Oramos.

Well yesterday was Sunday. And for the first time since I've been in Peru, I went to a church building for church. We usually meet together in one of the two families' homes, but this week, with lots of visitors from the Harding research team, we went to the Iglesia de Cristo for worship.

The preacher there is named Sabino. He's really friendly, and he speaks the clearest Spanish of any native speaker I've ever met. Although this was my first time visiting his church, I had met him before because he comes by ICDU's office from time to time. Because it is usually necessary, the way Sabino usually gets things done is by telling people what to do. This week, he had asked Greg and Kyle to pick some guys from the group to help with church services since he knew we were coming.

On Saturday night, Greg appointed Michael (one of the Harding visitors) and me to head up communion for the following morning. Michael and I decided to go ahead and split up the bread and cup prayers. I chose the bread and was told that it would be a good idea to have something prepared as a communion thought, like a certain scripture to read, in addition to praying in Spanish.

I spent a good deal of time that night looking for a good passage to read from. It was harder than I thought to find a passage that talks more about the bread than it does the cup. Most of the time, it's a packaged deal. But I did find John 6, where Jesus compares himself to manna, the bread of life from heaven. Perfect. I read over it a few times in Spanish to familiarize myself with it. Then I translated and typed out what I wanted to say in the prayer, happy to have the opportunity to get it just right rather than have to pray in Spanish on the fly in front of the whole church. I printed out my prayer along with the John 6 text from an easy-to-read Spanish version. I stuck it in my Bible. I was ready to pray, dangit!

But--as is His typical nature--God had something else in mind.

When it was time for "La Santa Cena," the Lord's Supper, Sabino got up and asked Greg which two of us he had appointed from our group to help. Michael and I went up to the front. I had my Bible in hand, ready to read from the script I had so carefully prepared. Then Sabino started reading a scripture and giving a communion thought. Hm, ok. I thought, I'll just say, "I also have something to read before we pray..." That way, I can still read from the bread prayer script which is cleverly tucked away in my Bible.

Meanwhile, God laughed.

"Michael, if you'll pray for the bread...and Aaron, you pray for the cup," instructed Sabino. You've got to be kidding me. I'd never felt so prepared to speak Spanish in my life, and now this. All the time and preparation and translating, and I still have to wing a prayer in a different language because Sabino switched it up on us...

I put down my Bible. "Santo Padre..."

No one snickered during the prayer, so I think I got away without blaspheming. Man I was glad to get through that.

"Aaron, if you would now pray for the offering." Okay, seriously? I think at that point God was just messing with me, because, well, we just have that kind of relationship.

Again, no snickering; no lightning. Prayer success. Crisis averted.

Now, with all that being said, it really wasn't that bad. And if you know me, you know that I am much too go-with-the-flow to get truly flustered by something like that. After looking back on the whole situation, how well prepared I felt and how differently things went, you might think I'm trying to say that planning is futile because you just never know how things will turn out. And certainly, attaching yourself to a single plan with no room for variables will eventually go awry. But that's not really what I took away from it all.

Instead, I am reminded of (1) how much God is in control, (2) how much I am not in control, and (3) how much that is okay. Do I think God thwarted my plans specifically to put me in my place? Not at all, although He certainly has the right to do so. God has "God-knows-what" in store for me down the road, and one of the best ways He prepares me for that is by raising the stakes, by making me think on my feet. I can plan and prepare and plan and prepare all I want for certain tasks, but I get the best picture of where I am when I am caught off guard.

Maybe this applies to you too. Maybe not. This is just a story that offers great perception into my personal relationship with God, which is perception into me as a person, because after all what more are we than who we are with God?

Machu Picchu Family & Simple Tasks

Last weekend, Briana, Kristen, and I took a short trip to Cuzco and Machu Picchu. They--whoever "they" are--say that you just can't go to Peru with going to Machu Picchu. I'm sooo glad we did it. The train ride to the waypoint city of Aguas Calientes was absolutely breathtaking, not to mention the ruins at Machu Picchu itself. Everywhere I looked there was something picture-worthy, be it a green jungly mountain reaching from a river to the sky, or an Inca wall still standing after centuries of earthquakes.

One thing really took me by surprise, though. My favorite part of the whole trip was not the view, or the history, or even the food. It was getting to know a family from Lima on the way to Machu Picchu. On the train, the seats where situated in groups of four, two seats facing two other seats. I sat with a mother and her two sons, and across the isle, Briana and Kristen sat with the boys' two aunts. The train was long and we were all eager to practice our Spanish, so naturally we got to talk quite a bit with this family. When the train was over, I wasn't really expecting to see them anymore; I just didn't really think about it.

Then after while we were waiting for the train back, I was looking through a souvenir market when I felt a hand tap on my backpack. I turned around and it was Diego! Him and his brother Javier recognized me in the market and got really excited! They asked what time our train back towards Cuzco left, and sure enough, we were in the same car again! On the way back I sat with Firelei, one of the aunts. She taught me all about various Peruvian "jergas," or slang words, especially the ones that have English roots like "chequear" and "luquear" which both mean "Look/Check that out." In return, she wanted me to explain some of the differences between England English and American English. As an example I showed her the difference between the US saying "Harry Podder" and England saying "Arry Potta." Understandably, she laughed at me...

After the train stopped in the town of Ollantaytambo, we were expected there to be a bus waiting to take us the rest of the way to Cuzco. There was no such bus. No worries, though, because our "familia fiel" offered to let us ride with them in the 10-person van they had reserved. As if we hadn't bonded with them enough during the two train rides, we got to drive another hour with them.

By sheer coincidence, the boys spotted us again in Cuzco the next night. They saw us through a window from the street while we were sitting in a restaurant. We immediately paid and ran outside to see them and asked them if we could do breakfast together the following morning. After saying goodbye, we spent the next few hours that night finding a gift for the family to thanks for helping our trip go so smoothly. We found a photo album then went to an internet cafe to print out the picture of all of us that we'd just taken outside the restaurant. We put the picture in the album and spent a loooong time thinking up (in Spanish) a note we could write on the inside of it that would express just how much of a blessing they were to us.

Breakfast was fantastic! I really felt like family with them, and I had to try really hard to hold back the tears when they read our note in the photo album. Like I said, I was not expecting the people I sat with on the train to be my favorite part of the trip, but they were.

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Overall, it is absolutely incredible how beneficial this internship has been to me. I told Robert Oglesby last week that regular intern-ish tasks become a lot more complicated in a culture, language, and city that I'm not familiar with. For example, we had a inauguration party for the first community library on Friday. Before we headed over to the library site, Greg sent me to get styrofoam cups for hot drinks at the inauguration. I was supposed to go get cups and meet them at the library. In the US, especially with your own mode of transportation, this would be extremely easy. In Peru, however, this involved taking a taxi to the San Camilo market, finding the disposable cups & plates store, communicating what I wanted, what size I wanted, and how many I wanted, paying for them, and getting another taxi to a landmark church near the library so I could find my way to the party from there. I've found that the increased potential for problems in simple tasks makes for increased problem-solving and responsibility on my part...

¡Que emocionado!

Wow, I am a horrible blogger. And I was doing so well there for a few days...But I made up for it with tons of links for you to enjoy throughout my post!
This site is one of three places where I am keeping track of what I'm doing here (my journal and diario for Spanish tutoring are the other two), and I blame this for why I don't post very often; I feel like I've already written everything down.

It's also a lot easier to post when I don't have anything else to do. Since I've been here, I've had two hours of class everyday (besides reading and writing outside of class), and I've also been working on creating name tag badges for a research team that's coming soon from Harding to help with ICDU's community projects. It was really exciting to see ICDU make it's first no-interest loan to help Willy, the son of the lady who helps both the McKenzie family and the Smith family around the house, buy a taxi to stay employed. It was truly the beginning of a great relationship with the rest of this family, and I loved seeing how willing people back home were to loan Willy money so he could keep his job.

In other news, Ben, Wes, and I have signed the lease and sent in the security deposit for our house next fall in the Stevenson neighborhood of Abilene. This "intentional community" is going to be so much more than a house. We will be living together, not just rooming together. Our use/adaptation of a New Monastic model for community will no doubt be the next adventure worth blogging about!

I've posted some pictures from the last two weeks on Facebook. Even if you're not on Facebook, you can see the pictures here.
The team also had me post a short bio on their website. If you'd like to see that, and the rest of their site, click here.

Lessons!

One of the men here that works closely with the team and the ICDU, used to work for a language school, and his name is Alfredo, which is apparently a pretty common name here. Besides working with ICDU, Alfredo also works with Megan and her Spanish, and he might work with others; I'm not sure.

Before coming down here, the team mentioned that he would be a possibility for language classes for these two months. Well I talked to him this morning after his lesson with Megan, and we agreed to start Monday! ¡Que emocionado! We're going to work for two hours every day after lunch, and I can't wait to get started.

I went out with Greg today to a part of town that sells a lot of furniture and used appliances. He's in the market for a few things because they just got to move into the other half of their apartment right before I arrived. He explained a lot about how the shopping works there, and how he would look in different stores for the same furniture in order to find the best prices. He also mentioned how interesting/strange/frustrating it is to be the subject of some form of racism. None of the stores had marked prices, so sometimes the vendors would expect him to pay more just because he's white.

This is a picture of the volcano that overlooks the city of Arequipa. It's awfully handy in orienting myself when I don't really know where I am. As long as I can see that mountain, I can at least know the general direction of home.

Isn't it beautiful?

La Hospitalidad de Los McKinzie y Lecciones de Marcos 9

Well the internship has officially begun with TeamArequipa and their Instituto Cristiano de Desarrollo Urbano (Christian Institute for Urban Development). Greg and Megan have put me up in a great room with a warm bed--and my own baño!

Being in a high altitude desert, the weather changes drastically from warm and sunny to cold when the sun goes down. I find myself layering up often.

Tonight, I went with the team to a Bible study they've been attending. I don't think they're usually in a leadership role in the discussions, but Greg filled in tonight for the regular missionaries who are currently on furlough. The study was amazing! For one thing, I understood way more than I thought I would. But more than that, I was able to stop thinking about praticing my Spanish and really let the message affirm me and shape me spiritually.

We talked about the words of the dad of the demon-possessed boy in Mark 9, basically, "I believe, but help me to believe more." Later in the text when the disciplines ask Jesus why they weren't able to drive out the demon, He tells them that that kind of demon can only be driven out by prayer. That phrase is incredible in my Spanish Bible because it calls it "la fuerza de oración," the force of prayer. What an awesome reminder of the power that comes with prayer through the name of Jesus! I pray that the rest of time here is filled with things to learn like this!

I Lived to Travel Another Day

Well I'm pretty sure that everyone reading this already knows that I am back from Uruguay...Once we got back from our free travel time in Tierra del Fuego, things really picked up pace, like getting homework and projects turned in before we came back home.

And everyone knows how Christmas goes. Especially in our family, there is absolutely no time for blogging with all the present-swapping and game-playing. Speaking of which, I'm sure I'll have a hankerin for chickenfoot come August.

This last Spring semester was even more transformational than the Fall in Uruguay, if you can image that. I met some incredible people at ACU, people who are helping me to grow and to know God and His quirks :-) It's amazing how drastically your view on things changes when make a real effort to actively show love to people...I highly recommend it, even though it may come at a high price.

During the Spring, I took a class called Intro to Ministry and Missions, which is the pre-internship class for Bible majors. Well the time has come to do that internship, and where else to do it but South America?

TeamAREQUIPA has been gracious and accommodating in setting everything up for me to spend the next two months with them in Arequipa, Peru. Peru is going to very different from Uruguay and Argentina. For starters, their Spanish will sound different. In the Southern Cone, they pronounce the double-L and Y letters with a soft 'j' sound that almost sounds like a "sh." In Peru, the double-L and Y are both pronounced like English Ys. For example, the word for chicken, "pollo," sounds like "po-jsho" in Uruguay, but "po-yo" in Peru.

Another difference between the two South American countries is that I am going to stand out a lot more in Peru. In Uruguay, most everyone was caucasian, but in Peru, the general skin-tone is darker.

I have also been told that mountainous regions like Arequipa tend to be more traditional in their culture and mindset than coastal cities, like Montevideo, Uruguay, where the culture is much more open to change. This would be mostly due to the amount of seclusion in the mountains versus the constant visits from other cultures in a harbor town.

I'm excited to learn the small conversational phrases used in Arequipa. Not everyone uses "¿Como estas?" and "Adios." In fact, in Montevideo, it was mostly "¿Como andas?" and "Chao."

Well my plane for my first stop on the way to Peru is boarding soon. Check back for updates and pictures, and don't be afraid to leave comments!

Location, Location, Location

First of all, it's been really strange having too see all the election madness from abroad. We're not out of the loop, but it's been amazing to see how much other countries know about US politics. But since our free travel started, we've heard some crazy stories about the tensions back home, including Ryan Oster's run-in at school...

But since you came here to hear about what's going on here, I'll tell you.
We got to our hostel without any problems and we are now in Tierra del Fuego! The whole region is known as Patagonia. The town we're in is the southernmost city in the world: Ushuaia, Argentina, El Fin del Mundo (which means "The End of the World"). Even though it's springtime here, it's quite cold and snows almost every day!

We did have a bit of a mix up with our taxi on the way to the airport, though. We loaded our luggage in the trunk and climbed in and I said, "Aeropuerto," as "Airport," and our driver started driving. A few blocks down I started to think, man I really thought the airport was the other way, but I guess he knows what he's doing. Just to be sure I decided to bring up the airport in conversation. I asked him what the name of the airport was, and he started to answer the question then said, "Oh, aeropuerto?!" We then proceeded to turn around. Apparently, when I told him "aeropuerto," he thought I said, "Al puerto," which means "To the docks." Once we got it all figured out, he turned to Lindsey and Jessica in the back and said (in Spanish), "This guy wants to take you to the port! But don't worry, I'll get you to the airport. Haha."

The rest of the journey down to Ushuaia, flights and all, went very smoothly. We got some interesting "food" on the flight, though. It was two icy pieces of bread on either side of egg, mayonnaise, and a thin slice of something that I think once was meat in a former life. Surprisingly, no one died more than a little bit from it, and we landed here amongst the Andes just fine.
The guys that work here at the hostel are extremely friendly and speak pretty good English. Once we got here, we showed them the tours we had scheduled through the travel agent in Montevideo and they said, "No no no, I mean those tours are ok, but they're made for old people. Let us call the tour company for you and tell them that you want to cancel your tours. We'll have them apply the money you already paid for tours to ones you won't get bored with." So after getting information from the hostel guys (who know all the tours in town), a little stubbornness on our part, and 30 more dollars, we got to extend our tour of the Beagle Canal by about 2 hours (which included seeing penguins), and we got to see Lago Escondido by a 4x4 off-road vehicle instead of by an excrusiatingly slow train. Everyone we ask about the train down here has a reaction that varies anywhere from rolling their eyes to pretending to blow their brains out. Needless to say, we went with the 4x4.

The off-roading was better than I ever could have imagined. The 4x4 picked us up at our hostel and then we picked up two other tourists. Turns out, they spoke English, too! Jo was from London, and Neil was from Northern Ireland. When we first started out, we drove to a lookout where we stopped and took pictures. Then instead of staying on the road, we drove off the side and down a steep switchback. We were all really exited, but after awhile, I couldn't help but thinking, "This is cool, but it's nothing I couldn't do back home." I especially thought this when, after we had been driving for a while, we saw a big truck and a camper parked on the side of the road. If they could get down there with the camper, then this hasn't been that extreme. Eventually, we got to a little farm and our driver said, "This is where we're coming back to for lunch." Then he turned off into the trees and said "Now the off-roading begins." Come to find out, the ride so far had not been part of the off-roading at all, just getting to the trail. Heck yeah.
There was an immediate difference. Instead of a dirt road with pot holes, it was now a mud track with huge ruts and divits. I was sitting in the front seat (not sure how I scored that one) so I have lots of pictures of the hood of the 4x4 with a wall of a hill in front of it or muddy water that would've been up to my waist.
At one point, the driver was pointing out all the damage that beavers cause to the landscape. There were huge trees knocked down and moved into the middle of the stream. At that, Jo said in her London accent, "I'd hate to run into an angry beava."
Meanwhile, the off-roading just kept getting better and better. At one point, the driver took Erin's video camera and GOT OUT OF THE JEEP. He goes "Bye!" and waved and climbed out his door to leave us rolling through a mud rut pit with no one at the controls. It wasn't that fast, but it was really weird because we just kept going without a driver!
After he climbed back in and we went a little longer, I noticed that I could see the lake (Lago Escondido) through the trees ahead. Then we started going faster than we had gone before, and the hill ahead seemed to drop off pretty suddenly.
And it did. He drove us right down a hill and straight into the water! The waves in that lake were higher than I knew were possible in a lake because of the wind, and they were crashing up against the side of our 4x4. When we drove up back on the shore, most of the drive along the coast involved the left half of the jeep on the trail, and the right half in the water.
Right before it was time to get out and take pictures of the lake, our driver pulled a sharp left away from the lake and towards a huge dirt wall. It wasn't just a steep hill like before. No, there was no way we were going to make it to the top of this thing. We drove up the wall and just sat there nearly vertical. It felt just like Jurassic Park...but with more laughing and smiling. And less dinosaurs. He finally let off the brakes and we rolled back down into the water. And then we went right back up again, the waves of the lake under the back window and the sky through the front windshield.
After he let us down, we climbed up on top of the jeep for a group picture and then headed back to the farmhouse for lunch. When we signed up for this tour and they told us lunch was included, we figured they'd just give us sandwiches or something before we went back to town. But no. They sat us down in front of some amazing barbeque'd beef and sausage. It was amazing. Too bad none of us really like wine, because they had that too.

Speaking of which, we've been making some excellent food choices since we've been here in Ushuaia. We did go out for seafood one night, which was expectedly expensive, but just about every other meal has been ridiculously cheap. We cook hot dogs with fresh buns from the panadería across the street from our hostel. We go to the supermarket and buy chicken and onions to sauté and vegetables and meat for a stew. It's amazing to come in from the cold and have hot stew! We can also make some pretty mean pizza with ingredients from the panadería. And since it's a bread store, the crust is obviously amazing.

Yesterday we went to the National Park here to hike around, and I don't think I've ever done anything quite that cool in my life. We drove out there without a guide or anything which was great because we could come and go as we pleased, never being rushed and never waiting on other people. We just packed some sandwich stuff and started off on one of the shorter trails through the park called the Island Hike. After a few minutes, it started to snow on us harder than any snow we'd seen here. It was freezing but we still had a blast because it was so cool to look around and see the snow falling all around us. It was even sticking a little bit. (Remember, this is their spring.) Tanner and I climbed out onto an island across a little stream. The wind was coming from the other side of the island so we stood out there and got COVERED in snow and then went back so the girls could see us looking like snowmen.
When we drove back to the hostel, we were all bundled up and frozen and wet from tromping around in the snow, so of course, we sang Christmas songs. We couldn't help it. It's like Pavlov's dog; in our minds, snow equals Christmas.

Then TODAY...oh man, today was awesome. We drove up the mountain behind the town as far as we could and then got out and walked up toward the glacier that overlooks the whole city of Ushuaia. While we were hiking, we met a hiker on the way down that told us, in a German accent, that there was no way we would make it to the top without snowshoes because the snow was just too thick. So of course, we thought, "Awesome! Let's see how far we can go!" Sure enough, the snowfall got thicker and thicker and it made for some incredible pictures. It was at this point that we couldn't help but feel sorry for those of our study abroad group who went to the beach for free travel. I mean, its getting hot in Montevideo, so we can go to the beach there later. But when are we going to get the chance to go to the END OF THE WORLD again? And even though our snowman making didn't go too well, we did just about everything else...snowballs, snow angels, sliding on the snow like penguins...and no matter how mundane the activity might be, everything sounds amazing when you put the phrase "AT THE END OF THE WORLD" on there. I hiked through the woods AT THE END OF THE WORLD. I nuked a hot dog AT THE END OF THE WORLD. I bought tic-tacs AT THE END OF THE WORLD. See? It turns everything to sheer epic-osity. Location, location, location.