I went to Matamoros, Mexico on a mission trip with my church. It's very very close to the border, near Harlingen and Brownsville, TX. We had 14 youth and adults go, and BOY! it was an adventure. We drove for awhile, staying over in Edna, Texas. I tell you what, they are just the nicest, coolest, most hospitable people I've ever met. There was a chick from the newspaper there, and we ended up on the front page of the Edna newspaper!
We left the next day and, due to some trouble with our church van, got to Matamoros about 11:30pm. We were sooooo tired, but it was worth is to sleep in our super-cozy bunk beds.
� 2001 [email protected]
Alrighty! I know the site's about Blair, but it's my website and I wanted to talk about my mission trip and encourage you if your'e thinkning about taking one.
We woke up the next day to a LOUD clanging bell, apparently our call to breakfast. The food was enough to wake you up in the morning, it was sooo good. That and a nice cup of coffee got me going into Journal time, which I'd use to tidy up my bunk a little. I tended to journal after lights out, with a flashlight uder my sleeping bag. It was so quiet and peaceful where we were, out in the middle of nowhere. I loved it. We spent the time after at "Concert of Prayer", which is where we prayed for each other, the camp, Matamoros, and the work we were going to do that week. It was awesome to worship and go back to our bunks, where I met the Pennsylvanins, my new friends for the week. We were at the camp with churches from Colorado, Virginia, Nebraska, and 2 churches from Pennsylvania. How exciting!! I always loooove to meet new people. This was especially exciting because, silly as it may sound, I don't know many people from the North. I REALLY don't know many New Engladers. (We lovingly called them yankees.) I loved my new friends and I still keep up w/ some of them. It's been too soon to see how that'll turn out though....
We went back for cultural training (etiquette, basically.) and we got to talk in our church groups about our fears and hopes for the week. We had lots of free time, and my good buddy Leigh and I took a walk to the big blue Joya stand and got fruit punch and orange sodas. Joyas are Mexican sodas...they're really tasty, but not nearly as fizzy as our sodas are. I still have a glass Joya bottle in my room! They also had Cokes and Mexican cookies, which are soooooo cool! The best are Florentinas, which are sandwich cookies w/ either strawberry or chocolate in the middle. Very very yummy. I wish i could get them here.
The work was unlike anything I've ever done beofre. We played soccer with the Mexican kids from the colonia (neighbrhood) we were working in all morning in 115 degree weather! It was fun though, they're sooo cute! I loved working with the kids, they were so willing and receptive to the love of Christ.
In the afternoons we'd work on construction. There was a church in our colonia that was growing and needed a new building, so we got to tie ribar for cement molds and lay bricks for the new walls around the dilapidated old church. I had never done any of these things in a mission trip before and it was SO much fun!!
We also did door-to-door ministry, led Bible school and helped 15 people accept Christ! There was even one day where we served lunch to a hole bunch of kids at The Invasion, the poorest section of Matamoros. We were told that that the meal of chicken, rice, beans and tortillas was probably the only meal they'd get that day, and that they wouldn't eat a meal like that until the next mission group came....It really makes you think about how much you really have and how much we complain about the dumbest things, things that don't even matter. Some people don't vene have food, or a place to stay warm. It was an awesome, life-changing trip. The friends I made that week in my church and in camp will stay with me for a looong time. Please please think about taking some time out of your summer (or whenever) and going on a trip to serve others less fortunate than you and I.
For more information about killer mission trips like mine, visit Adventures In Missions.
Back 2 Blair
