Tijuana Christian Mission

After much waiting, we had the opportunity to travel to the orphanage in Rosarito, Mexico that the church I grew up at built. In fact, I went on several of the initial trips after the property was purchased back in the 90's and helped with constructing the first building.

In the last few years, my dad has traveled down on day trips to help with various maintenance tasks and I have wanted to take the kids. Finally, we were able to go!

We awoke at 4am!!! Met with our friends who would lead us down at 5 and arrived at Hacienda at 8:30 after an uneventful drive listening to half of The Horse and His Boy.

Marlin and Eric who lead us were on a mission to fix a non-running maintenance cart and get set up for some projects for groups coming down I the next few weeks. After spending some time greeting the kids and touring the facility (which now has more than 10 buildings!), Marlin set us to work in the orchard. There are 62 new trees that will grow fresh fruit for the children to enjoy.

Some of the trees required new stakes. Many needed to be reattached to their stakes and all of them needed weeding. We had fun gardening. A few of the kids joined us as we worked.

Orchard directly behind us, school in the background on the hill. 

Jo & Kik played tag with the boys who weren't working on building. (The older boys who live there are helping build a block wall, slowly replacing the chain link fence that currently surrounds the property.)

When we arrived, the youngers were at school a stones throw from the property. They would return at noon and the olders would then head over. 

We were able to walk over and see the new school facility that opened this year. Prior to this the children were schooled in a house, one-room schoolhouse style. The teachers drive in from great distances and there is no other school in the area. This new school is an upgrade from the house with 4 classrooms and sometimes 4 teachers.

After lunch, the elementary kids came home and we hung out with them.

We got a little soccer game going on their soccer field - that was fun for all.

Then it was time to head home.

Goodbyes were said with hopes of returning soon. 

We spent just under an hour waiting to cross the border. This ended up being a great lesson in bargaining that I never intended only because when I saw soccer jerseys I just wanted to know how much they were, but also knowing I only had $23 cash in my possession. The original cost the man told me was $33 for 1! At that point, I knew I didn't have enough for 4 jerseys and said so, so he could move on. Yet in the end, he agreed to taking my $23 for all 4 jerseys! Crazy bargaining!
 

We had a really great trip to Tijuana Christian Mission's Rosarito campus. The kids are way motivated to learn Spanish. They want to talk to these kids. We will go back. Hopefully we can fit regular trips into our budget!