On Wednesday nights we have "english" potluck where we eat good food and speak in English. I love it because dessert is always great and its a chance to catch up with the other SALTers and MCC workers. Afterward, we usually have some sort of devotion time. This week we were asked "what gives us life and what takes away life." i am so blessed because so many things here "give me life." i am starting to feel part of my host family, part of the church community, and a real teammate on my volleyball team. i love walking home from work and randomly hearing "cordy cordy" (say that really fast and that's how everyone says my name) from a church member. or getting to vball practice and actually remembering names and joking around with my teammates.
working at my job gives me life because i love managing cenro menno's library and taking on new responsibilities. centro menno is in a huge transition year because one couple is leaving in february and the other in june. so i can tell i am already an important part of the centro menno team. last monday us SALTers went out to visit a colony and wow, so interesting. one girl said it looked like she was back in Canada. we visited a family with 5 girls and 2 boys and the dad is a mechanic who just got back from buying tractors in detroit. small world. we ate a huge lunch, got a tour of the house, barn, and mechanic shop. then we went up to their balcony hang out, drank coca-cola and entered into a singing showdown. the 5 daughters practice singing old hyms in different parts, so they sounded all wonderful and harmonized. then they said, it's your turn to sing. well, we had just learned to sing an african song together during a retreat, so we sang that. they liked it and asked if we ever sang on the radio...should they be asking about radios haha? they also took pictures of us with their first rate digital camera...so i didn't feel bad about taking pictures of them.
my host family gives me life by just interacting with them and sharing daily life, be it cutting through the back lots to get to church or going to a birthday party. (this one guy was from California so we played baseball with his grandsons and sang "Happy Birthday" accompianied with my host dad's accordion) one night i got home and some people from church were over making bookmarks for Sunday (we're studying 'the purpose driven life' in sunday school) so i helped cut out something with fancy scissors. the championship for the Bolivian soccer teams was going on and my host family's team, Blooming, was tied 1-1 with the other team. my host sister was so nervous she just kept pacing up and down and my host nephew would shot out random plays from the bedroom where the TV is. finally blooming scored and everyone was jumping and screaming and lit off a few fireworks. haha love it. they are also always telling me to "vamos" or come along, and i do. because of that i've played on the church volleyball, soccer, and basketball team. and i ran in a 13km "marathon." ok, didn't run the whole thing, but the last 500 meters was in the futbol stadium around a track, so i ran pumping my arms in the air and singing "the final countdown." afterward someone asked me and my north american friend where we were from. we said the u.s. and we came to bolivia just for this marathon. i think we impressed them. a couple of people also wanted a picture with me the "international runner." i acquiesed, but they just laughed when i said afterward "5 bolivianos por favor"
one thing that takes away life from me is my 10 year old host niece. i think she has add, desctructive behavior, and lacking in serious attention from her parents. she is at my house every night of the week, sometimes til 10, 11pm. i always try to be nice and friendly and spend some time with her, but that never lasts long. she is constantly running around, breaking things, and abusing the family dogs. i try to tell her that hitting a puppy and picking it up by its hair is a bad thing, but she just looks at me with a indolent, blank stare. i had to walk away yesterday because she wouldn't stop hurting the dog, so she through it ate me. yikes. and she always tells me i understand nothing. i get frustrated, but then i have to tell myself it's been 2 months, i'm 22 - she's 10, her parents work alot so she just wants attention, and kids are just raised differently here. so i just pray for patience and then go read a book.
one huge thing...my family bought their plane tickets!!!!! they are coming jan 15-22!! so excited and just can't wait!! hopefully my spanish skills will be stellar and the fam will be wildly impressed. maybe i'll just say words that sounds spanish...i could probably fake some low german for them :)
oh and i now am finally part of calvin propaganda! it only took me 4 years! here's the link to my championing the history department!
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