Hello from Venezuela!!! We made it here with ALL our luggage! Praise the Lord! We got here late and then had a drive to get to Guatire. It was amazing to drive through Caracas. There are 6 million people in Caracas. Many live in the Barrios (Slums). These dot the hills around Caracas. Thousands and Thousands of lights all over! These houses are block houses that are basically built one on top of the other up the hillside. Many of these people do not have cars. They are mostly unskilled workers, Dave (Belch) tells us. There are Barrios in Guatire too. We arrived in Guatire late late late!! It was 2 am Guatire time before we got in bed. We are staying with the Belches until tomorrow, when we move to the church and we will stay there the rest of the time.
On Thursday morning, we went to the church to meet people. It has been an adventrue ever since! The people down here are very friendly. There is not really an age gap or anything. Everyone treats everyone the same, regardless of age. My Spanish of course is HORRIBLE but some speak enough English to make it work. The others you smile at and use hands and grab an English speaker.
The church here sent a team to the Amazon yesterday. It was an amazing experience to hug goodbye people I had known for brief hours and pray for them. We all stood in a circle and held hands and one of the Venezuelans prayed. We don´t translate prayers here. If a Venezuelan prays, then it is in Spanish. And we all just pray along. It is really neat!!
Yesterday was a long and tiring day as we got used to the people and the climate etc. I was really dehydrated all day long so it was hard to try to stay awake. But today I think I drank about 6 nalgenes full and so I felt so much better, enough to go on a hike!
Today, we were at the church in the morning, preparing for camp. Then we drove to the EDGE OF THE ANDES!!!!!!! and swam in the river. Some brave ones went cliff jumping. (No, I was not one of them! Big Surprise).
The food has been really great so far. I like it. Chicken, empanadas, things with ¨sqeaky¨cheese (some sort of goat cheese I think that squeaks when you chew it!)
I got a big surprise yesterday and today. Dave B. asked me if I was prepared to play for church on Sunday... A SOLO!!! I told him all I had was chord music, but I could whip something together. So... then today, they asked if I could play for WORSHIP!!! I said yes. We were practicing today and what an experience...jamming with Venezuelans. Defintely an experience. (Jacob and Michael, don´t be jealous!) I am looking forward, with a few nerves most likely, to worshipping and playing on Sunday. Fortunately, the drummer speaks a little English, or I would be lost. It is fun trying to communicate with them. They look at you and speak a long string of Spanish, and I just stand there looking blankly at them. No Intiendes. Or Mas Lento, por favor! (I don´t understand, or much slower please!)
Tomorrow we will do devotions in the morning and then go to the site where we will be and do advertising. The weather is nice... he he.... really hot and really humid! It does not bother us too much because we are inside a good portion of the day. It will be worse when we are in the sun more next week all day long. Lots of sweat though now!
We start Camp Monday and go through Friday. We will most likely have 200 kids. I will be a group leader, paired with a Venezuelan woman named Yosmar. She speaks no English. Please pray for patience for me, with not speaking much Spanish and with the kids. We will have 6 and 7 year olds. Please pray that I can communicate as I need to. Pray that we all show off Christ in a huge way, that our actions and few words would speak volumes of the love of Christ.
I won´t have much email access, if any, from here on out. We will be living at the Church, and so I doubt that we will have email.
Oh yes, driving! You might have seen movies (or been here or another country) and experienced the driving. Um, words to describe. Yes, much like the movies. Except now I am in the car. I can reach out the window (not that I have done this nor do I plan to) and if there is a car next to us, I would be able to touch the person inside. Yeah, that CLOSE!!! They have laws, however, they are not really enforced and definitely not followed. Red light????? Well, it means basically nothing. Most of their lights are there, but don´t work. There is not reason to fix them when they break because no one follows them anyway. Who has the right of way? The one who does not put on his brake and just goes!!! No stop signs, you just merge! No passing lanes, you just pass! They don´t have speed limits, so you just drive as fast as you want. On some streets there are speed bumps, so that is the only thing that slows you down. Um... I think I would like driving here. No 20 mph through Manito anymore!!! Interesting adventure when it comes time to go anywhere. You just have to relax and not think about it. And by God´s grace, I don´t have an ulcer yet!!
Thank you so much for praying! God is good to grow us together with the Venezuelans. Pray that our unity would keep growing and that we would be bold to speak Spanish and that we would be bold to share the gospel. Pray that as we are not getting much sleep next week (up at 5.30 am, out the door by 6.00!!!) that we would be walking in the Spirit, loving each other and not being cranky when we are tired.
Love you all!!Tanya
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