Year and a half

Scotty and I celebrated our year and a half anniversary yesterday. I got up early to make bacon and cornmeal waffles (and coffee, of course), and set out a framed picture of us I had put together and a card that listed 18 reasons (for 18 months) that I love him. We marveled together that the time had passed so quickly, but admitted as well that so much has happened in this short time we've been married, that sometimes it seems much longer. We ran errands most of the day, enjoying clear skys and a warm sun. Scotty spent about an hour with 2 guys from his ESI (Equipping Servants Internship) class who have commited to meet weekly to be accountable and pray for each other. God has really blessed us with relationships like this that are so necessary for our spiritual growth. In the evening, Scotty took me to an Argentian steak house for dinner, only after presenting me with 18 yellow-tipped, pink roses and a sweet card, where we enjoyed a hearty meal. He proposed we rent a romantic film (how often do I get that proposal??) and we settled in for the night to finish of our day. Several times that day (and many others) we thanked God together for this gift of marriage. It seems that through the hard times, the misunderstandings, the hurt feelings, and the enjoyment as well, we have learned so much about God's grace and desire to bless us with good things. Sometimes our good comes through trials, so we embrace those as well, knowing that we have an opportunity to trust and rely on our Savior to get us through. Scotty is a man that makes me feel loved, who challenges me in my faith, who puts up with and forgives my sins against him, and who I am extrememly blessed to get to experience the highest highs and lowest lows with.

Sorata

Because Bolivia is celebrating the 3-day extravaganza of Carnaval (consisting mainly of throwing water balloons, spraying each other with foam, and drinking large quantities of anything alcoholic), we decided this would be a good chance to go to the small town of Sorata with a couple friends. Sorata is mainly a place that hikers visit, wishing to enjoy the amazing scenery of this valley town, at the foot of 2 of the highest mountains in the country. The town has remained small and generally impoverished, but the town square boasts about 6 or so little Italian restaurants, aimed at pleasing the handfull of trekkers and other Bolivians who come for a peaceful get-away. Our main goal for the weekend was to enjoy our friends and find a nice trail to hike on. We planned on taking one that wound its way up to a mountain top village and then headed back down to some caves a couple hours from the town we were staying in. After several hours of steady uphill walking, we made it to our destination, enjoyed a snack lunch and questioned the locals how to get down to the caves. Their reply was, "down there!", with a general hand signal to a walking path nearby. We struck out on the path and began heading downhill, but gradually realized we were walking farther and farther away from Sorata. We figured the trail would eventually bend back toward town, but after about an hour of walking in a steady rain, but enjoying immense beauty nonetheless, we decided we should ask again. We actually hadn't come across any people for about an hour, but soon after found a small home with a family gathered outside. Their response to our questioning about how to get to the caves was the same, "go down!". But, this time their hand signals were in the opposite direction of where we were walking. They assured us we would eventually come to a town on the path we were taking, but it was quite a ways away and not anywhere near where we wanted to go. After deliberating about which way we should continue (we had not seen any other paths in the direction they were suggesting), rock, paper, scissors won out with us heading back the way we came. We found the path in no time and happily started our down-hill, muddy decent. Spirits were lifted, as we were all starting to wonder if we'd ever find little Sorata again. About 3 hours of hiking later, soaked through and covered with mud, we realized that the only way back to warm showers and food (about all we could think about at this point) before dark was to hitch a ride with the next truck coming down the road (there was almost no traffic on this rainy holiday). We flagged down a pick-up, jumped in back, and braced ourselves (very literally) for our long awaited return. I had never been so glad to see a run-down hotel and immediately proceeded to take a shower and a long nap. That was definitely the highlight of our trip, encountering hyper, balloon-throwing kids, many pigs, donkeys, and cows, as well as a wonderful display of God's creative genius along the way. My favorite moment was a drive-by foaming that we were victims of, with an old country lady looking on with a huge grin. I think our gringo faces covered with foam made her day.

The waiting game

Yesterday was a prime example of how things can take a little longer here than they would back home. After I left the internet cafe yesterday, Scotty and I went up into the market to look for ceramic tile and a piece of furniture for storage of kitchen items. The time looking at ceramics was not too bad, although we seemed to get the silent treatment from most of the ladies that worked in the stores. We found some tile we really liked (to put in the kitchen furniture), but that cost $6 per piece. Since we wanted 8 pieces and we knew the furniture only cost about $150, we decided that we shouldn't pay a third again of the price just for a few decorative tiles. We continued shopping until we found something at 9 Bs. a piece (about $1), which seemed much more reasonable. All of this meandering about was done in a constant drizzle and dashing in between cars and people, which is the game of market shopping, very much resembling "Frogger" (Atari, anyone?). We found the furniture store where we had seen our piece earlier in the week and went in to order one to our specifications. The owners are quite nice and friendly, which is the main reason we chose this store and not another one that had a similar, cheaper piece of furniture in it. But, they were quite busy that day, and asked politely if we could wait for just a minute while they attended to another couple that was already there. Well, the "minute" turned into about an hour and so we shared turns sitting down on a chair and staring at the piece of furniture in front of us, trying to figure out all the changes we could make to it to make it perfect. The rain picked up outside, and then let off, then picked up again. Scotty got hungry and found a handful of trail mix left over in his backpack. He was still hungry. I offered him anything in my purse he could find that was edible...chapstick, mints, water. None of those seemed to intice him. Then I accidently bumped into an iron rail (the store was not much wider than me) and knocked it over onto the head of the owner. Feeling like a big loser, I apologized, and he assured me that it was alright (although, he disappeared after that, I'm sure seeking medical attention). Another lady came in and took a seat, waiting her turn too. She started talking to us about why we were in Bolivia and was happy to find out we were Christians like her. We had a quick, pleasant chat, but her attention span was not quite as long as ours, so she took off. We were just about to follow suit, having waited over an hour, but then the owner came back and was ready to hear all the details of how we wanted our furniture made. We left about half and hour later and walked back down to our parking lot. Parking lots here are not quite what we are used to in the states, but more like a dirt lot where they squeeze as many cars in as possible. When we returned, we found there were about 5 cars behind ours that inhibited us from leaving. At this point, I'm cold, wet, and hungry, and very ready to leave the craziness of the market. Sadly, a 9 year old was the one directing traffic inside this lot, and it took about 20 or so minutes of shuffling cars, moving them around very much like those games with plastic squares that you have to move just right to form whatever picture it's supposed to be. I sat in the car, dumbfounded as to what I was watching behind me, but somewhat amused that this is normal life here. We finally exited with much joy and decided to go to our favorite restaurant, since it was almost 7 and way too late for me to start cooking. So, we called that our Valentine's date, which we had decided to postpone until the Bolivian day of love (in September), because we had completely forgotten about this holiday. So, next time you get frustrated with check-out lines at Walmart (as I constantly did), remember the Bolivian market.

Cornbread and Chicken

I´m having one of those moments where I feel like I´m living in two worlds at the same time. Scotty´s gone off to Spanish class and it´s turned cold, wet, and rainy outside, so I´m hiding away in a small corner internet cafe to spend the time while he´s in class. It´s dry and warm in here and there are two junior high age girls sitting next to me chatting away (I´m assuming with boys) on some chat page while Alan Jackson is singing loudly in the background "Where I come from it´s cornbread and chicken". That´s where I come from too (and have introduced many Bolivian friends to cornbread in the past few months). Here I am in the middle of the capital of Bolivia, thinking about the meeting we had with our SIM team this morning, sharing our joys and frustrations of being missionaries in a latinamerican, third world country, but Alan Jackson´s country twang is bringing the memories back of another day- attending middle school as a gawky, introverted girl who loved country music, saturday afternoons taking pontoon boat rides at my grandparents house in the country, driving out to High Springs to search the antiuqe stores and share lunch with my mom at the Great Outdoors Cafe. It´s wierd how your mind can be two extremely different places at the same time, 2 places that you love and that have such comfort and familiarity. Like the weather, my moods and feelings about being here can change so quickly- from peace and optimism to wondering what the next step is and how I fit into it. Scotty and I are finding greater challenges with some of the people in our church plant team than we could have foreseen and are actually planning on confronting one couple tonight to discuss some of this friction. Confrontation is hard, but we are finding that we are called to present the character of Christ as we learn to love, forgive, humble ourselves, and seek reconciliation.

And Alan continues to sing, "it´s alright to be little bitty..."

Because I haven't written in so long and have no idea where to start, I will talk about our cats. Pictured here is Malphurs, named after a street that was close by our home in Charlotte. We affectionately call him "Darth Malphurs" and often wonder what he will do next to entertain and annoy us. He is demanding, often leaping from couch to couch in attempt to reach you so that he can hook you with a needle-like claw and force you into petting him. He is the first at our bedroom door when I get up in the morning, screaming to be fed and loved, and will follow you around screaming until you placate him. He loves water, as you can see by this unique resting place- the guest bathroom sink. He often waits at the shower door for me to get out so he can go in and walk about in the leftover puddles. Ever since Cheddar told him there is treasure at the bottom of the floor drain in the kitchen, he spends much time removing the drain cover, inserting his arm up to the armpit, and fishing around in the muck below. All that's come up so far is yucky dirt clumps. Gross. Cheddar, on the other hand, couldn't be sweeter and more adorable (we do think Malphurs is adorable, by the way). His greatest trick is "the flop". When he wants attention, he will walk to wherever you are in the house and flop, very dramatically and usually with a "thump", to the floor. Always on his side, always as if he's reached the end of a very long and hard journey. The other night, he even leapt (not fell, but actually jumped) from Scotty's lap, into the flop position (on his side) on the floor below- as if he was in a cannonball contest without the pool. Good form, Cheddar... Cheddars favorite activity, after the flopping, is sprawling out in contortionist-like positions to take a nap. Strange animals we have raised.

Besides this, we continue spending time with our church plant members, getting to know the families a little better each time. Scotty is leading a Bible study for our weekly meetings, which is encouraging him grately, and stretching his Spanish skills. We both hope to start a theological training course next week with Bolivian men and women from the city, most of Scotty's classmates will be local pastors. Scotty has also committed to playing for a city basketball league for his sheer enjoyment and in hopes of making good friendships with non-Christians. I'm going to start teaching one of our teammates to speak English, something that should be fun, but challenging for me who hasn't been trained to teach. We're looking forward to our church plant beginning to meet apart from the church in a couple weeks, giving us the opportunity to dive deeper and find out what this business is all about. Next weekend we are leaving the water-throwing craze (as part of a "religious" celebration called Carnaval) to head to the beach of Chile with gringo friends and a couple church plant members. I can't wait to see the beach again!! I want to take advantage of the warm summer before the chill sets in. And even bigger news, Scotty and I are considering buying land in Mallasilla before the costs raise, desiring to invest our resources here and eventually build a more permanent home. Although there are always frustrations and hard times, we are living in a consistent state of peace at where God has brought us and excitement (mixed with fear) of what He has in the future.