the "woohaa"

That's Marc's name for it. It happened on Friday of last week, when the mayor of Tegucigalpa, Ricardo Alvarez, one of the councilmen, Dr. Mario Pineda, vice-congressman Dr. Mario Zelaya, and TORCH leaders Marc Tindall and Tim Hines met at El Reparto and Nueva Oriente for fairly good sized press coverage of the agreement between TORCH and the municipality to help in move families from very dangerious communities that are literally collapsing to safer communities.Press conference in El Reparto. Facing the cameras, from left to right is Dr. Mario Pineda, councilman (in white shirt), Dr. Mario Zelaya, vice congressman, Ricardo Alvarez, mayor of Tegucigalpa, and TORCH leader Marc Tindall


El Reparto, where one of the old, condemned houses has already been torn down.

Two girls who moved into one of the new houses built in Nueva Oriente with their family


Press inside one of the houses being built in Nueva Oriente

TORCH leader Tim Hines speaking to the press at Nueva Oriente

There were lots of people at each site, as you can see in the pictures. The first stop was El Reparto, where the press talked with community and TORCH leaders, as well as with one or two of the families who had already had houses built in Nueva Oriente. One of the old houses had already been torn down.

After reaching Nueva Oriente later that afternoon, you could see people flocking up to the top of the mountain, where two houses were being built side by side. It was obviously a huge event for the people living there. I wanted to be closer to the action, but I was asked to help bring some tin up from further down the hill. I noticed my Honduran friend carrying the tin differently that I was used to, so I tried carrying it that way....it was actually kind of awkward. And of course, as I reached the top of the mountain, I saw camera lenses staring at me, even as I already thought I looked stupid. (By the way, the next day, just as I feared, my picture was in The Heraldo, which is one of the major papers in Honduras...it wasn't bad as I thought it would be, but funny all the same)

So, the public officials got to have their faces associated with helping families out (they also strongly encouraged Hondurans to get off their rears and start helping each other out more, from what I hear), and we got to build some houses for families in the name of Jesus...a pretty cool day, I thought :)