Only Real Ones Make it to the Last Paragraph *Week 9*

This week was a very casual, ordinary week. My mom and I got invited to every single team meal, every single day by Mamí herself. We got to hear Papí, Mamí, and Leshawn’s(the American nurse that lives here) testimonies. Then Saturday my mom left with the team that was here all week. Besides this, nothing else really happened this week. I told myself when I decided to start blogging this journey, that if I ever had a dull week I would write about my past and why I’m here now. So…

The story starts about nine years ago when I turned ten. For all five of us kids, my parents offered us a trip to Disney World the summer after our tenth birthday. Alina and Jaden were the only two kids that ‘decided’ not to go to Disney. From that point on, every summer from 11 to 18, we would accompany our mom on her annual mission trip to Orphanage Emmanuel here in Honduras. This meaning that I have been coming down every summer for a month since I was 11 and I’ve gotten to make so many incredible friends and memories along the way. The first day of my first ever year(2016) down here, my mom took me around the place to show me what was up. While on the walk around, we bumped into one of the ladies in charge of the Medianos house(mainly boys from 11-12) and she told us that they would be watching “The Croods'' together and that I was more than welcome to sit with them. Being my first day in a place I wasn’t yet acclimated to, I was initially nervous to just hop into interactions with the kids my age. However, I decided just to follow my mom’s lead and watch the movie. When I walked in, the boys kinda just looked at me and went back to watching the movie. However, two boys waved me over to sit by them so that I wasn’t sitting alone. Those two boys, Sergio and Jerson, would become two of my best friends during my first trip. After the movie, me and my mom made our way to the Comedor(mess hall) where she introduced me to Luis David(he is a very good family friend and my mom considers him a son of hers, he lives in North Carolina now) and asked if I could sit with him to eat. That was my first interaction with my “Cuñado”(just google it). Luis David became a very good friend of mine through the years.

The next day, I was at the Tienda eating with my mom and Alina, and we got to meet two male volunteers; Arturo from Texas and Jordy from Ohio. Jordy was sort of a part of the Ohio Team. Jordy went to the same church that the Ohio team did, but Jordy came as a six week volunteer for many years, he just tagged along with the team when they left. Jordy had a very big impact on me, and as I’m writing this post I’m sure his name will pop up a few more times. The events that happened the next day I will never forget. I was sitting in the hotel(4 room flat house inside the orphanage) where my family was staying and I heard the medium boys playing in the yard right outside. I trotted down to play with them and I remember wanting to seek out Sergio and Jerson but I didn’t need to because they both ran up to me as soon as I entered the yard. While I was in the yard, the boys were playing with a small hole filled with water under what used to be a gazebo. Turns out there was actually a small pond under the ex-gazebo which we pulled a toad and some tadpoles out of. But the part I will never forget is somehow pulling a crab out of that hole even though the orphanage is ~2,600 ft above sea level. Naturally, being pre-teen boys, we were very excited and took the toad and crab over to the sidewalk to have them fight. All I remember is that they didn't want to fight so we put the crab in a cup and carried it around for the rest of the day. My job assignment for my first couple of years was to be with my mom all day so most of my first trip was spent updating clothing size charts for each individual kid(just about 600 back then) and sitting in the yard with the special needs boys in the afternoon and then hanging out with the medium boys at night. While working in the special needs yard, I got to meet a boy my age named Oscar who was assigned to watch Richar(one of the special needs boys). Me and Oscar spent a lot of time together my first year and even made a little jingle with each other that we still bring up to this day.

As my first year continued, I remember playing soccer against Claudia(the best soccer player on the girls side) and talking smack the whole time. And also Rudy(a good friend of my older brother Andres’) making a bet with my mom that he could scare Alina with a plastic gecko. He did, so my mom gave him a Mexican paleta(sucker). These small memories with people I haven’t seen in years still mean the world to me. My first year here I got to help unload a semi container. Containers used to come every 4-6 weeks, bringing goods to the orphanage. Now the orphanage is lucky to get three containers in a year. On that same day, we went to church at night and my mom saw the Miller family from New York and she got to introduce me to them. My mom told me that this was the third consecutive year that the Miller family and our family came down at the same time. It was a mom and a dad that had brought their two daughters(Rachel and Rebecca, around Alina’s age) and a son that's a year younger than me named Nathaniel. I got to share many good memories with the Millers while down here. Then, the day after I met the Millers, the Ohio team left after their week-long stay, taking Jordy with them.

Luis David’s birthday is August 5th, meaning that every year we came down we would be able to celebrate with him. Luis David was a pretty popular guy down here, so naturally, he got a lot of eggs smashed on his head by both his friends, and my family. During my first trip I also got to meet Michelle and Alejandra who are two other kids that my mom considers daughters of hers and that I consider family as well. Both of them left the orphanage between my last summer down here, and now though. With the boys my age, my mom and I started a tradition of buying movies and snacks for some relaxing movie nights. And now, I am currently in the process of buying 4 movies for every house down here and I plan on having movie nights with all of the boys' houses, and maybe the small girls house too(I’m not allowed to be around girls close to my age for that much time). I do distinctly remember that during my first year down here I chose some movies for the medium boys and I listed them off by the school. I bought two animated kids movies(probably something like “Big Hero 6”) and then I also bought two action movies; one of them was Batman vs. Superman. As I listed them off, I remember them booing the two kids movies, and then HOORAH-ing the action movies. On our last night at the orphanage we watched Jurassic World(that we had bought) with the Medianos. When we had finished the movie, and all of the popcorn and drinks, we were surrounded by the boys who were all sad to see us go(this became a recurring thing, #foreshadowing).

To start my second trip the Miller family and our family got to the orphanage a day apart, so Morgan(the office lady before Danielle) decided that we would get our first day off so that we could just all have our meeting together. So the next day she gave us our assignments, and for the second year in a row, I was assigned to be wherever my mom was because my mom still didn’t trust me to be on my own. So most of my trip was just sitting in the classes that my mom would be teaching and then getting to chill with the Medianos in the evening. The first night that I got to go to the medianos house, I was so excited to see all the friends that I had made the previous year! I didn’t see my best friend Sergio at first, so I just assumed he was somewhere else. But all the boys that remembered me were very happy to see me. On top of that, the medium boys house had a basketball poll now. The new leader of the house, Solomon(Moncho) came outside and showed me what he was all about in the driveway. This was one of my first interactions I had with the guy. There was one morning that my mom left me in the yard to play with the medium boys while she went to teach at the school, and while I was there, Moncho drove by in his gator and asked if I’d like to help him run a few errands. Moncho was the electrician for the orphanage so he did a lot of the maintenance around Emmanuel. Later that day, my mom went into town to get movies for the Medianos so that we could have movie nights just like we did the previous year.

As my trip went on I ended up finding out that Sergio was peer pressured to run away from the orphanage by his older brother and his friends. This was heartbreaking to me because I really cared about Sergio and I would’ve ended up sponsoring him that year if he had still been there. This was my first confrontation with how real that kind of situation is. The realization was gut wrenching because I knew it wouldn’t stop at just Sergio. I had to be prepared to lose friends in the 11 month block that I wasn’t here, every single year.

On the flip side of things, as year two continued, my dad came down two-ish weeks after we did, to volunteer for about a week and a half. My dad works full time, year round, making it difficult for him to come for a month. And as much as he likes coming, the heat down here doesn't get along with him well either. While my dad was down here, I helped him help Mike build the Engineering School that they were planning to start. As I started getting closer with Moncho, he brought up the idea of a basketball tournament with his medium boys. Of course I jumped on this opportunity. Alina and I always used to beef about who was better at basketball [I’ve always been better (the beef was never squashed)]. There were four teams made and the captains were Moncho, Luisito(an older boy that watches over the boys), Chino(a good friend of mine, also Danielle's husband), and then me. Alina came late so she was put on Luisito's team. Alina showed up and helped Luisito’s team beat Moncho’s team. I played Chino’s team first and my team was the bomb and started the game up 8-0. But then my team was the actual bomb and lost by two in the end. So it was Chino vs. Luisito in the Championship. Alina didn’t play in that game but Luisito's team still won. The next day Luisito must’ve been on some kind of basketball mind grind and asked me to show him some moves. While I was showing him my stuff, I skidded my toe across the pavement, in sandals, and I think it's so worth it to mention that in my mom’s blog she specifically said, “and he didn’t even cry.” What a trooper this guy!

As the second year went on, my mom started letting me out of her sight more and more. She trusted me to work with Moncho since she knew Moncho knew what he was doing, plus Jordy was also with Moncho to keep an eye on me as well. I specifically remember one day when Moncho, Jordy, and I went into one of the big girl houses to work on a light switch. As we were working on the switch it kept sparking, and that’s when we figured out that Jordy is afraid of electricity. I poked fun at him for that, but Jordy and Moncho made sure I got that end of the straw too. A couple days later, Moncho and Jordy were parked by the toddler playground waiting for me to get into the gator, Moncho started pulling away to tease with me but when I picked up my pace to catch up, I totally wiped out in a puddle of mud(there was a lot of fun was poked). Fast forwarding a bit, my dad left with Alina about a week before me and my mom did since Alina had volleyball tryouts. My dad has a tradition of making a meal for a staff member and their family every time he comes down. He used to be a gourmet chef at a restaurant back home in Wisco, so he enjoys using his talent to bless a family down here before he leaves. The whole week he was at Emmanuel I BEGGED him to make a meal for Moncho and Ana Yansi(Moncho’s wife) since they had the biggest impact on my trip. Though he didn’t spend much time with Moncho and Ana, he eventually folded under my immense peer pressuring abilities and made a meal for them. 

During my final week, I met a young man around my age named Marlon. Marlon and his two cousins were found on the streets begging for food so they were brought to Emmanuel sometime around my trip. Marlon was a very sweet kid but he never smiled, probably due to the trauma he had to endure at such a young age. I spent a lot of time with him trying to make his transition easier. Ever since my siblings and I were young, my mom has pushed us to sponsor a child around our age through  ‘Compassion International’  but I never felt a calling to sponsor a child while looking at the website or being at ‘Life Fest’ and seeing the pamphlets. When I met Sergio I knew I wanted to keep in touch with him while I was away and I wanted to be able to give him gifts. I would’ve sponsored him but I was too scared of taking ownership of the process. A similar thing happened with Marlon. However, because of Sergio, I knew God was leading me to sponsor a kid from Emmanuel. I got all of Marlon’s information and I read through the entire sponsorship packet. However, with less than a week left down here, I never got to make anything official and unfortunately, by my third year, he was gone. The last thing I remember of my second trip was sitting with Rudy and talking about our plans for the future. As a 12 year old, I didn’t really have any plans for my future, but Rudy did. Rudy told me that he planned to join the Honduran military and serve his country. I wished him luck but I remember being very sad because I knew that meant I wouldn’t get to see him again.

My third year started with a warning from Norman(our trusted taxi driver in the past) telling us that there was a chance that our trip would take a little bit longer than usual because the residents of Honduras(specifically semi, taxi, and bus drivers) were protesting the ridiculously high prices of fuel in the country at the time by causing roadblocks all throughout Honduras. And sure enough, an hour into what should've been a 90 minute trip to the orphanage, we hit a roadblock. Four semi trucks decided to park perpendicular on a dirt ‘highway’. I was asleep when we pulled up to it but was woken up to being extremely overheated and sweaty. Luckily there was an ice cream vendor that I went back and forth to 5 times due to the heat. We sat in that road block for six hours before the semi trucks finally pulled away. The next day at the orphanage we went to get our assignments from Morgan and also got to say ‘hi’ to the Miller family that got to Emmanuel a couple days before us this time around. For the first year ever, I was assigned with not my mom! Morgan assigned me to be with Moncho and Jordy during the day and I remember trying so hard to hide my smile in the meeting and stay professional😎. My first day of work was actually Moncho’s rest day, so I tracked down Selvin(speaks fluent English) so that I could work with him. At first, he didn’t have anything for us to do, so we went tarantula hunting on the hill in front of Papí and Mamí’s house. Later in the afternoon, Selvin and I got a call that the fountain in front of the church was overflowing, so we went to take care of it. After fixing the fountain Selvin thanked me for helping….. and then pushed me into the base of the fountain. On Sunday, I brought my now brothers for life🤞 Maycol, José Solomon, and William to church with me so that we could sit and worship next to each other. The following Monday I was working with Selvin again for some reason. He didn’t need my help at that moment, so I just walked around a little bit. While walking around I found a horse, which confused me a little bit because usually the horses are in the barn all day and not out where I was. So I told Selvin and he was confused too. Turns out the horse was from town and somehow got into the orphanage. We had to let it back into town even though I insisted we keep it at the orphanage. I had even named it José Francisco(don’t judge, that’s a pretty name). 

Once my mom was able to purchase movies again, she brought them to the house and Chino(who was now in charge of the medium boys house) set up some blankets to project the movie onto. We continued our tradition of having these movie nights with the boys. And it was at these movie nights that I met a little boy named Gibran and his brother Christofer, who much like Sergio and Jerson, waved me over to sit by them. While the Ohio team was here, they hosted an American vs. Honduran basketball game since the last time they were here they hosted a soccer game and lost 13-0. Alina and I were invited to play, however, we came a little too early and the Grandes(older boys) told us that since we weren’t a part of the group we had to be on the Honduran team. We agreed, and helped them win 32-20 even though the group had a 6’6 red head that the kids called ‘Zanahoria’(carrot). A couple days later the team left and when the bus returned it brought my dad once again(for what would be his last year to date). For the week and a half that he was here, he held his typical schedule of doing maintenance and cooking meals. A couple days after my dad left with Alina, Papí and Mamí treated me, my mom, and the Miller family to a lunch in town. Papí drove us to the place in his truck which meant that only the adults would fit in the front, so Nathaniel, Rebecca, Rachel, and I all sat in the bed of the truck, even on the highway, which is very much legal here. The food was very delicious and we had some very nice conversations while at the restaurant. With two days left in my third trip, I decided for sure that I wanted to sponsor Gibran. This time I knew I had to finalize the idea since I dropped the ball( joke for...) with Marlon and Sergio. I finalized everything in one day and was able to tell him before I left that I had sponsored him.

The first day of my fourth trip, I ran to the Medianos house to see Gibran. I didn’t see him right away so I assumed he was just upstairs. I sent one of the other boys to go get him and I hid around a corner. When he walked downstairs I walked around the corner and Gibran gave me a huge hug and we were both so excited to see each other. After that interaction I had to sprint back to the office to get my assignment. For this trip I was assigned to be with Chino in the horse barn. To this day, I’m still not sure why I wasn’t with Moncho because the horse barn is fairly easy to take care of and there were already 4 people in there, but regardless, I was happy to help. On Luis David’s birthday we went up to the power toddler's house to celebrate by having a Chinese rice meal(a common delicacy) and cake. Alina egged Luis David good, but then suffered the consequences by getting cake to the face. This was also Kaylyn(my itty bitty baby sister that we call peanut)’s first year down here and yet somehow she got in the crossfire of the cake fight, resulting in a very lukewarm to room temp. welcome to Emmanuel. While we were at the birthday party, the Miller family rolled in to Emmanuel and got situated in their house. Alina and I were really excited to introduce Peanut to the Millers and all of the traditions we built up throughout the years. We would go on to show her our infamous “obstacle course” on the playground and the unique card games that we bring back every year. Much of the work I did with Chino was just painting, but I was in the horse barn a lot. So one day when Peanut showed up, I asked if she wanted to ride a horse and she got all excited and Andi showed her the ropes. One of the last things I remember about the trip was painting the pillars in one of the chosas(pavilion kinda) in the big boys yard. This is where I met Raleigh, who at the time was just out of high school and decided he wanted to volunteer for 6 months to a year(sounds kind of familiar). But then, everything changed when the COVID-19 attacked.

For what should’ve been my fifth and sixth year was replaced by two lock down filled summers. When COVID hit, all the Americans in Honduras were given a decent amount of time with a hard deadline to leave the country. This includes Raleigh. Even though he was still pretty young, he felt God was calling him to stay. Not knowing how long this lock down would last he must’ve been scared but he still trusted the Lord with the decision. Two years passed and when I returned with my family, Raleigh was still here. Now he is an official staff member.

And finally, for what should’ve been my seventh year. This year was Jaden’s first year coming and also Alina’s first year not coming. On top of Alina not being down here, the Miller family wouldn’t be down here this summer either. For a typical trip to Honduras from home, we have to drive 4 hours to Chicago and then from there we have 1-2 connections before arriving in Tegucigalpa(Comayagua now). However when we got to Chicago this time, we didn’t have the paperwork filled out and ended up MiSsiNG ouR fLighT. Two days later we tried again and made it to Honduras safe. The day after arriving, we got our assignments from Morgan. I would be with Moncho once again which I was super pumped about. We headed to the comedor, where I got to see Gibran, Christofer, and all my other brothers as well. While the girls side was leaving the Comedor that day, a 9 year old girl named Maria José came up to me and introduced herself. I had never seen Maria José before so I knew she was pretty new to the orphanage. It became a recurring thing that after meals, she would run up to me and give me a hug and chit-chat with the fam. After that meal though, we headed back to our house, which happened to be the new team house, which is a huge house meant for over 30 people. We were expected to keep this whole house clean by ourselves too. Before we started our first cleaning job, I made myself a simple ham and mustard sandwich and cut my finger really bad somehow, but… “he didn’t even cry” -mom. The scar is still very visible to this day.

Whenever church would roll around I always brought Gibran and Christofer with me. I would’ve brought Maria José with me but I was never allowed to take her to church or the tienda because she misbehaved in her house. So her and I had many conversations about that and even though she was improving, she was still grounded. Moncho and I spent a lot of time in the power toddler's house during this trip fixing a sink counter and putting up a metal wall. On August 7th, a team came into Orphanage Emmanuel. When a team comes to the orphanage, they almost need to bring a certain atmosphere with them to make a difference down here. It’s really hard to explain but this is why teams like the Ohio team, the infamous February team, and the Union team made such a big impact on myself and the kids down here. The team that came was from Florida. They were a pretty typical group with a pretty typical average group age. However the first person on this team I met was a man named John. John was a super odd person haha, but I really enjoyed talking to the guy(#foreshadowing). Throughout all of my fifth trip, I had been begging to run a volleyball game with the big boys, the staff, and the team, and finally my dreams came true. We had to tie a tennis net up in the gymnasium and it wasn’t the prettiest process. Eventually the boys came and even though curfew is 6pm for the boys and 8pm for everyone else, we were in the gym, playing the greatest sport ever made, until 10pm. The next day was similarly exciting because my good friend Chino proposed to Danielle(the office lady) and since she said yes, we threw a big party for them.

As the days went on, Moncho and I had finished the sink counter in the power toddler's house and decided to sit in the living room of the house and chill out for a bit. Out of nowhere, John walked up to the house with a bible in hand and asked us if he could give us a piece of scripture. So we listened to him give us a verse and use it to share with us that he believes God puts certain people in certain spots at certain times to help us realize his plan for us. This message was the first glimpse I got of what God wanted of me. As I knew my trip was winding down, I had purchased a shirt from a vendor and walked around with a sharpie, having brothers and sisters of mine that I met over the years sign it. I also had Papí, Mamí, Moncho, and Morgan sign it. On my final full day of being at the orphanage, I ran a dish down to the comedor and on my way back I passed by the gymnasium where a devotion was being held for the small boys and small girls and the medium boys and medium girls. Chino, Alexander, and Andi were running the devotion and during devotions down here they sing a lot of songs then have a short message. I went and stood in the back by John and tried my hardest to sing with the kids but I kept getting choked up thinking about how it’d be my last time coming for a really long time(cuz college). As I stood there singing the songs that I grew up listening to with the kids I’ve seen come and go down here, I naturally had a bit more than a couple tears to shed. While I stood in the back trying to sing, the little boys standing in front of me kept looking back at me clearly concerned. After the last song, Alexander said a long prayer and dismissed the kids, and as soon as the kids were dismissed ALL of the little boys standing in front of me circled around me giving me hugs and saying their goodbyes. Then the girls side noticed the circle and rushed over as well. Maria José was crying by one of her leaders so I made sure to go over and say goodbye to her. That night was one of the greatest moments I've ever experienced in my entire life and I thank God to this day for giving me that, because it was the second reason I got from Him to come back down. Before I went to bed on my last day, I wrote notes for some of the most significant people I’ve met in my past years. In the morning, I dished those out to the people they belonged to and then headed to the bus. On my way back to the bus, Maria José stopped me in the middle of the road to say goodbye to me and she gave me a rubber bracelet that I promised I’d never take off. After saying goodbye, I hopped on the bus and we were off.

The bus ride was really hard for me but it gave me a lot of time to process what I felt God was trying to get across to me. With about 15 minutes left on the bus ride I made a decision. I wrote another letter, this time to Papí and Mamí. First, I thanked them for letting me grow up in their home. Then I went on to promise that I’d come back again. I didn’t know how or when, but I knew I’d be back. Then, on the car ride home from Chicago, I told my mom what I thought and she supported the idea and gave me many questions to think about. While home, the more I thought about going back, the more people I told. It was kind of my own way of cementing my idea, because if all those people expected me to go to Honduras to volunteer and I didn’t, I would feel like I not only let them down, but myself as well. I prayed about the idea a lot and I decided I’d take a gap year after high school and serve down here for an undetermined amount of time. I planned to leave in August but certain events prevented me from doing that. Instead, I was led into the childcare field by starting a job with the YMCA summer care program. Since I had graduated high school by now, my mom wouldn’t be funding my trips to Honduras anymore. However, she still went on her trip with Peanut and Jaden. When she came back she told me about her travels and about all of the kids that wished I had come with. What broke my heart is that she told me Maria José had run away from the orphanage. This hurt a lot because a couple months prior, the bracelet she had given me snapped at one of my volleyball practices. As summer came to an end, the only options the Y offered me were before school care and after school care(sited at the nearby elementary school). I jumped on both of those opportunities but I felt like I wasn’t doing enough. With a school day long break in between my two shifts, I decided to ask the front desk lady at the elementary school if they needed a recess or lunch aid and she said that yes they needed help and gave me the head of HR’s phone number. When I called him, he gave me an opportunity as a paraprofessional and set up an interview with me. I worked 6am to 6pm five days a week to help fund this trip of mine. I worked at both the middle school and the elementary school(they are right next to each other) during the semester I was there and in November, I ended up getting suckered into being the head coach of the 7th grade basketball team as well. There are a lot of stories I could tell about work but that isn’t what this post is about so I’ll fast forward to this trip.

I finalized all my paperwork and was ready to leave by January 27th. But I wanted to see Andres in MKE one more time before I left, so I drove down and spent the weekend with him. On Friday night, Andres and Madi treated me to sushi, which I told them was perfect since I wanted to treat myself to sushi one more time before I left. After that, Andres and I set ourselves up for a beautiful churchy chicken dinner while watching ‘Rebel Moon’. We had mixed feelings about both the movie, and the churchy chicken dinner. I spent most of my Sunday with Brendan(an old teammate of mine that attends MSOE) and then went back to Andres’ place for about four more hours afterward before heading back home. The next day at work my wisdom teeth were bothering me a lot, so I called a couple places and scheduled an appointment for Tuesday. Tuesday was just supposed to be a referral appointment, but when the doctor saw how far along my wisdom teeth were, he decided I needed them pulled that day. That same Tuesday, I begged my dad to take me to work because I swore to him I was fine. And I was fine. But my mom told me that "by tomorrow I would be in a world of pain”, and sure enough, the next day… I felt completely fine. So I had a coworker pick me up and take me to work since my parents had my car keys(because they knew). Then I worked a full day on Thursday so that I could say goodbye to all of my students and coworkers. On Friday I ran multiple errands and packed, but I also went to the brand new Neenah High School(they finished the summer after I graduated) to say goodbye to some of my favorite teachers. I was so glad I could visit all of them and I made sure to have my mom send them my blog so that they could keep up with my journeys down here(hi guys!). On Friday night, my parents brought me to Chicago and finally, I’ve caught you all up to blog post #1. One thing I don’t think I ever mentioned is that Gibran and Christofer left the orphanage two weeks before I came down and they now live in Tegucigalpa(the capital) with their older sister. It's really unfortunate that I won't get to see them everyday, but I plan to make my way out to see them once during my trip.

On a final note, for all of my friends who have made it here to the last paragraph, you are truly a real one and I appreciate you stickin it through and giving my story a read. Since I am writing this post at the end of week 11, I just decided I’m going to jam weeks 10 and 11 together since not a lot happened in week ten anyways. Once again, thank y’all for the support and I look forward to continuing to write for you. To be continued…