This month, I am living in a sweet little mountain town in Bolivia. We arrived in La Paz at the beginning of the month, met by snow capped mountains, 13,000 feet elevation, and temperatures in the low fifties. This is a first for us- we’ve pretty much been drowning in our own sweat for the last 7 months.
After a few acclimation days in La Paz, we hopped on an overnight bus. This was the second worst bus I’ve ever been on in my whole life (the worst one was in India). We bumped down a rocky, unpaved mountain road for 14 hours. When I would look out the window in the middle of the night, I could see that we were feet from the side of a cliff. Sometimes on the Race, you just give it to the Lord and go back to sleep.
At 6 am, we came to a stop on a cobblestone street. Our host, Pastor Froilan was waiting with a cab ready to meet us. I didn’t know it then, but I love this little town. And, so you get a glimpse of life here in Apolo, here are the top 5 reasons I love this town.
5. Market runs- We are cooking for ourselves this month, which I have really come to love. We use all fresh ingredients from our local market, and we befriended a lot of the store owners. I love running out to the market with my teammates and picking everything for our meals. Weirdly enough, I have learned to cook on the Race. You know, just getting my Proverbs 31 on.
4. Our Home- We have such a sweet living arrangement this month. The living arrangements can be such a point of growth on the World Race. Sometimes, you live in a tent. Sometimes, the only space you have is where you physically lay at night. Sometimes, there’s a ton of dirt and bugs. But, this month, the Lord has blessed us with a two story house! We have bedrooms, space for our things, and an awesome kitchen. We have space to work out together. And we have a big kitchen table to do quiet time and eat together each day. Our house is an old missionary house attached to a church and a preschool. I love the kids that yell to us through our kitchen window. I love that everyone knows where we live when we invite them to our English Classes each day. “Vivimos a la Centro Christiano!” During the mornings, we’ve been painting to spruce it up for the kids and Pastor Friolan.
3. The Mountains- Apolo is surrounded by mountains. Being from North Carolina, I get mountains. I mean, I’ve been to Asheville, you know? But these are a totally different ball game. There’re HUGEEEE. And one day, we thought we could just casually walk up one of the mountains. Haha, it looked so close! We walked for two hours, and didn’t even get to the base of the mountain. Another day, our ministry host took us to a waterfall. It was so beautiful!
2. Speaking Spanish- I took Spanish at UNCW and honestly, was pretty metiocre at it. Conjugating into past, future, and conditional tenses was pretty hard for me. My senior year I taught ESL in Belize and got a lot better at speaking Spanish while I was there. But, something beautiful happened in Apolo. I’m actually not awful at Spanish! I can buy things in the market without translators, speak to people in church, get directions, ask for things, all the basic things. And, as my friends and I struggle together, we learn from each other. Speaking Spanish is so much fun! I am praying for a Holy Spirit download to fluency while I’m here. The Lord is the one who created all the languages after all. #Genesis11:1-9
1. The people of Apolo- MY FAVORITE! This is my favorite part of the whole month!! Because we are living in such a small town, we get to know a lot of people. We are the only “gringitas” in town, so we stick out. And through teaching English (side note: five of our English students accepted Christ!) to most of the kids, going to the same produce stands, and walking past the same houses every day, we have become regulars to quite a few people. Here are some of my favorite characters from Apolo, Bolivia.
BELEN AND NAIOMI: These two little cuties went to the preschool next to our house. The way to their hearts is feeding them snacks, especially chocolate popcorn, and going down the big slide with them. And picking them up, of course.
GLORIA AND SARITA: One of our first days in Apolo, Alex and Mikayla went to search for wifi in town. We heard that little Apolo didn’t have any in the whole town, and that was 100% true. They also didn’t have any ATM’s either!! But, Mikayla and Alex got a (completely false) tip that there was wifi at Hotel Lavanderia. And, with the Lord’s intervention, they met sweet Gloria. Gloria owns the hotel and she welcomed us joyfully each time we came to see her. Then, she introduced us to her daughter, Sarita. Sarita spoke English and became our real-life Apolo Google and our good friend. We loved going over to the Hotel to say hello, bring flowers, and make pizza with Gloria and Sarita. Note to future Racers: GO SEE THEM 🙂
GONZALO: We literally ran into this man in our favorite corner store in Apolo. He heard us speaking English and started rapidly talking to us “Hey girls are you from the United States I am very grateful to the United States I used to live there you know what are you looking for oh cheese I know where you can get it let me know and I will help you whenever you need anything here in Apolo I always help the Americans here”. He was like the narrator in a book or movie that just popped up at a random time in town and started talking to you. He’s and interesting guy and kissed us each on the face on our last day.
HOLGA: Holga went to our church. She gives big hugs and told us she was going to stuff us into her purse to prevent us from leaving on the last day. I call her my Bolivian Abuelita.
