When we awoke this morning, we were quite surprised to find frost on the ground. It was colder than we had thought possible this far south. We then remembered that we were at a higher elevation so it could get cold during the night. After brushing our teeth and using the bathroom, we washed our faces in a large plastic bowl that the mother of the house had filled with warm water. This struck us as being a very gracious act on her part. All the water was carried from the nearest water hole on burros. Since they had no hot water heater, the water was heated on the stove in a large kettle. These kind people really went to a lot of extra work to have us in their home as guests.

Breakfast was served on the bus before we left for work at the Church site. At breakfast, all the men who had stayed at the farm discussed the impact that our hosts had made on us and decided that we would offend then if we didn’t stay at least one more night with them, if not for the remainder of our stay.

We all headed for the work site, which would be the first time for all of us. As we arrived, the Mexican workers greeted us and shook hands with us. That is, each person shook hands with us and greeted us personally not just one person for the group. We asked what we could do to get started and they put us to work with the steel reinforcing rod. We straightened it out and then cut it to the desired lengths. When we first started, we were cutting it half way through with a hack saw and then breaking it off. Harold found a cold chisel and large hammer so we tried this and it worked fairly well, but the chisel was very dull and needed a good sharpening. We kept cutting pieces and then started bending the steel to shape. We worked until about 4:00 P.M. at which time we returned to the bus for supper and time together before returning to our respective “home away from home.” We drove back to our home in the country where we had decided to say and the family greeted us warmly. They were glad we had returned to stay with them. They once again watched us get settled in and we tried to communicate with them. We gave them some seeds and candy we had brought along with us. Then we called it a day and went to bed.