Alejandro lives in Montaña Verde with his wife and grown children close by. His home was destroyed by the hurricanes last November. Two weeks ago when I went up to check on the progress of the homes we are building I saw him carrying lumber for his roof. To get lumber you go into the woods, find the tree(s) that you need, cut them down, cut the lumber to your specifications, and then carry it out. While it is still wet. From personal experience I can tell you that there is a huge difference in the weight of fresh cut versus kiln dried lumber.
In these remote mountains there are very few with pick up trucks so it is common practice to carry your lumber out of the woods to your property. But Alejandro is 72 years old. And the wet lumber had to be carried on his shoulders (his sons helped him too) from about 2 kilometers away, on mountainous terrain.
Why?
First, there are not many people with trucks in this part of Montaña Verde, and often it is impossible to get close to where the lumber is anyway so carrying it for some distance is always required.
Well, you have a pick up truck don’t you? Yes I do. You could have hauled it at least part of the way, right? Yes, I could have.
When we do construction projects, whether it be a church or a family home, we always work in partnership with the pastor, church & community leaders, or the homeowner. We commit to providing a certain amount of resources for the project and the recipients commit to providing whatever they can. We didn’t ask Alejandro to carry his own lumber out of the forest. He didn’t tell us he was going to do that. He just did it. He is very appreciative for the help that he is receiving but he is not content to sit back and let everybody else do all of the work for him. This was something that he could do, even at 72 years old, so he did it.
Besides the home for Alejandro we have 5 other homes under construction and 6 more that will be started in the coming days and weeks. Two of the 5 homes have roofs, a third one will have a roof in a few more days and the rest will have roofs in a week or so. After that we’ll finish the floors and bathrooms so these families can start living in their own homes again.
Because of the generous donations we have received we will be able to build a total of 14 homes. We had hoped to be finished with most or all of them by now but the distance, the difficult mountain roads and the fact that there has not really been a dry season in Montaña Verde this year has made it very difficult for us to advance the construction as quickly as we thought we would.
Now that we have reached May and are approaching June it is necessary to go up very early in the morning and get back down the mountain asap, ideally no later than lunchtime if possible, as afternoon rains and heavy thunderstorms are the norm now. One of the delivery drivers had to spend the night a few weeks ago because an afternoon storm rolled in making it impossible for him to go back until the next day.
Please pray for God’s favor and protection so deliveries can be made safely and that we can finish these projects as quickly as possible.