Working as teachers can be a rollercoaster experience. One day during recess one of the children from the 4th grade said I had to come quickly, I thought, "what now one of the kids is hurt or there was a fight or something worse". When I arrived in the class room they all yelled, Happy Birthday!!! This really did surprise me because it was a week after my birthday. They had bought me a present and had made me a cake. I felt so happy and proud. But that too would pass, two days later I gave them a test which most of them failed. What a let down!!! That was a month ago and I am happy to report their grades have improved. And as I step back to reflect on how much they have learned since January I can say I truly am proud.

December and January are vacation days for school kids. We honestly needed a break as well. But I noticed a lot of the kids were looking for something to do. So I opened up our basket ball court to any child that wanted to play. During the month and a half the same 10 – 15 kids showed up to play. For me it was a most enjoyable time. It required almost no planning and was a lot of fun. I was able to spend much more quality time with these kids. Even though most of our work is with children, I don't get the one on one interaction with most of these children. While I had no real program I would try to end with a word of instruction. Often this was provoked by some child with a bad attitude or two kids fighting. In many ways it is the same kinds of things that I dealt with in my own boys as they were growing up. Though this was a small group compared to Oansa (120 kids) or the school (350 kids), I none the less felt just as useful in this service. These kids all said that they look forward to doing this again next year. I as well look forward to vacation from school and playing basketball.

Sunday, September 30 was "Children's Day" in Guatemala. To celebrate this holiday our church, Iglesia Bíblica, invited Dennis and Chochy Ruano and team to bring the Chochy Sueña concert to our neighborhood.

Because their music is of the highest quality, we have used it with various children's programs here in the neighborhood. Even at the school, several of the children used music from the Sueña CD in one of their dance routines. While none of the children knew that Roxana Ruano (Chochy) grew up in their neighborhood they all knew her songs. This made it a real treat for the kids to have the chance to see a live concert in their neighborhood.

We cleared the chairs out of the sanctuary, and they packed the house.

The public schools in Guatemala have been given very little funding over the past decades. As a result anyone with resources sends their children to a private school. The children that end up at these state schools come from the poorest families in the country. This year both Donna and I were given opportunity to teach as volunteers, in the public school in our neighborhood.

An other thing that I wish to share with you is the growing concern I have for our security. In the past months we have had several holdups in our neighborhood two on our street and one last night in front of our house. Our work requires that we become part of the community; we do not have the option of cowering behind our front door. Please pray for wisdom and Gods protection.

In Christ - Dan