13th Anniversary!

This last weekend was the 13th anniversary of the founding of the orphanage here in Nicaragua. They had celebrations all weekend and Father Phil who heads the organization came for a visit. When I joined them on Sunday, they had already had mass and I was just in time for.... a meeting!

Much of my life is consumed with meetings, but it's always good for me to sit in on them to know what's going on. This particular meeting was with the head of the NPH Nicaragua Board and the mayors of two of the nearest towns on the island. They're wanting to use the NPH property as a technical school/community college once we've left. They have some great ideas, but there are a lot of very important details to work through before we know if this is actually a feasible idea.

After the meeting, the kids put on a dance program. Unfortunately the video is entirely back lit, so it's a little difficult to see, but several different age groups dance. I also had to cut it pretty short because of my bandwidth constraints on uploading video. Lastly, the camera is a bit shaky because I was recording and having some demands on my attention by a 7 year old boy at the same time. A lot of the kids are really friendly and they'll come up, take your arm and put it around their shoulders. Then, because they're kids, they bonk, poke and wriggle around for the rest of the time.

After the program we all ate the most delicious BBQ'd chicken and then about 50 of us headed back to the ferry to ride across the lake to the mainland. It was a great finish to the weekend and good way to celebrate 13th years of taking care of the kids of Nicaragua!

A view of Madera (the smaller volcano) from the ferry dock on the mainland