The Princess Conference

Well, I'm still here, although there were a few times during the past week when I just didn't know if I'd make it! The Princess Conference really eclipsed a lot of my time. Three evenings were taken up with making the centerpieces and the floral "crowns" for the girls, decorating, and one last rehearsal for the drama. By Friday we were already so tired, and the conference hadn't even started!

Laura and me making the flower crowns while waiting for the tableclothes to arrive (We made close to a hundred crowns in all!!)

Friday I left school at noon, well, as close to it as possible (I had to wait for nearly a half hour for a taxi to arrive) and headed to El Atrio (the SAM base) where day 1 of the conference was already in full swing. I jumped in to help with manicures and the craft, then quickly changed into my costume for the drama. The story (told in Spanish as was the whole conference) was about a princess who decided she just wanted to be ordinary, so she ran away from the castle to see what life was like on the street. It was based on the story A Parable about the King by Beth Moore, which is kind of the Parable of the Prodigal Son retold.

Here I am as a noblewoman, sitting in the square while awaiting the arrival of the king. Laura and Beth are my companions.

I think it was a success, although with a few surprises for the cast! The "trumpeter" (played by Jeff) was just going to pretend to play the trumpet, but instead he actually...I don't think "played" is the right word...made a sound that was so horrible we all burst into laughter instead of sedately leaving our seats to greet the king. Then at one point the naughty boys who were hiding in the tree, watching the king, were supposed to throw seeds at him. Well, to make it more realistic Janine supplied them with some small beads to throw. Unfortunately they were just a little too into character, and actually chucked the beads at us as hard as they could! Everyone was so impressed by our acting ability when we gasped in annoyance and pain...because it really hurt!

Other than a few minor inconveniences the first day went very smoothly. The second day (Saturday) I was able to participate for the whole day...and got more than I'd bargined for! The girls were divided into groups of five, with one "councilor" per table. Two of the councilors from the first day were sick on Saturday, so they asked me to fill in! Let me remind you that this is a Spanish only conference...yeah, I was not exactly qualified! Fortunately they put me at a table with three MK girls, one of whom is especially fluent in both languages, and she was able to translate for me. It went fine...I just smiled and nodded at the other girls a lot and tried to think of simple sentences to say.

Some of the princesses bedecked in the finest toilet paper...(one of the games, where each table had to design a dress out of toilet paper. A fun twist on the old wedding shower game.)

My group proudly displaying their new manicures - Emily, Laura, me, Brenda, Jessica, and Becca. (Can you pick out the MKs? =))

The conference was really fun...we had several activities followed by a short talk then small group discussion. We also served breakfast and lunch, and dessert! The theme of the conference (obviously) centered around what it means to be a daughter of the King, how to become one, what the future of a "true princess" will be like, our responsibilities, etc. It was an excellent topic, one that the girls could really relate to. After all, what little girl doesn't want to be a princess? And, as one of the speakers and my dad both pointed out, as daughters of God we really will live happily ever after!

Did I mention that even though we held the conference for two days, which allowed 80 girls to participate (40 each day) there was still a very large waiting list? Well, we took a vote and decided to go ahead and hold the conference for one more day...next Saturday! You can definitely pray that we all stay well and are recharged to do it all one more time!

One more prayer request...I've mentioned the Hause family several times...they are a SAM missionary family that Laura is especially close with. Beth, the mother, has been experiencing health problems for the better part of two years, and they haven't been able to much for her. She went back to the States for testing and treatement two months ago, but it didn't really help. So, Wednesday she is returning to the States indefinitely...she just really needs to get healed before she can continue with ministry. Please pray for her and the whole Hause family as they enter this time of separation (she and Jeff have four kids - Marie, who is in college in the States, Brittany 11th grade, Steven 8th grade, and Pablito 3rd grade). If the testing or treatments take too long the rest of the family will also return to the States indefinitely. Please pray for them!!

Vacation Adventures: Part II

So you're back for more? I hope I didn't exhaust you with my last posting...I'll try not to be so long-winded (can you say that about the written word?) this time.

We arrived home safely from Brazil with all our luggage (thanks Lord!) on Saturday, then had one day before SAMBO's (South America Mission Bolivia) field conference began. Each day was basically the same schedule. We had a time of praise and worship together, then our speaker gave a message, then we had a business meeting where each team shared highlights of the past year and goals for the coming one. Then we lunched together and had a relaxing time of fun and fellowship in the afternoon before returning for dinner and the evening session. We had a team come down from the States to lead worship and do a program for the children while the adults were in meetings. It was a very enjoyable time. Our speaker was wonderful...a missionary from Nepal and England who just recently moved back to the States, so he knew exactly where we were coming from. He was very honest and transparent with us, which really opened the door for us to be real with him and each other.

We were supposed to go away to a retreat center for the conference, but the home office decided that because of the political unrest in the outlying areas (no cause for alarm, just some roadblocks) they wanted us to stay inside the city. Our meetings were held at the Hotel Cortez, where we had dinner as well. It was a very nice facility with air conditioning! (Of course since we weren't used to it most of us froze...but we didn't complain! =)) I don't want to bore you with details of the meetings, but I have some pictures of the "fun times" in the afternoon that I thought I'd share.

Tuesday: Games and water fun at the SAM base

They rented a "bouncy castle" for the kids, but a few adults tried it out too. Here's Elliott (a new missionary who is working in one of the smaller towns outside of Santa Cruz) sliding down...fortunately he managed not to fly off the end. Our speaker (his name's Wade) had worse luck - he tried a summersault and felt right out!

Katherine and Raquel Strebig with David Gambrell standing by the slip-n-slide. I was all for going down it myself, but somehow I remember slip-n-slides being so much longer! I decided it wasn't worth the pain of throwing myself on the ground to slide for only a few feet. Instead I played cards and Apples to Apples with a bunch of the other party-poopers (i.e. adults)

Wednesday: Bowling and the Singles' Sleepover

I don't have pictures of bowling...sorry (they actually do have a bowling alley in SC...it's called Cosmic Bowling. It brings back memories of college!) My team got second place - but then we were bowling with the rails up. Hey, we wouldn't want the kids to get discouraged would we?

Wednesday night the "singles" stayed at the hotel. We got 2 guesthouses (one for girls, one for boys of course) and stayed up until 2 am playing Mofia and Dutch Blitz. We all yawned our way through Thursday's session, but it was worth it!

The girls had this huge "chalet" all to ourselves, so that's where we all hung out. It had this weird looking divider running through the entryway...here are some of us peeking through the various openings. (This was at about 1:30 am, and some had already gone to bed).

Katie (Art teacher, newly arrived from furlough) Elliott, Richard (one of the music leaders down for the conference from the States) Sunny, Dana 1 (I'm Dana 2...isn't it weird that there are two of us? I've never had that happen before - I don't even know any other Danas), Matt (also a musican from the States) and Virginia.

Here's Laura with Katie...reunited after a six-month furlough (they are really close friends). Katie is great...I really love her already. It's fun having another single teacher to hang with!

Thursday: The Talent Show

I really can't describe this to you...it was an amazing mix of talent and ridiculousness, hosted by Mr. Moo the Cow (Jeff Hause translated for him, but threw in too many bovine jokes so Mr. Moo got mad and refused to MC for a while...the Snail filled in). Some of my favorite acts were:

The Spoon Balancers (speaker Wade and Jonah Vanderswaag demonstrated the fine are of balancing a spoon on the end of one's nose...very impressive)

Jump 4 (Katie, Heather, Emily and Rebecca, who performed an amazing dance number which included much hand slapping and leap frogging)

Did You Know? (an audience participation game wherein someone would stand up and announce a little known fact about themselves. Virginia told us she had an uncle in Congress...Ohio)

And so many more I couldn't possibly name them. This was definitely a highlight of the week!

The kids ended the Talent Show by performing some of the songs they had learned in their program. I just have to say that each one of these kids is so precious...definitely a testimony to the faithfulness and concern of their parents. I'm so grateful for the chance to get to know them!

We finished Friday at noon, but the "singles" (I use quotation marks because we also included the married-but-here-alone musician and a married-no-children missionary couple) decided we hadn't had enough fun - we got together that night for more games and spent the evening laughing and behaving like kids...which of course we all are. It was such a great way to end my break.

I'm now starting my second week back, and it's a busy one! I have a commitment every night this week, and the Princess Conference the SAM is hosting for girls is all day Friday and Saturday. Check back next week to see how I survived!

Vacation Adventures: Part I

So since it's been so long since I've blogged, I decided to split my story into two parts.

Part I: New Year's and Brazil

I sent an email with all the details of my Christmas celebrations, so I won't rehash them all here.

Laura, me, Virginia, Kristy, and Dovanna at Virginia's house Christmas morning

New Year's Eve was fairly uneventful...I got several movies for us to watch, since that's my family's tradition, so all of us watched movies until 11:45, when we went outside and toasted in the new year with sparkling cider and fireworks (supplied by Andre - he even had a couple huge ones that exploded in the sky, just like the 4th of July! Fortunately we avoided burning down the house).

Kristy and me, looking oh so festive (keep in mind this picture was taken at midnight, hence the tired eyes)

New Year's day we slept in (obviously) and just lounged around. I was savoring my last calm day of vacation, since after that my busyness really began! That night I packed for Brazil. As an afterthought I threw in a hooded sweatshirt, just in case the meeting rooms were cold with a/c. Boy am I glad I did!

We flew out the morning of the 2nd from the Santa Cruz airport on AeroSur, a new Bolivian airline. They we giving really good rates, and when we booked our flight several months ago they had a special deal, and first class seats weren't that much more than coach. What a nice perk...we got to bypass the long lines at check in, and were seated first with complimentary peach juice as all the other passengers filed on...so fun to see how "the other side" lives. =)

When we landed in Sao Paulo we got our first taste of culture shock when we went through customs and realized that none of us spoke even a word of Portuguese! I've never been on a trip where not even one person in our group spoke the language - but there we were, nine teachers, most fluent Spanish speakers, but no Portuguese whatsoever! Fortunately we found that if you speak very slowly in Spanish, then might be able to understand a little of what you're saying. On the other hand, we rejoiced to find that Sao Paulo is definitely more Westernized than Santa Cruz. There was even a Pizza Hut in the airport!! (Bolivian pizza is definitely not my favorite). As we drove from the airport to our hotel we spotted several more American stores and restaurants - Outback Steakhouse, a Cinemark movie theater, even a Sam's Club! For a little while it almost felt like we were back in the States...which cause a bit of a blunder when we got to our hotel.

Let me give you some background information. In Bolivia, as with most developing countries, the sewage system is...hmm, how about I just say that it is never a good idea to flush your toilet paper. Therefore, there is always a trashcan sitting right by the toilet. However, when we got to our room there was no trashcan in sight - just an ice bucket with a lid and a liner sitting near the sink. Well, we thought maybe we really are in civilization! Just to be sure though, we checked with the first missionary we met. He gave us a funny look as we described the ice bucket, and then said "that's not an ice bucket, that's the trashcan." It was so funny...we were just glad we hadn't filled it up with ice! It really did look like an ice bucket...but then, they definitely don't have ice machines anywhere in Bolivia - I don't know why we expected Brazil to be any different.

This was just the first of many stories that led me call Brazil Almost America. There were so many things that were similar to what we'd find in the States - McDonalds, for instance (also non-exsistant in Bolivia). However, they used Brazilian beef, so the hamburgers were almost like the real thing, but not quite (of course, in America McDonalds' hamburgers are also "almost beef", so the Brazilian ones were probably much better!)

We were so excited when we found out there was a Walmart in Sao Paulo! A group of us skipped out on one of the morning sessions (I know, what bad teachers we were) to go.

here I am in front...looks just like the real thing, right?

However, once again we were a bit disappointed. Though laid out exactly like a US Walmart, complete with the blue department signs, it was filled with Brazilian, not American, products. We did find a few things...I got a really cute bag there (I'm sorry to say that my purse addiction has not lessened since leaving the States, I think it's actually gotten worse).

The Brazilian mall was also quite an experience...it was "almost" like a US mall, only it had six floors! We wandered around for half an hour looking for the food court, which we had been told was on the ground floor (nope, it was on the top). We actually lost Laura for a little while when we got separated at the elevators. She was supposed to meet us just one floor up, but when we got on we found out the the floors weren't numbered, they had Portuguese names instead! We rode the elevator forever, stopping at every floor to look for Laura, much to the amusement of the elevator operator, who finally asked us in English what stores were on the floor we wanted. When the doors opened and Laura was standing there, we got so excited we all cheered! Talk about the stereotypical tourists!! It was hilarious.

I guess maybe I should say something about the conference, since that was the reason I was in Brazil after all. I know from the previous stories it sounds like I didn't spend any time at all at the conference, but actually that's about all we did. The schedule was extremely full - our first session started at 8:15 every morning and the evening session didn't end until close to 9:00 every night. It was a great time of instruction and encouragement. I especially loved visiting with the other teachers from Christian schools all over South America. They were such a wonderful resource. We had a couple job-alike workshops where I met with other early childhood teachers - this was definitely the best part for me!! I got some great ideas and a clearer picture of what I should be doing.

The last afternoon we were bused over to Pan American Christian Academy, which was the Brazilian MK school that hosted the conference. It was really fun to tour their school see similarities and differences between it and SCCLC. Their school is bigger than ours, and I think has been around longer too, but it was so similar too...an open campus with nice classrooms and beautiful landscaping, classrooms that opened onto centeral courtyards. I don't have any pictures because I was just going to get them from Virginia (who took enough for all of us) but she hasn't gotten them to me yet and I didn't want to wait. For dinner they had catered a regular Brazilian feast with different kinds of meat that you chose as much as you want of, rice, salads, cheese...it was delicious. The evening ended with a concert by a string orchestra made up of young people from some of the Brazilian orphanages. They were so amazing...super talented. It was a great time.

Saturday morning we managed to squeeze in a shopping trip to a little tourist spot on the outskirts of the city. It was a neat spot...very picturesque. I got several keepsakes, including a Brazilian shirt that I absolutely love! (Pictures coming)

Fellow SCCLC teachers Liz, Debbie, and me on a bridge in the tourist village. Notice my very stylish new bag! (Thank you Brazilian Walmart) Also notice my gray hoodie...which I wore every single day since it was cold and rainy our the whole time! So much for trying to make it to the beach! Oh well...maybe next time

The Amazon! Okay no, it's just the river flowing by the village. But it looks kind of like the Amazon doesn't it?

We made it back to the airport in plenty of time, although our flight had been moved up an hour (when do flights ever leave earlier than planned?) It was actually a relief to step off the plane and hear Spanish again...at least I can understand a little of it!

That's definitely enough rambling for now...bless you that actually stuck with me and read it all. Part II of My Adventures will include a description of the SAM field conference...I'll try not to be so long winded. Thanks for reading!

I'm back!

Hi everyone! I think blogger is having a problem, because it won't let me post any pictures at the moment. My stories would be so much better with illustrations, so I'm going to save them for tomorrow when hopefully blogger will be working again! I just want to let you all know that I'm back at school and have internet access again (I think I went through withdrawal).

Check back tomorrow for volume 1 of my Christmas break adventures! =)