We Need Assistance in Building a 
Home For a Christian Family in Mezcala 

Above you see Luis and his wife, Letti, standing on their other property located near the village square in Mezcala. The house on the right is Luis', on the left is his brother's. Luis and Letti are standing in the walkway that separates the two houses. If you look just behind Letti's left hand you can see the depth of the dirt and trash that has "accumulated" in the walkway over the years, which is three feet deep. The inside of both houses and the back yard area are also three-feet-deep in refuse and dirt. It turns out that the neighbors (or judging by the amount of refuse, perhaps the entire village) had used the property as a handy garbage dump for many years.

Here you can see the depth of the refuse, just to my son Barrett's left, nearly halfway up the door to the house. The entire foundation is hidden by the dirt and trash. The room on the right, that belongs to Luis, is 3.50 meters wide by 4.50 meters deep (10x14feet). No roof, no floor. Note: The two-story structure to the far right is a neighbor's home.

I've already begun excavating the interior of the room, the walkway, and the rear yard. So far we've dug out and hauled off five dump trucks of material. The refuse includes everything you would expect to see in a village dump... old bikes, toys, rusted and broken tools, clothing, and hundreds, if not thousands, of bottles. Most of it has composted over the years and is just dirt now. We've rescued about 50 boulders from among the refuse, which we'll use to build a retainer wall in the back to keep the sloped hill from washing down into the house during the rainy season.

Here's a view of the lot and small single room taken from the rear property line. Since this image was made, we've cleared the entire lot down to the dirt, and have also begun removing the top 3 to 4 inches of soil to clear away the broken bottles that could harm the children. In this view you can also see just how deep the refuse is that surrounds the house. Those are 8.50 foot walls, the composted refuse in the rear is three feet deep. 

Above are some rough plans I've drawn up to aid in completing the room already there and also in building an additional room a little larger in size in the rear of the property. I'm not an architect or draftsman, and the drawings are not to scale, so please overlook my mistakes. I'll be working directly with the construction workers, and can correct any issues that may come up due to my poor quality drawings.

Finally we've made some headway! Above you can see the comparison of where we've so far removed six dump truck loads of refuse and dirt. It takes awhile with pickax and shovel. 

Where we are located
The village of Mezcala is a small fishing village located on the shores of Lake Chapala in the state of Jalisco Mexico. Lake Chapala sits 5200 feet high in Sierra Madres Mountains, and as the largest fresh water lake in Mexico is 50 miles long and 20 miles wide. The people of Mezcala are poor and depend on agriculture and fishing to feed themselves. There is no industry in or near Mezcala as the village is located approximately sixty miles from Guadalajara. Many of the men travel to Guadalajara by bus each day, a three hour round trip over the mountains, to find work. Others grow vegetables and fruit to sell, or work as fishermen for an income.

I've hired two local men as day laborers to help me in excavating Luis' property. They work very hard eight hours per day for 150 pesos each, which is roughly $14 U.S. per day or $1.75 U.S. per hour. I give them extra money for lunch as well as a bonus as the work progresses to another stage of completion.

We've cleared the interior of the house, the walkway, and so far about 4.50 meters of the rear yard where we'll build the new room for their bedroom and bath, plus the exterior wash area. 

Because the soil in the rear of the property is made up of unstable composted refuse, we are unable to build the new room on top of it. Thus we've been removing the soil to get down nearer to the original rock foundation of the property. 

Luis and Letti discussing the plans for the new addition with the contractor's son. 

Before beginning this project for Luis and Letti, I explained to them that I personally did not have enough money to build a house for them. I told them how Sissy and I had prayed and that God had assured us He would supply our needs to complete the task at hand. 

Luis and Letti have had no personal experience with anyone from the USA, other than myself, my family, and two families from the church we attend that is located 25 miles over the mountains. 

The information that seeps down to them about Americans is usually regarding the wall that is being constructed along the border between America and Mexico, and about the Mexicans that have drowned while being forced back across the Rio Grande at gun point by American border patrol agents. 

I explained to them that I was asking my friends back home in the USA to help us financially in building them a home. Luis and Letti had no idea that Americans would care about their needs. They began to weep when I assured them that, Yes, Christians in American do care about them. God's Holy Spirit moved there among us for a few moments, and I was again filled with that peace that is beyond all understanding. I was assured in my spirit, that as I stepped out in faith to help them, we were doing so in God's Will.

The rear view of the original room showing the level of dirt we removed. The surfaces in and out will have to be scraped and new cement applied to seal out moisture. The stone and brick wall to the left is the neighbor's house. It's normal (and legal) to attach your new house to the neighbor's already standing structure... which makes for one less wall to build... 
"peso pellizcar"  (peso pinching).

Our contractor, Senor Joel, shoveling out another meter of dirt to make room for the new addition.  

I'm estimating that we'll have removed 12 or more truckloads of refuse and dirt when finished. With 9 wheelbarrow loads per cubic yard, and 5 yards per truck load... that's 45 wheelbarrows per truck load or 540 wheelbarrows total. Yes, Mexico is a labor intensive nation, as our aching backs can attest to.

Above is Letti carrying a 25-pound sack of cement for the construction of the foundation to her new house. During the day curious village ladies stop by to visit with Letti at the work site, but find that they have to follow her around in order to speak with her. She is of course, courteous, but won't remain idle very long.

Letti works side by side with us each day while the children are in school.

Above, Senor Victor shovels one more truck-full of the dirt we're excavating from the hillside in the rear of the house. Two workers dig it out using pickax and shovels and bring it to the front in wheelbarrows and then two workers shovel (throw) it into the dump truck. This is truck load number ten. 

I've fondly nicknamed this old yellow truck "The Big Banana".

The Big Banana sits out front for our loading convenience from 9 am till 5 pm Monday through Friday, and only costs me 125 pesos ($11.19 U.S.) per full truck load.  Viva Mexico!