Today we went to the mountain hub. It was an 11 kilometer drive through a narrow, winding mountain road. Upon arrival, Molong showed me the well they are constructing. It is quite deep with a cement wall around it to protect it from the floods. It will be used for laundry and bathing water only.
Next, we climbed a long hill on foot where a few houses sat. One of the houses was Albert's grandmother's house. It was small and only one room, made of wood, with a small porch. She is 88 years old and still gets up at 3:30 in the morning and climbs down the long hill and looks wood for the fire. After she became a disciple of Jesus, she went around and made disciples of others in the area, I was told.
Molong showed me the house they constucted mostly out of bamboo. They use bamboo for the posts and supports and made their own lumber from the trees they cut down to make room for the house. The house, which is not used yet, has two floors and is open all round. The thatched roof was made from palm branches. Even the floor was made from bamboo. It is quite a beautiful place.
Albert is going to take over the land that his grandma owns, and he will be liviing in one of the houses on that land. They are installing a toilet in the one corner of this house, shown below, which is made of brick. Most houses ae made of wood and are much smaller. One of their close neighbors lives in a small wooden thatch house, one room no bigger than about seven feet square where a family of five eats and sleeps. There are no bathroom facilities yet on this mountain.
We brought chicken to barbecue, and made some rice, and ate bananas for dessert. Afterward, Molong sent about eight of us out to go house to house in the area and pray for the sick and make new disciples. We prayed for several folks, one with a fever, another with a bad knee, an older lady who had hip pain, and another older lady who had pain in her abdomen, who also wanted to become a disciple of Jeesus, so we baptized her.
Jomie is a young disciple who is very zealous for the Lord. He led the way by communicating to the folks in their native Cebuano tongue. After we baptized the lady in the picture, Jomie splashed water on his feet. Everyone had worn sandals, except me. I'm not good with sandals in the mountains. It came to me quickly why they had to wash their feet in Jesus' time. The roads were dusty, iike the ones we were on. We traveled through small trails to get to houses that you can't see from the road. It was quite amazing to see the level of poverty that folks live in every day.
Upon return, I was tired. We ate a meal together and had a visit from an American missionary who is trying to get to work with human trafficking victims. She is from Florida, and has been here two months.
Anyhow, what a day. Tomorrow we go to another island, where we will be continuing some work on building a toilet. We will have to take a ferry boat, putting the whole vehicle onto the boat. It should be an interesting day.
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