When God does something, you just sit back to watch

I have to admit I'm a bit hesitant about posting this. We live in the tropics. Palm trees are a part of our daily landscape. Before leaving on our internship, someone made the statement that we were "going on vacation".  I really shy away from sharing anything that would seem that we are on vacation, or that our life is a vacation. Honestly I wouldn't choose this life as a vacation, but perhaps you would.

The reason I am hesitant is we took a break. It was a planned break, planned around our visa renewal. It costs us 37.00$ (bz)to leave the country as a part of Belizean law. This is why we don't frequently leave. Our visas were due to being renewed. Last time we went to Mexico, we were able to avoid our visa renewal fee by leaving and only paying the exit fee.  Unfortunately we did have to pay both fees, but it was worth the try!

Where did we go you ask? Chetumal!  Most Belizeans, especially those more north, go to Chetumal to shop. While it is distinctly Mexican, it does have some vendors from the US.

















 Our first stop was Mcdonalds.  The kids had dreamed about this for 4 months!  I joke that I only let them go to Mcdonalds while in Mexico. We don't while we are in the states, and there aren't any in Belize.  I unfortunately got something. It made me suffer later. Mcdonalds and I don't get along. Of course this was a Mexican Mcdonalds, they had a variety of salsa to put on your food.



Shopping was next on our list. We walked across the parking lot to the mall. The mall! An air conditioned place to walk and peruse the thousands of things available to buy. Not to mention the food court!

After a day of shopping, looking and exploring things in Spanish, we looked for a place to stay. Someone recommended a the hotel behind the mall. Nathanael and I navigated checking in in Spanish.  As they were in the process behind the counter, Nathanael noticed that the woman was gesturing at a cleaning lady behind us.  Nathanael asked if the cleaning lady was Deaf. "Yes" came the answer.

Nathanael conversed with her some. The next day we took her and her friends who work at the hotel out for dinner.  It was a difficult time. There were 4 languages at our table. The children conversed in English. We ordered in Spanish. Nathanael attempted a combination of ASL, and the Deaf taught him some LSM (ligua de sordomudo) the sign language in Mexico.

We were in awe!  We could not have planned to meet these Deaf people. It was simply a thing we stood back and saw God do!

We were able to connect with them via what's app and Facebook. We are thankful for what God is doing and hope that we can see the Deaf again in our next Mexico visit.

Thanks for sharing with us. We pray you have a blessed holiday season!

Spring