Double the Groups, Double the Fun!

So this week was a two for one special. We had a group from Guntersville, AL working with the church in San Vicente and a group from Owens Cross Roads (Alabama) working with the church in Erendira. Those two churches are just about 30 minutes apart, so both groups ate breakfast and dinner together and stayed in two hotels in San Vicente.

Usually when there are two groups in one week, we translators get split up and assigned a group to work with. But this week was different, since the groups were working together in some capacities and separate in others. I spent each morning/afternoon with Guntersville and each evening/VBS with Owens Cross Roads.

It was such a blessing getting to know and work with two different groups at the same time. I believe there were about 50 people total between the two groups, and with groups of only 15 during the two previous weeks, it was a big overwhelming at first!

Siobhan, Jamie, Me, Sara and Misha at Covelli's with the Special Assistant to the Field Director.

Luckily, some familiar faces, Kent and Jamie Pendergrass, greeted us on Thursday. We went out to eat at Covelli's and had a briefing with the Kent, the Special Assistant to the Field Director of Baja Missions, before the Field Director arrived. To understand Kent's job, just think of this: Kent is to Matt Moore as John the Baptist is to Jesus (it's not nearly as blasphemous as it appears).

I spent Friday shopping and getting ready with about 15 people who came down early. I became pretty good friends with some of the kitchen ladies, Laura and Carrie :), and their friends and family members, Chris and Connie, that night, and those friends helped me learn all the names and faces and family ties the next night when the other 35 people showed up all at once!

The San Vicente church added a sister to the family of God on Sunday, and the two more sisters were added to God's family in Erendira during the week. Both of these groups were very well organized and had great classes for the kids and the adults.

New friends Mont and Jerry Michael with Minga, their new wife.

I spent the mornings taking lunch to different schools with the Guntersville group, and the afternoons doing house visits with Antonio, the preacher in San Vicente. Then when the OXR group would come back for dinner, I'd ride to Erendira with them and translate the VBS class for the children. The first night we had about 15-20 kids, and by the last night we had 50 kids!

Erendira is a pretty small town, and it's the newest of the Baja Missions churches. So the church there only has about 20 active members, not including their children. All over the Baja, there are places called Ranchos where people are given a small amount of money a one-room "apartment" in a concrete complex to live with their families in exchange for their work in the fields every day. A lot of times, they move to different Ranchos as the picking seasons for different crops change. These people are the poorest of poor, not even having a place to call their own, always on the move looking for work.

OXR took a bus to the Rancho in Erendira every night before VBS to pick up kids, who would run screaming to the bus when they saw us pulling up. We also picked up some adults from the Rancho who occasionally visit the church, when they can find a ride. Those these kids were the worst behaved and gave me a headache every night, I saw Jesus in them because of their desire to be a part of something bigger than themselves. They really did listen to the stories and they learned and retained what they learned.

The group from Guntersville built tables for the kids' classroom, to go with the benches built by the Woodland Trace group from two weeks ago. (I have pictures on my camera but I can't put them on here until I get home at the end of the summer!) They also painted the teen room lime green and put in a new rug, painted the kids room yellow, painted a mural on the wall and added a rug to that room as well. The classrooms look so amazing, and so much different than they did just two weeks ago!

Guntersville also did some more work on Lola and Guillermo's roof, put insulation into the house of a couple who both just got out of the hospital and will be in bed for at least 4 or 5 weeks, and readjusted the basketball goal at the church.

My new best friend Connie with one of the boys getting a brand new house!

The OXR group painted the outside of the new church building in Erendira, including a sign on the building, a cross on the top of the building and a sign on the main road pointing people in the direction of the new building. They also built a house for Jacinta, a woman in the church with three boys under the age of 7, who recently lost her husband. By the time they left on Thursday, they had dedicated the house to her-- complete with keys for two outside doors, a custom-made bunk bed with double-size mattresses, dry wall and electricity.

This is Big Baby from the backpack game.

I had such an amazing week with this group. From Wicked singalongs, anti-jokes, many games of Gotcha and Horse, to making a mouth-percussion band, screaming "Acelerale chofer!" with the Rancho kids and hiding super creepy objects in people's backpacks, I spent most of my week laughing with my new friends who I think I'll be able to call friend for years to come.

Hanging Loose in Zorrillo

 Well my week in El Zorrillo is over! The group from North Alabama is on their way back to San Diego right now, after eating one last lunch in Ensenada with Javier and Yolanda Franco.

This was the first week I've spend with the church in Zorrillo and I absolutely fell in love with the people there! I translated the kids class all week, and with an average of 50 kids per night (each of whom seemed to scream all the time an incredible volumes...), that was a challenge.

Jessica, on Sunday night of the kids' classes.

I stayed in the clinic all morning, translating for two EMTs, a nurse practitioner and a nursing school student. Not only did the group host a clinic each day, but they also took their medicine to the streets and canvased the whole barrio, going on house calls when they got wind of sick people who were stuck in their homes.

Overall, including the on-site clinic and the house calls, we think about 140 patients were seen. Rick, one of the EMTs in this group, is known for being "needle-happy," giving shots and IVs whenever he sees fit. His reputation preceded him, and as people came into the clinic, they asked me which one to avoid so they wouldn't get a shot! It was pretty funny.

This is Jesus. And he is precious.

Overall, we worked really hard this week and I'm excited to have a break this afternoon and tomorrow to catch up on sleep and maybe catch some rays, fingers-crossed. You'd think, being in Mexico that I'd be able to retain my tan pretty well, but I've spent most every day inside a clinic translating. So my color is fading daily....

Saturday we head back down to San Vicente with two groups-- Owen's Crossroads and Guntersville. OXR is working with the Erendira church and Guntersville is on their first trip to the San Vicente church. They'll both be staying at the same hotel in San Vicente and eating breakfast and dinner together, so I think each translator will get a chance to work with each group/church.

I should have internet during at least some of the days while I'm at the church in San Vicente, so I might get a blog up next week. Thanks for reading!

Bittersweet endings, new beginnings

Well our first group is back in San Diego now, and we are anxiously awaiting our next groups! With a slight change of plans today (if you saw my feet, you'd see that they are in Mexico... that was for Doug), I'm going to be in Zorillo with Siobhan and Misha this week. Our group doesn't arrive until tomorrow, and I think we'll be staying at the Villa Marina tonight.

With that being said, I won't have internet at all next week to post blog entries, but I'll try to type some out during the week to post when I get back to Ensenada next Thursday or Friday.

God blessed us with an amazing first week. Three people were baptized into Christ this week at the church in San Vicente, and the classes that the Woodland Trace congregation prepared for the kids was absolutely incredible. It was so well organized and the kids were so attentive, always wanting to learn more and participate. Kudos to Renee, Janie and Linda for putting that class together and all the teenagers for their hard work also.


Yesterday we went to Erendira, a coastal town about a 30 minute drive from San Vicente. Though it was cold and windy, we spent some time on the rocky beaches there, reflecting on our time serving God that week. That was a lot of fun!

The Pacific Ocean, as seen from Erendira.

I'm sorry that I can't post more pictures in the blog. I can't upload any of the photos from my camera, so the few pictures I can add are the ones I take on my phone and upload when I get wireless.

I've never spent more than a few hours at the church in Zorillo, so I'm excited to spend an entire week working with brother Franco and the Friends of Zorillo from North Alabama. I'm pretty exhausted, so hopefully I'll find some time to rest during the next 24 hours.

Thanks for reading :)

It is what it is

(The title is for Sara Robb, Siobhan Hickerson and Misha Venegas.)

It's been an interesting start to the week. I didn't think I'd have internet at all this week, but the preacher's house on the same property as the church has wireless that I can use every once in a while. We had some issues getting from Ensenada to San Vicente, and once we got here we had some issues with our hotel reservations.

I know that we are doing God's work in here in San Vicente, because Satan wouldn't be working so hard to mess up the plans of the group from Woodland Street. Speaking of this group, I LOVE THEM! The group is smaller than most, with only about 15 people here. Half of them are youth group members and the other half are adults.

The group is from Alabama, and they are all so joyful, hardworking and so so kind to us translators. Though the experience we bonded over wasn't the best, Siobhan, Sara and I all felt like a part of their tight-knit group within hours of meeting them. I love serving God with people I can laugh with and work hard with.

The group is doing house visits, some construction projects around the church and a small clinic. Dr. Naden brought about $3000 worth of medicine to give out to people he treats. This morning I translated the reception table, getting people signed in and through the blood pressure, temperature and vitals stations. Tomorrow, I think I'm going to be translating for the doctor, which is much more difficult. I'm excited to fumble through all the human anatomy words that I don't know in Spanish. My "words that I learned because I didn't know them when I needed to know them" notebook is going to fill up a lot faster than I planned...

This week God has really put into perspective what is important and what isn't. We as Americans tend to depend on material possessions in a way that makes us almost addicted to them. I love coming to Mexico, because I find myself not checking Twitter every 10 minutes or wondering someone's going to respond to my Facebook wall post from five minutes ago. It's only been 4 days since I crossed the border, but I already feel at home with my translator family and in this country I love so much.

It's almost time for a cyber fast

Tomorrow afternoon will probably be the last time I have internet access for the week. We are heading to San Vicente with a group from Campbell Street Church, which I think is in Alabama, and the hotel we're staying at does not have internet.

Today was an exciting day! After a wonderful night's sleep in my armchair-ottoman-armchair bed, which was more like a crib (the hotel room only had one bed and there were three of us!), I went along with Siobhan and Sara on the trolley to the border. Normally, you can just hop on a trolley for $2.50 one-way and head all the way to the border, but today our trolley broke down and we had to deboard and reboard another train. And with 5 suitcases and three backpacks between us this was more than complicated.

When we walked up a huge ramp, across a sky bridge over the interstate lanes going into and out of Mexico, down a huge ramp, through two sets of 8-foot tall turn styles, we played red light/green light (for those of you who've been to Mexico through the San Ysidro border before, you know what I'm talking about) and made it into Mexico! Our good friend and fellow translator Misha Venegas was there to pick us up, and we stopped for lunch in Rosarito before checking into our hotel in Ensenada.

The city of Ensenada right now is a MAD HOUSE. The famous Baja 500 race is happening right now, and I had no idea it was such a huge deal. Every single hotel in town is sold out, which is why we're staying at the Flamingos hotel instead of the usual Villa Marina room. This was the last hotel room in town, and it just happened to be a suite with a jacuzzi in the living room area..... not complaining :)

Once we checked into the hotel, we walked around the streets of Ensenada where all the race festivities were going on. People come to Ensenada for a up to a week prior to the race, which starts tomorrow, to hang out, camp with their families and friends and basically party until they drop. I'd equate this celebration to a mixture of PCB Spring Break and Mardi Gras in New Orleans, but with more foreigners. Once we picked up Caroline Bumpus, we had dinner at Chispas (DELICIOUS tacos) and then just hung out with Misha, Arturo and Mario.

Now, we're about to go to bed because we're all so exhausted! Tomorrow we're going to Baja Frut for breakfast, then watching the racers go through town, dropping off extra stuff at the City of Children, going to Leonardo's for lunch and meeting the group from Campbell Street to go on a Costco run and head south! If you know Ensenada and me, you know that my day tomorrow is about the PERFECT food day possible. Ever. I'm pumped.

I really appreciate all of you reading this who have been praying for my safe journey. God has blessed Siobhan, Sara and I with an amazingly smooth trip down to Ensenada. We are so excited to get to work tomorrow! This might be the last blog you'll get from me for the next 4 or 5 days. But check back soon for a new post!

My 24-hour pre-mission trip mini-vacation

I believe that set the record for the most hyphenated words in one blog title. But that hyphen-filled title was necessary to describe what this post is about!

Thanks to the travel expertise of my mother and my constant need to have every minute of my life plan, today went as smoothly as possible. Mom dropped me off at the airport at 4:30am, and when Siobhan finally arrived and got her bags checked 30 minutes later, we sailed through the expert traveler line, grabbed breakfast and sat at the gate for about 15 minutes before boarding.

After a two and a half hour layover in the Illuminati headquarters (Denver Airport), we exit row-ed it to San Diego, took a shuttle to our four star hotel, The Westgate Hotel in the Gaslamp district of downtown, and settled in. Siobhan and I went a block over to Horton Plaza, this amazing open-air mall with lots of restaurants and cool stores, and ate lunch. Then we came back, rested at the hotel and greeted the third and final American translator traveling with us, Sara Robb.

Tomorrow will be another day of adventure! We are taking the trolley down to the San Ysidro Border, walking across and being picked up by Misha Venegas, a Mexican translator who we'll be working with all summer. I am SUPER pumped about tomorrow, because I get to see my precious angel babies at the City of Children for playtime tomorrow. 

Pray that we have safe travels, moving from one country to the next for 8 weeks. Thanks for reading and I hope to post again soon!

New to the world of blogging...

I feel like this is my first "someone talked me into Twitter #notsurewhattodo" post. But I'm new to blogging, and I'm not sure what to do. In about 8 hours, I'll be headed on my 8 week adventure in Mexico.

Though I've been to Mexico countless times with Baja Missions, I've never been a translator before. Naturally I'm about to puke from nerves, not-gonna-be-good-enough feelings and more stereotypically predictable emotions that overwhelm you before a new adventure.

I love the feeling of going back and reading a journal from years ago, but I find that my brain works too fast for my hand to write, and journaling tends to annoy me more than relax me. So I've decided to try and keep a blog, to help me remember my adventures and to share what I'm doing with all my friends.

Thanks for your love and support, and please spend this summer with me in prayer for the people of Baja, that we can meet God where he's already working and create and further relationships with our brothers and sisters in Christ.