truth #33: lions, tigirillo and root canals, OH MY

And there I was in a face down with Pumba's wife and three kids.  I was in a dilemma as the bathroom lay directly in the middle of our face down.  Yet every move forward I made, she hunkered down as though she thought mauling my shin was the primary objective of her life.  I was on the point of forgoing the much needed facilities when Pumba himself stepped in to call his family over.  I watched as the trotted off together five tails held high in the air.

South Africa, a land full of interesting animals and the site of the 2010 AIDSLink International symposium.   I was invited to this join this symposium about three weeks before it started as the original representative for Latin America confirmed that she could not make it.  Then I found myself starting a almost 2 day journey on the 29th of October.  The meetings were enlightening and very encouraging as we are all trying to combat this pandemic of HIV and AIDS through giving hope and support.  We are hoping to see the presence of AIDSLink growing in Latin America in the coming years.  This is one aspect of the work that I do while in Ecuador.  As I had three days to wait after the end of the symposium to head back to Ecuador, I stayed at the home of one of my friends.  They were extremely kind and hospitable and took me to see many interesting things, like the warthogs pictured above. 

Three days before heading out to South Africa, I headed to the dentist for my first check up and cleaning in two years.  The dentist can be a scary person to many of you but I was confident that a cleaning couldn't be too bad.  Well I sit down in the chair and my dentist starts poking around, next thing I hear after a string of spanish words was a phrase something like this "Well, the only thing left to do is to extract it".  My blood ran cold.  I am pretty sure she saw the terror in my wide eyes because she grabbed my arm reassuringly and said "Not the tooth honey, the root".  My blood only warmed slightly as I realized that the big train bearing down on me spelled out "Root canal" and ten seconds later it had started... If any of you have shared in this wretched experience you probably won't believe me when I say I walked out and hour later a very happy camper.  Yes that is right, happy.  You see I have had a problem with a tooth on the right side of my mouth for over 2 years and for the first time in two years I could actually chew on the right side of my mouth without pain!  I am still adjusting! 

About three days after getting back from South Africa, I headed out on a first time ever Youth weekend with the youth from Santay Island.  We took them to a beach about 2 hours away from their Island and Guayaquil.  As their island is in the middle of a muddy river, this was the first time for them to have seen and swam in the sea.  We also stopped by KFC on the way back, also the first time for many of them to have eaten this fast food.  It was a great weekend, we were able to make some of those fragile yet highly meaningful connections that make youth ministry work. 

My friend Clarice arrived one week later on the 22nd of November.  She went on the line-up trip that Darren and I put together for Zaruma.  Zaruma is a little town on the side of a mountain to the south of Ecuador. We are planning our next medical trip to this town in the first week of March.  We were very impressed with the small church there and the way that the whole community was excited about this upcoming clinic.  There we were introduced to the typical plate of Tigirillo.  This is the name of a small wild cat that lives in Ecuador (Santay Island boasts of having several that kills the chickens and dogs, I even heard a few weeks ago that it killed and ate half a horse!).  But come to find out this typical food is vegetarian!  It is fried egg mixed with cheese and mashed plantain.  It was good!  We arrived back to Guayaquil on Thanksgiving day.  The celebration didn't happen for us though until the weekend.  On Saturday in line with what we did last year, the Americans banned together (with some help from our ecuadorian friends) and put on a full fledged thanksgiving dinner for our OM family.  We had turkey, dressing, hot rolls, salad, fruit salad, green beans, gravy, sweet potatoes, pumpkin pie and even cranberry sauce!!  

Five days later, after Clarice returned home (thanks for the visit Clarice!!!) and after another volcano cloud of ash, I flew to Quito for several meetings with pastors and new missionaries that we will be sending out in January.  It was a very fruitful trip and I also did some hunting for a venue to put a HIV conference in May.  We did at one point go off on a 4 hour search to find a Convent that has place for events but only found a house of nuns without options for events...  Though I half desired to join the convent to escape my endlessly busy life, I reluctantly decided not to on the basis of differences of faith.  I returned back to Guayaquil just in time for the start of the holiday season.  Sunday we celebrated Sinterklaas, not to be confused with Santa Claus as Sinterklaas is turkish, claimed by the Spanish yet honored by the Dutch on December the 5th.  We pulled out our wooden shoes... oh wait we didn't actually do that part..  We pulled out the mystery gifts from Sinterklaas and the poems attached.  After everyone opening their gifts we all began to guess our Sinterklaas.  It was a fun event for all of our team.  Soon we will be on to Celebrating Christmas with our families.  I am very excited about this part.  Christ's birth is such a great time to renew hope considering that it was His birth into the world that brought us the long awaited hope.   It will also be nice to see my family...

OH MY!  Yes it has been an incredibly crazy time!  I would say that this part (the OH MY) would represent my just about sinfully crazy schedule.  I must stop!  I am snatching times to read a book by EM Bounds called Power through Prayer.  I want to have that kind of prayer life.  It is hard to do so at times when you are running all the time.  Sometimes I need to just stop and realize that I must take time for my relationship with God, that is what it is all about anyways.  What am I working so hard towards?  Sending missionaries?  Why? So that people can hear about and know God like I do?  But if I am not taking the time for a relationship then how can I preach to people about knowing God?  Ministry is important, yes, but always, remember what it is all about.  Knowing God!

South Africa

http://picasaweb.google.com/tabk219/SouthAfrica?feat=directlink