Hilliard Presbyterian's Check out our Monday & Tuesday pictures and letter below. View Wednesday & Thursday's pictures and letter here! List of trip participants at bottom of this page... |
 Monday, June 26, 2006Dear Friends, Well, we had a long trip here, but we are here safely. We ran into some rain, a little construction, a little traffic. Mostly in Florida. We are staying in the First United Methodist Church in Clewiston, on the Southwest site of Lake Okeechobee. It is a reasonably large facility with a very nice social hall, kitchen and classrooms. We are using some of the classrooms for bedrooms and the sanctuary for our worship times – card games in the narthex!Today (Monday) we began work. We went to two homes today. At the first home, the Cuban family living there is made up of the grandmother, grandfather and five of the grandsons. Yes, all boys ranging from age 2 to age 11. The 11 year old was quite chatty and showed me all around his home and the damage that was done to it. He is very tired of living with the mold and having no electricity in any of the bedrooms and the cracks in the walls. He has developed asthma since Hurricane Wilma came through and all his brothers are frequently sick as well.
We helped clean up a great deal of debris around the home. Reynaldo (11) has a horse of his own and he competes in lasso and rodeo competitions. We also moved all the tile, windows, doors and roofing material that FEMA delivered when the initial assessment was for repair, until a contractor came out and said no way could the home be repaired. After lunch, we went to Yeshika’s house. Yeshika is a mother of one 7 year old boy. She also had much water damage and has already had her roof replaced, only to have more shingles torn off by another storm! More roofing repair people will be out in July to do a more effective job than the previous company which has since gone out of business for ineffectiveness! We tore out the wall board of several walls and two ceilings. The mold is very bad, but we are all Tonight we were fed by the members of the Pentecostal Church in town. The pastor and his wife dropped off 12 meals of baked chicken w/yellow rice, salad and huge baked potatoes. They must have been two pounds each! ...It was delicious, and everybody ate well. Continue to keep us in your prayers that we may continue to be healthy and safe! Pray also for the Alvarez family and for Yeshika and her son. TUESDAY. June 27, 2006 We are going to definitely be there the rest of the week. As we have taken the damaged drywall and insulation out, we have found even more damage to the structure than anticipated, so we are moving more slowly as we have to replace all of the framing around the windows, and a couple of the ceiling joists need some additional support so that we will have something to attach the new drywall to! Today is extremely hot, and wearing long pants and long sleeved shirts, along with the hats, goggles and particle masks makes for a difficult day. We had hoped to get a swim in, but the pool will be closed by the time we get back and have dinner. We are eating at the Baptist church tonight, hosted by one of their adult Sunday School Classes. In Christ, Email Kim and The Team at kim@hilliardpres.org
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2006 Mission Trip Participants:
Brad Patch, Beth Lewis, John Newland,
Shanice Akoto, Megan Parsons, Kaitlyn Strong, Eleanor Cherryholmes, Loren
Varvarosky, Tamaliyapo Mphande, Jim Ray, Matt Butterworth, and Kim Trimboli
Their home is uninhabitable and is going to be torn down even though they have been living in it for almost a year post-hurricane. 
wearing face masks and goggles and taking fresh air breaks. Tomorrow we will finish taking out the insulation in the ceiling, replace several rotted boards around the windows, and begin replacing the insulation and wall board. This project is likely to take us most of the rest of the week. 
