Belize- Day 1

I met Paula (with Ken and Luke) and Dava with David and the boys to go to the airport to catch our 10am flight to Belize City. Check in was uneventful and included the "I need to take everything out of your bag, ma'am" typical search I seem to get every time I fly! I think what triggered it was my flash drive. The guy took it out and turned it over, extended it, then put it back. I guess it looked like a pocket knife. Funny, but I missed a small hand sanitizer that should have been in my liquids bag and wasn't. They didn't find that!

The 3 1/2 hour flight was smooth and the flight crew was lots of fun. Flying in over Belize you get a good look at the blue ocean water, the scrubby tropical vegetation, and the marshy  areas that must breed malaria-carrying mosquitos! Landing you see it up close. The guy directing in the plane was in a casual white shirt, pointing with his fingers. No orange signal cones here! Of course the plane taxis up to this strip of a building and they roll the stairs out to meet the plane.

Customs was easy for me, but Paula (and her three bags) had a little bit of a hard time. We got our taste of the heat and humidity as we went out to meet our bus and our bus driver for the week, Moses. Moses has 7 children, two in college in New York and the rest here in Belize. We also met the other volunteers from Habit Missions, Ian and Letricia, Paul, and Shane.

Our first stop was in the mountains near the Guatemala border. As we headed to the mountains from the coast, the landscape changed along with the houses. Many near the coast are built to withstand hurricanes (or permanently damaged from hurricanes). We checked in our hotel, The Aguada in Santa Elena, which is beautiful, and had about 30 minutes to put things in our room before we had to be back on the bus to go to a youth rally.

People in Belize don't do things on time. They're not concerned with missing an appointment. Things start an hour or more later than announced. That's how it was with this youth rally. We were there at 6:45- others got there more like 7:30 or so. It was slow starting but it turned out to be so fun! There were youth from seven churches there. Some had prepared dances, skits, and songs to share. Paula had a suitcase full of candy and Dava had tons of silly bands that we handed out. There was one little 5 year old boy who stole all our hearts- he started out far away and came closer and closer all night. The rally ended with the youth calling out songs and us singing them, often a capella.

Some of my observations from the day:
- Youth are the same no matter where you are! They're silly, attention-grabbing, love candy, and want their voices to be heard. They're beautiful and individual and trying to find their place in the world.
- God is the same everywhere, too. He's the same in the USA as He is here. He'll do amazing things if we open our hearts to Him.
- Traveling with a group is fun. This group in particular is filled with characters! It is going to be fun to see what they'll find to pick on next!

We had a great night's sleep and I'm ready for day 2- heading to breakfast, and then I have to give the message at worship this morning. God is good- all the time, no matter where you are.