Ups and Downs

El tiempo is really flying by! It´s so hard to believe I´ve been here six months already. Chantel,who has been working here about three years, is getting married on Saturday. I organized a ¨despedida¨ for her (basically a bridal shower without the presents) and invited all of the ladies from church. José Luis and I were really worried how the ladies would react to my organizing that without checking with any of them first. He warned me that some of them might get the wrong idea about what we would be doing and not want to come just because of that. Normally the Christians here don´t do anything for those who get married or have babies; if they do, it is usually just a short worship service for all of the men and women together. According to José Luis, a despedida is a ¨Catholic tradition,¨ and the Christians here 1. más o menos refuse to celebrate anything having to do with 2. Católicos—even ¨Saint¨Valentine´s Day and ¨Saint¨Patrick´s Day. And if you haven´t picked up already from my previous blogs, they are also extremely reluctant to change (which is probably why the only thing they ever do 3. celebrar is have a worship service—even for birthday parties and weddings). I understand their desire not to ¨fall down the slippery slope,¨etc., but I wish more of them would understand that not every change is 4. malo. This was definitely one of those tiempos when I didn´t know if I should follow my heart, even though it could bring disastrous 5. resultados; or follow the cultura--simply to avoid offending others. Well having others (my fellow hermanos and hermanas en Cristo, no less) talk bad about me isn´t a good enough razón for me, personally, NOT to do something I strongly believe in.

So I went through with my plans—but nonetheless tried to lessen the blow by having the party in the school, rather than the church, calling it a ¨reunión de mujeres,¨rather than a despedida, and inviting the women 5. personalmente, rather than having it announced. And, because Chantel and I are both Gringas/Gueras/Americanas, I elected to use the American approach of 6. juegos and comida rather than the Mexican approach of preaching and more preaching. About 15 women came, only about one-fourth of the women of the entire congregation. But I enjoyed coordinating it, and I think all in all it went pretty well. I just hope that the women will have only good things to say about it, now that they have seen what it´s really all about (and see that we really didn´t play any dirty games! Ha ha.)

On a side note…remember from an earlier blog I mentioned that men never serve themselves but just wait for the women to bring the food to them?? Well we said the 7. oración for the food and I said ¨we´re going to eat now¨…and nobody moved! I went upstairs for 8. algo, and when I came back they were still just sitting there! Well as it turned out, two or three of us had to first put everything on serving dishes and take the serving dishes around to the ladies one by one. I fixed banana pudding, and I have a theory that no one ate it simply because they couldn´t serve it with their hands, like the 9. pan. Anyway, by the time we finished most of them were already done and some were starting to leave—and I hadn´t even started yet! Needless to say, I am STILL learning about the culture, six months later!

All of the students from the Ocosingo school who are already preaching or teaching a kids´class/Todos los estudiantes de Ocosingo que ya predican o enseñan una clase de niños

The problems with the teens that I talked about in the last blog are more or less the same problemas that every congregation deals with. What makes them more challenging for us, however, is the lack of interest shown by the other miembros. I started thinking the other day that there really aren´t very many people at church between the ages of 20 and 30. The few who are that edad are mostly all 10. casados and have kids and hardly ever come. And there certainly aren´t members lining up to help us out at youth events (most of the time it´s just José Luis and I.) So there really aren´t any good authority figures for those young people to look up to other than their 11. padres. I really think if we had more active members in that age range, it would influence some of the jovenes to be stronger cristianos. So maybe instead of encouraging the teenagers we first need to encourage the twenty-thirty somethings who aren´t coming! I appreciate more than ever now our 20 somethings class at MJ and understand why that class is so importante.

12. La semana pasada we played soccer and basketball with the teens at a local parque and ate sandwiches and 13. botanas together afterwards (which we do about once a month). 14. Las buenas noticias is that 15 came, many of whom hardly ever come and need encouragement the most. 15. Las malas noticias is that we will no longer be taking a grupo to the youth rally in Tuxtla that we have been so excited about. It just so happens that the congregation will be hosting a 16. seminario on the same day, and David decided that it would be better for the jovenes to stay and help with the seminar than participate in the youth rally. José Luis and I have been thinking for some time that the youth rally would be a great encouragement to some of the teens who have not been coming as much lately, and many of the teens had already started making plans to attend. (Some were even going to ask off work for it.) The youth rally will be a one-day, once every four months 17. evento with teenagers from all over the area, while the seminar will be a three-day event with mostly only 18. adultos. Furthermore, the seminar is not intended for teenagers, and if we have a hard enough time just getting them to come to church on Sunday morning, how will we ever get them to come to a seminar about a topic that doesn´t even interest them? So José Luis and I can´t help but feel disappointed about David´s 19. decisión. José Luis often tells me that the other members (including David) leave him completely in charge of the youth but don´t give him any support, and 20. ahora I can see why. It´s times like this when I really wish the congregation here had elders; I have a feeling that if more hombres could have helped David make that decisión, the outcome would have been diferente. As for las clases, David seems to think that the teens need to hear him preach more than they need the classes…but I personally don´t know any 13 year-olds who actually enjoy sitting through a 2-hour sermon. We haven´t made any final decisions about the classes yet, so we´ll see what happens. Please pray that everything will work out well for 21. todos.

On a happier note, I went and visited a congregation on Sunday where one of our students is preaching. He is a middle-aged man, about 50 or 55, and he has only been a Christian for less than diez años. But he shows up for every class right on time and never complains. His 22. hijo, who is about my age, goes with him each week to teach the kids´class. He was previously very active with our young people, but he gave up being around his amigos to help his dad. They drive about two hours early every Sunday morning to a little comunidad called Nueva Leon. The congregación is still very small—only 5 members and about 10 kids—and most are from the same familia. But just to convert those five people has taken two years or more. Maybe in another two years, there will be five more. As is characteristic of 23. muchas Mexican communities, the men have very little 24. educación (and the women none). While José preached, one of the older men kept reading each verse slowly and to himself—but loud enough for all of us to hear it—and about ten minutes after we finished going over that particular 25. pasaje. If I were José I would have been a little annoyed, but he handled it very well. It turns out that one of the ladies we went and visited in el hospital was largely 26. responsable for the conversions in Nueva Leon. Here are some pictures from the culto and the clase de niños:

A few days ago I was abruptly awakened by an earthquake as my whole bed started shaking at 6 a.m. It was not big enough to cause any 27. daño, but it did last for at least diez segundos and shake the whole second floor. It´s the second 28. terremoto we´ve had since I´ve been here.


I introduced José Luis to peanunt butter and jelly sandwiches the other day, and he was very impressed! If only every Mexican could try them instead of eating their boring tortillas every day! Well once again my entry has gotten too long before I could say all that I wanted to say…but that just means you´ll have even more exciting news to look forward to the next time (ha ha!)

One day I decided to run up this 29. monte that overlooks the city. It killed my knees, but it was worth it for the beautiful 30. vistas at the top! Normally some of the poorest residents live at the top of the montes (where the roads are not wide enough for carros and look more like hiking paths). The building you see in this picture is actually a casa!
Hasta Luego!

1. more or less

2. Catholics

3. to celebrate

4. bad

5. personally

6. games

7. prayer

8. something

9. bread

10. married

11. parents

12. last week

13. snacks

14. the good news

15. the bad news

16. seminar

17. event

18. adults

19. decision

20. now

21. everyone

22. son

23. many

24. education

25. passage

26. responsible

27. damage

28. earthquake

29. mountain/mount

30. views

Los Problemas con Los Jovenes

Saludos faithful readers! It seems that some of you still do not understand how to add comments?? Ok, well I give you the instructions one more time, but please let me know if you are still confused afterwards or if anything doesn´t make sense! First, scroll all the way down to the end of that particular blog posting (past all the Spanish vocab and everything). You will see a link on the lower right hand corner that says how many comments there are. (If are there are 0 comments, you should still be able to click on and open the link.) Next, put the mouse inside the box on the upper right corner that says ¨leave your comment.¨ Once you have finished typing the comment, click on the part below the box that says ¨anonymous,¨then ¨publish your comment.¨ If it works you will see the comment appear on the left side. I recommend posting the comments using ¨anonymous,¨because otherwise you have to set up a blogger account. Just make sure that if you do it that way you write your name at the end of your comment!

These last two weeks I have been doing a lot of spring cleaning in the school. It´s not something I enjoy, but it had to be done! Chantel has moved into an 1. apartamento in preparation for her upcoming wedding, so I moved all of my 2. cosas up to her room last week. It´s definitely a lot better living 3. arriba!! It´s a lot warmer (I have gone from about 6 heavy blankets on the 4. cama down to 3!), and there is more 5. privacidad. And, since it is actually two rooms divided by a partially open wall, I feel like, for the first time in my 6. vida!, that I have plenty of 7. espacio for everything.

On the other hand, I must say that I feel like more of a fraidy cat than ever now that I live in that casa 8. enorme all by myself! I hear so many noises that make me think someone else is in the house--especially since there are 9. vecinos on two sides with nothing but the wall between us! (Hardly anyone here has a yard.) Sometimes when I sing to myself really loudly in la mañana I have to remind myself that the neighbors can hear 10. todo--(but at least they can´t understand anything I´m saying : ) Today when I left at 2 p.m. I almost stepped on a man who was completely passed out right in front of the house!!! When I first arrived in augosto I got really worried anytime I saw a man in that position, but it turns out they are nothing more than drunks. Now I see drunk men passed out all over the city at all hours of the día, but never has one been so close to my doorstep! But don´t worry, the house/school is very secure and I almost always feel safe. One Saturday I returned at 11. medianoche and the front door was wide open because the students forgot to lock it when they left, but as far as I can tell no one came in and nothing was taken. What are the chances??

Parade in Cintalapa, Mexico celebrating the Mexican Revolution/Desfile en Cintalapa, Mexico para celebrar la revolución mexicana

I mentioned in my last blog that the jovenes have been missing a lot of church and classes lately, and unfortunately that trend has not reversed itself. When we started the Sunday morning classes a few months ago nearly all of the jovenes were coming, but lately José Luis and I both have been averaging only about 5. They have missed for various razones. Some feel like las clases (or church) aren´t really 12. necesario, some arrive really late and don´t want to interrupt the class in the middle, and some are at that in-between age when they can´t decide if they´d rather hang with the jovenes or do more ¨adult¨ things. The smaller class size really doesn´t bother me that much. As I mentioned to José Luis, I grew up attending Bible classes of only about 3 or 4 students of various ages—and was often the only girl. However, we are afraid that the few who are still 13. fiel in their attendance may eventually feel discouraged and stop coming, as well—especially now that they are used to the bigger class size.

So we have been thinking about ways to improve the situation other than telling the truent ones we missed them and asking the non-truent ones to help encourage them. Most likely what we will do is combine the two classes for a while (so that José Luis will teach all of the chicos and chicas 14. juntos.) I don´t really want to give up teaching my girls´class, but as I told the girls on Sunday, we do what we do for them, not for us. So we´re hoping that maybe more of them will come to class if they can be with the opposite sex (ha ha!!!) If not, at least the class size will be 15. doble what it has been. On Sunday I also had my girls write some anonymous suggestions for me of things they don´t like about the class, topics they want to study, lugares they would like to go for get togethers, etc. Well either they didn´t understand the 16. instrucciones or they just really don´t want to change anything, because what they wrote was incredibly vague and not very useful. One of them actually wrote that she would like 17. estudiar ¨topics appropriate for teenagers.¨ I asked them if they would like to start having the class with chicos and chicas together in place of our class, and, surprisingly, many of them were very opposed to la idea. So I think what we might do is have the class with everyone most weeks but still have our girls´class once or twice a month, as well as still have the ¨girls´only¨ get togethers.

José Luis and I both have been struggling not to feel discouraged about la situación. The last time he had a get together for them, on New Years Day, the only ones who ¨came¨ were the ones who live at that house. So he is reluctant to initiate more get togethers and says that it´s not worth it to plan anything if no one´s going to show up. But the way I see it is, if we don´t plan anything for them, they may think that we´re not interested anymore, either, and only feel more discouraged. Besides, I feel like even if there are just a few who do appreciate what we´re doing, it´s definitely worth our time and effort. On Saturday we´re going to have another time of playing soccer and basketball in the 18. parque, so hopefully a lot will come. If anyone has any comments or suggestions about how to encourage the teenagers more, please do let me know!

This week I also went and visited two hermanas who are very sick in the hospital. If I had to pick one word to compare this hospital to American hospitals, it would be: small. The entire hospital was one floor, one block. There was no carpet, no waiting rooms, no TV, and no vending machines. Family members wait to receive news by standing in the hallways, and patients receive a bed assignment, rather than a room assignment. The room that I saw was very similar to a camp cabin—about ten basic beds placed side by side, with no furniture to store belongings. It just so happened that the two ladies from our congregation had beds right across from each other, so that we were ¨kind of¨able to visit them both at the same time. I say kind of because the hospital only allows three people at each bed at one time (regardless of whether they are family or not), and we first had to leave i.d. before we could enter. Supposedly the 19. reglas are so 20. estricto because the hospitals here have had trouble with some people wandering around the rooms stealing items from complete strangers.

I have more to say (a lot can happen in two weeks!) but I don´t want anyone to stop reading in the middle of my blog just because it got to be too long again (ha ha!)

Until the next time,
Elizabeth

Title: Problems with the Teenagers

1. apartment

2. things

3. upstairs

4. bed

5. privacy

6. life

7. space

8. huge/enormous

9. neighbors

10. everything

11. midnight

12. necessary

13. faithful

14. together

15. double

16. instructions

17. to study

18. park

19. rules

20. strict

Weather Words and Phrases:

¿Como está el clima? (What is the weather like?)

Hace calor. (It´s hot.)

Hace frío. (It´s cold.)

Está bonito. (It´s nice out.)

Está lluviendo. (It´s raining.)

Está nublado. (It´s cloudy.)

Está caliente. (It´s warm.)

Está ventoso. (It´s windy.)

Está fresco. (It´s cool.)

clima (climate)

el tiempo (weather)

See the bus in this picture? Maria Auxiliadora is the neighborhood I live in, so this would be one of the busses I would take when I ride public transportation.