San Lucas 12:37-38

Last week was our first full week of ministry. Dave helped out with the Jireh Project playing games with children and youth who shine shoes in the streets and helping them a bit with their homework. Phil helped teach a few English classes at The Colegio Evangelico Emanuel an elementary and high school and I did a little bit of both. So far I am really enjoying teaching at the high school. Since we have begun I have been able to teach seven classes and am slowly getting to know the youth. For the last part of the last class I was in today I just ended up talking to a few of the students and getting to know them. They invited me to play soccer with them and to come to their church. I can't remember why, but some how we ended up talking about museums and they all thought it was pretty cool that in Canada we have a wax museum and a cheese museum. Or maybe they thought it was a little weird, but I am choosing to believe otherwise.

We also managed to fit in some hang out time with our friends into our busy schedules. I finally convinced a group of Bolivians, including about seven guys to go see '27 Dresses'. In case you don't know what that is, it's one of the newest chick flicks playing at the movies. It was a good time minus the fact that Phil got everyone in trouble for starting a popcorn war halfway through the movie. I think the guys may have been a little bored.

Thursday night was another interesting evening. Let's just say that we truly experienced the indirect communication and lack of timeliness of Bolivian culture. We were told to meet at the church at 7pm to meet for dinner with the young adults group. Knowing by now that 7 never means 7 we purposely showed up at 7:30 thinking we would be in time for dinner. We didn't leave the church until 8:30 and eating dinner was miles down on the agenda. However we didn't find this out until we actually completed the crazy adventure we were about to embark on. After leaving the church at 8:30 we drove for about 20minutes out of town with no idea where we were going. We made a stop at one girl's house to pick up a mystery item and then another stop to a bunch of guys standing on the street and then one last stop to pick up chocolate. If this doesn't make sense to you, don't worry it didn't make sense to us while it was happening either. We kept laughing that a car rally or some sort of scavenger hunt would have been the perfect explanation for what we were doing. Finally we arrived at a home with a big field in the backyard. There was a large bonfire in the middle and about 50 chairs set up around it. We played games and listened to a pastor give a sermon in lieu of Valentines day. We finally did get dinner that night. It was at Harvey's at 11:30. Although we all knew it wouldn't feel great eating so late the next morning, after a 10 hour fast it was all that I wanted. There have been few times in my life that I have laughed so hard and could think of a more ridiculous adventure, but that is a good thing because I like adventures.

At this point I am beginning to miss home a little bit and it is the little things that I find myself remembering and being most grateful for at the end of the day. For example, having one of the students remember me from helping out at his youth group makes me think that slowly relationships are being developed here. Or, going to Volleyball Monday nights at Calama church and not playing but just watching and talking to the people who come and getting to know them. Or when Ivan makes us coffee and lets us hang out in his office and watch TV while our laundry is being done. Or walking into the grocery store and finding maple syrup and American style peanut butter on the same shelf. Ok, maybe that last one is a little less significant than the others but you would be surprised how good a little taste of home can make a person feel.

- Tarryn