Texas Volunteers

We welcomed a group of Texans on Thursday afternoon. This group will be helping with several projects in the West Bank for the next week. The flight was uneventful and they even arrived about 30 minutes early. That is the good news; the bad news is that the luggage handlers were on strike and they didn't get a single piece of their luggage. Oh well, we stopped by the grocery to buy toothbrushes and a few essentials, fed them a light supper and put them to bed.

On Friday we took them to the Galilee to tour. A good day of seeing the country and some of the Biblical sites. We went back by the airport expecting to take several hours to find the luggage if we found it at all. However, in about 20 minutes out they cam with ALL the luggage. PTL!! Off we went to Ramallah in the West Bank to get them settled in their apartment. After supper we spent some time talking about the work that the team will be doing.

On Saturday we were off early to the village of Mazra. We had a GREAT day. Our team and host family harvested a ton of olives (literally - 2000 lbs) It just about killed us, but we did it. Our primary goal was to interact with a Palestinian family and that also exceeded our expectations. It was great to work side-by-side with this family from 8 AM to 5 PM, sit on the ground and share our sandwiches and apples with them and eat their homous and bread at lunch time and then join them in their home after the day's work for a simple meal. Our local partner said the whole village was excited about our coming and that this family will never forget the day the Christians from Texas came to help them harvest olives.

For more pictures of the olive harvest, click HERE.