccer with the kids for about and hour and a half. Caution: the game down by the riverside may result in breakage or loss of your second toe......player discretion is advised; parental guidance suggested under the age of 13. btw, it was not one of your lovely children that got hurt.

Next we headed into the town of Solola for a bball game against some local girls. Well, the score was somewhat self explanatory: 20-87. Player of the game: Maggie Leech. Our student assistant was most likely our leading scorer. Emily beautifully shared her testimony at half time. She spoke about her developing relationship with Jesus.

Our next stop was the hotel for showers, then straight on to Betty”s favorite restaurant. Fun Fact: Betty once had a bilingual dog (He also spoke cat). The food was completely delicious. The dogs swarming our table were not as delicious. However our pasta/guacamole/waffles/steak made up for the unwelcomed guests. On our way home we practiced our bargaining skills for Antigua tomorrow. Falon got us all a great deal on some bracelets. Its easy to say that were all super pumped for tomorrow bye.

Morgan’s DCOTW: 11 (and 1 cat)

Guate '12 Day 4

Hi loving parents because i know thats the only people that are reading this ha. Anywayz this is Georgia (the guatemalan boy catcher) and Waller (the baller).

Today was a freaking incredible day. We got up at a fantastic 8:30. Yet we were still just as reluctant to get out of bed. shocking i know. We had pancakes for breakfast, which tasted fantastic. Not quite up to the breakfast tamales though. After the lovely breakfast, we headed off to Betty’s school (Precious Moments). Fun Fact: Guatemalan 5th and 6th graders could kick our drumline’s tail. Any who, as we walked into Betty’s school, our hearts and eyes were opened to how blessed we are. Their playground was about as big as a small bedroom. Their entire school was a 3 room house. Yet the approximately 180 kids were the most gracious and loving people. As we walked further into the school, we were swarmed with 3 to 5 year olds. Just the simple hug we would give them brought so much joy which could not be equalled to any materialistic gift we could ever give them. As you can see we were really touched by them today.

After we had a basketball clinic of extremely disorganized games as a result of the slight communication barrier, the kids from Precious Moments made us the cutest little dolls out of wooden spoons and cloth then leading to a sick nasty drum line performance. It was extremely memorable. Fun Fact: Peppers hurt worse coming out then going in (compliments to Betty). Our next stop for lunch was Pollo Campero, which was completely ballin. We all got some form of chicken hence the name. The best part was probably the ice cream sundaes and the fact that everyone in the entire restaurant stared at us the whole meal.

Next we made our way to the HIV orphanage. The journey to the orphanage was so beautiful we had to stop and take junya and senya pics. When we arrived we were greeted by smiling friendly faces and lots and lots of hugs. We then proceeded to the baby room where we loved on tiny chillin and made some buddies. After we had our baby time we went to the playground and passed out our little gifts and love on some more chillins. Courtney, making the mistake of setting her bookbag full of gifts on the ground, was bombarded with tons of hyper kids in need of toys. It was priceless. After the gifts were passed out and some of the kids stopped asking we had a delicious grilled chicken dinner prepared by the best, Clint and Adam. The kids loved it so much, some of them even chewed up and ate the bones. After we cleaned up and said our sad good-byes we set off back down the mountain. The car ride consisted of deep thought and harmonious melodies. Fun Fact: Ann Hilton drank the equivalent of a six pack......of coke and Morgan ate 34 pixie sticks.... Anyways, we hit up the McDonalds here in Guate and everyone was in awe of the sophistication of the luxurious dessert bar and cafe. (Yes I took pictures, I am Waller) This day concluded with weird convos, awkward side comments, and cards. This is Georgia the guatemala boy slayer and Waller the baller signing off, thank you and goodnight!!! ;)

Morgan's DCOTW: yet still 4 (sadness)

Guate '12 Day 3

This is AnnHilton aka Ann & Emily aka nothing. This morning we woke up promptly at 7:22 and had a wonderful American breakfast consisting of bread, eggs, bacon, and fresh OJ. We were then picked up by Wild Betty and taken to our first game of la dia. FUN FACT: you can buy goat milk very fresh of the street....but you have to milk the goat yourself. While heading out to our game, we made a bet with Betty that if we won, we would receive a stomach-full of Pizza Hut. We played Colegio Sagrado, but unfortunately we were not victorious in this game, losing by 2 to a very good team from the impressive private school. At half time of that game, Morgan aka the dog whisperer, shared her testimony with the crowd (it went very smoothly). We then proceeded to our next destination, Colegio Lehnsen, to play yet another basketball game. We made another agreement with Betty to go to Pizza Hut if we won this game. At this court, we learned that the school was an English-immersion School where most of the classes were taught in English. During this game, we demonstrated our mad skillzzzzzzzzzz for students grades 5th-9th. Half of this game we played against their learning squad and while the other half we played a little Junya vs. Senya ball (the juniors dominated naturally). Falon and AnnHilton shared their testimonies during and after the game. The students responded really well and were very appreciative that we had come to share with them. Also, we truly enjoyed interacting with them. After AnnHilton was finished sharing her story, a young man came and told her, “You are the girl for me”. As a show of their gratitude, they kindly provided our team with a post game snack of pizza. We then exited the school in the pouring rain and proceeded to the glorious mall.

Unlike our Northpark mall in J’town, this three story mall was mesmerizing. We headed straight for the food court where we finally received our Pizza Hut that Betty promised us. We indulged in hot breadsticks, pizza, and then, best of all, cinnamon sticks that Courtney insisted on getting. In the end, we were all glad that Courtney forced us to get them. We were entertained by Waller’s hilarious attempt at the ipod game as she belted out a pitchy version of Adele’s Rolling in the Deep. We then ventured to get some delicious fro yo and were able to share bracelets/cards with the ladies who worked there. After that we came back to the Hostel to take a siesta. After a couple hours of free time we headed out for our last game. It was a long journey but the scenery was worth the drive. We saw the beautiful mountains and a really cool volcano. We played against an older group of women in a sketchy gym and we wore them down in the end winning by a rather large margin. During halftime Waller shared her testimony with the players and the crowd. She did a marvelous job and we handed out many bracelets hoping to share God’s love with the people there. After the game we headed back to the Hostel. During the ride, we talked about some challenges to walking out the Christian lifestyle while we're at home and some of the day's highlights. When we arrived, we had delicious meal of homemade tacos followed by carrot cake and some fluffies from all of us. It’s now time for beddie bye - we get to sleep a little later tomorrow so we are pumped about that. Sianara!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
gudnight.

Morgan’s DCOTW: still 4 (not impressive anymore)

Guate '12 Day 2

Here we are day 2 in Guatemala with Falon and Courtney. Sleeping was grandioso. We woke up approximately at 7:55 to a most unusual meal of breakfast tamales. Not knowing the culture of the Guatemalans, we were not aware of putting sugar on them so the bland taste was not our type, to say the least. Mom, if you’re reading this....which you probably wont be, Falon was not the last one out the door for church! We were much welcomed into the Guatemalan church where Clint spoke to the youth from the book of Nahum and Adam spoke to the adults. We then listened to the preacher who also preached in Nahum but in Spanish soooooooo basically we were clueless. After the sermon, we ate lunch and intermingled with some local teenageres through a game of ninja.

The teenagers wanted to come see us play, so they followed us to our game. We played on an outdoor court, which gave us a nice breeze - but we had to check the wind before each shot. FUN FACT: the weather is amazing. Thanks to the church youth group, we had loud fans cheering us on. At halftime Maggie boldly shared her testimony with the Guatemalans and did a fantastic job (seriously). After her testimony, we had plenty of people, adults and ninos(children) flocking to us wanting the bracelets and cards that we were handing out which tell about salvation through Jesus christ....it was awesome.

We girls, always keeping our eyes out for cuties, spied a muy caliente Guatemalan futbol player during the game....he was pretty much everyone’s type but he was only interested in one. After the game he discreetly followed us over to where we were walking, not in a creepy way but an interested way. We all took a picture with el muy caliente futbol player. Coach Hatch then told him that Falon was VERY interested and wanted his phone number. He then turned to Georgia and said “no number 10 - can i have your number??” And so she gave him her number, who knows maybe long distance relationships work once in a blue moon. Georgia said if they see each other again, it’s meant to be. If they don’t, it’s just not.

The ballers rode back to the hostel with wild Betty. The showers were slightly better considering we had dos mas. Tonight we had more Americanized food, hamburgers. Marta, who is the owner of the hostel, is also the head of the missions team at her church. Her missions team is currently going through hard times so we were glad to be an encouragement to them as they joined us for dinner. We encouraged them to continue praying for their hopes of traveling back to Haiti and to Africa this year. They recently received the money to help a single mother of a teenage girl who was sexually abused by her uncle build a house in a nicer and more safe area of Guatemala City. We enjoyed singing songs with the missions team, us in English and them in Espanol, but the same song “Open the Eyes of My Heart Lord”.

After our time with the missions team ended, a new game was introduced to our team called Quelf. It was most unusual and resulted in Emily wearing a cardboard box in her shirt, Coach Hatch and Courtney playing leapfrog, Emily and Courtney wearing chinstraps designed by Falon (don’t ask), Sara and Madeline doing golf commentating, Morgan drinking water out of a cup from the opposite side of the cup, Ann Hilton having to ask her feet permission to speak, and lots of sign language and homemade poems. In the end, team Georgia/Maggie was victorious. RANDOM FACT: Emily’s suitcase is full of cheerios and the altitooties is now called the fluffies, thanks to Coach Hatch.

We wrapped up our night by reflecting on the things that stuck out to us most in the day. A message from the missions team resonated with us when he said that our age (teenagers) was our greatest challenge to walking in holiness with Christ, so without prayer and reading God’s word, it is so easy to get caught up in the temptations of this world. Also, leaving the United States and traveling overseas has made us realize that no matter where you are God is always there. Although we are disconnected with our friends and families, we always have a connection with God whether we are in Guatemala, the United States, Africa, or anywhere. Now is bedtime because we have 3 games tomorrow starting at 9 o’clock.

Morgan’s DCOTW: 4 #poormorgan

Guate '12 Day Uno

Senya Sara Badger and Senya Mags here all the way from GUATE. So uhhhh, welcome to our blogs! After waking in the early morn and arriving on time at 4:45 (except Waller) to the Jackson Medgar Wiley Evers International Airport, the lovely basketball babes embarked on our journey to the foreign land mass in Central America (‘MERICA). After shifting 6 to 7 lbs each from Falon and Courtney’s suitcases and 13 from Maggie’s, we left the airport promptly at 6 am and arrived in Houston, Texas at 7:15 am. FUN FACT: Ann Hilton has the cutest suitcase EVER. We girls then traveled a far far way through the Houston airport. However, it wasn’t until 15 minutes of walking had passed that none other than Georgia Dewey (La Jorge) proclaims that she can not find her wallet or boarding pass. After extensive searching of her backpack, it was to our dismay that the wallet was gone. As a result of this, Georgia, Maggie, and Adam took a trolley back to the gate of our previous airplane in hopes of retrieving the lost wallet. Having made their way back, they grappled with the woman airplane conductor person for around 15 minutes. Finally, Georgia was able to procure the lost item of value and meet up with the group. We then ate some Mexicano breakfast wraps and microwavable bacon for the bargain price of ten dollars. As a result of the stressful events of the morning, Clint and Adam felt inclined to take a couple shots........................ of espresso.

Our plane ride, consisting of puffy clouds and ginger ale, to Guatemala was quite lovely. The ballers and boys arrived in the Guatemalan airport while taking in breaths of fresh air. We successfully made it through customs and the crazy Guatemala City driving with the help of Crazy Eddie, our driver. FUN FACT: the correct term for driving in Guatemala is CTG (cruisin the Guate- complements of Sara y Mags). Arriving at the hostel, we were pleased to discover that our hostel was nothing like the movie Hostel. After struggling and acquiring mucho scratchos, we made it on the roof of our hostel. We had a nice photo opp.

Wild Betty picked up the bball babes and we CTGed. After being in close quarters in our van, it became more than apparent that two of us had the Altitooties. We will not publicly humiliate these two blessed children. The good thing is that Emily’s wide variety of pharmaceuticals has got us covered. We arrived at a boys prep school gym, and after story time con Betty, it was time to meet our first Guatemalan opponent CSJ. The entire game was a constant battle, requiring us to push through our first game funk. We came out victorious with a 2 point win despite some sketchy calls and unfamiliar international rules violations. FUN FACT: after the game, the CSJ coach pleaded for a rematch, which will occur on Thursday night. We met up and chattered with the Jackson Prep boys ballers. Sara and Cade then shared their testimonies between games, and we handed out bracelets and English to Spanish cards about the gospel. SO GOOD. We watched the boys dominate the first half of their game, then saying goodbye to our nuevos amigos, we departed. On the drive home we jammed to Christian music. We made it back to the hostel and were welcomed by a scrumptious din din of white bean chorizo goulash over rice with fresh vegetables. It was legit. After taking freezing cold showers, Coach Hatch pleaded with Sara and Maggie to write on the blog. So here we are.

Morgan’s dog count of the week (DCOTW): 2

BTW we are delirious and running on empty, so please excuse the strangeness of this blog.

Much love, Sara Bolen and Maggie Leech

Hard to believe it's time for Guate 2012 - just 10 days away! I am so excited about this year's trip. We have had 2 great training sessions so far. The girls are very prepared to allow God to use them and their testimonies to change the hearts of the people we encounter in Guatemala during our time there. I know that God will do great things in Guatemala while we are there and can't wait to arrive on July 21st. Thanks for your continued support and prayers!