March 11

Again, a very busy day. Our schedule was about the same today as yesterday.....just different locations. We left the hotel at 8:15 for an approximately 2 hour drive on roads that not only were immensely crowded but also poorly maintained. So, we bounced about in the cars alot in addition to dodging all the traffic. We finally made it in one piece to the ministry center we were going to. There we split up again with the same three choices of places to go to. Sam & I both chose the CDC centers. These are the ones that have the schools. The first one was in a little village surrounded by rice fields. We washed the children's hands, scooped out their nutritionally balanced rice meal onto plates, and took lots of pictures. The second one was down a little narrow road in one of the larger towns. We are told this one was situated in an area of the most needy. It was very small but here, instead of the children following us back to the car we were followed by the adults and those kids who were not part of the school. After visiting both of the schools we went back to the ministry center arriving about the same time as the other groups. We ate lunch then had a little bit of down time while classes were being taught for the area ministers. Some of the women met with the wives of the pastors and visited with them. The children at this center then presented all of us with handmade woven fans and flowers. And, then we got a group picture. It was originally just going to be a picture of our team but ended up with nearly everybody present wanting to get in on the picture. So, many different picture groups were taken! After loading back into our vehicles we drove to another small village. We had to walk down part of the road as it was too narrow for the cars to drive. We went into the center of the village to a house where we sat on benches watching the faces of the community as they listened to the Evangecube story. It was very interesting to see the community life. Finally, after a very long and strenuous drive back to the hotel we are ready to eat and rest.