The past two days have been full of planning for services and playing with kids. We have been growing increasingly more and more frustrated with the communication barrier. We try to spent as much time as possible playing with the kids of Cenovia. Brienna says, “Kids spell love; t-i-m-e.” I agree and think most of our time should be spent with the kids. But, some other team members have a good point in that we need to let them know why we are playing with them. They need to know that the love we are sharing with them comes from Jesus.
The other morning we did some walking around town to meet some more of the residents. I cannot get over their willingness to invite us in just to hold a conversation. We stopped at a little tienda to buy some tomatoes, but the woman told us that she does not sell tomatoes. She would not let us go until she gave us some of her own tomatoes. It was really hard for me to accept the tomatoes, but joy is not just in the receiving but in the giving too. We left the store and passed the school where the P.E. teacher waved us down. He was wearing a Steelers jersey. The day before he was wearing a Patriots jersey; I had told him I was from Pittsburgh and did not like the Patriots. We watched the kids playing Futbol and cheered them on. They kept saying, “Mira!” which means look. They demonstrate so much joy when we simply look at them or give them a high five. We had to plan for the evening service but promised to meet up to go to the river in the afternoon.
A bunch of kids met us to swim in the river and this time we were ready with our suits and some more Americans. The Lost Boys could have taken us on the path with no mud but of course they wanted the rest of the Americans to get the lodo experience, so once again we slopped through the mud. The water felt so good and the kids seemed so happy to get to play. They played in the rapids, did cartwheels, and jumped out of a tree into the water. Near the river was a trail of ants carrying leaves that were about twice their size, so we spent time watching them work.
Our path home took us past the pile of rocks that my team had struggled to climb. It only took one American pointing up the mountain and the kids took off. Even the little pre-schooler’s scrambled up the mountain; obviously they had done this before. They did a much better job on the climb then we had, but I was still concerned because they seemed to be oblivious to the danger of the heights.
