shake that money maker!

There was a slight timing issue the other day so we didn´t go to our dance class. We went this morning instead. What an experience!!!!!!!! To start with my outfit hadn´t been improved unpon so I did end up in my pyjama bottoms which is not a good look for the gym.

    I was the only white person there which made stand out quite a bit. Plus, of course, when hot and excercising I go red but  nobody else does here. I was this one bright tomatoe in a mass of dusky beauties! :(

     Latin dancing is very different to Europeans. Our time seemed to involve a LOT of pelvic thrusts and shaking my "booty" and assests! You remember that car advert with the song " I see you baby, shaking that..."? Well, this morning between 8-9 that was me!

arobics here we come

Guess where I´m going this afternoon? Classa de bailatherapi! Which is a dance & Arobics class. Should be fun and I (sadly) certainly need the excercise! I just hope I can understand the instructions, ah well I can always fall back on the classic "copy what everyone else is doing" technique :)

  A slight hitch, I have no sports clothes. For obvious reasons (I´m allergic to excercise) I didn´t pack any. I´ve cobbled an outift together of a vest top and pj bottoms. I´m hoping this looks like a relaxed summer European version of leisure wear. I have a horrible feeling though that I just look like a weird white woman in her pyjamas!

that which we are, we are

"It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,

Tho' much is taken, much abides; and though
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield."

                                                                    Ulysses

  One of my favourite quotes and it never fails to encourage and inspire me.

united

“it really doesn’t matter much
what you do here. What matters to us is that friends...chose
to send you, and that you have come to be with us.”

new address

Casilla 17-24-351
Santo Domingo de los Tsachilas,
Ecuador

Santo Domingo

 I am moving in 10 days!!!!I am settled here now, I´ve got my life in a nice routine and I know people. The idea of movng and starting all over again is daunting. On the other hand I am excited about finally moving on and I am eager to get to work! I am eager but also fairly nervous. I know nothing about disabled kids and the work with teenagers and Laura Flores is hugely important and therefor terrifying. I know it is God who will achieve stuff not me but even so the work is so great and I am so little and insignificant.

     Laura Flores is a pretty foul place (in every sense of the word.) Caroline is a 14 year old girl who got pregnant and then her baby was killed. I heard that story in England and it helped me decide to come and work here. Well now she has a "boyfriend" and he drugs her and makes her prostitute herself. On Sunday it was her family we went to visit. Jill had found out the mum can report (doesn´t have to be the girl) him to the police. Sadly we came too late. The bfriend has taken Caroline away to Quito where she´ll permanently work as a prostitute now. Everyone here seems to feel she is "lost forever" . She´ll probably end up murdered. It´s so awful! Teenagers think they´re adults but she´s still a kid. The horrible thing is Jill says this story is not a rare tragedy. She isn´t "called" to work with teenagers (lucky her) but se feels the girls are hugely in danger. They all get pregnant at 14 even the "good" ones. Jill is madly keen on my starting up a version of GIGGLE here to connect and help the girls. One group for kids in church and one group in GIGGLE. Must be some serious beadwork that will keep girls away from sex!!!!

   Nothing is set in stone obviously but the idea for work so far is, I´ll do Mon, Tues, Thurs, Fri mornings helping at the school. Wednesday morning I´ll do English session and bible stories at the PEPE playgroup in Laura Flores. Tuesday afternnon will be prayer group for womens ministry. Free time might be working in an orphanage for children orphaned by AIDS and perhaps a clinic for the terminally ill. Plus some stuff for the abused womens work.

     The living arrangments are pretty good. One big building. The school is downstairs and upstairs are 2 flats. Jill and Katy live in 1 and the pastor and family (and me!) live in the other. Couldn´t be much closer to the school could I? Plus I have Jills apartment on tap for decent tea and English dvds whenever I want not to mention support etc. I´m pretty pleased to be honest. I haven´t seen much of them so I can´t declae them lifelong friends but pastor William and his family seem nice. It´s him, his wife Jenny and their 2 children. 14 Year old daughter and a 12/13 year old son called Israel.

Santo Domingo

My weekend is going really well, in fact I'm staying over an extra night and returning tomorrow.

      Yesterday I was driven down by Katie. I visited the school (for disabled kids) and walked into town and had luch with Jill. Afterwrds we had  tea and had a long talk. Most productive; we've vaguely mapped out the work I'll do here and set a date for my coming! School re-opens on Monday 4th April so I'll start then. Only 10 more days in Quito!!! No more post to Quito please! Today I've met the pastor and his family who'll I'll be living with. Was publicly introduced and presented to the church this morning and met tonnes of important people. This afternoon I went to Laura Flores to do a house visit, assist in sunday school and get a feel for the place. Quite productive I'd say!!!

   Guess what? I've eaten chicken!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Now that I'm moving here I cannot be a veggie. Thought it best to try meat whilst with symathisers. Feels weird to actually eat the stuff after 17 years of strict abstinence.

 Laura Flores is....well...dreadful is the word I'd choose. Filthy, dark, and over crowded slum. No running water, people live in hovels, and don't get me started on sanitation or lack thereof. Family we visited lived in 2 rooms-4 kids under the age of 5 and their eldest daughter has left to become a prostitute in Quito. Other family had their son murdered. Apparently there death by violence is frequent and fairly normal. Girls are all pregnant at 14. Just tragic!

Hello,
        what should I write? Mmmm nothing major has happened but lots of little things. Ceci reviewed our classes this week and apparently I´m now on Level 5. Level 10 is what we are aiming for I think, I´d hoped to be further along than half way there but on the other hand it´s good to know I´v made some progress!

   On Sunday I went back to Sangolqui market and wow it really is quite something! The weirdest moment for me was walking past a 3ft high pile of live crabs waiting to be sold (dinner?) I do find it hard to see young children working and selling things. I know it´s just part of the culture here but it still feels strange to me.

     I´ve been touched this week by a couple of examples of the faith I see here. The other day Ceci, her grandson and I were out for a walk when we were harassed by a mentally ill man. He chased us, shouted and started throwing rocks at us. It was quite a scarey moment and the poor little boy was very upset. That night he  was too upset and scared to sleep so his mother read him some favourite Bible verses to calm him. On Tuesday Cecis mother was quite ill with high blood pressure. Ceci, her daughter and I went to visit her. As well as giving aspirin, making her comfy etc we annointed her with a little oil, read the bible and prayed over her. It was a really moving moment, us kneeling round her bed praying.

  Oh hang on. Just had a phone call from Jill, my mission partner, she´s invited me to Santo Domingo this weekend. I will stay with her, meet some people I´ll be living and working with. Yay, this sounds like a great opportunity and a nice break.

Can I please ask for a qick prayer request? I need to book my flight home by this Saturday which means I need to finally decide when I´m returning. The original idea was to come home in January, however I´m feeling that I should stay a little longer. This, of course, will mean I need some extra money. Should I extend my stay or return as planned? If I stay how/where can I get extra money?

    I really need some guidance and a strong answer from God. I would greatly appreciate your prayers and advise!

home visit

This afternnon I´d planned to go for a walk, do some shopping and check my mail. Ceci invited me to do a house visit with her after we´d walked to the post office. But she spent ages on the phone so I had to give up going on my walk. On the way Ceci was looking up bible verses and I suggested Romans 8V 38 but in spite of that I was feeling distinctly grumpy on the bus especially when we arrived and Ceci met another lady who was visiting with her, what was the point in dragging me along?

     We went in and met the lady; her son is a serious drug addict. He´s gone into rehab voluntarily but still somehow holds his mum responsible. It was so hard! The poor woman was in a dreaful state, just listening to her made me want to cry, watching someone suffer is so difficult. Is her son a troubled and broken man or is he arrogant and selfish? I don´t know, probably a mix of both. Whatever the answer is, his mother is wretched. She seemed so tired and broken hearted. She cried while she told us how he refused to hug her (and his wife) goodbye yesterday when they visited. How can he be so bitter? He is only 20something and has a pretty&sensible wife, a gorgeous 18 month old daughter and a mother who adores him-it´s such a waste!

 It turned out the other lady who joined was just starting out on "visiting" duties and didn´t know what to do yet.  I´m sorry to be depressing but this afternoon was emotional. On the bright side, the woman hasn´t abandoned her faith which is great. Ceci ended up sharing the passage I´d suggested ( I had a WORD from God?! seriously?) and talked then we all prayed together. I´m happy to say the woman did seem to take comfort from the verses and prayers.

It´s a national carnival holiday here so everything is shut! Can´t post letters, buy stamps or walk to the shops. Everything will be closed again tomorrow too. I won´t have been to the post office in over a week and normally I go 3 times a week! I´m getting withdrawal symptoms.


  Over here carnival means the children run around with water ballons and spray cans of foam and anyone is fair game! I was "got" last week by a little 5 year old girl with a can of foam. She looked so proud of herself I couldn´t help but laugh. My host however are prudently staying indoors until it´s Wednesday and all is safe again :)

mini break!

   ok so Mindo, well it´s a town further up north in the jungle. In my opinion it´s a village not a town but apprantly locals are trained as guides and they have 3 pick-up truck taxis and 4 cars so that makes them a bustling town! Who are we to argue?! We had to take the bus through the mountains to get there, took about 3 and a half hours and we left at 5.45 am. Fun times! The bus trip was quite pleasant and the views were spectacular.

   In Mindo we stayed at a hostel. The hostel is entirely made of polished wood and one side is totally open so you look out directly into the  trees and are surrounded by hummingbirds. On one side of my room I had a verandah and on the other side was a lounge(?) with 2 hammocks. I spent a few very relaxing hours swaying away and listening to the birds. On Saturday morning we were up and breakfasting at 6am and got a truck ride up to the top ridge of a mountain. The truck ride will forever stay with me!! No seat belts (of course) and nothing to hold unto. The road (and when I say road I mean dirt track with whopping big holes in) was dreadful. The locals tried to fix the holes by pouring gravel all over the place which just made the road even bumpier. If you ever do this kind of journey then be warned-sit by the window and if aren´t very careful you will end up banging your head against the glass (guess how I learnt this.) We got to the top by 7.20 and spent the next 4 hours walking down the mountain. The early start and bumpy ride were worth it-the walk down was amazing!

    It was so peaceful; all I could hear was the water dripping off the leaves and birds all around us. So much natural beauty before you, it´s impossible to not believe in a Creator God. Everything was so green and lush. Hundreds of different kinds of trees and creepers, the only ones I could recognise were palm tress and banana trees. GIANT ferns bigger than me (and a normal sized person) guarded the sides of the ridge. The jungle is so dense. Our path had a 60ft drop on either side but you couldn´t really see it because of the thick undergrowth. The trees had dangling vines-looking like right out of a Tarzan film! The trees are covered in moss which hangs down, I felt like I was in an "Indianna Jones" film. Whilst walking down we spotted some beautiful birds including a couple of Toucans! I´m not an Ornithologist but seeing those birds in the wild was quite an experience! Take that Chester Zoo 

   At about 9.30 we passed a truck dropping off hikers. We went past feeling smug. Giving kindly but patronising looks of those who´d already been on the trail for 2 hours  Made me feel hardcore whereas they were merely day trippers! We tutted (in Christian love of course) as we passed them.

mini break! wohoo

Last minute plans have come togather and we´re off to far flung places! Were going somewhere (I´m not a 100% sure where though.) Mindo? I think we´ll be by Santo Domingo. We´re leaving at 6.15 am (yuck) tomorrow, Thursday, and returning Saturday afternoon. Lets hope we have a fab time. Please pray I don´t lose anything valuable or get anything nicked (I´m taking my bank card, mobile, camera and kindle with me.)

   On Monday I arrived at the post office (yet again) but this time I had a clever excuse! I didn´t need to look pathetically into my empty mail box, this time I needed to print off a document. If I just "happened" to check my mail box it would not be important. This slight deception is because I check my mail box a lot and usually it´s empty. Up until last week it didn´t really bother me since the post office lady is friendly and I practise my Spanish on her plus the walk to Conocoto is my only source of excercise. However...last week a lady watched me check my empty mail box and say to the PO lady "ah look at her, she doesn´t have any friends!" As my sister says-shame on my name ;)

   Yesterday  as I arrived the PO lady stood up and waved at me and gave me a big thumbs up! Did this mean I had a letter? I didn´t want to get too excited so I went over to the computer and started printing off my documents. When I went over to pay I casually opened my mail box while nobody was looking and...a pile of letters fell out!!! The Post office lady came over beaming at me.

    Getting letters and cards from family is so special. The nicest surprise though was the reaction from the Post Office lady, she was so obviously genuinly thrilled for me. I know it sounds cheesy but seeing her beaming at me with excitement was the nicest bit!