Greetings from Guatemala!

We have officially finished our first week of Guatemala and I have absolutely loved it! Before we flew down to Guatemala, we spent four days at Training Camp on the Toccoa Falls Campus. We spent that time getting to know our team, learning about the culture we were about to live in, and drawing closer to God through worship and Bible studies. I have absolutely loved getting to know everybody on my team! I had no idea I could love and grow close to a group of people so quickly.

The days we have spent in Guatemala have been incredible! We visited some of the ministries that we will be working in and got to see an overview of what we would be doing for the next two months. 

On Thursday and Friday our team split into two groups: one group went to the Grandpa House and the Hospital, while the rest of us went to the Coffee Farm. 

On Friday, the Coffee Farm team met our contact, Julio, in Santa Maria. We walked with him to one of the parts of his farm where he grows different varieties of coffee. From there, we all grabbed a bag of six coffee plants and hiked to the place where he processes the coffee beans. After he explained the complex process to us, we got to work. We did different things, ranging from fertilizing the garden to planting coffee plants.

While I love serving people through manual labor, it was great getting to know one of the workers there, David. He doesn't speak much English and I don't speak much Spanish, but it was so interesting to get to know him despite the language barrier. We had a fun time stumbling over trying to pronounce each others' names and teaching each other common phrases in our languages. 

At one point, he pointed at my tattoo, said "Me gusta!" and–in broken English–asked what it said. After about 10 minutes of trying to tell him/act out the word "fearless", I called my friend, Hannah, over to help me. The three of us talked about our families, what we're studying in school, and many other things. 

After talking more and getting a bit disheartened from truly feeling the language barrier, it was encouraging to be able to communicate with David and start to get to know him. It reminded me that, no matter how ill-qualified I feel, God still can use me in mighty ways. Praise God!