praxis weekend

so we spent this weekend at our praxis sites and this is a lil summary of what i did:

- got there friday and met up with a woman from the community named Nancy and her 6 year old daughter Luciana who i stayed with. right away i could see that they both had very big personalities so i figured it was going to be an interesting weekend. They were great! we went to their house and ate dinner (ps i was not a vegetarian this weekend...but it was hard to be because they always made my plate for me and then gave it to me..wah wah). we prepared that night for a grande fiesta the following day for Nancy´s nephew, Diego, who was turning 1. i helped cook a bit and talked a little. there was tons of family around the whole time so it was hard to figure out who actually lives there on a regular basis. Nancy´s sister and brother-in-law were visiting from the states, they´ve lived there for about 30 years. first in cali, then washington, now arkansas (about 20 minutes from the boarder of Missouri...so weird) i was talking to them for a while in sort of spanglish. they kept switching from spanish to english but i responded in spanish. after preparing for the next day we went to bed and i shared 2 beds pushed together with Nancy and Luciana. it was weird because it wasnt weird.

- saturday morning we woke up pretty early (6:30am) and were on our way to Nancy´s work to do a few things. he dad owns a jewelry store that most of the kids work at including Nancy. we got there and she showed me how to make a few things and then i actually made like 5 necklaces for their shop. then i was playing with Luciana and i braided her hair, which she absolutely loved. then about 11:30am we headed back to their house to finish getting ready for the party. the night before we went to Centro Hogar to borrow like 50 or 60 chairs because she expected at least that many people to come. she has a huge family and whoever was in country was going to be there. i had to finish preparing for my english class that i had at 2pm (sidenote: we´ve started teaching english every monday at Anita´s house to people in the community. my praxis partner, Katy, has some experience teaching ESL so she is doing the older students (there are about 6 or 7) and i`m teaching the younger ones. i have 5 students between the ages of 5 and 9, theyre so cute) normally we have class on mondays but because we were at praxis over the weekend, we got to take monday as a free day to relax so we had class on saturday instead. i went to teach at Anita´s which went well and by the time class was over and i was back at Nancy´s the party was well underway. it was huge, 2 pinatas, 2 cakes, about 60 or so people. craziness, but it was so fun. then when the party was winding down we went on a house visit to spend time with and give some of the leftovers to a woman from their church community who just had surgery. its incredible to see the extent that the people here enjoy life but then reach out to others over and over again; its really beautiful. then after the party was over we took the chairs back to Centro Hogar in the back of a pickup truck. we stood up in the back, hanging onto the bar connected to the roof. i felt like i was back in grade school peaking my head out of the sunroof of "the spaceship" (aka my parents minivan) riding around the suburbs of New Berlin.

- sunday we woke up early again and Nancy had to go to the market for a few things so i helped Luciana get ready for the beach because she was going with some of her other family members. then her aunt picked her up and Nancy and i went to the celebration of the word at Anita´s house. It was similar to a catholic mass except there was no priest and they said different creeds and such. every week the celebration is lead by different people in the community and this week was lead by two 14 yr old boys. the homily was left open for anyone that wanted to comment on the readings, communion was pan dulce (sweet bread), and the sign of peace was very long because we practically said peace to everyone. it was really interesting but i have to say that i was mildly disappointed. im not quite sure what i was expecting but i guess i imagined something a bit more radical, it was still pretty similar to a catholic mass, which was not what i wanted. im not judging it yet though, i plan on going back a couple more times to try it out. i just dont find inspiration within the context of a catholic mass (or something similar to one) right now in my life. after mass, pretty much the whole community walked about an hour mostly uphill to another community called Las Nubes that is even poorer than them to have sort of a church community picnic. it was on a hillside with an incredible view of the whole city (dont worry i took pictures). we were waiting for lunch to be ready and i started talking to a man from the community named Gustavo who i felt drawn to from the first time i met him. he teaches guitar lessons to youth in the community (aka im also hoping that he might teach me too...) he was saying that Las Nubes is mostly evangelical but that it really didnt matter that they are a different religion. it doesnt matter what religion anyone is, if there is a need, as people of faith, whatever one that may be, they need to reach out. then i was telling him that one of the reasons i study theology is not just to learn more about my own, but to gain a better understanding of all faiths. religion, spirituality, and faith are so important to so many people in the world that to have a little better understanding of those is to have a little better understanding of people, of culture, of the world. so many things can stem from theology. its incredible what you can learn about a person by learning what things they have faith in, what are the things that make their heart beat faster.