Cuba December 2007 Trip Journal

Team members: Bruce (leader), Julie, Chelsea, Janet, Steve, Taffy, Tom, Shari, David, Ira, and Darlene.

December 2, 2007, Sunday
My early morning flight left at 6:00 am from KCI. While in the check-in line, I met Tom for the first time. He lives two hours north of the airport. I was expecting to find him since we were on the same flight. All the team was to converge on the Houston to Cancun flight. It was a quick turn around in Houston. When Tom and I got to the gate, the plane had already boarded. During the flight, I went to the back and found Bruce. The others were all wearing bright yellow team travel shirts so they were easy to spot.

Darlene, the team member from Baton Rouge, had missed her flight due to reasons that were confusing to me at the time. She had a later flight into Cancun to link up with us and we ate in the airport during the layover. Tom and I changed into our yellow T-shirts. While we ate, a stranger (American) stopped by our table - he had seen our VIM T-shirts. He was a United Methodist too and asked about our trip, then wished us well.

Darlene finally arrived after many trials and tribulations with her luggage. She was carrying most of the medicine and there was concern about getting it through Customs. It all turned out OK with the only exception being missing stool softener from one of the other bags. Her bags had been checked through to Customs, but she didn't know it.

We jumped on the shuttle bus to the terminal where our Cuba flight departed. We located the small Cubana airline counter. They said we needed "visas", but Bruce insisted we already had them waiting for us in Havana. No - we needed to buy them here for $18 each. They were purchased at a different counter on the other side of the terminal. To expedite things, Julie charged them all on her credit card - which really helped. We later understood these were not the Cuban entry Visas, just an airport tax. Team members had to spend time at the ticket counter, go over to get a "visa", then come back to check bags and re-obtain the ticket!

This was all confusing enough, and then things got even more chaotic. It became extremely busy at the Cubana counter. Not only were 11 Americans trying to check bags and get boarding passes, but a crowd of others as well. We later found out that there are only two flights a day from Cancun to Havana: Cubana and Mexican Air. The Mexican Air flight had been cancelled (or delayed) so everyone was switching to our Cubana flight. We got there just in time - they were starting to give our seats away.

We were also concerned about overweight baggage and were prepared to pay the overage. Things were so crazy that the poor ticket counter guy didn't spend time to process this and just let them go (which was a great thing for us).

Time was now very short to get to the gate in time and not miss the flight. We arrived at the gate and soon boarded the people mover bus. We were all very happy to be on the bus at this point after all the disorder with the visas, bags, and tickets. Then the bus proceeded to sit there for about an hour before eventually taking us to the plane. As we climbed up the stairs to the plane's door, it was interesting to see the Russian signage on the plane. It was a Yak-42 and I hesitate to guess its age.

Before the plane pulled back from the gate, I saw a large cart outside the window full of luggage. Several bags were identified with the team's distinctive neon green cord and one I could see was mine. We knew before we left the ground that all of our luggage would not arrive in Havana with us - and it didn't. After the plane was pushed back, we stopped and waited another long time. It was several hours late taking off. People going back to Cuba after visiting Mexico brought back large, bulky items they could not normally get in Cuba. This added to the luggage problem.

While waiting in the cramped seats, what appeared at first to be smoke started coming up from the floor. No one seemed particularly concerned about this. I figured out it was just water vapor from the air conditioning. One of the vents happened to be next to my feet. It acted like a fog machine at a rock concert. A passing thought: I wonder if a Cuban airliner crashed in the ocean and killed all aboard if it would make the news back home. Just wondering.

When we took off from the Cancun airport, we flew over the beach area. There were large hotel resorts, swimming pools, white beaches, and beautiful blue water with patches of turquoise and green. The airplane was very noisy, both from the engine and the people. I remembered my earplugs and they really helped.

Toward the end of the flight, there was an announcement in Spanish over the intercom which we could not understand. Then a flight attendant walked down the isle spraying, what we assume, was some type of disinfectant in the cabin - maybe for bugs or bacteria. As we came in for the landing at Havana airport everything was green and beautiful. You could see tall Royal Palm trees. As it turns out they are a very common sight all over Cuba.

As expected, half our bags did not arrive. Oh well! After checking through Customs with what we had, we met our translator for the trip: a vivacious 34-year old Cuban woman named Laura. She will stay with us just like one of the family for the entire trip. Manuel was the long time bus driver - Bruce and Ira remembered him from their trip five years ago. Even in the dark we started to see all the vintage 40s and 50s cars.

After a long ride in the early evening darkness, we arrived at the Cuban Methodist Center. We were assigned sleeping rooms and I was with a group of four. The rooms were simple with clean bedding and a towel. A blanket was not needed. The common bathrooms were off the hallway. The toilets barely flushed and, as usual, put the toilet paper in the trash can, not down the toilet.

There is a staff of people working here. It has accommodations for teams like us and well as other Cubans who visit the center. There is a dining hall with long tables, two cooks, and two helpers/servers. Other employees of the compound include "security" which also got translated as "custodian". It was neither in the traditional sense. Basically there is always someone on site to just make sure things were OK with regard to people coming and going - to keep an eye on things.

There were nice place settings at the table. Dinner was pumpkin/noodle soup, fried bananas (plantains probably), rice & chicken with hot sauce, fruit juice, water, and marmalade for desert. Many of us were tired after the long day, but not really sleepy yet.

The VIM mantra continues - Be Flexible! The remaining bags should arrive on tomorrow's flight - but there's no guarantee. The original plan was to leave tomorrow and travel four hours to Camp Canaan, then travel eight hours the next day to Pilon. We'll need to spend an extra night here and the schedule may slip 24 hours as a result. Worst case is we will have one less day to work. We'll see.

December 3, Monday
Ira woke me at 7:30 am for 8:00 breakfast. Soft bed. Warm shower - low water pressure, but adequate enough to get the job done. The bathrooms are nice and tiled. The entire Methodist Center (MC from now on) has been fixed up a lot in the last 5 years.

We gathered in the lobby outside the dining hall and chatted about where people were from and how they knew each other. A great quote from Darlene: "People in need have no nationality". Janet is a 7th grade life science teacher. Julie is ex-Air Force academy. Taffy's real name is Catherine - Cathy for short. When very young her sister pronounced "Cathy" as "Taffy" and the name stuck.

After breakfast we walked to a bank on the next block to exchange money. As we walked up to the building some uniformed officers got active. One handed another an automatic rifle. An armored van had just pulled up to unload money. We had to wait until this was done before we could enter. In fact, we waited just around the corner out of sight so to not make them nervous. The exchange from U.S. dollars to Cuban convertible currency units (CCU) is one to one after a 20% cut off the top. So $150 USD bought 120 CCUs. There's a dual money system: one price for locals and another for tourists. One local peso = 5 cents. One CCU = $1 USD less 20%.

After exchanging money, I waited outside the bank and did some people watching. There was a man in the street pulling a cart with 2 large empty barrels. Later I saw him going the opposite direction except the barrels were now full of water. Fortunately for him he was now going down hill. Another man was washing a white Lada 1600 (a Russian car) with a bucket of soapy water. There's a school across the street and we could see the different grades outside playing and doing activities. Cuban students wear school uniforms. The school looked like a large rich person's house. Many buildings that were some sort of establishment had security guards.

It's common to see people on bicycles and motorcycles. It was also not unusual to see sidecars. There must be a helmet law in Cuba because everyone wore some form of helmet. Bicycles are old styles, nothing like we would see in the U.S. I saw one bike seat that was mostly all duct tape.

And, of course, many vintage cars. Cuba was in its hay day in the 1940-50s. After the revolution, all of that changed and new cars were pretty much a thing of the past. By necessity, old cars had to be maintained and used. I've never seen so many brightly colored '56 and '57 Chevys. Also Hudsons, 3-hole Buicks, Plymouths, etc. I thought this was really cool, even though I don't know a lot about cars.

Back at the MC, the team met with the Bishop's assistant. There's a change in the schedule due to the bags (duh!). It's important to get to Pilon due to church activities there. By the time we drive there we will have seen most of Cuba. Pilon is a "kind" church, but "poor". However, it is alive in the Holy Spirit. It was founded in 1956 when just a chapel. The hurricane two years ago destroyed the church. It had to be torn down and totally rebuilt. It was too small anyway. It's a growing church. This is a big project for this location. Normally we would leave the medicine in Havana to distribute, but we should take it to Pilon. The government does not allow guests to stay in people's homes. If the mission site is not safe or ready, we will stay in a hotel. It sounds like we will have a marathon drive all the way to Pilon in one day. We'll get up early tomorrow morning and start. We'll still stop at Camp Canaan on the way back.

There's still an hour before lunch so some of us walked around the block to see what there was to see. Darlene and Taffy bought cans of "TuCola", the Cuban generic Coke. Darlene has to have her cola! We stopped in a small music store, but it was mostly CDs. Coming back to the MC we stopped in the church, which is right next door, to take a quick tour. The sanctuary has a drum set, sound system, bass guitar, no electric lights, lots of windows, and light colored walls. The hard walls and tile floor make even normal speaking reverberate. I can't imagine how loud it is with a room full of people and amplified music.

Because we needed to wait for today's flight from Cancun (for our bags), we had time to kill this afternoon. We decided to go to "old Havana". On the bus ride there it's interesting to see the political propaganda billboards. Since there is no free enterprise, the city - in fact the whole country - is free from sight polluting signs. In its place are government sponsored (I assume) billboards. There is one particular billboard which simply has President Bush's face "+" a well known Cuban terrorist bomber's face "=" Hitler's face. No wording - just a drawing of faces with math symbols.

As with many old cities hundreds of years old, it is close to the water's edge. There are many buildings with scaffolding undergoing restoration. The Spanish government is helping to pay. Since the Spaniards founded Havana they see it as part of their heritage and are willing to pay to have it restored. Many buildings have columns and look colonial in style.

We walked through several areas or squares in old Havana. In one corner there is a 4-5 story tall church with wooden scaffolding covering the entire front of it. It's made of 6 x 6(?) posts butt spliced with boards on the four sides - lots of cross bracing held with two nails on each end. It's unbelievable that it stands up under its own weight! I wouldn't work on it for anything.

There was live music coming from a restaurant: trumpet, drums, conga, guitar, percussion, and stand-up bass. Many of the old original buildings have ornate wood doors 15-20 feet tall. As I walked down the street, a guy came up to me and said "Cigar?" asking me if I wanted to buy. This must be illegal because it seems like he's doing it covertly. He speaks softly, has no vendor stand, not even a cigar to show me.

There are many art galleries, especially folk art. This is because of the government's support of culture. A vendor at a horse-drawn carriage talked to Chelsea and me asking if we are missionaries. We tell him "yes" and "Pilon". He says "God bless you" as we part.

Shortly after that another man across the street asked me where I was from. At this point I'm thinking "Gee, these Cubans are really friendly". I walked over and started to talk with him. He tells me his name, asks mine, shaking hands a long time, etc. He's very friendly and engaging. Then I hear "Steve…Steve…". From the other side of the street the team is saying "come here" so I go back with the others. Later I learned that Laura saw me with this guy and told the others to "call him!" Apparently I was not in a safe situation.

Down one street is a large wall painted with full body portraits of famous historical Cubans. Some are portrayed as standing on balconies.

There was a slight breeze and it's cloudy. This is good; otherwise, it would seem very hot. In one square there are some original wooden "bricks" (the size and shape of paving bricks) in the street for pavement. These date back as much as 480 years! Most of the squares have shops, music, fountains, etc.

As we headed back to the bus, a violin and guitar player tried to engage us with music for some money. No luck on the money, but I gave the guitar player a confetti colored guitar pick that I had. Mistake! The violin player comes back and holds out his hat for "a peso". He says something about "papa" and "Happy Navidad". In hindsight, it was fortunate we had this time to see the old part of town. We wouldn't have had time to see everything at the end of the trip.

Back at the MC I saw a guy in the dining room playing a guitar. I went in and, even though he spoke no English, figured out he plays bass in the praise band. We played some songs for each other and he was teaching me a Jose Feliciano song when Bruce came in and said "come on Steve - we're going to the airport!" All the people who had bags to pick up at the airport got on the bus and started to leave. They had just pulled away when someone noticed I wasn't there. That's why Bruce ran in to get me while I was playing guitar.

The bag pick-up went without incident except for a large bag of medicines that Darlene had. She was delayed from the rest of us, but finally immerged from Customs. She had to explain the drugs and in the process hid the vials used for injections - just in case. She did not have any needles though. Most of the customs agents are young people who probably don't really know what they are looking for. We ate dinner and showered for an EARLY departure for Pilon tomorrow morning.

December 4, Tuesday
Breakfast at 6:30 am. Bus left a little after 7:00. This began the longest drive (time-wise) I have taken in one day. Thankfully I wasn't driving, but it was tiring none the less. Highway A1 is the main highway that runs East and West through much of Cuba. It's a divided highway like an Interstate, but certainly not up to U.S. standards. The "divider" between the two directions was just a 6 foot strip of grass punctuated by decorative flowering bushes at regular intervals. The width accommodates 3-4 lanes each direction, however, the lane lines (where present) are very faint. Vehicles drove kind-of where you thought a lane should be. Any lines you could see were more of a "guideline" instead of a "rule" - I guess.

People stood on the roadside trying to catch a ride. Some would hold out a peso to indicate they will pay. Otherwise, free buses or trucks might pick you up - if they had room.

As Manuel drove, we saw hours worth of palm trees, banana trees, strange tropical vegetation, but everything is green - in December! There is also a lot of sugar cane at various stages of growth. And look - there's a large grove of orange trees.

At 8:00 am there was still some morning mist in lower areas, but that would soon burn off. I saw two men with a pair of oxen pulling a single furrow plow - it looks like something from 100 years ago. Out here in the rural area it was not uncommon to see a working team of oxen or horses pulling carts. There were even occasionally people standing in the median selling food or other items.

People on bikes are very common in Cuba, even riding on the side of the highway. You would never see this type of pedestrian traffic on a U.S. Interstate. After two and a half hours we stopped at a nice rest area (a hostel). There was a "convenience store", nice rest rooms, and souvenirs. By the time we were three hours away from Havana, there were fewer people on the side of the road.

At locations along the double highway are metal "tank traps" and other forms of barricades which are off the road. There weren't enough of them to effectively actually stop tanks and I thought maybe they were some sort of political/military symbol or "art work". Manual said they are for putting onto the highway in case Cuba is attacked. They are obstacles to prevent planes from using the highway as a landing strip. These are mostly within 100 km of Havana and not so much out in the rural area.

The divided highway eventually narrowed into a single three lane road. The middle lane is for passing from either direction (aka a suicide lane). Occasionally there are police checkpoints. Manuel slows down at each one to see if they want us to stop. They never did and just waved us through. I later heard those may have been state borders.

Now we're down to a single lane road each direction. As the highway gets further away from Havana, the road gets narrower and less maintained. This is true all the way to Pilon which seems to be at the edge of the world. It's slow going as we have to pass numerous horse-drawn carts and dodging car-sized potholes.

Lunch was at a nice roadside restaurant. Most of us ordered the fried chicken with potatoes (because it was available and we knew what it was). It was sizzling hot out of the pan. While waiting for our food we walked on the pathway behind the building through an area containing foot bridges and a babbling brook - very serene and peaceful with all the greenery.

In the afternoon, we were just riding along when Manuel pulled the bus off at a house on the side of the road. I figured someone had to take a quick break or something. This was not a rest area - it looked like someone's residence and out buildings. He pulled in, stopped, looked around, and maybe even honked. Actually, he was getting some fuel. A large shirtless man came out and got several 5-gallon containers of diesel and poured into the gas tank. We all got out of the bus while this was going on so we could stand and stretch. Obviously, Manuel knew fuel was available here. There were no signs. I don't know if it was an official gas station or just some guy on the side who always has fuel. Strange. Regardless, in 10 minutes we're back on the road again (I hear a Willy Nelson song!).

There's another rest stop for rest rooms and snacks. As the road becomes narrower, it's important not to stick any body parts (like head or arms) out the window. When a large vehicle passes going the opposite direction, sometimes it is only inches away. It amazes me that during the entire trip there are no accidents or travel issues. Manuel did a great job!

After 14 hours on the road, we finally arrived in Pilon and pulled into the church. It's dark but we can tell the church is nowhere near finished. There's just concrete block walls - no floor, windows, or ceiling. Indeed this will be concrete work, not finish painting as originally told months before. As we got off the bus and stretched our weary bones, we still didn't know our sleeping accommodations. Dinner was waiting for us though - fish and rice.

It turns out we are staying in the pastor's house which is right next to the work site. This will be very convenient. The six women crowd into one room with three bunk beds (and a window air conditioner!). Adjoining that bedroom is a new huge bathroom just finished the day before. In fact it's so new that there is no bathroom door or shower curtain yet. No one ever said you had privacy on a mission trip! The new bathroom has very PINK floor and wall tiles, as well as hot and cold water.

The guys share two other rooms, one connected to the other. There were beds in every corner of the house! We settled on three of us per room. The bedroom door must be new, too, since it has no door knob. A piece of duct tape was on the edge of the door and sticking out on the ends. This caused the door to sort-of close tight and stay closed. It was awkward from one side to have to pull this little piece of duct tape toward you with just enough force to close the door. We share a small bathroom and shower off the hallway, which is also the bathroom that the family uses. The water supply to the sink is not connected until the next day. No hot water faucet for the shower, just "water".

Immediately next to the house is a roof structure (think large "car port" for people) that constitutes the "temporary" worship center. There is a hodge-podge of pews which I assume were rescued from the old building. This is the church building until the new one is built.

Upon introductions, Pastor Aleibiades Negret immediately became "Pastor Al". He lives there with his wife and three kids: Jose, Joshua, and Kari. Their temporary bedroom is an open room that is wall to wall beds. This is where the family moved during our stay. No privacy for them. Four days earlier the Pastor's wife had surgery and was released from the hospital just the day before. She moved slowly the entire time we were there and was visited daily (?) by a home nurse.

The oldest child, 17 years, was home from school on family health leave to help at home. He stayed in a small separate room jammed with equipment and supplies. The middle boy, maybe 10-12 years, must have stayed with friends or family somewhere else during our stay. Baby Kari is cute as a button and, even with her case of terrible twos, ruled the roost.

In addition to the family and a 12 member team (including Laura), there were 5-6 women around all day helping to cook, wash, clean, and help Mrs. Al. Then there were 6-8 men working on the building, but they did not occupy the house. Add to that other church members who came around, worship team practice, and the older son continually blasting music from the sound system, I really felt sorry for the recuperating wife. As we learned more over the first day or two, we realized what a hardship and sacrifice it was for this family to share their home with so many people.

December 5, Wednesday
We sort of sleep in today, but gather for 8:00 breakfast. Some are up before others and find the coffee. It's in a yellow plastic container labeled "Happiness Vacuum Flask". This becomes one of our most endearing jokes for the whole trip. We don't get coffee. It's "who wants a cup of Happiness from the Yellow Happiness Vacuum Flask?"

As we finished breakfast, the workmen had already started working on the building. As with the start of any project like this, we don't really know who the people are or what to do. Most of the day was spent selecting long thin trees (4-7 inches wide at the base), cutting them square to length, nailing a small board on the large end as a base, handing up and positioning planks on the open roof to create a flooring to pour a concrete roof, cutting rebar, sifting gravel, wheelbarrowing the larger pieces sifted out and dumping as filler inside the building. We quit around 6:00 pm after what seemed a long, hard day.

A word about cutting rebar - Cuban style. There was a lot of rebar on site - no doubt enough ordered to do the entire church. We tried to cut it using the one and only reciprocating saw and a fine tooth blade. Either the blade was too dull (probably) or the metal too hard. It barely made a dent. So plan B. Carry the rebar to a train wheel held upright by a stick through the axle hole. Place the bar perpendicular on the wheel's edge and hit it 6-7 times with a 25 lb sledge hammer. Extremely labor intensive! I left the heavy work to the younger stronger Cubans who wouldn't die of a heart attack like I would. My role is just a hard working helper.

And a word about the reciprocating saw. A Bosch brand - very sturdy. This was in almost continual use - all the time being abused. It was handed back and forth from the crew rough cutting the poles and the crew performing their final positioning.

There are rooms on three corners of the building. The concrete roof for "room #1" was poured before we got there and is still in the 30-day cure. Every morning the top of it is watered down from buckets of water pulled up by rope. There are 42 (what I will refer to from now on as) "tree poles" used to support the planking for each roof. That's to hold the weight when the concrete is poured. It's a lot of work to cut and position this structure. Most of the work we do on this trip is preparation for pouring the other two roofs.

During the lunch time siesta, several of us walked to the ocean front to see what there was to see. We passed a shell of a building that had been part of the sugar cane industry. We found a finger of man-made land that once supported a long pier which held a railroad track that ran out to load the sugar cane boats. There were only a handful of rusty metal support structures in the water now. Local boys swam in the blue water, out to the pier, and jumped off like a diving board.

The church building we are constructing would normally not be allowed under Fidel's government. Apparently, existing churches could stay, but no new ones built. An exception is if it were destroyed like this one was by a hurricane. It can be rebuilt.

In a sense, the hurricane was a blessing that allowed a new, larger building to be built. However, if you peel another layer of the onion back, we heard that on the night after the storm some men from the church came and pushed down the remaining walls forcing a complete destruction. Architectural drawings for a new building have existed since 1999, but nothing could be done until the storm.

This home church has spun off eight other smaller churches in/around Pilon. Some of these are home churches. We will go to one tomorrow night. Pastor Al said that many children come to the church service and when they leave they are drunk with the Holy Spirit.

I was resting after work when I heard strange music being played from the street. After a time I eventually got up to see what was making all the noise. It came from the building across the street. Other team members had already gone over. By the time I got there and actually saw it, they were almost done. It was a calliope-style instrument that is unique to Cuba. Laura had never actually seen or heard one before, so she was very excited. This was a concert of sorts. In addition to the calliope were drums, shaker, a cow bell, and maybe more. Surprisingly there was not a big crowd. These guys get together and play whenever they can just to keep the tradition going, so it's no big deal for the locals to hear them. Also, tonight is a wedding rehearsal for a young couple from the church. They will be married Saturday.

December 6, Thursday
As the work day began Bruce, Julie, and I volunteered to go with five locals including Pastor Al and Laura out to "the bush" to cut more trees. Tools consisted of one (1) single-bladed axe and one (1) machete (right - that's what I thought too). We climbed up into the heavy duty truck bed taking with us drinking water and bug repellent, and off we go to - well - I'm not exactly sure - but I'm sure it will provide a unique experience!

We drove down the street and then down into a dry river bed that ran through town. It was basically a dry canal with levees as river banks to hold in the water. However, at several places roads were cut through the banks to allow traffic to cross. In a hard rain the dry river will sometimes flood nearby homes. After going "down stream" a ways we crossed back up onto a regular street. A few hundred yards later the truck jerked, made one of those noises that make you cringe, and then jolted to a halt. Oops - transmission problems.

The driver and helper got out with some tools and crawled under the truck. After five minutes someone suggested we might as well get down and find some shade. We waited on the side of the road while the driver pulled a seat out of the truck to lie on the ground to better work underneath the truck. That's not a good sign!

Instead of twiddling my thumbs, I pulled a magic trick from my pocket and changed all the gems to purple! After 15 minutes it was clear the truck was not a quick fix, so we caught a ride back in an open cart pulled by a tractor. I have to confess that the three of us were not heart broken by not having to cut trees down in "the bush" with a machete. For the rest of our time in Pilon there was not another attempt at cutting down more trees.

We had to walk a couple of final blocks back to the work site. As we got near I repeatedly egged Julie on with "Come on - I'll race to you to the church", but she would have none of it - even racing an old fart like me. Now you have to understand that Julie is ex-Air Force and ex-AF Academy. She had already shared stories of school and being immersed in that male-bonding environment. Even I can tell that she is extremely independent and quickly replies (in a friendly way) to an offer of help "I'm OK."

So - knowing this - I decide to continue pressing the envelop with "Oh - that's right - you're just a girl". That did it! She started running and I along side her for the 100 feet or so back to the church. Other team members who were lollygagging on the porch had a strange look on their faces like "why in the world are they running on a hot day!" The race was a tie. I figured not bad considering she is 15 years younger than me and stronger.

Since we couldn't cut down more trees, we moved the ones dumped the previous day from in front of the church to the side. Two piles were created: straighter ones and crooked ones. It usually took one Cuban to pick up and move one tree and it took two Americans to do the same thing.

Once when Sergio threw down a tree, a big splinter of wood flew off and whacked me on the cheek just under my eye. Everything was OK, but I was hoping for a black eye or at least a minor bruise for a temporary "battle scar". I spent other time helping to lay planks on the roof in preparation for pouring concrete. Others helped to build concrete forms for the side of the 3rd room. Just before lunch the concrete mixer was set up. I have a feeling the afternoon is going to be busy!

All the meals in Cuba were very good and filling. The hard work makes a person hungry. More about the food toward the end of the trip.

Sure enough the afternoon had us mixing concrete, loading and moving wheelbarrows full of various gravels, sand, carrying water, etc. Alex, one of the local men, controlled the actual mixing of ingredients. The mixer itself was temperamental at times. It might get overloaded and stop turning. Then he took the end of one bare wire and touched it against another wire. Whatever this did caused it to goose it back into action.

This first pour was to level up the 3rd room wall. They must have run out of cement blocks at that point because it was a course or two short for that section and needed to be leveled before the roof was done. There were only two buckets and you can only fill them about half full. One person shoveled concrete from the wheelbarrow into the bucket and then it's handled several times to different people up on the scaffolding to pour into the form. The scaffolding was moved several times to help lift up the concrete to the right place.

Other work was preparing more tree poles. It seemed like there was always 2-4 people doing this. Each room needed at least 42 poles and we prepared two rooms (for those who are math challenged - that's 84 poles). Additional poles were needed to support the edge forms which stuck out from the wall. We had just the one reciprocating saw with (we thought) just one wood cutting blade.

How we made cuts seemed inefficient. The tree starts out having been rough cut at both ends. We cut it once at the base to square it off (although the blade never cut straight) and a square cut on the other end to get it more to the approximate needed length. After a piece of wood was nailed on as the base, Juan and Roberto measured it where it will specifically go then made a compound cut so it supports a cross beam. That's A LOT of cutting for one old worn out dull saw blade! If that blade breaks we are in a world of hurt.

While we were working, a horse drawn cart backed into the yard and unloaded an old ram (i.e. sheep). They later butchered it behind the house and hung it in the tree outside our bedroom window. No doubt the mystery meat we had over the next couple of days was supplied complements of the old ram.

Another hard day's work! There are people all over the place: the team, the family, kitchen helpers, and people for the wedding party. At the end of dinner there was a light rain for about five minutes, then heavier for 45 seconds - then it stopped.

Tonight is a party for the couple getting married Saturday - sort of a combined bachelor and bachelorette party. Of course there was the obligatory loud music with jumping, singing, and clapping, a funny skit (portrayed by other persons) of him asking for her love through a friend, newlywed game (Q&A), charades, and a "put lipstick on your fiancé while blindfolded" game. Fun for all.

December 7, Friday
At 7:30 am I heard music while still in bed and thought it was the band across the street again. It was some sort of Memorial Day parade and I missed it! Just goes to prove - you snooze, you lose.

We continued to prepare tree poles, switching for a time to using the machete to cut the smaller top. This is to help save the saw blade. There's an art to swinging a machete. After being embarrassingly bad at it, I had the most luck using both hands, aiming well, and not rushing.

Juan wanted us to always make two cuts on the pole: one to square off the large base end, measure upward, and then cut the smaller top. Some of these trees have a larger base diameter than others and it's murder on the reciprocating saw, as well as us, to make those thick cuts. We figured it's better/easier to use the top that's already cut, measure downward, and make a square cut for the base. It's half the cuts and the cuts you do make are not as hard. The base should still be large and strong enough. A couple of times Juan "catches" us and he corrects our method. But when he is not looking (or we block his view) we do it "our" way.

The bus took several folks up the coast for a shopping trip. Fresh fruit and other things were purchased. The big item was a new clothes washer. A day or two after we arrived, the small washer at the house broke and could not be fixed. The team agreed to buy a new replacement, especially considering we were the cause of a 300+% increase in wash load. A new washer available in Pilon was not good quality. The new one was larger and of good quality, but was in another town. By U.S. standards this was still a small portable washer.

A load of sand was delivered, but it needed to be sifted. It's very hot today and everyone took turns working in shifts. The sifting technique is interesting. Two people hold a large flat tray with a screen on the bottom. Material is shoveled in and the people shake and shake - or more accurately they shake the tray. The small material falls into a new "good" pile and the large junk remains in the tray. The other fun technique is dumping the larger junk into a separate pile. The tray is kept horizontal, but swung high and to the side. Quickly pull the tray down and back and the junk pieces fall by themselves in a pile. This seems counter-intuitive, but is more efficient than dumping the tray upside down.

In the afternoon, the saw blade finally broke. It was just a matter of time - I'm surprised it lasted as long as it did. Somewhere they came up with a replacement blade. Even though it had smaller teeth it seemed to work OK. Maybe it was sharper too.

The 3rd room roof was ready for planks so I helped with that. The large gaps due to irregular shaped boards were plugged with wet leftover cement sacks, slivers of wood, anything to keep wet concrete from falling through a hole. During this time 4-5 young boys (6-7 years?) came by the other side on the fence. Julie and I talked with them. One knew some English. It was after school and they no longer had on their clean school uniforms. Their dusty street clothes consisted of shorts and in one case just underwear. No shoes.

The afternoon break produced some real coconuts. They were sliced just enough to create a hole to drink the milk from. Not liking coconut, I passed on the treat.

The government electrical truck stopped by a couple of times over the past 2 days. They seem to be very friendly with Pastor Al. One guy was around the building this afternoon presumably related to future electrical work, but I haven't seen any real work on it.

Several times during this trip a deaf man was on site. He can not speak, but makes loud noises in lieu of talking in addition to sign language. Clearly he is a church member and makes signs indicating his heart is filled with the Holy Spirit. During the church service one of the young women helping at the house (Julia I think) signed to him. We determined Cuban sign language is not the same as American Sign Language.

Shari went with a bunch of Cuban men to pick up a small load of concrete blocks left over from someone else's project. She thought some other team members were coming too, but they didn't climb in the truck. She was the only woman in a truck full of men. (editorial comment: it's things like this that can cause an international incident. I've seen it before. It's how rumors start.)

Rarely is a tool thrown away if it breaks. It is fixed, patch together, jury-rigged, or reused for something entirely different. This is necessary because new tools are hard if not impossible to find. The ones you find new are not good quality. On the first or second day here, some folks went on a shopping expedition for tools and supplies. The bus went to towns several hours away to find supplies. They found virtually none. Some nails. No hammer, no saw blades, no shovels. Unbelievable! If we had truly understood the needs here it would have been very easy to bring tools.

An old man and his granddaughter came by as Tom and I waited outside for our shower time. He shook our hand in greeting and the little girl (6 years?) gave us a kiss on the cheek. After a hard day of working, the gesture was much appreciated.

Tonight we went to a worship service in Bon. Initially I assumed this was a different town, but it must have been the name of an area in Pilon. This is one of the eight sister churches that started from the main church and service starts at 8:00 pm. The music was really good, but really loud. The sound system was turned up and the room was small. It was like trying to talk in a loud bar. Many songs were interspersed between other items in the order of worship. There was an electric keyboard and a drum set. The drummer looked about 13 years old, but was pretty good. The team was introduced and we each had a chance to say a few words. They really liked it when I said that tonight I am a member of their church. It was a very meaningful worship experience.

The story of the hurricane became clearer on the bus ride back. Two years ago Hurricane Dennis hit the town and destroyed the church. Same year, but earlier, as Hurricane Katrina. There was much damage to other buildings and homes in Pilon from the wind and rain. The irony hit me that six months ago I was on a New Orleans team helping with Katrina damage. Two hurricanes the same year - two VIM trips the same year - two years later.

December 8, Saturday
No rush to get up today - this is our day off and we're going to the beach! We traveled by bus (as always) about an hour north on the coastal highway. On the way we passed Billy goats along and in the road, a baseball field being "mowed" by a herd of goats, surf along the coast, washed out road from the hurricane, a rock slide, and beautiful mountain scenery. We stopped at a wonderful high point for a photo opportunity. We all got out and took copious postcard quality photos.

We back tracked to what was an all-inclusive resort. I think we paid a certain amount and got a day's worth of beach and lunch buffet. The path from the resort to the beach was "guarded" by a lizard-looking monitor. It would have been scarier, but it wasn't very big. We romped in the very warm water and reclined on chaise lounges. Some read, some rested, some talked, and some didn't do anything but soak in the beauty of the moment - lying under a palm tree feeling the ocean breeze. I wished Kathleen were here. She would love the water. While waiting for the buffet, some played ping-pong. The buffet was good.

Afterwards back at the beach, a few of us followed a trail along the water front from the beach area to a point of land where the surf was breaking. As the trail went off the beach and into the overgrowth, there were three men. They were trying to sell trinkets and lobsters. We had been warned about them and declined all offers. They probably were not supposed to be there - that's why they stayed out of sight from the resort security. We called them "the Lobster Boys".

The trail wound along the water's edge and there was much litter washed up on the land. It was funny to see how many shoes had been lost! At the point, the surf was coming in and breaking about 100 feet off shore. There were rocks next to the water, but a huge layer of coral above that washed up over the years.

An item of special importance was the "Blue Bag of Goodness". It ranked almost as high, but not quite, as the Yellow Vacuum Flask of Happiness. This was a large blue cloth bag filled with snacks. Taffy's coworkers had sent it with her. It came in very handy on the long bus rides and at the beach. I'm not a big fan of missioners taking snacks and junk food on trips, but I have to confess I ate from the Blue Bag of Goodness - and it was good. I wonder if this was yielding to temptation.

In the afternoon, the sun went behind the clouds so it was not hot, but very pleasant. Julie had a pad of Sudoku games. They were "hard" category and I struggled at it, becoming quickly frustrated. Stupid game anyway! We started back around 6:00 pm when it was getting dark. After another fish dinner back at the ranch, we discussed what song(s) to sing at Sunday service. We settled on one song "Joy to the World" - the Cubans know it too. Alex, their song leader, came by and sang with us. We tried to find various songs in common between his Spanish songbook and ours. He has a beautiful high tenor/alto voice.

There were some kids around so I brought out the white rope. I performed the knot-tying challenge and thread-the-needle trick. One boy threaded the needle the first try and he didn't even know the trick! I let him keep the rope. Laura said to stay out of the street tonight. There was music coming from nearby - some kind of party - two guys got in a knife fight and were hurt - the police came. We're just as happy to stay here anyway.

One boy had his own trick and a pretty good one at that. He had three beans in one hand. He took one, put it in his mouth, cracked it open, and spit out the pieces. Repeat for the other 2 beans. Then he ran his finger slowly up his bare stomach and up comes a whole bean which he takes from his mouth and placed in his closed hand. After "regurgitating" all three beans, he opened his hand and the beans were gone!

During our time in Pilon, a lot of us suffered from different aliments: colds, respiratory issues, coughing, the green apple quick step, sinus problems, sore throats, etc. Darlene and her medicine were a God-send. Shari is a nurse and was a great resource too. We could have been in serious trouble otherwise. I took a 3-day course of Azithromycin.

December 9, Sunday
Still (as always) slow getting up. Quick shower before church. Actually, the morning session is Sunday School and worship service is in the evening. As people showed up, the adults knelt at the pew and prayed out loud.

The rope trick is very popular this morning, especially with the boys. They have already invented new tricks. Some of the kids play hand slapping games - both boys and girls. Sunday school started with adults and kids together, lots of high energy songs (10+ minutes for a single song!), kid's songs, then they single filed out to their Sunday School class. Today we (the team) have the kids for 45 minutes. We found this out five minutes ago!

The five minutes is more than adequate when you have a7th grade teacher and willing helpers on the team! Janet led a puppet skit to teach "Jesus Loves Me" and then the story of Abraham and Isaac. We handed out small plastic crosses, candy, and Christmas cards written by church kids back home.

The adults and kids rejoined and the kids sang "Jesus Loves Me" in English. An offering - a prayer. A Pentecostal-like evoking of the Holy Spirit. Pastor Al works the crowd into a frenzy as he touches, speaks, and blows into the microphone for effect. One woman shakes almost uncontrollably. The whole morning session was around two hours long.

After Sunday School I cut the 45 feet of rope I always bring (for clothes line or emergencies) into shorter lengths so more kids can have the magic trick. The ropes are a big hit. The older kids can't do it because they try to figure it out. The younger ones just blindly do the motions and it works (magically)!

After lunch and siesta, we went to play baseball - US vs Cuba. The baseball game ended up being a basketball game instead. The park we were to play in one block away was really four blocks away. Be flexible! The only shade on the outdoor court was from the pole holding the basket up. It was hot in the Cuban sun. Janet and a few girls did a great job cheerleading for our two 3-person teams. Somehow I got an undeserved reputation for poor sportsmanship. For the record, this is TOTALLY UNFOUNDED!!! But I think Darlene beat me out for the title with good cause (so there!).

Alex fell and twisted his ankle. He could walk on it, but it hurt. After we got back to the church, he decided to go to the hospital to have it looked at. A few hours later he came back with a cast on his ankle and foot.

The two hour church service started at 8:00 pm. People were dressed in their Sunday best. The service consisted of many songs & prayers, high energy, liturgical dance, three testimonials from the team (Bruce, David, and me), a sermon with Yami translating (on the subject of "nothing is impossible for God"). Pastor Al gets shouting and Yami is talking loud too and trying to keep up, but Al hardly gives her a chance. Toward the end of the service, the team went to the front and everyone else gathered around us and prayed. Very moving.

December 10, Monday
Tom had devotions this morning. It was a good discussion of the VIM purpose. Ira shared that most After Action Reports say "I went to give, but received more". Some great stories about how lives were touch in other trips.

Now work! More preparation on concrete forms, the 3rd roof, and the new restrooms. We loaded wheelbarrows with two sizes of gravel and brought the large water barrel over near the mixer (it's heavy!). There's going to be a lot of concrete mixed. I helped as we bucket-brigaded concrete into the restroom footings. While we're at it a form was made and we poured an extra wet concrete mixture into a 10 inch gap in the concrete fence that runs along the back of the property. Others worked on more forms for the two roofs. Pastor Al brought out the church plans/blueprint. They were originally created in 1999 in anticipation of someday being needed. Meanwhile Kari - with a bad case of the terrible twos - cries and screams a lot (but she's still cute!).

Another note about Julie. She can work 10 times the amount as I can. The Cuban workmen all know Julie's name and recognize her for the hard worker she is. More of the same work in the afternoon. At one point Luis and I each carried two long (15 ft?) planks about five blocks to a carpenter. They got very heavy even though we stopped twice to rest. If I stopped too long or often, I wouldn't be able to go on so I made myself keep walking. No one was at the home workshop so Luis left a note penciled on the board telling what needed to be cut. Sitting on the work bench of this open air shop was a beautiful table. It was about 3-4 feet long and 1 ˝ ft wide. The bottom stringer was turned on a lathe. It had a factory looking oil finish. Very nice! The top of both of my shoulders were red and sore for several days from carrying those boards.

Luis and I cut rebar. More accurately he cut rebar. I helped. For one of the roofs, we needed 27 pieces of various lengths. I held the rebar on the train wheel and he pounded it with the sledge until the rebar broke. At one point, I took about ten swings - missed half of them - and handed it back to Luis having done enough to say I did it. Later, I helped prepare more forms for concrete. When will we ever get done?!

At one hot point in the afternoon, David placed his handy-dandy REI thermometer and compass in the sun to get a temperature reading. It was 92 degrees in the sun. This was one of the hottest days.

This evening we had a "sunday school class" led by David. We talked about the Great Commission. My opinion is that it is a pretty good idea. Laura told a true story of a friend who died - a very moving testimony to faith. "Singing Alex" paid a surprise visit. He used his bike as support and hobbled along the side while holding up his cast. We were all very glad to see him.

I was lying in bed resting before going to sleep. There has usually been a good breeze while we are here, but tonight it's particularly active. At the head of my bed is an open slatted window and a tree right outside. The wind blew the tree and its big leaves and made "a storm is coming" sound. It sure doesn't seem like the Christmas season.

December 11, Tuesday
My routine has been one of the late risers - not an early bird. The ear plugs work well and I need my beauty sleep. Besides, my poor tired body just wants to lie there even if I am awake.

It seems this evening's excursion to another town is cancelled. We were supposed to only work in the morning, but now we have another full day's work ahead of us.

This morning I helped to lay concrete blocks for the restrooms. We only did the bottom half because these need to cure a few days before setting more weight on them. At first I was the self-appointed "block mule" moving two blocks at a time from the big stack over closer to the work - only about 20 feet. Then Julie and I worked under Luis' supervision to place and mortar the blocks. The blocks are a piece of junk. To cut one in half all you do is tap it (to score the block) with the edge of the trowel on all four sides and it breaks cleanly. When that was done I helped on the 3rd roof fastening rebar together by twisting wire at the intersections. This made it stronger (a little I guess) and keeps it from moving around. Then lunch and siesta. Siesta ended about 2:30 pm.

Everything we've done the entire trip has prepared us for this moment: building forms, sifting gravel/sand, cutting rebar, leveling walls, building support poles, laying planks, etc. The big pour begins. A large piece of corrugated metal is bought out and placed on the ground next to the scaffolding. The first mix is wheelbarrowed over to the metal and dumped out. I can't figure it out. I thought we would shovel from the wheelbarrow into the buckets like before. This doesn't make sense. A couple more wheelbarrow loads are dumped out together and then mixed some more by shovel. Ah-ha! This is just a larger buffer than one wheelbarrow - I get it now. Once we get going, a single wheelbarrow would not keep up.

Now the hard part. One by one the two buckets half filled with wet concrete are dead lifted up three levels to the top of the roof where it is unceremoniously dumped out and the empty bucket passed down. This concrete was moved a lot of times. After it is mixed, the concrete is poured into the wheelbarrow (move #1), wheeled over and dumped on the metal (#2), usually mixed up some more (#3), shoveled into a bucket (#4), picked up from the ground and handed to a person on the first scaffold level (#5), lifted up to the person on the higher scaffold level (#6), lifted up to a person on the roof (#7), usually from one roof person to another one who poured it out (#8), handed the empty bucket to a roof person (#9), to a scaffold person (#10), who droped it to a ground person (#11). This is repeated and repeated. Heavy and messy work!

Keep the gravel coming. And water. Joel said (in Cuban fast talk) everybody was going too slowly in filling and passing the buckets so he took over filling the buckets. Things speeded up. We called him and Alex "the machines". He would shout (I assume in a friendly way) to the mixers when they got behind and he was waiting on them. I worked on the ground level helping to pass up buckets, getting gravel, water, etc. I tried to mix up my work because there is no way I could lift buckets all the time. Three of the team were on the roof with 2-3 locals. The moving of buckets seemed endless. Once the concrete starts to flow, you have to finish. Several hours later we are done with the pour and everyone took a long break. Time for a soda.

We wishfully thought the 3rd roof would be poured tomorrow morning since we were still scheduled to work then. We Americans were exhausted. But no - we're not done yet. We will pour the other roof now - not tomorrow! Back to work! Bruce and David could scarcely believe it when I told them.

We moved the scaffolding to room #3 and the concrete was poured, not on the metal, but on the flat concrete in front of the old bathrooms. I switched to the roof this time around and it's easier work in my opinion. Julie was up here too, but went down to help when we started running out of space. We had moments to chat in between buckets. Juan is 48 years old. He asked me, but didn't believe I was 55. He plays guitar as I do, too. They tied a halogen work light on the restroom water tower to give us light as we worked into the evening.

At one point, the street lights, our work light, and much of the town went dark. Some, but not all, of the electricity went out. We worked right through the dark. Eventually it came back on after 5-10 minutes. It was well after dark (7:30 pm) when we finished. NOW we are totally exhausted. After the trip, Tom calculated it took 450 buckets to pour one roof and we did two roofs.

December 12, Wednesday
Did I hear a trombone? Yes - I saw it through the church window across the side street. He went inside before I could get over there; otherwise, I would have found out what was going on. Before breakfast we took pictures with the Happiness Vacuum Flask. And the rooster was still crowing just like every morning. There has been rice almost every meal (except breakfasts). It's white long rice from Vietnam in a big 80 kg bag. We found out that Luis has been the foreman for our project.

It turns out we do not work today (woo-hoo!). There was a rumor last night that the reason we worked so hard to pour both roofs was to have today off. We were only supposed to work the morning anyway. We used the free time to take a bus tour of Pilon. We've been here over a week and haven't really seen much of the town.

The first stop was to the water's edge where the sugar cane pier was. Some of us had been here the first day. The pier used to have a railroad and a local ferry. The U.S. Navy used to dock here too, in the old days. The railroad piers extended a long ways out, but only traces remain. The rest is long since rusted away. Agriculture and government plantations are now the local economy. Back in the 40-50s, sugar cane was King. After the revolution and nationalization, people left and the sugar business died. It kept going on "life support" until 2002. We drove around some more and saw other buildings of interest. When you get right down to it, there wasn't a whole lot to see in Pilon.

Back at the church some of the men were there with a live pig. They were getting ready for the pig roast party that evening. A fire was heating a large iron pan of water. I helped to dig out a fire pit. Luis was using a pick, and then shoveling. I took over the shoveling part.

WEAK STOMACH ALERT: The following section is a detailed (aka gross) account of the slaughter and preparation of the pig. If this isn't your cup of tea, skip down to the next section.

Why I did such a detailed rendition of the pig's demise I'm not sure. I grew up a city boy and, quite frankly, have never witnessed a pig being killed before. Maybe it's a form of therapy. The pig lay on its side with its hind feet bound together then tied to the tree. We pondered as we observed the poor creature whether it sensed its fate. We named it Wilbur the pig. More accurately it was Wilma (or Wilburina).

When the time drew near someone placed on the ground the corrugated metal used the previous day to pour concrete on. They lassoed its neck and led it onto the metal with the rope still tied on its feet. It took no small effort to throw Wilbur on her side. If it didn't realize what was up before, it surely knew something was about to happen - it was fighting and squealing for all its worth. Luis struggled to hold Wilbur down with his knees - placing all his weight on the doomed animal.

Salvador knelt down and stabbed a long 10 inch knife into the front chest of poor Wilbur. Several times he thrust the knife home - presumably to pierce the heart. With each stab, the pig squealed a loud death squeal punctuating the normal frenzied squealing of fear and resistance. At this point I was expecting a gusher of blood, but it did not happen. I also thought the noise would cease quickly after the stabbing, but it did not either. The frightened, squealing, dying Wilbur continued to fight while it bled from within. So much so that from time to time Luis would be bucked upward from Wilbur's attempts to thrash about. After what seemed 1-2 minutes the loss of blood finally took its toll and the one-sided fight gradually subsided.

When the struggle ended, Luis slid the pig up a few feet on the metal. Still it quivered - its little pig tail rotating round and round. Finally it was still. A bucket of water washed the blood off the corrugate metal down onto the ground. Cups of boiling water were dipped from the large boiling pan and carefully and slowly poured on the lifeless Wilbur to loosen the hair. With a knife the black hair was scraped away exposing a white skin. This slow process of cleaning took about 30-45 minutes. After that they gutted the pig cleaning out the insides. Then they hung the carcass from the tree until after lunch. The silence of the pigs….

Sergio cut a tree pole to length (10-12 feet), cut a sharp end on it, and "skinned" the bark to make it smooth. This would become the skewer. To position the pig on the pole, they stuck the pointed end up the pig's rear end through its mouth (ouch!). It took two tries. The first time the point came through the side of the jaw instead of the mouth. Its feet were tied out of the way with metal wire and nails were driven through the snout and tail to fasten it to the pole. In the meantime, wood and charcoal were started in the fire pit. For the next several hours, Wilbur was roasted over the fire while continuously being turned on the spit.

I think Julie and I were the main witnesses to these proceedings. There may have been others watching from a different vantage point. And certainly others heard it.

WEAK STOMACH CONTINUE READING HERE.
Despite the "pork harvest", this whole day was a lazy, restful day. It was nice after working so hard the day before.

After Yami ate lunch, I asked her about getting my toe nails painted. Several days ago a woman made a house call to "Mrs Al" to give a pedicure. I only half jokingly asked if she would paint my nails - just something Cuban painted on the big toes. The women all laughed and the pedicurist said yes. Until now I hadn't any free time to go with Yami.

We walked a few block to a house - actually it was a shack. The following is one of those experiences that occasionally happen on a mission trip - a unique event experienced with no other team members. It's a special thing (the last one occurring on a windy Mongolian hilltop).

Yami and I passed through a gate that would normally lead to a house. In this case there was just a cement foundation where a house once stood. It was destroyed by the hurricane. The family now lived in a couple of outbuildings - shacks basically. The ground was bare dirt and a few chickens had the run of the place.

The woman who did nails for a living lived there with her Mother and son. There were two women customers ahead of me, so I sat in a chair and 'mama' brought some hot water to soak my feet in. Yami translated for me and we spoke while waiting. We had a good chat and I learned a lot not otherwise learned. Yami said the woman indicated she was a little self conscience from me being there at her "humble" home.

The women thought it very strange this American man wanted his toe nails painted and got a kick out of me being there. I told them this was the very first pedicure I've ever had. (I guess I felt it important to point that out!)

While my toes were soaking, mama washed dishes outside in two large pots on a small table. I don't know the name of the girl who did my toes. She carried a variety of colored nail polishes and "nail things" around in a large Ziploc bag. After trimming and cleaning the nails outside, we went inside the "shack" for the paint job. She applied a fairly clear polish on all the toes and then creatively painted little Cuban flags and the word "Cuba" on each big toe. The going rate was for a pedicure is 5 CCUs. I pulled out money and offered to pay her (twice), but she refused and said it was a gift.

While we waited, Yami and I had a chance to talk. She shared with me that she was divorced three years ago. It was an abusive relationship. She said she is happy being single. When divorced she lost everything including a place to live. She was taken in by a "church sister". Since then she has rented here and there. She hopes to have a house someday for her two boys and herself.

Drinking is a common problem in Cuba. She told of a sermon the Pastor gave. He said that we must do things that are uncomfortable - to act with authority. The true story was a woman who went home after the sermon and encountered her drunken husband. She thought of the sermon and when the husband came after her she ran, which she had never done before. The neighbors could see what was happening. He chased her around the block several times until he collapsed. Instead of leaving, she went to kneel and kiss him on the cheek. That act of love changed his life to Christianity.

She said Pastor Al is well known and respected in the community (I think I heard he's only been there six months?). Yami grew up in a nearby town. Her parents attended a Baptist church, but it was very conservative. The pastor was the only one who said anything during the service. The congregation never stood up. Very different from the style we have observed while here. She likes the Pentecostal style better.

During the hurricane there were only two people killed. A three-month old baby accidentally died while being closely held by its mother trying to protect it. An elderly man died of a heart attack. He refused to leave his house.

A roasted pig is a tradition around Christmas. Yami told me that one year she roasted a pig just for her two sons and herself. Of course, it was just a small pig, not a large one like we are having.

It had started to lightly rain when we left for the walk back. The pig was being roasted by the time we returned. I sorted out clothes to leave and to take with me. In some places in our room, rain water was dripping in and buckets were placed on the concrete floor.

Originally, we thought there was to be some type of service tonight, but it's really just the local workers and us having the pig roast. A guitar showed up. Yami must have asked someone to bring it since she knew I played. Juan and I took turns and traded songs.

The team ate first (as usual). The "2nd shift" had to wait because there were not enough plates or table space. We quickly clean the table and plates ourselves (not letting the women help who had served us all week) so we could serve them their meal. I was asked to play guitar for them while they ate, so I provided soft background music. The combination of many people crowded around the table, having a good time, eating a good meal (poor Wilbur), and the music made for a very nice and relaxing setting.

Afterwards we all gathered in the sanctuary for speeches and gifts. We "tipped" about 16 people and presented Pastor Al with a Spanish Bible. Juan and I traded more guitar music. Juan and Alex played/sang duets in Spanish. Very nice.

When we returned to our room for the night, it was still raining and the roof was still leaking. It was leaking like a sieve. Fortunately it was not directly getting Bruce's bed wet, but it was close enough to make it very damp. The two corrugated pieces of tin roofing did not overlap enough. A dip in the ridge line of the roof allowed water to back up into the seam and come in. We tried moving the bed and the buckets, but nothing helped much. It was going to be a wet night.

Al and Jose came in the room. Al took one look at the situation, slowly shook his head, stepped over and, with his big hand, pushed the ridge line of the roof up three inches. The water stopped coming in! They worked a long time to fix it to last the night. Someone from the outside pushed the edge of the tin up three inches to create a larger overlap and then placed concrete blocks on it. Al cut a tree pole and propped the roof up so it wouldn't sag. That was about the best they could do - but it seemed to work OK. It was probably around 10:30 pm by the time all this excitement was over. After I got home I looked on the Weather Channel web site. The rain was from Tropical Storm Olga.

December 13, Thursday
A couple of minutes before getting up, the PVC curtain holder fell down (ker-plop) hitting me on the head and David on the nose. Nice wake-up call!

At breakfast we found out more about the typical Cuban food situation. It was one of those things you wished you knew earlier in the trip. The government provides only 10-15 days of food per month. They had saved up so we could eat in the fashion they thought we were accustom to. We ate very well while we were here and in no small quantity. We knew the local worker ate leftovers after us, but did not realize that even eating our copious leftovers was like a king's feast for them. We didn't understand this until the last breakfast before we left! Aargh! We felt like pigs (oops - bad analogy Wilbur). Upon reflection, we had virtually no corn (meal) products and no eggs.

We left Pilon for the last time and traveled eight hours to Camp Canaan. After such a long and tiring visit and retracing the initial route, the return trip was somewhat unremarkable. One item of note was the bus had to stop on the highway to let a herd of cattle go by. It was being moved along the highway by horse-riding "cowboys". We took pictures while stopped. One cowboy yelled to good looking Laura "I want a picture with you". She jokes back "All right - everybody come over here".

Pastor Al went back to Havana on the bus with us to conduct some business there. Jose rode several hours to a town near where he lives. He will catch a bus from there to his house about 10 km away. As he left, he picked up a box that had several live chickens in it which I hadn't even noticed.

Camp Canaan is a beautiful campus containing sprawling buildings, landscaping, a pond, basketball court, walking bridge, tall palm trees, a (empty) swimming pool, and the "Temple". This is a large sanctuary used for many different purposes in the Cuba Methodist conference. And the mosquitoes were out!

After dinner, back in the dorm, someone said "Don't go over there. There's a snake!" In the hallway right outside my door was a 3-4 foot snake. It didn't look particularly ferocious, but it didn't look familiar either. We didn't know if it was poisonous or not. We unraveled a wire coat hanger and Julie (the brave one) used it to pick up the snake and maneuver it outside. Laura said later it was a baby. It is related to Anacondas and grows 9-12 meters long. They were non-poisonous, but aggressive. They will raise up like a cobra. If you walk by their den, it will go after you. If I needed to get up in the night, I always checked the floor out first with the flashlight! I thought later that if it was a baby, then where's mama snake?

Folks went to bed at different times. During the evening, the electricity would blink out for short lengths of time. Bruce, Janet, and I were in the common area chatting about missions. I shared that I felt this trip was more "task" for me personally than "mission" - maybe 70-30% (using the VIM task and mission definitions). Bruce disagreed - he felt I was much engaged in the mission aspect.

December 14, Friday
Someone heard a sound coming from a cart which was close to the dining hall door. Underneath it was a box containing several cute tiny puppies who were yelping. After breakfast we loaded on the bus. There was a guy at the camp who asked us to deliver two letters when we got back to the states. One was addressed to somebody in Mission Hills. I said "That's in Kansas City. I'll deliver that one personally" and I did. We got a photo of the sender and me holding the letter. Small world.

The bus left at 8:00 am and arrived at the Methodist Center in Havana around 12:30 pm. There was another large VIM team staying there. This Montgomery, AL team had worked on the seminary in Havana.

We went to the market to buy souvenirs for a couple of hours in the afternoon. I got all the essential trinkets I needed for people back home, but it literally took every cent of Cuban money I had. I only had the 25 CCUs needed for the airport exit tax. After we got back at the MC, some of us made a quick run down to the local music store before dinner. Things definitely have that "winding down" feeling.

After dinner Bruce gave his team leader speech and reviewed remaining paper work. David performed a very entertaining musical "Cuban Home Companion" incorporating each of the team member's antics into a song. Shower and then read some.

December 15, Saturday
THE LAST DAY! There's no big rush to get up and around. The other team is leaving for the airport as we get up. Breakfast isn't until 9:00 am, so at 8:00 I was sitting on a concrete bench in front of the MC with no one else around. Havana is fairly quiet this time of day. A few people walk by on the sidewalk - a motorcycle - a car. I'm reading my book. Some dogs are barking.

A few team members went to the big hotel nearby to use the Internet. There is bad snow/ice back in the Midwest. It will be interesting to see how that impacts our travel. Nothing we can do about it anyway. After a filling scrambled eggs breakfast we left for the airport where all of our bags were shrink wrapped (for security purposes?). The process to get out of Cuba was pretty painless - no glitches. As the Yak-42 taxied onto the runway, the water vapor from the air conditioner belched fog into the cabin even worse than when we came into Cuba. But it cools the cabin very nicely.

The flight to Cancun was 1 hour 10 minutes. As we prepared to land, the flight attendant once again walked down the isle spraying "something". It was 85 F in Cancun. The plan was to get to the other terminal, check our bags, and have plenty of time to eat and rest. It was a long layover. However, the Continental computer system had other ideas.

There were a good number of people in line at the Continental ticket counter. The zigzag rows of lines (like Disneyland rides) were mostly full when movement just sort-of stopped. The computer system apparently broke down. We ended up waiting - doing nothing in line - for 1-2 hours (not really sure) before they started processing tickets by hand. I think they were hoping the system would start working. Now we were out of time and had to hustle to the gate. Some grabbed a quick bite to eat "to go".

The whole plane had boarded except that Taffy was not on the plane. Actually, David and Shari were not yet there either. Taffy had lost her passport and could not enter the plane. D/S stayed outside the plane ramp to assist her if they could. Once the plane door was shut, you can not get on. There was a definite possibility she could miss the plane! In case she was stuck there, D/S gave her all their cash. She had run back to several places to see if the passport was dropped. Desperation was setting in! Finally, the second time she went to the last security check point she found someone to help her. The passport had been left there and placed in a back room. When Taffy finally boarded, we all clapped.

After the almost two hour flight to Houston, it was long long walk from the plane, to baggage pick-up, through Customs, recheck the luggage, and get a boarding pass. We did not have the boarding pass for our respective next flights because of the computer problem. And everywhere you went, there were long lines.

By the time I finally got the boarding pass it was only a very short time until the flight was to leave. We each did our own version of O.J. Simpson running through the airport. I caught the train to a different terminal. There was a girl on the car - maybe 19 years old. We were both going to the same flight. She had been gone from home nine months and was frantic that she could not miss the plane to KC. So I told her (knowing that we only had a matter of minutes) we would be each other's running partner to catch the flight. When the doors opened we both started running like sprinters out of the blocks.

Our gate seemed like it was half way to Oklahoma. When we got there the small plane had already boarded and our seats assigned to stand-by passengers. The girl gave her frantic sob story to the gate agents. They looked at each other and said come with us. She and I waited outside the plane door while one of the agents went inside. They (thankfully for us) had the two stand-bys deplane and we got our seats back! Woo-hoo! (Too bad for them though) They walked by us on their way out, but seemed to be in good spirits about it. The bags did not make the flight, but they were delivered to my house the next day.