Story originally printed in the Coulee News or online at www.couleenews.com
Published - Tuesday, July 01, 2008
Bangor grad raising funds for Mexico mission
Malory Hendrickson, a graduate of Bangor High School (2004) and Luther College, is going on a mission to Mexico beginning this August as part of the Young Adults in Global Mission program of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. She will be raising funds for her trip in the Bangor/West Salem area before her departure.
“I’ll be working south of Cuernavaca in a very poor area, and I’ll be there for a year, starting Aug. 17,” Malory said.
Along with her parents, Gary and Jane Hendrickson, Malory is a member of Our Savior’s Lutheran Church of West Salem. She majored in religion and Spanish at Luther and worked the past three summers at Sugar Creek Bible Camp in Ferryville.
 Malory Hendrickson's mission to Mexico wont be her first visit to the country. As is obvious from the photo at left, she made a few friends when she went to Mexico while studying abroad during her college years. Contributed photo |
Hendrickson had to apply to YAGM and then wait to learn whether she had been accepted. Although she knew she would be going to Cuernavaca she did not learn the specifics of her assignment until last week.
“It turned out that I got exactly what I wanted,” she said.
Hendrickson will work with an organization based in Cuernavaca called Caminamos Juntos (the name means “walking together”). And, according to the literature the ELCA provided her, it is one of the “most physically and emotionally intense placements” for YAGM in Mexico.
Volunteers live together in a house in Cuernavaca but will spend Wednesday through Friday nights in a community center in the the town of Tlamacazapa (also known as Tlama). The drive south to Tlama takes two hours over steep and poorly maintained mountain roads.
The volunteers will spend Wednesday through Saturday afternoon in Tlama. Conditions there are very basic cots and sleeping bags are the only sleeping accommodations. The group will cook food brought with them from Cuernavaca. There is no running water in Tlama and water is scarce in general.
Volunteers will arrive back in Cuernavaca on Saturday night of each week. Sunday is their only day off. Mondays and Tuesdays are reserved for administrative work and preparation for the coming week’s activities in Tlama.
There are more than 80 children in the Tlama area who cannot attend public school for various social, economic and bureaucratic reasons. Last year’s volunteer in Tlama coordinated an education program. Right now it looks as if Hendrickson’s major focus will be similar.
“I’ll be training young educators who will then go out and serve their communities. I’ll be showing them how to teach and how to become role models,” she said.
Hendrickson needs to raise $4,000 to pay for her trip. “In general, everyone who goes on a mission has to raise $4,000, even though it costs considerably more than that. The $4,000 is just the amount that I am required to raise,” she explained.
Hendrickson has come up with a number of fundraising avenues. On three Wednesdays in July (from 7 to 8 p.m. on the 9th, the 16th and the 23rd) she will give Spanish lessons at Our Savior’s in West Salem. Suggested donation for the lesson is $5.
“But if people don’t have money, they can come anyhow,” Hendrickson said.
On July 30, Hendrickson will host a fundraising dinner at the church. She also will give a PowerPoint presentation about her mission at that time.
In addition, throughout the month of July there will be a silent auction in the Koinonia Room of Our Savior’s church. Bids will be accepted during Saturday worship services (5:30 to 7:30 p.m) and during Sunday worship services (8 to 11 a.m.).
Malory will ask local businesses for items to donate to the the auction. Other items to be auctioned will include various crafts and other homemade items made by her family and friends even promises to bake a pie or mow a lawn.
“I’m also going to place a Change for a Change jar somewhere for donations, but I haven’t decided where I’ll put that yet,” Hendrickson said.
Although she undoubtedly faces a lot of hardship in the months ahead, Hendrickson a veteran of five other missions since her freshman year in high school, plus two study trips abroad while at Luther is enthusiastic about the challenges ahead.
“It is not about bringing a new way or enforcing any kind of beliefs on people, but about sharing what we have and being open to learn from all that their culture has to offer,” she said. “I don’t have anything new to bring to the friends that I will meet, but I do have a lot to share and a lot of love to give. Preparing for this year means opening myself up to learn from every new day and being understanding, compassionate and peaceful to anything and everything that may happen.”
With the waiting almost over, Hendrickson is eager to get to work. “I’m stoked, I really am. It’s wonderful I got just what I was hoping for,” she said.
All stories copyright 2006 Coulee News and other attributed sources.