Thursday, July 20, 2017

Paraguay Phase 1

Day 1 - Miami to Paraguay
I knew it would be a long travel day, no one would have had to try too hard to convince me. I didn’t and wouldn’t have guessed at how it all went down though.
Miami to Panama City went smoothly. It’s when the planes tires hit Central American soil that things got rocky. Not in the landing itself but in many of the things that are taken for granted in the time after a plane lands.
There were power troubles, a majority outage to be exact, that prevented the plane from being able  to utilize the standard walk way and thus kept us from being able to de-board like usual. So we sat on the tarmac for quite some time, close to an hour I think but time was hard to keep track of during the entire trip.
Eventually the operations at the airport used a ramp to allow us, and all the other planes that we could see, to get off and continue our travels. After getting off we got on a bus which took us to the terminal. Fast forwarding another 2 hours of sitting around we were notified that our next plane was ready to be boarded. Once aboard we waited for another 30 - 45 minutes because of potential flight path restrictions. If the nearly 2.5 hrs of waiting wasn’t enough then a dreadfully boring flight was like salt in a wound.
We landed around 1 am & quickly proceeded to the Visa area. It took around 40 minutes for the whole group to make it past those windows and beyond the nearby check point. From there a short walk to the baggage claim preceded another to the point at which our hosts were waiting. After a 20 - 30 minute drive to the campus we unloaded, got final instructions for the day and for the morning then retired for the evening. The guys quarters were nicer then I expected & before long sleep came upon me. It was a welcome ending to a long day!

Day 2 - Asuncion
Due to the late night we were given til 9 to have breakfast. After breakfast we participated in chapel time at the school down the hill. The amount of energy that the kids and the leader used was shocking. The only thing that kept it from being downright Pentecostal was the absence of a flag waver. It was a joy to behold and to be apart of!
We then transitioned to lunch. We’ve been told that lunch is the most substantial of the three meals   and for today at least, it bared out that way. It was a shmorgasbord of local fares and a swell introduction to the kind of food that the nation claims.
After lunch we had some planning for later in the week along with some free & personal time until evening church. The church service was primarily a prayer time where 30 or so people greeted one another, did some praying then separated into smaller groups and prayed together. Each group had a mix of locals and team members. As much as I enjoyed the praise time at the chapel earlier in the day, I think that the prayer time was the best part. It went longer then stated but was totally worth it and it was my first indication of how the locals would respond to me. It was said to me that they are a conservative people but that didn’t do justice to their response to me. After the prayer time concluded, several of them approached me seeking a picture. I didn’t know it at the time, but that would be a regular thing during the two weeks abroad.
From there we walked back to the dining room for dinner. It was a second straight meal that I would simply describe as highly enjoyable. Not long after though I retired to my mattress. Sleep didn’t delay for the second night, hopefully I’m able to sleep this easily during the rest of the trip!

Day 3
On our second day at the compound myself and half the group spent the morning working with second and fifth graders in English classes. We went between four different classrooms over the span of a few hours. Each of the four classes had it’s own flavor, some being more enjoyable then others. My favorite was the first of the fifth grade classes. A group of four boys crowded me and we spent a half hour or more communicating as best we could, eventually practicing certain words from a dictionary that had some pictures in it. Nothing earth shattering but gotta crawl before being able to walk.
Before spending some time sitting in on the other half of the groups work with the kids, we had free time - quiet time. That’s how the remainder of the morning went. After lunch there was a brief meeting, followed by another brief time unscheduled.
Then came the work.
While several members of the team went on a supply run the rest of us busted out tarps, rakes and elbow grease for some yard work. The ladies who didn’t go shopping did most of the raking while the guys did the “heavy” labor, picking up all the brush and branch, loading them onto a trailer before pulling it over to the prescribed pile location. 2.5 - 3 hrs later the courtyard area would make proud all but the most finicky of yard work people.
Once all the activities were complete we had dinner. Hamburgers with a fried egg and ice cream cake made for a great follow up to the manual labor. That was followed by another meeting time and prayer. With that, another day came to it’s conclusion.

Day 4
The day started out like the earlier ones had - early breakfast, meeting and then down to the school. Took longer to wake up this morning but the jumping and dancing shook the cobwebs out real quick. That consumed the morning with the same break for quiet time being the lone exception.
After lunch we went to work preparing for the one part of the trip that was told to be happening in advance - the boat ministry. From organizing meds to checking & packing a pair of tents, the area and each one of us was busy at work, buzzing around to get everything ready. Once everything was as ready as it was going to get we got another semi - American meal: Pizza. Not any kind of pizza that would pass in the USA but the crust was edible, even if the toppings were substandard to even the lowest of standards.
Shortly after that we headed for the bus station. Once there, I had a little bit of rookie moment but nothing came of it so I moved on quickly. All our gear was tagged and loaded onto the bus before taking the stairs to the second level. It wasn’t long before I fell asleep and that ate around 85% of the road time. We got to Antequera around 3 am and quickly separated to our quarters. The guys to a house and the gals to their dorm rooms on the grounds of the mission. Not to rub it in their faces, but the guys definitely got the better end of it! The only way our location could have been better would be if we didn’t have to walk the few blocks to meet up with the rest of the team.

So phase 1 is officially done. Now onto the work that I and we came here to do!

No comments:

Post a Comment