Nagatamal!

Nagatamal is the Honduran word for what we know as Tamales! The church in Mogote wants to raise money for a sounds system. It would be easy for a North American church of person to just donate the money, but the church wants to take ownership of their own affairs which is great. So without any influence from North Americans the church took the initiative to raiseing money for the sounds system. They started by selling tamales.

On Saturday a bunch of the women from church got together at one ladies' house and started the process. Wow, it is alot of work, but the end result is so gooood. I couldn't even tell you all the process, they had most of it done when I got there but here is a brief outline: wash/boil banana leaves, strip peices of palm to tie around them, mash corn, cook it, cook chicken and pork in an awesome soup of flavors, cut up carrots, potatoes, and green beans, wash rice. Then roll all of that up together in a banana leaf, then tie it up like a package, and cook it for another hour.

This is an all day process but it was so fun to get to hang out with the women from church outside of church talking, laughing, and working together. I am still amazed at the way these women live. They cooked everything over an open fire as you can see in the picture. I wanted to help as much as possible but I realized that I didn't even know how to wash dishes like they do without a sink and running water, much less cook tamales in a fire. They are neat ladies and accepted me with my poor cooking skills and culture mistakes like forgetting to greet everyone with a kiss...

After yesterday we are even more excited as the kitchen progesses. The women mentioned too how much easier it will be to do projects once we have a "large" kitchen with all the amenities. Will and Hector finished making a gutter out of concrete on the top of the wall yesterday so day by day we are getting closer.