So we flew out to Colombia on the 1st March after spending a few nights with the Parkers in London!!! We were greeted after a 13 hour journey by 2 brothers from bethel. They had great big smiles on thier faces, we knew we would be well looked after! Had fun with our 10 bags, getting them from the airport to the car, the poor brother lost control with the trolley at one point, all the 5 bags falling off!!! Poor guy, poor Caffitiare that got smashed!!!
After about an hours journey we arrived at the branch!!! Wow!!! Absolutely huge and beautiful!!! It houses 300 bethelities and also backs a program called Global Health, this is where brothers and sisters in special service can go to Columbia for health care, operations etc. the branch ferries them to appointments etc and cares for them whilst they recover! What a loving organisation we are part of? During our 2 week stay we met many in the program from Panama and a few places from the states!
Whilst at bethel for 2 weeks we sorted tools etc to take from the city to Barranquilla, we even got to go into the city shopping (for tools) Ferg was in Paradise, I would of much rathered jewellery shopping! We also worked for a few days with the maintenance department, oh what fun, they didn't speak English and we didn't speak Spanish!!! Lots of acting and a dictionary were the life savers!! We made some great new friends!!
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| Goody basket waiting in our room! |
On the 14th March we flew to Barranquilla, it's about an hours flight. This is where we will be working on the Assembly Hall Project. We were collected by a local brother who took us 40 minutes down the road to Galapa where the site is. Wow was our first impression, it's huge. There is already a per existing Assembly Hall and the plan is to make a new one parallel so they can run both at the same time. The old hall is being used as a kitchen/dining room, tool kribs and offices. There are around 40 working on the construction team (8 internationals and the rest Colombians) also another 50 volunteering from the local congregations. The atmosphere feels just like a quick build, all the willing brothers and sisters and you can see how happy they are to be volunteering their time for Jehovah!
We are living in an apartment in Barranquilla. We are sharing it with an Australian couple and a Colombian couple. It's a nice apartment and is very secure which is good. We have a little room and our own bathroom, we all share the kitchen. It's 40 minutes away from site so we usually leave the apartment at 6am and usually arrive home around 6pm, Mondays it's around 8pm after the watchtower. It would be nice to live a bit nearer but at least this way no over time working for Ferg, we leave at 5 on the dot.
That's all I can think of for the minute but I promise I will post regularly from now on!
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