Bienvenidos a Cancún!

Hola familia y amigos!

I'm safe and sweaty here in Cancún, Mexico. Though I was welcomed by flight turbulence and a deluge of rain and flooding, the skies have since cleared and the rain has become more sporadic. My friend Sarah Nace who is working with Back2Back picked me up at the airport back to the leaky but well-loved group home! Today is my second full day here and I am so excited to see what God is doing here. It's gonna be a busy summer for sure, but this week is the calm before the storm. New teams will be coming every week and it is the interns' job to help the teams with whatever is needed and facilitate relationships between them and the kids. We are here to make their experience as wonderful as possible.

There are three other interns here for the month of June: Annie, Alexis, and Gio (Giovanni, G-money, G-dawg) . Annie is arriving Saturday so be praying for her!

So far I have attended a staff meeting and have been going through staff training with the interns. We went to one my favorite food joints here: Parque de las Palapas. I got a tasty picadillo empanada!

Today we will be going to the Tres Reyes community to set up VBS decorations at the church there! Huzzah!

Though there isn't much to write about yet, I wanted to fill you in on a little Cancún history. The city was created in the 1970s specifically for tourism. A sudden influx of Mexicans and Central American people flocking to the promised jobs here has created a population problem. There aren't enough jobs for the people who left their families to come here and send money back home. The statistics here in Cancún are dire. Broken families are the norm with 70% of marriages ending in divorce. Cancún ranks highest in Mexico for the number of suicides and the drug/substance abuse is rampant. Sex trafficking and prostitution are also disgustingly prevalent. Widows sell themselves to provide for their families.

Back2Back is here to, as Erick (co-director of the Cancún site) put it, take back Cancún. So much progress has already been made with particular families and communities. I have already heard stories, though I know there are countless more, of children breaking out of the cycle of poverty with Back2Back coming alongside them and ministry partners, working together to meet spiritual, physical, educational, emotional, and social needs.

There is much devastation here, but hope overpowers the darkness. Satan doesn't stand a chance against the Light of the world.