2016 NYAC VIM Bolivia YAM Mission - Building Hope, Friendship and an Appetite

Monday February 15, 2016

Tirsha Wheatly writes:

After a long day, it’s finally morning. We had breakfast around 9:30am. It was amazing. To be honest I wish I could take some Coffee home! After breakfast, we had time for worship and orientation. I’m so excited of all the things we had ahead of us. But we just figured out we are running a vacation bible school. I’m very nervous! Nevertheless, I just want to point out how many supplies we collected. It’s simply insane. Oh Wow! the smell of the food they are cooking right now is making me hungry. Okay they are coming out with the food, gotta go!

After lunch we all jumped on the bus and led to the church we are building. It was a long ride but I got to take wonderful pictures and we got to see a statue of Jesus on top a huge hill. Once we got to our destination all the kids were waiting for us. They hugged us like we knew each other forever. Half of the group actually started working on building the Church and the other half including myself led Vacation Bible School. We asked them all of their names, I read a bible verse in Spanish and had them draw their favorite animal. Then we took a walk around the area.

Oh I forgot! We sung with the children and they taught us how to make a hat out of paper, pretty creative. Also, many of the girls drew better them me. I had to take pictures of their drawing. Also, I was amused how many of the kids wanted us to take pictures of them. They posed and everything. Nevertheless, I also noticed there’s a lot of poverty in Cochabamba. Most people make everything from scratch which I find amazing. They make their own clothe and grow their own food.

Okay, dinner time. The food was …… I can’t even find the right word for it. All was simply delicious. I’m just grateful for everything.

Tuesday February 16, 2016

Karicia Murray writes:

This morning was crazy. I woke up early to start my day. While I was coming down the stairs, I fell down the stairs, and my head hurt a little bit, and my back was giving me problems, but that did not stop me from what I came to do in Cochabamba, Bolivia. I was shocked that I didn’t cry, but usually I’m not a cry baby. I really like when we were at the work site, just working together and giving Bolivia a helping hand. I love doing construction work because I’m working a lot on my upper body. It’s fun to do that and I’m not really a girly, girly type. Getting to know people that live in Bolivia was great. They are friendly people and they are grateful that we have come and welcomed us to come back to Cochabamba.