Marty Hand family in Guatemala

This is a moment of confession/confusion/con-something…  Friday a week ago we had an organizational meeting right after breakfast… Hands are coming Sat./need to exchange money in the city/equipment on the bench in various states, a few other things.  Paul Gordon goes to the shop at the warehouse, Cindy cleans house and I go to the city for Vine business and exchange money for the Hand family coming a day later.  All errands done, and I have my foot to the floor on the accelerator heading back up the mountain – phone rings (I usually don’t answer it – traffic is light so I do) and I hear, “We are here”…….I am confused… couple more comments I finally say “WHO IS THIS?”  It’s Marty Hand and family at the airport..  YIKES.  Quick turn around back to the airport and pick them up.  Feeling very embarrassed and thankfully very forgiven we hit Pollo Campero, the house and the bodega.

You know you have teenage girls in the house when they look at your little bananas (called digitales – fingers) here in Guatemala and hear, “That is SOO cute”.  Sarah bananas are edible not cute.   Tools in back of van with the Hand family gear and across Guatemala City we head toward Casa/Clinica Angelina.

Marty Hand and I have been friends for over a decade.  He is a biomedical technician that has accompanied me on several trips to Dominican Republic and Guatemala.  His daughters asked specifically if they could take a trip like this instead of putting money into a senior trip.  So we set them up with Casa Angelina with the thought that they would not be in the van traveling as much as we do with the biomed teams.  Marty could repair and PM the equipment in the clinic and then work on equipment in the orphanage while the Hand ladies did what ever was HANDY.. they painted fence, cleaned the clinic, and played with kids.  Marty earned the name McGyver after fixing dryers, washers, stoves blender, microwaves etc.  Cindy Paul and I picked them up at breakfast on Thursday and took them to Antigua where the girls shopped.  We had a good evening of fellowship and got the clan to the airport in time for their flight on Friday.  The administrators at Casa Angelina have invited the Hands back anytime.

Marty will be part of a video project we are doing about the need for biomedical technicians in Guatemala (and the developing world).  This will be presented to the North Carolina Biomed Association meeting in September this year with Jim Moore and the biomeds at Samaritan’s Purse.

Marty, Joy, Hannah and Sarah…. I will never leave you at the airport again.  This is a guarantee because Cindy has promised to beat me with a broom if I ever do this again.  Photo blog is linked here.

A word about Good search.  We are over 13.00 dollars so we will make the $25.00 cutoff this year for a donation check at the end of the year of that I am confident.  Only 32 of our readers have participated and 1/4 of those only once.  If you are a student doing papers for your classes and using the internet for research, set up GoodSearch as your search engine.  (www.goodsearch.com)  Enter Vine International in the non profit you want to support box and we get a penny for every search you do.  Share with friends that want to support a good mission but don’t have money to do so.  If you buy anything online check through Goodsearch and see what kind of deal you can get and watch the donation dollars stack up.

Thank you to the Hand family for demonstrating their compassion for missions here in Guatemala.

In Christ, Dennis and Cindy McCutcheon