Day 11

Best of the day: a lovely post-church lunch outing with several families and individuals from the congregation. :)

Worst of the day: wishing I could have made it up the mountain today with Mr. and Mrs. A. But there will be other times. :)
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This cool breeze through the window, playing with my hair as I write, cannot be beat.

Hello, I am Ana Shalom, and I love Bogotá. :)

Since I last wrote, I passed my first day as teacher aide in first grade. I forgot to heat up the kids lunches enough in advance, so I rushed out at the last minute. Learning about soil was so engaging! I was starvingly hungry when I got to my lunch hour, and I very much enjoyed the bandeja paisa (a scrumptious bean soup with some beef and rice), salad, and platano chips. Then I sponsored the school bake sale, buying a cup of yummy vanilla ice cream with oreo crumbles. next it was back to work. I got to see the children practicing their la gata golosa dance for the cultural appreciation day that is coming up. Absolutely adorable, seeing the boys and girls walk up to one another (boys often looking more serious than I have ever seen them before), take hands, and dance towards the imaginary audience together. I helped with the afternoon math activities--a coin counting game, with American coins--and then helped with the get-ready-to-leave hyperactivity. I received several treasured hugs, and quickly prayed for these beautiful students in their respective weekend activities, hoping to see them all again, happy and well, on Monday.
After school, I took a public bus home with K, a Wheaton grad teaching kinder here, and then we met up at Crepes & Waffles with about twenty other teachers of ECA. It was a despedida (goodbye) for MM, the school's gym teacher, who is returning to Canada this week. He will be missed, that's for sure, and he seemed like muy buena gente (good people), the little that I did get to know of him. :)

Saturday morning, I got to sleep in. That was nice! But I am resigned to the fact that I am getting old, and that 8:30 wakeups seem like late enough. Proportional to 5:00, at least! I spent the morning watching an episode of Glee, skyping my family (and through that, watching another TV show with my youngest sister together), skyping an Ecuadorian friend, and doing various Italian grammar studies and exercises online. A well-spent morning, in my book. The afternoon proceeded to be tranquila, with lots of relaxing with Marv & Judy here at the apartment. I needed to refill the energy stores after this past week. Oh, and I got to skype with KW (a bestie from North) last night!

Sunday morning, I headed out to the autopista bridge to meet up with two of the teachers at ECA. I walked to church with them, trying out a different church today. And I really liked it. It is called Comunidad Cristiana de Puerta Abierta--the Christian Community of Open Doors. The people, the worship songs (two of which were my favorites in Bs As), and the speaker (who, at ECA, is the school nurse), and the community time afterwards...all exactly as I like them. It is a small church, about a hundred in congregation, and so it could quickly feel like a family. I think I may have found my Bogotá church home!
After church, I met and talked with various people, getting to learn many names through my new friend JV, the parent of the first grader I will be tutoring next week. He certainly is on a mission to find me a nice bogotáno to settle down with so I'll stick around. Which, you know, he can feel free to do, from my point of view. :) I love to meet new friends.
Speaking of friends, JV and his wife invited me to lunch with them and some others of the churchgoers. Strategically placed in the young D's car for transport, I got to know the V's daughters and niece and nephew. It was a short ride to Pompelmo, where we ate a tasty lunch. I wish you could have been there! The appetizers were small Colombian empanadas and patacones (twice-fried plantain patties...TASTY), and then came the jugos...orange, lulo, strawberry smoothies, mandarin, and others. Golly, please let this be the place God has in mind for me in the future. South American produce...invincible, incomparable. :) My meal was a chicken breast with creamy mushroom sauce, rice, salad, and french fries. Riquísimo. Others had some crepes, some had beef, some spaghetti, and D had a rice and mix-o-meat-and-seafood dish...which I tried, and loved. JV started off our lunch together by inviting his nephew to ask me whatever question he wanted me to answer. Poor kid, a middle schooler, I'd bet, started with how long had I been here. I answered, "Una semana y media--a week and a half."
JV, not satisfied with such a simple and easy question, told his nephew to ask again. I mean, he said, look how well she answered you that one. (Cue a flurry of compliments on my Spanish.)
So this time he asked:
"Sabías desde niña que algún día querías venir aquí a Colombia?" Did you know ever since you were a little girl that you wanted to come to Colombia someday?
My response? With open face, and a forthcoming explanation, "no."

I then had the opportunity to share with the table my experience in Bogotá last summer. If you haven't had the chance to hear that, I apologize for having deprived you of a big old story in which God let me play a small part. Ask me sometime.

They were, of course, very impressed at how God used this experience to bring about such massive growth and change in Barrio Egipto (a neighborhood) and it's notorious gang community. Also simultaneously struck at the brokenness in their own country, and how that had to happen to visitors--especially a missionary group. But, as I told them in all honesty, that experience of meeting the people of Bogotá in the various organizations we worked with, AND dealing with the initial ugliness and eventual radiant beauty of the Barrio Egipto encounter--these were the things that made me know I'd have to come back here someday. I still think I'm coming back again.

Looking forward to this week, it should be fantastic again. I have school Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday. Thursday there is a no-car day, so the kids have off, and the teachers do professional skills conferences and workshops and some lesson planning. I don't think I am required to attend. So, I might take advantage of my new friend D's offer to tour the city a bit. Also, I can't wait for tutoring Tuesday and Thursday evenings, to get to know J & A more, and their daughters. I am quite content.

AND DADDY GETS HERE ON FRIDAY NIGHT!!! iuuuuuujuuuuuuuuu :D
xox