Nicaragua February 13 evening

We are now in Esteli.  The hotel is in fact better than the previous.  I am rooming with Roger.  It is very nice.  It has a shower and a nice bathroom.  Even a TV, which does not work but looks nice, kinda fifties.  The room and the courtyard are in tile.  There is a garden in the center and the rooms arranged around it.  Small about 15-20 rooms.  A small hostel in which all the profits are given to help families and children.

The dedication of the clinic was amazing.  In the entrance to the clinic, they had placed an old painting of Our Lady of Guadalupe.  The town used it to process around the town on her feast day for many years.  They would start the processions from the very building that is now Tim´s clinic. Chilo, whose formal name is help of Christians after Mary Help of Christians, prayed so eloquently in Spanish that many tears were shed.  Then Roger spoke of the meaning the Guadalupe image carries for his family and for us all.  It was VERY moving.  Christ and Mary were present.  The clinic is in Esteli not too far from the church.  We will go to Mass later tonight.

All the hotels (all two of them) have Internet stations, so you have three or four computers at your disposal.  I will be able to email you regularly.  I don´t know what happens at our next stop, Jinotega,which is the poorest and most rural of all.  Esteli is more of a city than I had expected.  It is surrounded by mountains and is somewhat elevated itself.  The people are incredibly happy and friendly.  One young man, Chico is incredibly funny.  He can mimic just about anything.  He learned his Englsh (it appears) from listening to songs on the radio.  To hear his imitations of our English through actors and popstars is very entertaining.  We rode the bus up from Managua for two hours and sang Christian songs most of the way.  First we would sing them in English and then he would teach us them in Spanish.  We just finished lunch.  There is no way I can´t have meat.  There is no beans and rice at the restaraunt.  While we were eating a little girl came up to Chilo.  I asked if it was her daughter.  She said no, that children just come to her.  I gave her my chicken and Chilo packaged it with several other peoples donated meal remains and the girl took it with her.  There is definitely poverty.  The town though is fairly nice with cement streets and mostly cement or cinder block houses. 

When we were praying before the Guadalupe image, Two people were holding her image up because they had not gotten her hung up fully yet.  So then I helped them hang her up.  They used nails into the cement walls for brackets and so forth.  It felt precarious at first but we kept working at it until we felt the image was secure.  Many of the local people came by while we were having the dedication.  They would pray or tear up.
God is good.