Noehmi's Surgery, Take 2

This is Noehmi. She is six and tiny and very cute. She has a double hernia and we are trying to help her get it fixed. Many of you have offered to contribute to this endeavor, and her mother and father appreciate it very much, as do I. Yesterday we went to pick her up with her parents and take her to the hospital.

We drove to the center of town and picked them up. Her father, in addition to being a subsistence farmer, is the pastor of this little church in the village. It is the only other church besides the one we normally work with, the Baptist church that Santos pastors. This one is prettier.

This is Noehmi outside her house yesterday. Hers is one of the poorer families in Pueblo Nuevo, I think. She had on her fanciest clothes for the trip, as did her parents.

Unfortunately, when we got in the car, we noticed it had a flat tire. This delayed our departure BY NEARLY THREE HOURS! The reasons for this delay are too boring to write, but suffice it to say that it was both fun and stressful.

Here is Jonathan and Noehmi's father trying to read the car's instruction manual in Spanish. The book used the words "mango" and "gato" but not in their normal sense. Apparently these words also mean some car part that none of us could identify, and yet is crucial for changing a flat tire in less than three hours. Everybody, including the villagers, found "mango" amusing, and the little boy on the right pointed up in the mango tree we were standing under.

We put the warning triangle out while we changed the tire in case some high speed trafic might come up on us... on a horse or something.

After we let the car down off the jack, we saw that our spare tire was also flat, although not as flat as the original. I decided we were going to try and drive out on it anyway, but the family stayed behind in case we weren't able to make it out, which we did, gratefully. I was a little concerned that crossing the river with a flat tire might be difficult, but it wasn't any more difficult than normal.

So this morning, The M dropped the work crew at Danta Uno and then picked up the family at the suspension bridge. The mother gave her a big hug when she saw her, which was a surprisingly demonstrative display of affection. They all went to the hospital and got her examined and scheduled for tomorrow at 11 a.m.. The hospital is contributing 10,000 Lempiras (about $500) which will leave the bill at around $750 plus some expenses for food, and a hotel for a couple of nights. We have this covered now, thanks to you generous donors.

We shared a scripture with the family, Galatians 6:10 which says:

"So then, as we have opportunity, let us work that which is good toward all men, and especially toward them that are of the household of the faith."

I told him that even though we work with a different church than the one he pastors, that we share the same father, and are therefore family. His face brightened at this, but then he mumbled something about mangos that I couldn't follow.