Chiapas in picture form
...the first half of the trip, at least. I wrote a long update describing the first half of the trip, and my mom is sending it out to people. Here are some highlights:
-11 hours on a bus
-200 pesos (20 dollars) for a four-hour tour for nine people through the Mayan ruins of Palenque and the surrounding jungle
-Seeing unrestored ruins, animals, and waterfalls in the middle of the jungle
-The best italian food and the coolest restaurant I've been to in a long time... in the middle of the jungle
-The coolest waterfalls I have ever seen (even if Agua Clara wasn't clear, and Agua Azul wasn't blue... darn rain)
-A quest for Carl Weathers at the waterfall (a tribute to Arrested Development and Predator)
-Indigenous girls selling us tiny bananas, and the way they wouldn't leave us alone even after we bought bananas.
-A 220 km (140 mile) bus ride from Palenque to San Cristobal that took FIVE hours because the roads were so windy. (Think 80% hairpin curves)
-Four hours in San Cristobal's market for the girls; 20 minutes for the guys
-Eating at "Gato Gordo" (The Fat Cat)
-Running into a protest and having a guy explain what was going on
-Exploring San Cristobal
A few pictures:
This is a view of one of the buildings of the Palenque ruins, as seen from the top of another building. There is a small area that contains five different temples, and this is taken from the top of the tallest, the Temple of the Cross.
Kassie and me at Agua Azul, eating our baby bananas. There were countless indigenous girls running around, selling bunches of fresh and bags of fried bananas. They were SO good, even if they were tiny.
This is our whole group in front of Misol-Ha, a waterfall near Palenque. Misol-Ha is the main waterfall in the movie
Predator. (Or so I'm told... I haven't actually seen the movie.)
Six (of nine total) of us enjoying breakfast at a coffee museum in San Cristobal. We decided the museum looked lame but the food looked great. It seemed to work out well.
Going to the jungle
We are two and a half hours away from leaving for Chiapas, and I'm getting excited. I'm packed, and I'm ready for the adventure. I think it's going to be a blast. We're riding a bus ALL night, and tomorrow we'll be in Palanque, home to some of the most beautiful Mayan ruins and waterfalls in Mexico. After that, we'll be visiting San Cristobal (a colonial city) and Tuxtla (the capital), as well as our friend Pancho's house for a couple of days. I think it'll be a blast.
On a side note, many people associate Chiapas with violence and uprisings. Just to clarify: although political struggles still exist, the Zapatistas are now strictly that: a political organization. The possibility for violence obviously still exists, but if you play it smart, it's definitely a safe, enjoyable place to visit. So don't do a google search, see the word "Zapatista," and worry too much.
I promise I'll have a ton of pictures and lots of stories in a week. Pray for safety and a great trip, if you would. Thanks!
This week flew by. I feel like I say that EVERY week, but it's true - the weeks seem to go faster and faster all the time. Anyway, this week was busy, and we also spent a lot of time unwinding/recovering from the retreat.
Tuesday's En Vivo had a pretty low turnout, and we were a little disappointed. Dan (one of the staff) gave his last talk at El Pozo, and it was great. Dan is leaving in December (around the time we leave) after serving his two-year commitment. He is engaged to a wonderful former CCFer named Betsy, and they are going to get married in the spring. A huge highlight of En Vivo was hearing a few of the students talk about the retreat. Nate asked three people to just stand up and say their thoughts. My language partner, Angie, even called it "one of the best experiences" of her life. We all had big grins on our faces, hearing that.
On Friday, we had a girls' event we called "PozoCine." About 40 of us made pizza from scratch and then watched a movie while we ate it. It seemed to go GREAT - some people we have invited to things but have never shown up actually came to this, and we all had a blast. Hopefully, they'll keep coming to things. The weekend stayed busy on Saturday... Megan and I went to Cholula and had tamales from a small tienda my cousin recommended to us, eight of the exchange students and one of the leaders (Ivette) went to our friend's orchestra concert, and we had "Fiesta Azteca," a party with barbecue and games after home football games. Some of us went to a movie that night, and others hung out and watched the GT vs. Clemson game. I was sad to miss the game... until I found out the score. (31-7, Clemson for all of you non-GT fans)
This week, we're having "En Vivo Tranquilo," a once-a-month, more mellow version of En Vivo. We're going to have a fogata (campfire) out in the front yard and talk about "removing the masks in our lives." Halloween isn't a HUGE deal here, but people know what it is, and it coincides with Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead), the most religious/family-oriented Mexican holiday.
On Friday, the exchange students are going to Chiapas. We have Wed-Friday of the following week off for Dia de los Muertos (Nov. 1), so we're missing a couple of classes and taking a vacation. I'm SO excited about this... it's hard to beat Mayan ruins, waterfalls, jungle, colonial cities, zoos, and boat rides through canyons. It should be a great week. I'll try to update before we leave, and I should have plenty to say when we get back.
Here are some things to pray for:
-"Operation X": Angie (our mentor) challenged us all to come up with a way to impact the campus. Our events range from sitting in the library and offering help with English to going out to clubs with friends to playing guitar on campus. Pray that we meet new people and make new connections.
-Safety during travel: The exchange students are taking off for Chiapas, most students go home, and Sarah (a staff member) is going home to see her brand-new nephew.
-Students coming to events: We hope to have a better turnout this week at En Vivo Tranquilo, and we'd love to see some of the girls from the movie night at En Vivo.
Here are some more pictures from the retreat:
This is a picture of Elsa and me as high as we got on Malinche. The path basically disappeared, and we were inside of cloud, so we couldn't see where anyone before us went. Sarah, Elsa, and I decided to play it safe and turn around.
This was my "family" for the weekend. We had to take a picture of all of us, but with only half of us on the ground. Since Alex (not pictured) had his arm in a sling, we decided there were only five of us. (Half = 2.5 people)... if you can't tell, I'm the 0.5 person.
una viaje a la malinche (a trip to malinche)
This past weekend was the fall retreat for El Pozo, and it was SO fun. (And completely exhausting.) For the second year in a row, the retreat was at Malinche, a dead volcano about two hours northeast of Cholula. The facilities were great, and we had a blast. It was definitely different than what I am used to with a CCF retreat, but it had the same great feel of community, and it was a wonderful experience.
We got to the camp where we were staying (in cabins, thankfully) on Friday evening. Friday was a time to just hang out and play games - I got into a pretty heated set of games of Uno, and we had a blast. There were about 40-45 of us on the trip, and it was cool to see all of us in one cabin, laughing and talking in Spanish. Angie told us on Thursday that we needed to avoid speaking in English, and all of the exchange students did a really good job at it.
Saturday we had a few hours of free time, but the majority of the day was focused on activities in "families." Each "family" had a color, and we al received bandanas of our color. We met the first time and made team names, flags, and cheers. My "family" was the Aqua Amigos (aqua friends). We played some fun, competitive games: human twister - person 3's elbow touching person 6's shoulder, for example; and a cardboard car race were two of my favorites. We also had some serious stuff on Saturday. The theme of the weekend was "wrestling with God," and focused on the scripture from Genesis 32 about Jacob wrestling with God. In the evening, all of the student leaders attending the retreat got up and shared a time that they had wrestled with God, or a current struggle they were having. Afterwards, our families got back together and talked about a time we had wrestled with God. It was good practice for me, to try to talk about something serious in Spanish. It ended up being an incredible experience... a girl who has been a language partner to Angie and various exchange students (including me) for a couple years, but never really has gotten TOO into El Pozo, ended up sharing her biggest "lucha" (fight), and ended up opening up emotionally, too. I couldn't help but smile when one of the student leaders in our "family" moved across the circle and put his arms around her. I knew she was equally amazed by this - at the end of the session, she thanked all of us for being a REAL family for her that weekend. How amazing.
Sunday was a physically exhausting day. 15 of us decided to attempt to climb to the summit of Malinche. This is a challenge unlike a lot of hikes for a couple of reasons... you begin at a fairly high altitude, and 3/4 of the hike is a steep hike UP. I think it was, physically, the most challenging thing I have ever done. Kassie, an experienced climber, gave us tips about how to make it up the really steep parts and was a faithful cheerleader as we went. Eventually, the weather turned bad (we were essentially IN a raincloud - the temperature dropped about 25 degrees and the wind started blowing hard, and this all happened in about 10 minutes), and we decided to head down. Two of the 15 made it to the summit, but the rest of us decided that our 80-90% completion of the hike was a huge accomplishment in itself.
I ended up riding back in a car with Sarah, Elsa, and a new Mexican student. We were following the Bocho (VW Beetle) that Nathan was driving. Somewhere along the way, we missed the turn for Puebla. So, a three hour car ride turned into a seven hour ordeal. We eventually ended up in Texcoco, a city about 3 hours NORTHWEST of Puebla. We were all exhausted by the time we arrived, but we had a blast.
Here are some pictures... I will have one of me and Elsa in the rain cloud on Malinche in a few days, but I have to steal them from Sarah. Until then:
Angie (my language partner, not the exchange coordinator), me, and Megan playing Rummikub in the cabin on Saturday.
Joel and Joel (two of the guys on my exchange team) reading a poem about wrestling. These guys are HILARIOUS... the masks they're wearing are from Lucha Libre, Mexico's famous version of pro wrestling.
Cody and Wess (two of the interns) and me taking a break during our hike up Malinche.
There were little canyons running all the way down Malinche. This is one of them. The path was basically just as straight down - one of the staff members described the path as seeming to be the creation of someone taking a machete and just walking up the mountain. Definitely no curves to make it less steep.
I haven't posted in a couple of weeks; I'm sorry. This weekend, we're heading up to Malinche, a dead volcano about halfways between Puebla and Mexico City, for the fall retreat. I'm really excited, and I'm excited to see what God does through this weekend. I promise to write a real update when I get back Sunday... Monday at the latest, hopefully.
Things to pray about for the retreat:
- A good turnout... right now we're estimating about 20 Mexicans, which is more than last year but not up to our original goal of 2 Mexicans to every 1 gringo.
- Logistics/safety... safety on the trip, and no difficulty with getting everyone/everything to the camp. Safety in the higher altitude, especially for those who climb Malinche.
- Receptiveness... we have several people coming who aren't Christian. Pray that they hear the message and want to know more.
- Language... Angie challenged the 10 exchange students to talk as little as possible this weekend, and to speak in Spanish whenever we do talk. Pray for patience and endurance to speak all Spanish, all weekend.
This past week, like the others before it, flew by. There were no "big" events this week, but we still managed to keep pretty busy and have fun. I'll try to share some highlights of the week...
- En Vivo had a great turnout on Tuesday. I didn't get to see the actual service (my job for the week was babysitting Jack, Angie and Matt's five-month-old son), but when I came up at the end, the house was packed. Several of us saw people there for the first time - a HUGE answer to prayers. The exciting faces for me were those of Kassie's two freshman roommates. We have invited them both to En Vivo every week since we arrived, and they had managed to turn us down EVERY week. Finally, they showed up. One of the is even planning to come to our retreat to Malinche (a nearby, inactive volcano) in a few weeks.
- I have two new language partners. One is Angie (but not the same person as our exchange coordinator)... she is a Chemical Engineering major, and a really interesting person. We met for the first time on Friday, and she asked me a ton of questions... why I came, what I thought about different issues, etc. She spoke mostly in English, and I spoke mostly in Spanish. It was really fun. The other is Stephanie... she is a freshman, and she lived in Ohio for about five years. She's scared of forgetting her English, and so she loves the idea of 10 random gringos who want to hang out and talk to her. Also, we found out that her parents own a shop/restaurant that we frequently visit. She invited us to come try the Mole Poblano (mole, a chocolate and chili sauce, was first made in Puebla, and so every family and restaurant has their own - they'll all tell you that they have the best recipe.) We're excited about doing that... Stephanie's mom is pretty strict, so we're hoping that S. will be able to come to more events if she knows the people inviting her.
- This coming week, we are having "Open Mic Night" instead of En Vivo. They do it once a semester, and it's a chance for students to play guitar, sing, read poetry, whatever. All the exchange students have to do something, so the five girls decided to come up with a skit. We're going to teach "classic gringo dance moves," such as the running man, the lawnmower, the sprinkler, etc. We planned it and put together all of the music today, and we think it's going to be hilarious.
Now for some prayer concerns:
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School... this week is exam week, so we have test/presentations/papers for every class.
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Langauge... we're still improving. Pray for people to talk to, ways to get better, and patience.
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The retreat... Oct. 13-15 is the fall retreat to Malinche. We're praying for a good turnout and for the speaking to have a real impact on the people that come.
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Health and attitudes... we're hitting the halfway point, and we're all pretty tired. Some people are getting sick; others are struggling to stay encouraged. Pray that those who are discouraged can remember why we're here, those that are sick can get better (and will go to the doctor, even if they're stubborn about it =)), and that the rest of us can do our best to encourage them.
My camera's broken, so I'm going to have to resort to stealing other people's pictures from now on. So, here we go...
This is a picture of the exchange team for the semester. I love these kids... it's hard to believe we've only known each other for two months, and it's even harder to imagine going back to school without them in two more months.
Since there weren't many "photo-worthy" events this week, I thought I'd show you a picture of who I babysat on Tuesday. This is Jack, with Nathan (the head of the El Pozo staff)
I'll admit... this photo is entirely staged. Kassie and I try to make trips down to Cholula as much as possible, and this is from our most recent trip. One of our favorite coffee shops is decorated as a old-fashioned train station (some now-unused tracks run directly in front of the shop, "La Estacion."), and this is one of the decorations.
This weekend marked a HUGE first for the ministry of El Pozo. Our friend Elsa got baptized on Saturday, becoming the first student in the ministry to get baptized. Elsa was raised Catholic but, like many Mexicans, it didn't mean a lot to her. She got involved with the ministry a year ago, and slowly overcame her dislike of gringos. (She's from Cancun - her only impression until a year ago was that gringos were drunk, rude, and always in a "vacation" mindset.) She accepted Christ two weeks ago, and spent the time since telling her parents, best friend, and others important to her about her decision to be baptized. Her passion was amazing, and her best friend (a strict Catholic) was persuaded to come in from Mexico City (about two hours away) for the event.
She was baptized along with 23 others at "Aguas de la Vida" ("Waters of Life"), a retreat center outside of Puebla. The other 23 are all active members of Torre Fuerte ("Strong Tower"), which is the church we all attend. The senior pastor allowed Nathan, the head of the staff at El Pozo, to baptize Elsa even though it was a Torre Fuerte ceremony. So, we got there at 10, found out the event would be about two hours later than we were told, and spent the morning talking and playing games. Finally, we all gathered around the swimming pool and heard the brief testimonies of the 24 people to be baptized. Elsa was toward the end of the line, but our excitement didn't fade - after Nathan baptized her, she was met with the claps, cheers, and hugs of all of us. Afterwards, we had a huge "birthday party" for Elsa at the house, including a birthday cake and a huge pinata.
Life here has, otherwise, been fairly uneventful. School is a challenge, but I feel like I'm actually at least able to convey some of my ideas and my sense of humor in Spanish. It's very frustrating to make a joke and see it fall flat because I don't said something wrong; laughter when I try to be funny is such great encouragement to keep trying to talk in Spanish. The people here are so patient, and our friends will even offer advice and suggestions at the end of meeting together, telling us ways that we can improve. Very cool.
Some big prayer requests right now are:
- Elsa's mom accepting her decision to be baptized... at the moment they aren't talking, but Elsa is confident her mom will let it go in a few days or weeks.
- Language partners... I went to an English class and found 16 Mexicans interested in practicing English and helping us with Spanish. Pray that they are willing to meet with us and get to know us
- Student leaders at El Pozo... Elsa's baptism has "started a fire" among the leaders. A couple are considering baptism, and four are considering a summer mission trip to Africa.
- Missing family and friends... all 10 of us are starting to miss home some. Pray that we could keep our heads and hearts here, seeking to love on the Mexicans we meet.
Here are some pictures from yesterday's festivities:
This is me with two of my friends, Jackie and Ivette, waiting for Elsa's baptism. Jackie is from the States, but studying at UDLA for a year. She has quickly become a friend and active part of El Pozo. Ivette is a student leader at El Pozo and Elsa'a roommate.
This is Nate and Elsa during the baptism. Nate's a pretty mellow guy, but he was smiling most of the day yesterday.
This is a group of staff and student leaders from El Pozo after the baptism. From left to right: Sarah (staff), Ivette, David, Elsa, Alex, and Nate
