Farming is the main source of income in Pelenque. Some farmers use tractors while others work the ground with a plow and plant the seeds by hand (as shown in the picture below). Some of the crops they grow are corn, beans, bananas, coffee, sugar cane, garlic, and onions.

We traveled to Barquisimeto (Pelenque) with a group from our church. The Shaloam band performed during several church services, we helped with the children's Sunday School class, and played soccer and baseball with the youth.

Can you believe this growing season? Sholder-high corn on December 23.

Bienvenidos to Venezuela

We do our laundry in an open-toped washing machine, rince it out by hand, and hang it out to dry. Our forearms are going to be huge from the wringing-out process.

Brett journaling on our front doorstep. As you can see in the picture, most windows have no glass or screens, which also means no air conditionaing.

Upon arriving in Venezuela, they treated us to Coca-Cola and a meal of rice, salad, and potatoes. This is the kitchen in Brett, Cassandra, and Jeremy's

house where they do all their own cooking. They are trying to perfect making rice and arepas (the Venezuelan national food).

This is Shaloam Mennonite Church where we will be serving for the next eight months. There are about 150 people who regularly attend the church. Brett, Cassandra, and Jeremy are living in a house above the church. The palm tree in the center marks the front door of our house.

We gather in the foyer before every meal, every day to pray and make announcements. There is a little bell that rings to let us know when to meet, and it is annoying, but good. The mansion we are in is pretty cool, you can see the main staircase there, and it goes up and then two sets of stairs go to the next floor. It is 3 floors plus a basement






We have 2 sessions a day, about 4 hours total on a variety of topics ranging from cultural evangelism, powerful prayer, dying to self living for Christ, the father heart of God, leadership, conflict resolution, personality profiles, prophecy, and a whole lot of other stuff. Much of it is stretching, but in a good way.


This is the Dining Hall where we crowd in 46 people to eat food which is sometimes okay.
Each person eats on $2.40 a day, and that includes a lot of coffee and hot chocolate.
They are trying to prepare everyone for not so good tasting food, and not very balanced diets. Thankfully we found out that the Venezuelans eat real good!

This past Saturday we had a fall yard party for everyone in our community, that was geared mostly to families with kids. We had a great turnout, 70 people or so. We had games, face painting, bobbing apples, free bbq chicken, hotdogs, and even a bicycle repair station, which was very popular. I think every kid in the neighborhood brought their bike.

It took cassie a while, but she
finally got the apple, you
will have to ask her about it.

Brett playing with the kids,
and them teaching him
some local signs. He is
popular with the shoulder
rides because he is one of
the tallest.

Cassie gettin creative
with her face painting
skills.

Couple of local little guys
having fun

f

This weekend was our only weekend off during our training time, so we decided to go to Virginia!

We went with a friend from the training center to his house in the Shenandoah valley where his dad is a dairy farmer, and got to ride four-wheelers.
We also went up to the Shenandoah National Park
and hiked and camped for a night. The fall colors are
were crazy!

f

View from the Appalachian Trail, looking over the Susquehanna River. We went hiking on Sunday, September 30 for the afternoon.

The guys put on a banquet for all the girls

View from Resevoir Park where we like to go to get away from the noise of the city. It is only a few blocks away
HDC Yard where the kids come to play

Here is the main building of the Harrisburg Discipleship Center. This is where we spend most of our time in classes, worship, eating, and hanging out.

We had a fire behind the house the first day we were here. It was pretty exciting, and brought all the locals and tv crews out. Needless to say, not a lot going on.










Here is our team going to Venezuela.
Left to Right: Brett, Cassie, Dani, Alyse, Kirsten, Jeremy.











Hopefully we'll get more pictures up soon. We are new to the blog world, and only get 20 minutes at a time to work on it.