Ringing...or Reventando in the new year

So people here l o v e to reventar cohetes. Blast off fire crackers. Those who love me enough understand just how much I l o v e loud, startling noises. Especially ones that sound alarmingly similar to gunshots. Puchica.

That being said, New Year´s in Honduras was wonderful, and 2012 has been so great I´m just getting around to telling you about the 31st! We had a great service at church with a view different dramas and other special presentations. I was part of a drama all about God´s desired church. It had a powerful message, and a lot of us were touched just by participating. I played one of the people chained by something, struggling to break free. My prop chains were incredibly heavy over my wrists, so I was definitely struggling! But I loved the message, and we all shared some hugs when the song was over. Orlin and Judith performed a beautiful duet of one of the songs off Javier and Kerem´s album. Those two are quite the brother sister pair. Since the new year I´ve heard them sing a couple other duets, including a very moving version of Altisimo that left just about everyone in tears. I´m not sure what got it all started, but we ended up taking a ton of pictures after church.

With sweet Henry! 

After church and all the pictures I went to Pastor Alfonso´s for some food and more importantly the new year´s eve cake! A large group of youth from church came over, and we spent a good time chatting. At midnight they set off a really great fireworks show in town, and Mari and I walked down for that. I can say I´ve never been quite so close to where they were actually lighting the fireworks. That was a little unnerving, but they shot off quite the display. I´m always a little mesmerized by fireworks, almost enchanted. I think it´s totally crazy they can do what they do!  

You can´t see the whole thing, but Pastor Alfonso has a huge laugh going, and one can only assume he´s picking on me. Something he does well and often. It´s nice to have a catrachan dad looking out for me while I´m here!

After the fireworks we went to Cañaverales (a town just down from Peña) to spend some time with Naun, their oldest son, and his girlfriend´s family. It was my first time meeting them, and they were incredibly friendly. It was so late I wasn´t sure what it would be like paying someone a visit after midnight! We stayed over an hour just chatting and of course sipping a little coffee. Much like the other holidays I´ve enjoyed here, I was up very late but went to sleep with a smile on my face.