home sweet home

The Paraguay team left yesterday afternoon, and should be only an hour or two from Los Angeles by now. Only until I saw the team off at the airport did it start to sink in -- the fact that this country will be my home for the next year and half. It´s still pretty surreal, but the Paraguayans and the Chos (the missionary family I´m staying with) have been unbelievably welcoming and hospitable. They´ve been feeding me a little too well here (imagine having Brazilian BBQ every other day), but I sure ain´t complaining :)

The past two weeks were pretty busy, as we helped put on VBS for several of the local churches here. Because of the swine flu situation and more people contracting the flu/cold, the government issued a national warning advising people to avoid events with large gatherings of people. We didn´t know how this -- along with the bout of cold and rainy weather we´ve been having -- would affect the VBS turnout, but God was gracious and gave us sunny, clear weather throughout the entire week that we held VBS. Many more children than we expected came out, so we definitely praised God for that! We also visited La Esquina de la Sonrisa, an orphanage run by a family from Marangatu, and Jardin de Esperanza, an orphanage for children with HIV/AIDS. (I´ll be writing separate entries on these places later, as there are too many things to be shared in just one blog post.)

Starting in August, I´ll be taking over an English class for pre-kinder to first grade-level students at Colegio Cerritos, the private Christian school associated with our other church plant, Ebenezer. Until then, I´ll be settling in and getting my own internet set up on my laptop, so hopefully I´ll get to update a bit more before the school year starts and things get busy again!

Thank you all again for your prayers and encouraging emails :)

DTB