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2010 DAILY LOGS

 

DAY 1 - Saturday, March 13, 2010
Mex10 Daily Log – Saturday, March 13, 2010

Buenos Dias! My name is senor Bushey – Mr. Bushey – and I am the Coordinator for Neighborhood Christian School's 11th Annual Mexico Outreach. As you may have read in the introduction to our outreach, each year we take a group of 6th, 7th, and 8th graders, parents, and staff from Sacramento, California, to San Diego, via Southwest Airlines, where we get picked up by Youth With A Mission (YWAM) staff in either a big tour bus or many small vans and we drive across the border and travel about two hours south of the border to Ensenada and Maneadero, Mexico.

These daily logs will be from my personal perspective and will try to include as much about all the outreach as I can include each day. You'll get a lot out of viewing the hundreds of pictures and, if you know one of the team members, take a look at the DVD that I'll make at the end of this mission trip and you'll really understand how God blessed both the people of Mexico and our outreach team members!

I woke up this morning around 4:30am at my home in Dixon, CA, with my mind going over all the aspects of the outreach and whether or not I forgot something. As the leader of this group, I am responsible to make sure that everyone gets to/from Mexico safely and that we all have a great time and do a great work for the Lord. Part of that responsibility includes keeping all passports and airline tickets safe. I also need to make sure I bring all of that with me, including my family (my wife and two daughters are going this year), and all of my personal stuff. After ten years of doing this, it's getting' pretty easy.

To keep track of all the people, I take advice from Moses' father-in-law back in the Old Testament, and I appoint group leaders. This year we have five group leaders who are each responsible for ten people (give or take one or two). Everyone in group one receives a dry-erase-marker number “1” on their left hand. Group two members, a “2”, etc. Then I yell, “Get in your groups!” and the group leaders raise their hands, gather their group members, and then I say, “Group one – are you all set?” “Yes!” , “Group two?”, etc. I only have to talk to five people and I know within seconds that all 46 are accounted for and ready to go. It works great and keeps us all safe! The numbers on the hands help the adults remember which they belong to --- hee, hee.

I laid in bed, going over everything until about 4:45am and couldn't wait any longer. I got up and started getting ready. At 5:00am, I woke up the rest of my family and got them going. While they were getting ready, I ran over to Walmart and purchased some ping pong balls and paddles and extra miniDV tapes, several things I was supposed to get yesterday when I had the time. (I'm sure you know how that goes!)

I wanted to get out of the house by 6:00am, but it never seems to work out that way. We left a bit late, but got to the airport around 6:40am. We were greeted by a beautiful, clear, and crispy cold sunrise (our car's readout said 35 degrees – chilly!) My son drove us, so we pulled right up to the Southwest Terminal A, jumped out, brought our luggage in the building, gave him hugs and kisses , checked our luggage in, and received our boarding passes.

While I stood just inside the glass doors, Maria, Natasha, and Monica headed over to our standard meeting area, against the glass, about fifty feet away from the bottom of the escalators. Maria and the girls would be greeting the rest of the team after they passed by me. I handed everyone their tickets and then pink ribbons to tie onto all the checked luggage so we would have an easy time retrieving our luggage in San Diego. In San Diego, we have all the men look for pink ribbons, pull all the luggage off and put them in a pile. Then all the students and ladies look for their name tags, grab their own luggage, and carry it outside to wait for the YWAM crew.

Back at the ranch … after everyone had come in, received their tickets and pink ribbons from me, I then joined the group in our meeting area. They all had time to share their excitement about going on the outreach, put on their picture badges (we made ID badges for all students and staff – we used the school pictures, created a “Mexico Outreach 2010” badge, laminated it, punched in a hole, and hooked it to a lanyard - thanks Janette! -- a former Neighborhood mom who laminates our badges for us!). This provided an ID for all students for additional safety during our travel time. We always go as a group, but it's better to be extra safe.

Using my bull horn to save my voice for the week-long time of leading this group of missionaries, I quickly read off our “Airport Briefing” check list – some three pages of things like, “Don't say anything at security or at the border about guns, explosives,” and “Get in groups quickly when we are traveling,” and “We're stopping at In-N-Out for lunch after we arrive at the San Diego airport!” (that's always a favorite for most team members). I even cover how to take good pictures (sun and windows behind the camera, etc.).

Once the check list was covered, I prayed for our team, the outreach, and our family we were leaving behind. We got in our groups and headed up the escalators to security and Gate A14. Once at the gate, we had about an hour until we departed on our flight to San Diego. With at least one adult, students had the opportunity to get cinnabons, breakfast burritos, and more, while the adults grabbed a latte or two, and maybe even a cinnabon themselves.

We were blessed once again by the Southwest gate crew as they approved my request to allow our group to preboard so we could all sit at the back of the plane. After the few business class passengers boarded, they let our group board and it gave us the opportunity to sit together and share on the trip down. Then, being the very fun airlines and flight crews that we've seen over the years, the flight attendants recruited several of our students to hand out peanuts and pretzels during the flight! It was a great start to our Mexico Outreach 2010!!

It seemed like we were descending almost as soon as we got up to cruising altitude as the pilot let us know we were to be landing soon in San Diego. We spread the word about everyone chewing a piece of the Polar Ice gum provided in the goody bags so our ears wouldn't hurt from the pressure change on the way down. We hit the ground a bit early and were right on time at the gate.

The team members did great getting out of the gate, into their groups, and heading to the escalators, restrooms, and baggage claim. The men did a fantastic job of grabbing all the pink-ribboned luggage, putting it in a pile, while the owners retrieved their luggage and carried them outside to await the arrival of the YWAM vans. Within 20 minutes or so, we were all outside waiting for the vans.

Brenda, a fairly new arrival to the YWAM base and staff in Ensenada, originally from Ciudad Juarez (yep, the place where a lot of bad stuff has happened, but how she tells us that it's only in certain parts of the city, only with the certain crowd, situations, etc.) and now she is attending the university in Missouri studying international relations, hoping to be an ambassador or similar person trying to improve her country of Mexico and the world, especially with situations like what's happening in Ciudad Juarez … she was our contact point with YWAM.

After a few miscommunications, she finally got ahold of the bus driver and instead of many vans (they couldn't get enough drivers for us), we were once again treated to a luxury tour bus, which even had a restroom on board! We loaded our luggage, got everyone on, and we made our way to In-N-Out in National City, just 15 minutes or so south on I-5 from the San Diego Airport.

We had a very tasty meal (I had the #3 Meal – a hamburger, with grilled onions, french fries, and a strawberry shake --- yummy for your tummy! -- after I provided our bus driver with a free meal supplied by In-N-Out management), sweet fellowship, lots of pictures, fed some pigeons, and then once again on the bus and to "la frontera" – the border.

At the border, we had to all get off, take out all of our luggage, form a line, and then as family units, walk up to a pole and push this little button. We either got the green “PASE” light, which meant walk forward and wait until all the rest of the team passed the light pole, or we got the red “REVISION” light, which meant they were going to open up all of your luggage and check inside. To our delight, only one red light showed up, so after the guard checked the clothes and zipped the bags back up, asked a few questions, we were free to continue on our journey. (So, is there one guy sitting up in the glass office just picking out who gets the red light? We may never know.)

With the microphone, sitting in the jump seat next to the driver, I played “tour guide” for our team, describing the scenery and special places on the “cuota” or “toll” road through Tijuana and down to Ensenada. We had some great photo ops, including the gigantic statue of Jesus,
FOX Studios, the fish rings, beautiful shoreline, and many interesting buildings and houses. As we entered the Ensenada area, we saw two cruise ships in port, the huge Mexican flag fully extended in the fairly strong breeze, the statues of past Mexican presidents, la Riviera, and more. After heading into the south part of Ensenada, we turned left, off the main road, and up a little hill to the YWAM base overlooking the ocean.

We unloaded our gear, said a big “Muchas gracias!” to the bus driver, carried our luggage into the main plaza area of the base, and stood in line to get registered. Once we had our registration badges, I told everyone their room assignments. We all carried our luggage up to the rooms (three girls' and three boys' rooms), chose one of the bunk beds, placed our stuff on the beds, and headed back down to the plaza to get ready to walk down to the beach.

About an hour of playing on the beach, finding sea shells and sand dollars, watching the many seagulls and other birds running along the shoreline, enjoying the infrequent passing of a horse and vacquero (cowboy), or a more modern version on a four-wheeler, and just hanging out with family and friends, gave us time to stretch our legs, get some fresh air, and get ready for a terrific Mexican dinner.

Pastor Roberto Nino and his wife Ada prepared the scrumpdili-icious dinner of two kinds of tamales (meat and sweet), refried beans, salsa, guacamole, salad, corn tortillas, and several kinds of juices and water to drink. After our tummies were full, we had some play time to enjoy the game room/worship hall, the drink and snack cafe, the rest of the base, and our rooms.

At 7:00pm, we gathered in the worship hall for a time of singing, praying, a short, encouraging and energetic message from Pastor Mark from Alabama, a cute video on the rules of the place, picking up our YWAM shirts, stickers, buttons, and devotionals, and then a quick team meeting to go ove r tomorrow's activities and an overview of the week.

It is “time change” season, so we moved our clocks ahead one hour. We gave the kids a little bit of time to go beyond the 10:00pm in room, 10:30pm lights out schedule, and then headed off to bed for a noisy night of snoring, sleeping bag rustling, and strange smells, sounds, and lights.

All in all, I think everyone had an almost perfect first day here on the mission field!

Well, it's 12:11am, Sunday morning, so I better get some sleep! I'll try and write again tomorrow night and let you know how our day went. Until then, please pray for us and we'll try and do our best for the Lord here in Mexico!!
DAY 2 -  Sunday, March 14, 2010
Mex10 Daily Log – Sunday, March 14, 2010

The earplugs helped quite a bit, but didn't block out all the wonderful snoring throughout the night. Although I didn't have a running partner this morning, so I didn't have to get up early, I was still awaken by the noises and after laying there for what seemed like forever, I figured 5:30am was close enough to normal wake-up time, so I got up, got dressed and got to work on yesterday's pix and daily log uploading to the Internet. By 7:00am, Neighborhood's web site was already updated with the first day's outreach activities for the folks back home to enjoy.

Slowly the YWAM base plaza filled with our groggy team members and YWAMers looking for coffee and food. Breakfast of cranberry coffee cake, oatmeal, fresh fruit, cereal, yogurt, OJ, milk, coffee, tea, and toast was served at 7:30am and filled our tummies with some great energy food. Our travel group number two did clean up duty and then at 8:30 we used our five travel groups to separate into devotion study groups. We had students read Joshua Ch. 1, the few related paragraphs in the devotion book tying that Scripture reference into the theme for the week of “Forward,” and then completed and discussed the three discussion questions. This format worked really well, and got many of the students and parents involved in the devotion time, with all of us beginning our day really thinking about our walk with Jesus. It was a great start to the day.

At 9:00am, we had Mr. Suderow grab his guitar and lead us in a few worship songs in the plaza as the worship hall was getting the carpet cleaned. At 9:20am, we headed for the vans and made our way south to Maneadero and Pastor Nino's church for Sunday service at 10:00.

We had an exciting time as we turned off the main highway onto to the very bumpy dirt roads leading up the hill to the church. Within a few hundred feet, we were met with our first of three or four deep and wide mud puddles. As the fearless leader of this crazy crew, I had to just gun it and let the rooster tail spray signify our faith that God would get us through the  unknown depth and danger of the first quagmire! It was a great treat to watch all five vans do the same. They all figured, “If senor Bushey made it, we probably will, too!” The second such obstacle didn't seem as treacherous, and by the fourth one, it was simply a fun challenge. We then headed up the almost four-wheel style dirt road, made a few turns, and the “Maranatha” church of Pastor Nino and the surrounding community members was in site. We parallel parked along the church property, grabbed our backpacks and bibles, locked the vans, and entered the small church.

Our group took up over half the seats in the wooden pews. We even helped Ada, Pastor Nino's wife, bring in some more benches and folding chairs to accommodate the overflow crowd we expected. Within another 20 minutes or so, the local church members, and even some local visitors, plus three Canadian missionaries filled the little sanctuary to capacity. From the first moments, it was clear that the Holy Spirit was there and transcended language barriers.

Pastor Nino, Brenda (our YWAM translator), the church worship team of three young ladies, and another YWAMer Josue (who translated for the three Canadians), provided the non-Spanish speaking members of the audience with the English version of Pastor Nino's introduction, the prayer requests, and then he translated into Spanish the English sermon from one of the visiting Canadians. Our junior high “King of Hearts” drama team two performed their skit and did a really great job. Stan Suderow, our sixth grade teacher, then had four students go on stage and we sang several songs that we knew in Spanish. It was great for our students and Mr. Suderow to lead this Hispanic church in worshipping the same Lord of Lords and King of Kings who we worship in our churches in Northern California. Around 12:00pm, we said our final goodbyes, got back in the vans, and headed to the downtown, Big Flag, fish market area of Ensenada.

We arrived in downtown Ensenada, drove around the block behind the Riviera and over a newly installed bridge, turned into the Riviera parking area, parked, grabbed the ice chests full of sandwiches and water, and walked into the park area just behind the Riviera. It was a beautiful setting, with lots of flowers, grass, a wide mix of plants, beautiful and clean paving stone, cement, and tile walkways, on a very warm and sunny day.

A group of servant adults laid out the pre-made meat and cheese sandwiches, chips, cookies, and water. They then made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for those wanting something other than the meat sandwiches. We picked our spots to relax and enjoy the lunch and location, and some 20 minutes later, we were ready to pack everything up and head back to the vans to travel the few blocks to the flag area.

Driving around the block back to the main road, heading north a few blocks, turning left into the parking area, we parked, locked up the vans, and walked over to the main area where the giant busts (head statues) of past, famous presidents looked east over the central part of Ensenada. Holding a copy of the Vacaville Reporter, we took some pictures of the entire group. (We'll send this picture in to the Vacaville Reporter and at some point in the future they will print the picture with a short explanation of where we were and what we were doing.)

We then broke into a bunch of small groups and walked along the Ensenada Harbor, enjoying the bright, sun-shiny afternoon, while some of us purchased some cool souvenirs for good deals, others visited the fish-market with the live crabs, the big chunks of swordfish, the squid, and the very smelly, fly-infested, cutting and selling area. The weather was fantastic and due to the day being Sunday, there were hundreds, if not thousands of local Mexican families everywhere joining us in having a great time outdoors along the harbor. We took tons of pictures, lots of video, and tasted some churros, ice cream, and other tasty treats.

Around 4:00pm, we met back at the Big Flag, headed back to the parked vans, and then drove the 15 minutes or so back to the base. We had about 1.5 hours of free time to relax, or as most of the kids did, have some fun around the base.

At 5:30pm, instead of our regular dinner, the YWAM staff took us out for an unexpected dinner at a local Mexican restaurant. With over 50 of us, it took a wh ile for the small restaurant staff to prepare our tacos, tortas, quesadillas, and more, but we all left there fat and happy!
We got back just after 7:00pm, made a quick pit-stop in our rooms, and headed to one of the meeting halls just over the cafeteria on the second floor. Two YWAMer s we re playing only two guitars in a small, intimate setting quite different from the normal full band (drums, bass, electric guitar, acoustic guitar, vocals, keyboard, etc.). Everyone was worshipping and having a great time with the Lord.

Mark came in, told some very funny stories about when he was a kid and a few of the pranks he pulled on his sister. He then gave a great message about getting real with Christ, looking at where our walk is with Jesus. He then had us write down on a small piece of paper some sin or other thing we wanted Christ to just take away, and/or forgive us. These were just between God and each individual. At that point, Jesus (played by Jacob – one of our YWAM staff and now one our team members for the week), came in, collected all of the “sins” into a cloth bag and told the audience to follow him outside.

We walked down the stairs to the plaza, crossed the plaza and grouped together in the area between the plaza and the worship hall. This is the old van parking area, now full of gravel which is kept fairly organized and clean. As we entered this middle area, and looked to our left (at this point of the day, it's about 8:00pm and dark out) and we could see an illuminated wooden cross standing up, with a very elegant looking white draping over and around the cross member, and Jesus standing in front of the cross.

Jesus then places the bag of “sins” on the cross and departs. After some time to contemplate and review what we have done and what we see, Mark walks into the scene and asks for any who want to accept Jesus into their hearts for the first time, recommit their lives and hearts to Jesus, or ramp up their commitment to our Lord.

It was special to see about half a dozen or more young ones come forth and make that commitment. Mark prayed for them after he instructed all the audience to form into male and female groups and have a dynamic group prayer time. I felt honored to be able to walk around each of the groups and pray for everyone there. Hearts were changed. Let's hope and pray that it is a life-long change more in line with God's will for each and every one here.

We ended around 9:00pm and had one hour of free time for the kids. They used this time to play ping pong, foosball, get hot chocolates and milk shakes from the snack/gift shack. Around 10:00pm, I had a pingpong rematch with Sam and he beat me 5 games to 4. I finally have someone who I can really play with (and it only took 11 years for YWAM to get a real ping pong competitor!).

Back in the rooms, and lights are out at 10:30pm or so, unless you were like our room and chatted until after 11:00pm with our YWAM room buddies. Overall, we had a very excellent day for the Lord!
DAY 3 -  Monday, March 15, 2010
Mex10 Daily Log – Monday, March 15, 2010

The quiet “beep-beep-beep” sound of my Coleman watch alarm woke me up, and without making too much noise, I got on my running gear, grabbed the camera, and headed quietly downstairs to the plaza. Ethan was already waiting, and within a minute or so, Danny and Lucas appeared as well. Around 5:35am, I realized that I had set the alarm on Maria's cell phone, but hadn't updated her time when we came across the border. I ran back to my room, dialed 001 (to get to the U.S.) and then dialed her cell phone and heard a sleepy, “Hello?” – “Wake up,” I whispered, “we're downstairs waiting.” “Okay,” she answered, “I'll be down in a minute or so.”

Within five minutes, Maria joined our crew. We did our short video of the crazy runners while everyone else who was sleeping “was slackin'!” So Ethan, Danny, Lucas, Maria, and I slowly ran down the road past the YWAM base, crossed the highway, turned right onto the nice sidewalk area and headed for the downtown area. Due to my ankle still hurting, the other four had to run a bit, then wait for me while I ran very slowly --- sort of like four rabbits having to wait for the plodding tortoise. About 20 minutes later, we touched the gigantic flag pole at Ensenada Harbor. We stretched a bit, took a couple of pix, and then tried to do 25 down-angle pushups (with our feet higher than our hands).

On the way back, at about the half way point, we were running along the sidewalk parallel to the main highway, and heard a screeching noise and watched as a man driving a pickup truck hit the median, slammed into a light pole, bending the pole and exploding the light, which turned his pickup truck perpendicular to the lane in which he was traveling (parallel to us and in the same direction). Both front and rear tires on the driver's side were flat, and Maria and I ran up to the pickup truck, while the boys remained on the sidewalk. I got to the window as the driver tried to restart the truck and drive away. I told Maria that he's probably drunk. I knocked on the window and shouted, “Senor!” – he sort of looked at me but appeared to be totally out of it. Just then, two security guards or policemen came running up and told us to leave. Within a very short time, they had the guy out of the vehicle and were walking the man back to the curb. It was very apparent the driver was either drunk or on some kind of drug as he could barely walk. Just a bit of excitement for our morning run and a great way to start our day!

After a quick shower, I was blessed with one of my favorite breakfast foods … pancakes!! The staff had prepared pancakes, sausage, fresh fruit, and had several kinds of dry cereal, milk, yogurt, orange juice, coffee, tea, etc., – just a great breakfast beginning at our usual time of 7:30am! We filled our bellies and then while team three did clean up duty, the rest of us enjoyed some time of fellowship. At 8:30am, we met in our travel groups to discuss Joshua Ch. 2 and go over the devotion text and questions. It was another good time of learning more about what God has for us and how we can move "forward" with Him.

9:00am worship was exciting in the newly cleaned worship hall (they cleaned the carpets the day before). At around 9:20am, we headed for our vans, three vans for the junior high house building team led by YWAMer Jared and our own Mr. Walls, while the sixth grade evangelism team loaded up two vans and waited patiently for Pastor Nino's arrival to lead us to two different migrant camps for the day.

I went with the sixth grade team today, so I'll give you some details from our time. The junior high team, as reported to me when we got back, got a TON of work done, actually way ahead of schedule. They all had a fantastic time learning how to build an entire house. By the time their day was wrapping up around 5:00pm, they had all the walls up and the sheeting on the roof! Great job to all!

The sixth grade team headed first to Colonial Juarez, and small migrant camp just down the hill from Pastor Nino's church. The bumpy dirt roads brought us into the camp and the children began running to the center of the camp, where there was some open dirt space providing our team the perfect location to do our dramas and more. Part of our team walked the camp and invited all the people to come and see the dramas and receive some gifts from us. Some others of our gro up were pumping up a ton of balloons and stashing them in the back of the vans to hand out later after the dramas and songs.

Mr. Suderow led the students in singing some Spanish songs, while the students tried to encourage the local Mexican children to join them in jumping, dancing, and singing the songs. After several songs, they performed “The Champion” (“El Campion” in Spanish). The gospel message came across to the 60 or so young ones through the drama, even though our students couldn't say that message in Spanish. The message continued as our students performed the “Chicken” skit with Mr. Suderow and our YWAMer Brenda speaking the English and Spanish narrator parts respectively. The local children really enjoyed the dramas and songs.

We then brought out two brand new soccer balls and began one game for the girls and younger ones, and one game for the boys and older players. As those games were being played, the real little ones and some of the mothers from the camp were at the craft table getting some really cool “gospel bracelets” placed on their wrists from some of our team members and some YWAMers, including three dressed up as “paillasos” (clowns). After about 10 minutes or so, we had the children line up and our students and parents brought out the balloons and candy and handed each child one balloon and two pieces of candy.

Over at the back of one of the vans, some of our adult team members were providing moms with babies (or those pregnant) some cloth diapers and some pampers. We had many facets of ministry going on all over the place. It was really incredible.

It was also really getting warm – in the 70s or more and around 12:30pm or so we wrapped things up and headed just a bit south to the central park in Maneadero to eat a relaxing YWAM lunch in the shade of lots of trees and lots of green grass. We took our time and fellowshipped, with most of us just hanging around while some of the students played on the huge slide and the swings. It was really nice.

We then headed to Colonial Durango, a very poor camp just up the road past “El Reino de Los Ninos” (“Kids Kingdom” orphanage). While most of our team broke into two groups and walked the camp to gather the people to see the dramas, I borrowed Pastor Nino and a couple of our parents to help set up a table and chair from a local family, plugged in an extension cord to one house that had electricity (they pay $18 every two months for unlimited electricity for those in the “poor” category), and I set up my MacBook Pro laptop computer, an HP-Deskjet D1600 inkjet printer, the Canon HV25 digital camcorder, and opened the “photo studio.”

We had the children and families line up, I took a snapshot, uploaded the picture from the camera into a pre-designed drawing that had “Jesus Te Ama” at the top, some graphics, and Neighborhood's contact info so we could give the children and families a special “photo” they could cherish. It was such a blessing to have one of the young girls come up and say, “I remember you!” (in Spanish), and “Look – I still have the picture you gave me last year!” And sure enough, she had the page I had printed out with her face on it last year! What a blessing to know that something so simple, so inexpensive, could make such a memorable gift to this little girl. The line was long and seemed never ending for those wanting to receive a picture of their faces.

After close to an hour, we had to shut down the line so Mr. Suderow and the students could perform their skits, songs, and message to the camp's residents. After a great job by all, we broke out the balloons, candy, soccer balls, and I continued the photo studio. After close to three hours, some time close to 4:30pm, we wrapped it up and headed back to the base. Many “gracias!” - thank yous! - were provided by the children and adults as our vans left the camp area.

En route to the base, we had to stop at a road-side fruit stand for Maria to purchase some mangos and papayas. I ate one later and it was very sweet. She bought some extra for others in our van --- $8 for a big bag of delicious fruit – it would have been easily double that cost in the States.

We got back to the base a bit after 5:00pm, which gave us just enough time to take a quick shower and get ready for dinner. We had two kinds of pizza, salad, rice milk, fruit punch, coffee, and water to fill our hungry bellies.

The junior high team got back a bit late but in time to grab some of the dinner. For both teams it was a very successful day in service to our Lord!

Travel group four was on clean up duty and did a great job. I took the time to upload a bunch of pictures (Pix2). At 7:00pm, we started our worship and program time.

Mark, Sheril, and Busta did a great job in preparing our hearts to make a deeper commitment to our Lord. Busta shared how he had attended a very similar commitment service about seven years ago and he had written down, asking God, to bring Busta to many nations, to speak other languages, and to be a missionary --- and all had come to pass!! It was a great testimony spoken from the heart. After the message, the students were instructed and then found a quiet spot in the worship hall to answer the questions in the commitment booklet and had several stations they could visit around the room. It was a nice, quiet time with the Lord.

After, both students and adults hung out in the worship hall for a great time of fellowship. What a very nice end to a very busy and profitable day for our God! We're all going to sleep well tonight!
DAY 4 -  Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Mex10 Daily Log – Tuesday, March 16, 2010

I wasn't going to run again as my ankle was pretty sore still, but I got up early anyway and walked out of the room around 6:00am and headed to the cafeteria (one of the best places at the base to get four bars on my wireless signal menu while sitting comfortably with a table top) to upload yesterday's daily log and pictures to the school web site. The many birds were chirping, the sky was a clear blue, and it was already getting warm --- it was going to be a very hot one today.

As promised, I got a video iChat going around 9:00am and had a number of our parents and students to come outside the worship hall and say, “Hello!” via my computer, the Internet, and iChat connected to Janet's computer in the school office. Janet had the students come out of class to iChat with their parents and siblings --- it was a very nice communication time for both our team members and those still at Neighborhood. We'll try to do it again tomorrow morning.

After worship, we loaded into the vans and this time Maria and I went with the house building team while Bryan Walls, our house building team leader went with the sixth graders to be with his son Bryce and wife Toni for the day. The sixth graders had another great day with Pastor Nino.

Again, on Mexican time, Pastor Nino showed up late (was due by 9:30am), and then lead the caravan to Las Flores, a colonial located near Maneadero and over the hill from his Maranatha church where we went on Sunday. Mr. Suderow and the team played with a bunch of the children from the colonial, ran up this huge hill behind Pastor Nino's other church, played soccer, sang songs, did their dramas, created different shaped b alloons, and handed out candy to the children and diapers to the moms. Our team helped feed the children of the area (Pastor Nino's church prepared lunch for the children and our kids and parents were great servants for the Lord). After serving others, our team ate lunch inside the church building at the bottom of the hill.

The team wrapped everything up and traveled down the road to Los Olivos. Our students had a great time with the children at this camp. Though there weren't many children, they really enjoyed being with our team. The songs, skits, soccer, and gifts spoke the love of Jesus to both children and adults at Los Olivos.

It was really cool that there was time for the sixth grade team to go to the house building location and they got there right when the house was being finished! This is a record for Neighborhood – completely built in two days. The students, parents, staff, and YWAMers worked so well together and everyone is to congratulated for a job very well done! The house looks beautiful!!

The junior high team got to the house site around 10:30am and got right to work. They finished up the roof, the painting, the trim, the lights, and hooked up the electricity. Before we left, both the new house and the old house behind the new one were on electricity from the power pole!! We have only to put up the personalized family sign (with all of our names on the back of the sign) near the front door and do the house dedication tomorrow (I'll write more about that).

The entire outreach team caravanned back to the base, arriving just around 5:00pm. Some of us took a quick shower, changed, and then headed for a dinner of broiled chicken, corn, rice, cranberry sauce, tortillas, and the standard drinks. It was another scrumpdili-icious meal!

At 7:00pm, we headed over to the worship hall. Jacob and crew led us into the throne room of God with about 20 minutes of songs and then Mark gave another encouraging and energetic message. Around 8:00pm, we grabbed our jackets and flashlights and walked out the gate between the worship hall and the rooms, to the volleyball court area. Busta, our YWAM buddy/facilitator had gone to the local lumber yard and picked up a bunch of scrap lumber. Mr. Suderow, our resident boy scout, poured a bunch of lighter fluid on the big pile and within a few minutes, we had a roaring bon fire!

The entire outreach team and a bunch of YWAMers joined in some heavenly worship under a very mild, clear, starry night as we circled the bon fire. After several songs, Mr. Suderow instructed the team to break up into groups and pray for different aspects of the Mexican culture: government, family, entertainment, media, economy/business, education, and health/medical aspects. Students, parents, staff, and YWAMers all poured out their hearts for the city of Ensenada and the people of Mexico. We are confident our prayers were heard by our God and Savior and that they would be effective in interceding for this city and these people.

After the time of prayer, I grabbed a 2x4 and slid out several pieces of wood from the main fire and created three separate small fires so the students could get close enough to roast some marshmallows. (The main bon fire was way too hot to get close enough with our short skewers.) Listening to some great Christian music on the portable speaker, we had our fill of those gooey, tasty treats and then safely crossed the main roadway, navigated our way down the dirt/sandy bank onto the main sandy, beach area, and set up a “Capture the Flag” field. Mr. Suderow did all the work in drawing the lines for the field layout, and had previously asked our YWAMers to provide two small poles and red “flags” for the opposing teams.

Mr. Suderow had the sixth graders play against the junior high. The game began and the students were off and running as the parents watched leaning against a short wall nearby. We were blessed to have several street lights illuminating our part of the beach just enough so the students could easily see where to run.

With the gang busy, I had the opportunity to relax a bit and walked down to the water's edge. The constant crashing of the waves is so soothing – it's one of my favorite locations to just stay still and relax. As I looked down at the high tide water making its best attempt to get my feet soaked, I noticed something squiggly in the water.

I looked again and saw it was a grunion! You know, those small sardine-looking fish that pick a new moon night on certain beaches on the Pacific coast to lay their eggs. I grabbed about three or four of the grunion and ran up to Mr. Suderow. He was as excited as I was and we used my bull horn to call all the students together. As soon as they saw, with the help of many flashlights, what was in my hands, we all ran down to the water and began a 40 minute grunion run hunt. It was a terrific blessing and extremely exciting! The last time I caught grunion was when I was in high school (and that was many moons ago!). As the students came running up to me, “Mr. Bushey! Mr. Bushey! Look! I caught one!” we all screamed and then someone with a camera took some pictures. We threw them back in the water and caught some more! It was a tremendously fun and exciting way to end our Tuesday in Mexico.

We escorted everyone safely back across the street to the base and as our team members headed off to their rooms, a couple of the dads helped me with several buckets of water and we dowsed the bon fire. By the time my head hit the sack, I was dead tired – along with the majority of our team members. What another day full of blessings! Thank YOU Lord!
DAY 5 -  Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Mex10 Daily Log – Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Nope, they don't celebrate it down here, but WE DID! A bunch of us remembered to wear green!

Many of our team members had, by now, a routine of getting up early and taking a beautiful, serene, and very refreshing walk on the beach each sunrise. Most adults were talked into this by the students, but those team members who made the effort to get up a bit early and head down to the beach before breakfast were rewarded handsomely.

A breakfast of chorizo (Mexican sausage) y huevos (and eggs), plus some country fried potatoes, and the usual cereals, milk, juice, coffee, etc., provided us with ample nourishment for another full day of ministry. The Lord also provided another very clear and soon-to-be-hot day in the Ensenada area.

After breakfast, we had our usual bit of free time and then we met for devotions but had to keep it short as we had an early start for this day. We did about 15 minutes of devotion and then went to the worship hall for an early start. Steve led us in some great worship to get our hearts in the right spot to serve the people of Mexico.

Because the building team, led by YWAMer Jared and our own parent Bryan Walls, had set a new Neighborhood record by completing the entire house in only two days, we had the wonderful opportunity to have most of the team, both junior high and sixth grade groups, to go out together. We had a group of moms, one son, and some YWAMers take one passenger van and the empty tool van to head to the house building site, pick up Olga, the lady who was receiving the house, and take her shopping. Our very generous team members with funds from the fifth grade hot chocolate fund raiser (they raised money by selling hot chocolate at Neighborhood which pr ovide soccer balls, pumps, some kitchen items, and then extra cash for the family's shopping trip) provided over $1,300 for the family shopping spree!! What a real blessing for Olga, Benny, and the kids!

The majority of our group was to head out with Pastor Nino. Pastor Nino had set up an appointment at the “Libertadores de America” Chrisitian school at exactly 10:00am-11:00am. The pastor repeatedly pointed out that we had to leave the base right at 9:00am so we'd get there by 10:00am. So I got everyone out the vans and ready to roll at just after 9:00am, and Pastor Nino was on Mexican time, and didn't show up until about 9:15am! At least we were ready!

We drove into downtown Ensenada, past the big flag and the head statues, up to the hills on the north side of Ensenada, took a right and headed over to the school. We got there just a bit too early, so Pastor Nino took us on a little sight-seeing tour of Ensenada. Close to 10:00am, we pulled up to the school, parked, got out the drama kit suitcase, two soccer balls, the portable speaker, the red tool box (containing the microphone, MP3 player with our drama songs and more loaded on it, and the mic and MP3 cables), and all of our backpacks as we didn't want to chance leaving anything in the vans.

As we entered the gate, with the permission of the lady gate monitor, we were struck by the appearance of the school. The school is made out of cement and cement block walls, and is very clean looking. The students looked very prep-schoolish --- all in sharp blue and white uniforms. These children are from wealthy homes. Many of their parents drive the two hours to Tijuana or San Diego each day to work in the States. Others work in Ensenada, but most of the parents of these students are doctors, lawyers, businessmen and women, etc., as the school charges each student about $1,500 US per year in tuition.

As we met these students, we realized the advantage these students have over the hundreds of other children we've met in the migrant camps. First of all, they were all clean and tidy, most likely all had full restrooms and showers at home, with combs and brushes, toothpaste and toothbrushes, etc., to be able to dress and look so clean and neat. This also meant that they had a much better chance of having proper nutrition on a daily basis and having excellent opportunity at staying healthy, so they could attend school and receive a top quality education.

These students spoke Spanish as their native language but most of them also spoke English very well. Most of them have email accounts, computers at home, and all the standard toys our kids have --- MP3 players, Nintendo, TVs, etc. They were definitely in a completely higher class than what we've seen throughout the week.

We broke up into two groups – our junior high students and their older students, and our sixth graders and the younger ones. We had two soccer games going, one on the small dirt soccer field at the back of the school, the other on the cement basketball court/amphitheater. Of course, they killed our students playing soccer, their national sport. We did, however, have several of our students who could easily keep up with their best soccer players, so it was a very fun time. I even got in there as the goal keeper for the older group, and saved a goal shot by using my face to stop a very hard kicked shot. My eyes were watering but no blood came out of my nose, so praise the Lord! We all had a great time!

Around 10:30am, we all got together in the amphitheater and the sixth graders sang some songs and performed “The Champion.” The junior high “King of Hearts” team 2 then performed, and we had some testimonies and then had to wrap things up by shaking hands, saying our goodbyes, and dragging Mr. Suderow's guitar out of one boy's hands. He was REALLY good, showing us his ability to play “Stairway to Heaven” – a famous Led Zepplin song. Overall a fantastic time!

We packed up the vans, but couldn't head directly to Pastor Nino's house as Ada wouldn't be ready to serve lunch for our entire group until around 1:00pm. To my pleasant surprise, Pastor Nino took us around the hill and then up the hill to “Prayer Mountain.” This is a hill overlooking Ensenada that was affectionately named “Prayer Mountain” by the YWAMers who, for many years, used this with outreach teams to pray for the city. The police shut down the use of the location for many years as local teenagers and others would cause too many problems having parties up there. It was amazing to me that we could get access to the lookout point and enjoy the awesome bird's eye view of the entire Ensenada area.

Mr. Suderow led us in a time of prayer for the city and the people. Afterwards, one of our dads - Mr. Bewley, Maria, and I climbed down the path and went below the rock wall where our team members were standing. There were a bunch of rocks available so we made a big  “NCS” out of the rocks and then had our students come down and the parents took pictures of our students and “NCS” overlooking Ensenada bay. It was great fun!

We took our time getting back to the vans and then to use up some more time, Pastor Nino took us by last year's home building location. We said, “Hola!” again to the dad and son living at the house. Some of our parents and students had helped build that house last year, so it was a special blessing to keep in touch with this family.

It was close to 1:00pm, so we headed over to Pastor Nino's house. About 10 minutes after we got there, the shopping crew showed up and we all had a totally tasty lunch prepared by Ada (Pastor Nino's wife) and Elsa (a friend of Ada's from church). They had prepared tacquitos, three or four kinds of beef, beans, rice, picadillo, salad, tostadas, and especially for me – flour tortillas with a tub of butter so I could spread a bit of butter on the hot tortillas! It was a very blessed time of fellowship and piggin' out! The students also played with Pastor Nino's six or seven dogs (used primarily for security to keep the house and property safe).

Well, it was time to head over to the house site for the dedication. When we got there, the junior high team set up the family's new refrigerator, stove, carpeting for both rooms, and a bunch of supplies and other household items. We all crunched in front of the house and got a group photo and the YWAMers quickly printed out the photo and framed it. We handed that, a new bible, and the house keys to Bryan, the building leader.

Mr. Suderow opened up the dedication with some songs, then we had the junior high “King of Hearts” team 1 perform their drama. After, I said a quick introduction with Elga, our YWAMer translator repeating in Spanish for the family's benefit, we had Bryan tell the family how blessed our team was to be able to provide this new home for this family. He then prayed for them, handed them the bible, picture, and then the keys, and the family entered their new home!

Many hugs, tears, and lots of great memories wrapped up the dedication. We said our goodbyes and headed back to the base for dinner. I didn't do too bad as the task master as we arrived back at the base at 5:35pm, just five minutes late for the start of dinner. And believe me, the YWAMers take their meal schedules seriously! If you're not there when dinner is served, you're out! The dinner was delicious as usual and we all had a great time of fellowship as we talked about the week so far and especially the house dedication.

We had a special evening program all to ourselves! Because we were the only group at the base for this first week of Mission Adventures, we had a ton of flexibility in what we could do. Busta and Sheril were really great about going with the flow and providing a lot of opportunity for us to help shape our stay here in Ensenada.

Mr. Suderow put together a worship team from our group including Mrs. Estebez, Emily, Mr. Jordan, Mrs. Jordan, and Danielle. They led us in having a great time singing praises to the King! Mr. Suderow then talked about the outreach so far and asked for “volunteer” testimonies from the students (when they didn't volunteer, he “volunteered” students one at a time until they all shared). There were many very special testimonies from the students. The opportunity to share was provided to the parents, and many spoke some very touching and tearful accounts.

We then had YWAM souvenir gifts of shirts and a hat for two sixth and two junior high students. All the students did a great job, we just picked several who touched our hearts with their actions and hard work. Mr. Walls spoke a bit and handed out the junior high gifts, while Mr. Suderow handled the sixth grade gifts.

I followed up instructions for Thursdays schedule and an announcement of a ping pong tournament! Many of the students had been playing ping pong the entire week and they had been using a game whereby whoever wins the point stays playing. I used that format and kept score as the students had 30 minutes to compete. We even had two dads, Isreal and John, join the competition. It was a very competitive 30 minutes and Kyle came out the “Best Ping Pong Player for 2010!” He received a custom made trophy including a real piece of scrap wood from YWAM Ensenada, a ping pong ball with a three inch nail stuck through it to the wood and “Ping Pong Champion” entitled on the wood. It was a very fun tournament!

We continued hanging out and playing until 10:00pm, and then we all went to get some much needed rest after a long and glorious day.
DAY 6 -  Thursday, March 18, 2010
Mex10 Daily Log – Thursday, March 18, 2010

“Blessed are the flexible, for they shall not be broken!” This is the “beatitude” we've come to cling to during our Mexico outreaches. Today was a good example of needing to just go with the Holy Spirit, wherever He leads.

The day started out as planned – up early, getting the Daily Logs and pix uploaded to the Internet for the families back home, but the Internet connection kept dumping the picture upload process, so I had to keep reloading the FTP program to try and establish a good connection, thought all was going well, and it would bomb again after fifty pix or so. After many attempts, I resigned to just putting up the daily log and will upload more pix later.

Breakfast was blueberry pancakes, sausage, and the normal cereals, yogurt, and drinks. Very tasty, and again, anything like pancakes or waffles are my favorite breakfast foods. I think everyone has been very pleased with the food we have been served here at YWAM Ensenada. Our hats are off to the kitchen staff!

Thursday began with a very warm start, so we knew it would be another hot one! We've had several students and adults over the past two days with headaches and tummy aches, and almost positively due to the heat and not consuming enough water. It's like the saying, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.” Well, I've been telling everyone and telling everyone to drink TONS of water … oh well, maybe the pain will be a better instructor!

It's been a good year regarding sicknesses … we've had very few people down and out and most of those were sick with flu bugs before we left from home. I was one of those who was sick the week before we left and as I write this early Friday morning, am feeling about 90% back to normal.

We had our normal devotion time, going over Philippians Ch. 3 today, and then worship at 9:00am. Jacob and Steve did another great job helping us to start our day on the right track … going to the cross and seeking His face and presence. We finished worship and loaded up the vans.

Pastor Nino was right on time and we headed out to La Fuente de Vida (The Fountain of Life) project on the top of the hill near Pastor Nino's two churches in Maneadero. It was a totally thrilling ride up the very steep, very bumpy dirt roads (and I use the term “road” lightly). The students and most of the dads thought it was great. The moms on the other hand …

A bunch of huge turkeys greeted us at the top of the hill where a family lives just above the project site. One of the Tom turkeys puffed out his chest and strutted his stuff as I “gobble-gobble-gobbled” and took some pictures. We all walked onto the cement slab of the future community center building and when the group was gathered, I explained the five to six year old project, it's need for funding, and the hope that this project will bless the lives of many of the Oaxacan people who have migrated to the Ensenada and Maneadero area.

The goals of the project include a K-12 Christian school, job training for adults (making clothes and furniture, using computers, etc.), health care, dormitories for visiting missionary teams, soccer field for the students to play, and more. If you are interested in obtaining more information about this project, or for supporting this project, please contact the school office.

After we prayed for the project, we headed to a migrant camp called La Semilla. We headed down the highway just a bit and then turned right off the road onto a dirt road, down a steep hill, and then out into the countryside. We came up to another point where the road dropped down and Pastor Nino, leading in his Suzuki Samurai, hesitated, got on the walkie-talkie, and said in Spanish, but I'll translate here, “Okay Chris, you must tell every driver to go straight and don't stop!” I looked ahead of Pastor Nino's car and we were faced with the road ending in a river about 200 feet wide of an unknown depth.

Pastor Nino put it in gear and, with water spraying up on both sides, made it through the Rio Grande to the other side! I turned on the video camera and gunned it … looking down in the middle, the water was probably about two feet deep at its deepest, but what a thrill for all of us! Each van hesitated then went for it with shouts of triumph at the other side.

Along quite a long stretch of very bumpy dirt roads we turned near some plastic greenhouse type structures and came to an abrupt stop. The road had washed away and just dropped off some three feet. We all had to back up and go around the obstruction and found our way back to the right dirt pathway. We got to La Semilla to find it empty. After a few minutes of Pastor Nino and I looking around, we found a boy around 13 years old on a bicycle. He said that there were about 20 families still living there, but they were all out working at the next field. Usually we'd still find the women and small children in this camp, so I wonder why they were all working. Maybe they all had to work, even bringing along their smaller children. At any rate, we had another five or six kids come into the camp when they saw the vans, so we handed out some candy, two soccer balls, some clothes … Maria even took the shirt off her back when one of the boys asked if he could have her shirt! Some others did the same. It was a short but sweet time and we were off on our way to find Trinidad's house.

About 15 minutes later, we pulled into Trinidad's house and found the door with a chain and lock on it. Pastor Nino went over to the house next door and asked the family if they knew where Trinidad was. They said he walked to the store! Now this guy is 100 years old as of May this year and he is walking several miles to go to the store! Wow!

It was already about 12:30pm by now, so I had the team break out the lunch supplies and eat lunch while Pastor Nino and I made a big circle to all the local stores trying to find Trinidad. I was bummed when we had no success and returned to Trinidad's house. We brought out all the birthday presents that I had purchased at WalMart (a plastic chair, cans of refried beans, boxed milk, Sucaritas - “Frosted Flakes”, Maria's cookies, flour tortillas – they last longer than corn, a bunch of bottled water --- things that would last without refrigeration as Trinidad had no refrigerator). We had everyone sign their name on the chair, blew up a bunch of the balloons, and placed it all against Trinidad's door, and then covered it with an old sweatshirt that was laying around. I asked God if there would be some way that we could meet up with Trinidad today, but if not, could He just bless him. I ate a quick sandwich, loaded up the crew, and we were off to our long-awaited shopping and site-seeing time at La Bufadora (the Blow Hole).

As we entered the La Bufadora area, and drove down the road through the shops to the parking lot at the far end of the strip, most of the shops were closed. This was a sign of the economic times, with tourism down, many shops only open up on Wednesdays and Saturdays, when cruise ships and groups of tourists usually show up. There were enough shops open, though, for all of our team members to get some cool souvenirs.

We parked overlooking the pounding waves against the rocks, a truly beautiful vista. I paid the parking attendant the $10 ($2 per van), gave instructions to everyone to be back at the vans at 4:00pm, to have all students attach themselves to at least one adult, and to make sure that everyone visits the blow hole at the far end of the area. We walked up the hill from the vans to the shopping area and main road, and a blessing awaited us. There, laying back against a wall, sitting on the edge of the roadway, was none other than Trinidad!! My prayer was answered in less than one hour!! What a blessing!

I asked him how he got to La Bufadora and why he was here. He said he walked to the main roadway (a tremendous feat in itself for this 100 year old man who walks about at a snail's pace due to extreme arthritis and simply old age) and got a ride here so he could maybe get some money and some food. I told him we had gone to his house and brought presents and we were glad to see him. I don't know if he fully understood or heard what we were saying, but he did get my next message that he was to wait for me and we'd give him a ride to his house. He said he would wait while we shopped, so we made our way to the blow hole.

The tide was just right this year as the blow hole was in fine fashion, shooting the salt water way up into the air, some 100 feet straight up. From my understanding, there are three blow holes in the world. This one has a hole in the rock formation where, when a surge of water comes in, the pressure from the surge pushes the water into and up the hole with such force that it shoots very high in the sky, expanding into a giant spray cloud as it reaches the apex. When it's going like it was today, it's a very awesome thing to experience. We took lots of pix and then headed back into the shopping area.

Some of team members purchased some great tasting fish tacos, churros, and other tasty treats. Most of us did some bartering as we purchased sandals, hats, ponchos, blankets, hammocks, hanging chairs, clik-claks – oh, the Mexicans call them “taca-tacas,” sun glasses, leather belts, and tons more. The air was a bit cooler than in the Maneadero valley, so it was really a perfect day to enjoy the adventure of La Bufadora.

Around 4:00pm, we loaded into the vans and began driving out. We didn't see Trinidad, but word had it that he had walked to the front section of the area. Sure enough, we found him laying on the edge of the roadway again. One of the vans who had some room stopped and two of the team helped Trinidad walk to the van and picked him up and had him sit in the middle seat. We headed back toward Maneadero and when we got close to the road to turn off and head towards his house, he was shouting, “Stop, stop!” – he wasn't in my van so I didn't find out until later, but we drove back down the rough roads to his house. We helped him out, he pulled out the key out of his pocket, unlocked the lock, pulled out the chain, and opened the door. We took some video and pix of an incredible site. You have to see the pix to understand the poverty. We explained all that we had given to him and as we listed off the items, we couldn't find the tortillas. We were certain we had set them on the table when we had left before, but they weren't there now. We're pretty sure the family next door helped themselves to the tortillas and a box of donuts, figuring Trinidad wouldn't ever miss them. I guess it's the way things are … fend for yourselves. Anyway, Trinidad had some good staple foods and water to last him a while. We shook hands, gave him our blessings, and I said, “Yo quiero verte en el ano proximo, okay?” “I want to see you next year, okay?” Whether he understood or not, I don't know. But we're hoping he's still around next year. Again, what a tremendous blessing that God would allow us to find Trinidad at La Bufadora!!

We headed into Maneadero and directly to a small Mexican restaurant. Broken up into groups, we placed our orders of tacos, quesadillas, tortas, and many varieties thereof, both carne asada (beef) and abodaba (pork) including Fantas, Sprites, Cokes, etc., and enjoyed the very loud, festive mood of this semi-outdoor cafe. We had a special treat with a dad, son, and daughter singing troop. The dad played his guitar and sang, while the boy, probably six or seven years old with new cowboy boots, slacks, collared shirt, and cowboy hat, and the girl, probably four or five, with a cute outfit, sang along with their dad. It was a very special treat added to our delicious meal.

We also had an old lady come by selling gum and hand-made bracelets. I'm wearing mine right now --- it cost $1.00 and is really a nice piece of craftsmanship. The lady was probably very blessed with our group as I think we bought out her entire inventory.

Close to 6:15pm or so, we loaded up and headed back to the base, about 30 minutes away. We quickly got all of our junk out of the vans and then headed to our final night of worship and closing session.

Jacob and Steve once again had us all jumping and singing songs to the Lord and then, with some slower, more praise type songs, had us all closing our eyes, hands raised, in the very throne room of our Lord. It was a very blessed time of worship to end our week.

Steve and Busta shared about the week and how blessed they were with our group, Jacob solicited some testimonies from the students and parents, and then the staff members who worked with us and our leaders shared a bit. Busta blessed us with a group photo in a nice frame and we all gave the YWAMers a huge round of applause.

I finished up the session with packing and travel instructions for Friday morning and we had about an hour of play time before we headed off to bed around 10:00pm to get our last night's sleep (or portion thereof).

From my perspective, this has been the best group of students and adults. We had only a very few minor problems, only a few tummy aches or headaches and a bit of homesickness, but overall a fantastically successful Mexico Outreach 2010!!
DAY 7 -  Friday, March 19, 2010
Mex10 Daily Log – Friday, March 19, 2010

Many of us packed last night. When I got up at 5:00am, I headed to the cafeteria to finish up the daily log and upload the log and pix to the web site. The birds were already chirping the arrival of another clear, hot, spring day in Ensenada.

No one was up yet. I opened the door to the cafeteria and turned on the lights, plugged in my MacBook Pro and Canon HV25 camcorder, connected the two, uploaded pix to my computer, and worked on the daily log. At 6:00am, I took a break as I walked by all six rooms to wake up our team members. Half the rooms already had their lights on and people were stirring. The other half were silent, and I cracked the door and said, “Burning daylight, let's go!” as I slid my hand inside and turned on the lights.

By 7:00am, everyone was up and ready, and the bus rolled up and parked just outside the main door to the gated complex (the bus wasn't expected until after 8:00am). By 7:30am, the rooms were cleaned and all luggage was down in the plaza area.

We had donuts, cereal, and the usual beverages for breakfast. The students, of course, were in heaven with the donuts. We said our goodbyes to the YWAMers and loaded our luggage on the bus (we had the same driver as on the way in).

As the bus drove away from the base, we waved goodbye and looked forward to getting home. The two hour ride north found some of us sleeping, most of us conversing about the week's events, about seeing our families, about coming next year, and watching the colorful scenery passing us by at 90-100 km/h. The coast line was beautiful in the morning light, with the waves crashing on the shore.

When we got into the Tijuana area, I handed out all the passports to the adults (we had three students without parents and their group leaders held their passports). I reiterated the instructions for arrival at the border.

We'd have to get out of the bus, get all luggage out, both inside and in the storage areas below, and then get in groups to ensure all were accounted for with their luggage. We then walked through a very slow line into the glass-doored checkpoint. There were two open lines where the two border agents reviewed our passports, asked where we were, what we were doing, and how long we were in Mexico. We then walked to the xray machine, loaded our luggage on the belt, walked to the other side, retrieved our luggage, and walked out the other set of glass doors to the United States of America!

We had to walk about 100 yards to the next corner where the bus was waiting to load us up and carry us to the airport. Within about 15 minutes or so, we were all back on the bus and heading to the San Diego Airport.

At around 11:30am, we pulled up to the sidewalk area just before the Southwest terminal, unloaded our luggage and got in our travel groups to verify everyone was ready. I handed out the airline tickets to all adults and we walked into the terminal to check in, get our boarding passes, and head to McDonald's for lunch. At the ticket counter we found that our plane had been delayed until 3:00pm (it was scheduled to take off at 2:30pm).

At McDonald's, I had our team members line up and come to the counter in groups of three to four. I paid the cashier and had one adult from each small group remain to receive the food and deliver it to their group's table. This worked very smoothly and we all had our food within about 30 minutes or so.

We checked the departure signs again, and the plane had been delayed until 4:00pm. We had to decide how to waste some time, so I told the group leaders to either walk over the air bridge and sit in the sun outside, stay at McDonald's, go through security and wait at the gate, or visit the shops and find at least one object that begins with each letter of the alphabet. Whoever completed this challenge would get a reward later.

Three of the groups decided to go over the air bridge and relax outside. We had the crazy “Mexican Train” dominoes players in our group, so they played several games while we waited. As there were no tables or similar objects around, they sprawled on the cement and played dominoes. Others kicked back and took a short nap, while others just enjoyed each other's company.

Several of our group had Internet-connected phones, so they routinely checked the flight status and found it bumped backed to a 4:45pm departure. Around 3:10pm, we all got up and headed to the gate. Going through security was fairly smooth, and we found a very crowded gate area. Most of the students and some adults were seated or laying on the floor, playing card games or just chit-chatting about the outreach and getting home.

I asked the Southwest airline gate person if we could preboard again and she said not this time, that it was too crowded and with the delayed departure, it wouldn't be a good idea. We all had boarding passes in the B set, so we all sat fairly close to each other, with most of us at the back of the plane.

On the flight home, it was easy to sense that the excitement of getting home was accompanied by amazement that the outreach was already over with the adrenaline levels dropping resulting in a definite higher level of tiredness settling in. Some took naps, some played card games, some took pictures, some talked the entire time, and some just read or looked out the window. The flight attendant announced our group's presence to all the  passengers, and what we did in Mexico. Later, I asked her if she would ask who in our group had completed the challenge of finding at least one object beginning with letters A-Z. About half a dozen raised their hands, and she handed them Southwest Airlines wings. SWA crews have always been very generous to us.

When we landed, I quickly went to the front of the crowd to get video of the families waiting and then, when I was down the escalator, turned to get video of the team members descending to their waiting loved ones.

Our luggage arrived and within 40 minutes or so, we were all heading home after a terrific adventure! I was glad to be heading home, but already thinking about next year's outreach. It was a great time of service for our Lord!