You never know what you’re going to get with Marco as your contact! I remember a couple of nights ago, we were sitting around his table, exhausted from helping a single mother of three to level the foundation of her future home. (As a side, that has been by far some of the most tiring and most satisfying work we’ve done so far.)
We were talking about ministry opportunities for the rest of our time in Guatemala, and Marco mentioned a friend from Oklahoma who will be coming to the town we are staying in, El Tizate, in a couple of weeks. Jacinda, one of my teammates, told him about how her parents graduated from college there. Marco calls the guy on the phone, hands it to Jacinda, and turns out sure enough, Jacinda and the guy on the phone have a mutual connection. It was shocking, but at the same time, the more I travel, the more of the world I see, the more I realize how indeed, very small the world is. Indeed, we are all connected. Indeed, life is not full of coincidence but Divine appointments…
Yesterday was a 5:30 am wake up so that team Pneuma may accompany Marco on a trip to the coast. (He’s all about being environmentally friendly and economical, so he’s having a filter put in his car that will give him better gas milage.) There’s nothing quite like waking up to a symphony of beeping alarm clocks and screaming roosters, reminding me, I’m not in Washington anymore.
Sitting in the back of Marco’s white (now eco-friendly “green” van) I’m marveling at the beauty of the Guatemalan countryside. Palm trees, the greenest of leaves, and 10 ft tall corn stalks, waving in the breeze. I can’t help that feel life right now is a little like a dream. My eyes drift downward however, and staring me in the face is the harsh reality that the people around me live in every day. Trash every few feet piled along the roadside. Pot holes. A baby riding the front of a motorcycle; her father barely even holding her.
Even with the new filter, the exhaust fumes are becoming stronger and stronger in the cabin of the car. My head is aching and I ask if we can open the windows. It helps a little, but now the smells of cows, chickens, and who knows what else enter our nostrils every few minutes.
I’m still struggling to process everything. With little more than a week under our belts, our team is struggling to find our niche, and get into a routine.Something that we’ve learned already is that we must surrender our plans. Marco is the kind of guy that goes with the flow, and often plans come together at the last minute. Mainly, I think this month will be about discovering our gifts, our passions, and our place amongst the group. We’ve been blessed with a lot of time for “team bonding”, laughing, and loving on each other. I couldn’t have been blessed with a more loving group of people, from the small group that I’m on, to the entire S-Squad of 60+ people who are already like brothers and sisters to me. If the rest of the year is anything like this week, it’s sure to be an amazing year! Thanks always for reading~ So much love!
(Marco -the guy on the far right- is totally into natural remedies, so here he is having us try “grapefruit seed extract” to cleanse our bodies from parasites or something like that!) Bri, graciously allowed me to use this pic of her. I figure it gives you a good idea how it tastes!)
