saturday-sunday.

This weekend has been a blur. 
I have been secretly resentful of the pots and pans in the kitchen. They're Teflon (non-stick black stuff that you can't clean with a real dish scrubber). I hate Teflon. I have been resentful of the water here that comes in big blue bottles and makes my Nalgene smell like diesel exhaust when I open it. I have been resentful of the shower that's not as hot as it could be and the weather that's not as warm as it could be and the food that's not as cheap as it could be and my schedule that's not as organized as it could be. I have been festering in my mind, a week spent in rebellion of the changes that are what they are and the things that somehow, somewhere, secretly, I feel like I deserve. I feel like we've been over this already. But Saturday it took an entire shower for me to realize that things don't have to be what I want in order for me to enjoy them. I was chagrined when I realized what I had realized and how long it had taken, but I knew when I knew it that I knew it for sure. It was like a thing broke off of me, and all the sudden I was free to enjoy things that were less than I wanted them to be, and to see as a blessing things that had been taken for granted before. 
I let go of not having my own space in the kitchen. I chose to forget how much the dishes annoy me when everything I cook sticks to the bottom of the pan. I chose to be grateful for the plastic dishes we have instead of spending my time wishing I had my favorite earthenware bowl from home. And I know this is not all bad. It's not bad to want the familiar and to miss it when it's gone. It's not bad to know that my dishes at home are nicer and that my utensils work better and that my coffee from my french press is incredible. But it is bad to be resentful of everything I am offered simply because I have known something different, even something better. It is wrong when I am ill every time I cook because my food wouldn't stick to the bottom of my pan. I think you get the picture. It's okay to enjoy nice things. It's not okay to resent everything that isn't up to your standards of nice. 
Saturday I went to Oansa at a park near Mi Esperanza church, and met a whole haggle of new children. They played games for about an hour, ate a snack and heard a bible story, and then played soccer for another 45 minutes. I took pictures the whole time for Lisa Sappia so that we could later put together a video for a church that wants to support the Oansas here. 
Saturday night we came back to the church again to do iPraise, which basically means that Sylvia Harmon and Lo taught music lessons to individual kids while the other played board games with John and Po and I, along with 2 other adult helpers. For the lesson, John used his wallet to represent sin and his hands to represent God and us (and Jesus, at one point) and he did a demonstration about how Jesus takes our sin so we can be in right relationship with God. Just at the peak moment, when everyone was staring in rapt attention and John was almost whispering, a man, about 24, screeched the door open and came shambling in the room. And, true to Paraguayan style, everyone greeted him as he made his way to the table in the middle of the room. His name is Milcherd, and he's currently the worship leader for Mi Esperanza. He was there to have practice for the next morning's service. I had to laugh. 
After that, I spent about 45 minutes chasing the younger kids around and tickling them, during which I made best friend with a girl named Tara. She's about 9, and loves to be chased. I don't know if she was learning an instrument or not, but she was there for the whole night. It was so cold that we ended up hugging for a very long time. 
The next morning in Church, the short-term team from Somerset, PA was introduced to the congregation. They'd arrived about 4am and they left soon after their introduction to go and be introduced to another church. John preached on Ephesians, where it says that women should submit to their husbands, but also that husbands should love their wives like Christ loved the church, even laying down their lives for their wives. This is a completely foreign concept to most Paraguayans. Men don't sacrifice anything for women, certainly not in order to love or cherish. But John made it perfectly clear that the Lord's intent here was for the men to give love and the women to give respect. It was something I knew well, and was familiar with it from the book by Emerson Eggerichs called "Love and Respect," but it was all new to the congregation, from what it sounded like to me.
After church, Po and I went home with one of the ladies from her ESL class. Her name was Adriana, and we rode to her house in a taxi. I had never ridden in a taxi before (except that one time in Vegas at 4:30am when my whole family was leaving Nevada after visiting cousins in Reno and staying at the Four Queens was the cheapest thing to do) and it was very strange. He actually drove us all the way to her house, which I didn't expect since it was so far out into the cobblestone/dirt roads. We sat there with her eating Bijou (like chipa, only flat with parmesan cheese on the outside) and drinking Maté and watching The Disney Channel in Spanish for 
about 40 minutes while her mother and brother finished making lunch. For lunch, we 
had spaghetti and chicken, both in red sauces I'd never tasted, but were SO good. We also had
salad (tomatoes, green bell peppers, shredded carrots, and onions, on a bed of shredded 
cabbage, sprinkled with salt, lemon juice, and olive oil) and Sopa. Sopa, the word that means 
"soup," also means a kind of cornbread made with onions and spices, and very thick. We had 
the cornbread kind of Sopa, which is actually called Sopa Paraguayi. I ate as slowly as I could, but they still ate more slowly than me, and so the mother got up immediately and put more chicken on my plate. I stifled a groan. The food was so good, but I couldn't eat anymore! I finished all but the smallest bite of my chicken, enough so I ate it respectfully and not to waste, but also with enough left that she wouldn't give me more food. She still passed me the salad and the Parmesan cheese, in case there was anything else I wanted, but I tried as gratefully as I could to say "no," and "thank you," at the same time. It's a difficult combination. 
When everyone was finished eating, the family began cleaning the table of all the plates and food, and Po and I felt fairly useless. I was mentally preparing to say our goodbyes and find a taxi or walk to the nearest bus stop when Adriana came back in the room and asked whether we would prefer Maté or Cocido. Po and I both said, "Cocido!" with big grins, but our grins faded as Adriana smilingly put on her coat and rainboots to walk two houses down and get some Cocido for her mother to make. How are we ever to know which thing they have and which they don't, when they offer both?! I get frustrated about that, but I think frustration probably isn't necessary. There's no way to know which is which, and they're not going to stop offering. So let's just all be friends. (: 
Po and I, after Cocido, a half hour more of Disney Cartoons, a visit to one of Adriana's friend's houses to make a veterinary call about a cat that needed castrated, and more Maté, finally made our way to a bus stop, back towards home. We probably looked like Mennonites, wearing full length skirts and dresses, with white skin, riding a bus on a Sunday afternoon. Neither of us could feel our toes, and our feet were red with the mud from the streets around Adriana's house, but we had to go to the HiperSeis before we walked home (the HiperSeis is at the bus stop where we get off to go home. Down our street, home, to the right, or left to cross the street and go to HiperSeis) since the only thing I had in the fridge were six eggs. So we waltzed into the HiperSeis with tired and freezing legs, bought all the things I needed, and walked home. 
One of the things I needed was ground beef, which they don't just have in a cooler in the store. You have to go get in the meat line and take a little paper and they call your number and then tell them what you want. "Medio kilo de carne molido." A half a kilo is about 45g more than a pound. Anyway, my first time in the meat line, Yay! (:
Then Sunday night, Po and I took a bus to the Schell's house to meet the Somerset, PA team and have pizza with them, and also to hear the orientation class from Forest, since I hadn't heard it yet at that point. We had to wait for a bus, though, and so with walking and bussing and waiting, we didn't make it there until 5:30. 
After all of the formalities were over and when dinner was well underway, I finally worked up the social courage to talk to more new people that I didn't know, who would be leaving my life in less than 7 days, and try to make some kind of connection with at least a few of them. I managed to find a girl who went to Cedarville (where I have friends and had relatives), a woman whose sister's friend works at TFC, and a guy who works at a truck dispatch that sends people to Akron, Ohio all the time. So there. I did it. (: Then I escaped to the children's rooms to chase them around and threaten their lives and livelihoods with the looming curse of kisses. They have dubbed me the kissy monster, and the only words that keep them at bay are, "ya no mas, ya no mas," with an imperial wag of the finger. I love them. AND. The Sappia's youngest son, Caleb, actually chased me around to get a kiss from me. I was so surprised. He's not a very social boy, and he doesn't do well in social situations, but he was perfectly okay with chasing me around yelling, "kiss me, kiss me!" It was a happy night for me. (: