Kiva Loan

                       Just made my 17th loan to Kiva.

This time it was to Irene in Peru for an agriculture loan; you can read about her on the Kiva website. The money for this loan came from my son and daughter-in-law for my birthday.
Every loan I have made to Kiva has been paid in full. It's a great way to help out. Consider it! You only need $25 at a time.

Basic Literacy Class

I dropped in on Cheryl's Basic Literacy Class today in the church parlor. Joined in also; interesting to be part of the process and not the teacher.

Not too many students but I think this will catch on. Students were engaged and very eager to learn.

Also learned the honorifics 'Saw' and 'Naw' in Karen: Saw Thomas and Naw Shari.

Grammar Classes finished...

We have just completed a seven-week course on Grammar for the high intermediate and advanced ESOL students in our Karen community. There will be ten certificates awarded tomorrow morning between the English service upstairs and the Karen service downstairs. A total of 108 student hours was accomplished.

We will take a break for the rest of the summer. Stay tuned for plans for the rest of the year...

slowing down...

Class today had 9 students; most came in late. Next Saturday is the last class of the session. Will keep classes the future to 1 hour. We did, however, have a great class. We finished verb tenses with the future tense. Started on prepositions and students had some great questions. Cheryl will try a Basic Literacy class the week after I finish this session for a one shot deal to see if there is a need for that.

the beat goes on...

Started up Grammar Class again this past Saturday. Was locked out of the church again and only 8 students. But we had a good class on Past Tense.

Meet today with Pastor Nick and Cheryl to plan a Teen Activity Day. Details to follow...

A Mission in Later Life

Gave a talk today at CVOC about finding a mission in later life. Small audience but very involved; some prospective tenants and some residents. I talked about redefining your life in order to find new outlets for your talents. Shared tales of my experiences in Hartford with the Karen community and  mission trips to Brazil and Cuba.

blognote: The talk was sponsored by the Marketing Department and was not a part of our established lecture series.

Cuba Humanitarian Mission

Just returned from 7 nights in Cuba; 5 in Havana and 2 in Trinidad. Took medical and educational supplies. The upper picture is of students in Pinar del Rio at the school in Las Terrazas. The rest of the supplies were given to the principal of the school.


The other pictures were taken at the church in the Las Caritas mission. Each participant in our group took 20 pounds of over-the-counter meds. We also delivered medications to the priest working with the HIV/AIDS mission there in Old Havana.