I thought that coming into the race that the language barrier would be difficult. I took Spanish in high school and am at such a basic level and once the conversation moves past “how old are you?” and “what’s your favorite color?” I’m pretty much done. That may be the one thing I was right about coming in. Not being able to communicate with words is so frustrating. In Colombia, enough people knew basic English and we had our translator for the rest but Ecuador is a different story. This month we don’t have a translator and we are working in a poor neighborhood so English speakers are few and far between. Yet somehow I still let my expectations get the best of me on our first day of ministry.
Before arriving in Ecuador we learned we would be working with a French organization called “Ecuasol” and we would be helping with their before and after lunch programs. I was excited because I love working with school aged kids and I (selfishly) thought “Oh, they’re from France so they must know English, this is going to be easy”. After two buses totally 90 minutes my team and I ended up on a street corner in an impoverished neighboorhood starring at a pharmacy wondering what our next step was because we were told some members of Ecuasol would be wearing for us at the bus stop and that ended up not being true. We called the one number we had for the ministry and prayed that it would connect. Thankfully, it did but the person on the other line could barely understand me and me them. They said they would walk down and meet us and show us where the building was. A few minutes later we saw two blonde girls walking down the hill and we knew they had to be looking for us. Blondes are not normal here in South America so seeing someone with blonde hair is quite exciting. They walked up to us and opened their mouths and French came out. I can only imagine the looks on our faces because no one on my team speaks any French. They noticed our utter confusion and said “Oh, so you speak Spanish then.” One of my teammates, Kalie, can speak conversational Spanish so she stepped up and translated the best she could for us as we trekked up the hill to our ministry home for the next month.
Upon learning that as a whole we are not a Spanish speaking team the French volunteers, Acilia and Emily, tried to explain their foundation and their desires for us as best they could. I could see the frustration on their faces because they were trying to navigate between three languages in order that we could understand them. After a few sentences of mixed English and French, we told them that Spanish would be fine and we could understand what they were saying. This was a prayer for me as much as it was a statement leaving my mouth. We went through an “orientation” as they laid out a schdule for us and explained what their goal was. We left that first day having a better idea of what our mission was for this coming but I also left with a pit of anxiety. How can I connect with people who don’t speak the same language I do? How am I expected to minister to these wonderful French volunteers without knowing a word of French? And how in the heck am I supposed to help these children with their homework when I don’t even understand the questions being asked? I went to sleep that night with a head full of questions and an expectant heart watiing to see how the Lord was going to show up in this instance because I knew that He would.
We got the Ecuasol the next day and I was asked to help out in one of the classrooms where the kids work on their homework they got at school that day and other supplementary assignments the foundation’s teachers would assign them. I remember taking a big breath and telling God I trusted Him and His abilities to work through me as I walked through the doors. It would be really cool if I was able to say now that I walked into that room and fluent Spanish came out of my mouth and I was able to understand everything, but that’s not what happened. The first question a student asked me I couldn’t understand and I told them to ask their teacher. The same with the second and the third. I could have given up right there and shut down but I felt the Lord telling me to keeping pressing in and eventually I would be able to communicate with them. And He was so right. You don’t have to speak great Spanish to offer a struggling a hug or a smile for encouragement. It doesn’t take a native speaker to learn how to say “Keep trying, you’ll get it” (thank you Google translator). And it doesn’t take someone bold to ask for help and to ask the kids to repeate what they said or to slow down, it’s actually quite a humbling experience to have a child speak to you in slow, easy to understand, Spanish.
After a few days in that classroom and speaking Spanish for two hours straight I had a beautiful realization; God didn’t send me into that room because I could or couldn’t speak Spanish, He sent me in their because I knew how to love. I’ve heard numerous times before how love is the international language and it’s incredible to be able to live that out here in Ecuador. I get to have sweet Gabriela sit on my lap and I get to tell her that she is smart and beautiful and so important to me the same way I know the Lord does each night as she lays down her head. He speaks to her in the way she hears it the most and He is trying to teach me to do the same. She speaks through smiles and giggles because those require no translation and I love that we get to share that language together.
