Getting Tough

Things turned hard almost immediately after I arrived back.

(Keep in mind, the first section of this information occurred when I was not here, Wednesday, the day before I arrived, so my information is not to be relied on; only what I think I gathered from others.)

There was a college group in from Freed-Hardeman University. The group was at the beach on Wednesday (I arrived Thursday). Warnings were up at the beach not to swim, but there were some swimmers in the water. However, the FHU group was not swimming. There were some that were wading in water from knee deep to waist deep. A large unexpected wave came in and swept 3 boys (men) out without warning. Extraordinarily high and intense waves. Two were able to struggle back to shore after a major effort. One, Shane Ruiz, despite fighting to get back, could not. He was swept out to sea. Hours of rescue attempt and with the risk of others that dove in to save Shane were of no avail. Attempts for almost 10 days to retrieve his body have been unsuccessful.

I arrived back to Rio San Juan on Friday to a broken group of missionaries. And, the process began for family members to arrive; and a search to recover Shane’s body.

I have been involved in supporting and helping where I can, if I can. The family (parents, girlfriend, etc.) arrived around the same time I did. It of course has been unspeakably painful from them. Not only the tragedy, but as of now (Sunday), still no sign of the body either.

We have 2 more days of an expert recovery specialist from the US has come in to us Sonar to try to find him, but it does not look good. We are all praying that the Lord releases the body back to his family for them to have a little closure.

Most of you know of my experience in Africa with the loss of the boy when we were in Zambia. Many things remind me of that situation. I remember how difficult it was to move forward. I think many of the missionaries are feeling the same as we did that time.

And, during this whole process, Satan is at work attempting to break spirits and destroy the efforts of many good people that have been working for many years to bring some hope to this area. This blog is probably not the right forum for the details, but suffice to say that we all need a lot of prayer and hope (spiritual hope) that God will heal.

Also, during this incident, Marsil Paul and Nidia came to visit. The day after they arrived, I assisted the family with others arriving at the airport and was not with them that day. They decided to leave RSJ early and head back to Santiago. But, they also decided to take all the food I had purchased for their visit, with them, without telling me, or asking me. I arrived back that evening, hoping to fix a sandwich before bed and discovered that all the food I had bought for their visit was gone. I called Nidia to ask why she had taken it. I told her it was not appropriate to take it without telling me. I said I would be happy to give anything to her, but to take it without asking was not right. She basically handled it as I should have expected. Got hot tempered; angry, and without any thinking started yelling and screaming over the phone.

This was my friend whom I now have lost. Not unlike the stereotypes that I had to make of Latino women. Long story short, she has decided that we cannot be friends any more. I regret she feels that way, but I don’t regret letting her know that her actions were hurtful to me. If I could not be honest in my feelings then it was probably not a long term friendship anyway. My biggest regret is the lost of my relationship with Paul and Marsil. I enjoyed a good relationship of love and friendship. That will be almost impossible at this point.

I pray God heals that situation as well. But, I also have minimal expectations that I will be able to truly understand or be understood with Nidia. More cultural walls to climb.

And, lastly, the property we were about to purchase has fallen through. For various reasons, we are unable to move forward because of the need for company papers from the seller that are not being given to us. We cannot afford to purchase property that does not have clear title, and in the DR, there is no such thing as title insurance. Many foreigners get cheated out of their money because they do not get proper documentation for property purchases. We are trying to avoid that, and thus, cannot move forward. So, we are back to square one in the property search.

There were be good weeks and bad weeks. This was a pretty bad week in many ways. Almost everything that was moving forward has either fallen, or stalled.

As of now, I’m not too down. Yes, a little sadden by all the events, but I’m also confident that I only want what God wants. And I’m counting on Him showing me what’s best. Not me trying to figure that out.