New Wilmington Mission Conference

Thursday June 28 we traveled to a church in Lolita.  The church was providing us lunch for the day.  As is common here in Guatemala lunch was not quite ready when we arrived.  So we worked on getting wood for the chicken coop and then we were able to go see the ladies cook lunch.  I decided to go see the work in the kitchen.  Some of the ladies from the church were cooking a huge pot ver a small fire.  It was so hot outside and standing by the fire increased the heat immensely.  They then went inside where they began making the tamales.  They are a meal often eaten during celebrations that are wrapped in banana leaves.  I was excited to watch and then had the opportunity to learn how to make the tamales.  The women were so excited to teach me.  It was a great experience to learn how hard they work.  I made only three tamales and my hands were burning from the heat and my eyes were burning from the smoke.  These ladies spend much of their day in the kitchen and do not get the respect they deserve.  Also they had many, many more tamales to make before they were finished.  I loved seeing the smiles on the women's faces as we learned about each other without using any words.  They laughed when I laughed and I did the same knowing in some small way what they were laughing at.  Learning how to make the tamales was so exciting because it is so much a part of their culture and part of experiencing their everyday life.
Sarah King