Hola!
What a hot day here in Santa Cruz.. 35 degrees! I am sorry for not updating the blog in a while. Things have been moving a long quite quickly and I didn´t seem to get much time to update. Things are going well here. My family bought me a fan today.. thank the lord.. so I will finally be able to sleep better! It get´s pretty intense here at night with the humidity. This past week flew by. Work is going well, although I am completly exhausted at the end of the day. The kids are great, but they really take advantage of my lack of spanish and don´t listen very well. It gets a bit frustrating sometimes! Yesterday the SALTers got together and we had a meeting in the morning and then went to an organization connected with MCC called ´Pronats´. This organization works with children who are working on the streets. It was very interesting to hear about their way of working with the kids and preventing them from using drugs etc. Last night as I was on my way home on my micro, we hit another car. So here, when there are crashes no police come and so people just keep driving when they get into a collison. So we hit this car pretty hard and then we just kept driving. But then the car drove up beside us and the men inside the car started yelling at the bus driver. Then the one guy got out of the car and started punching the micro. In the end the car sped away and so our micro started chasing after the car. Thankfully the car was long gone before we could catch up to them. I have to admit I was pretty terrified after that.
I feel like I have seen many challening things this past week. One including a women beating her 2 year old kid with a stick. People keep telling me that this is normal and I shouldn´t make a big deal about it, but it is a big deal to me. So it´s challening to turn my back and walk away from situations like that. There was one thing that the director at Pronats said yesterday that really stuck with me. He said, ¨You can´t tell a child that God loves them when they are hungry¨. I think this verse is very true, but it´s a challenging thing to think about.
So, my host dad (Walter) asked me the other night if I could preach in our church at the end of October. I willingly accepted and so now I am trying to prepare a sermon... IN SPANISH! I think I will actually learn a lot, but it will take some time to put everything together.
This next week all the MCC workers are heading off to Semiplata for our retreat. It´s about 4 hours away from Santa Cruz... and it supposed to be beautiful! So we´ll all be away this next Wednseday till Friday! Looking forward to it!
Well I need to head off for lunch. I feel like there are more stories to tell but I have no time! I hope you are all well!
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Adrienne! Look at you woman! You're going through so much and seem to be taking it all in stride. Lots of prayers out to you.
ReplyDeleteLove
Adrienne, a sermon in SPANISH!?! Way to go! I wish i could be there to hear it.
ReplyDeleteI'm echoing Alina's love and prayers! :)
Hi Adrienne! It was so great to "see" you today on skype! What a treat! And thanks so much for the updates on your blog. They are very good to read. It sounds like your time in Bolivia is going very well, and that you enjoy living with your host family. That is so good! There are five IVEPers in Calgary...one of them just arrived last week...his name is Pholani, and he comes from Swaziland. 23 years old. He has worked at an MCC partner org called "Act of Faith". Actually, he volunteers there, full time. There is no money to pay him and the other 22 volunteers that work there. There are only 2 paid staff. Pholani works as a peer educator with HIV/AIDS. One in three people in Swaziland are living with HIV/AIDS. He is working with me in the AIDS and Peace programs for the year. Great guy. I keep asking him how his transition to Canada is going, and I think of you all the time...wondering how you are doing, and whether the "honeymoon stage" is over. You are a courageous person, Adrienne. I hope that your life in Bolivia...good, bad, exciting, boring...all of it adds up to a wonderful experience, a life-changing experience. We're so proud to be a part of your family, of your life.
ReplyDeleteWe leave for kenya in 12 sleeps! Yikes!! It is exciting, and scary at the same time. But I'm so glad that our whole family can go, and Clare too. It will be a challenging few weeks. There is a very severe drought in Kenya, millions of people facing starvation because of failed crops and dieing livestock...and on top of that the HIV/AIDS, poverty, oppression. It will be hard to see. You must be seeing these things too. It is hard to make sense of it all.
We have so much to be thankful for, and so much to give to others.
Happy Thanksgiving, Adrienne! We think of you and pray for you often! Thanks again for the updates! STay well, stay safe. We love you!
Kim