#11 - Chilled

13/02/2011

Had a nice lie in until 9 - such a lovely temperature to wake up to, nice and cool. Just before I went to sleep I heard Andrew sleeptalking in Spanish which was interesting - wish I could have understood what he was saying but it was disturbing anyway.

We all went to the local church for the morning service. We started by singing worship songs for like 45 minutes, which was really cool and there was loads of clapping and freedom of expression and praise to God which is rare in the UK. A few were sung partly in Spanish and partly in English - ´Open the eyes of my heart´and ´Holy Holy Holy´to name but two.
That was followed by Ryan (the American guy whos name I couldn´t remember yesterday) preaching on Jonah chapter 4 - he´s such a warm and friendly guy with the widest smile ever which hardly leaves his face. We then had rice and pasta with various vegetables and meat which was very nice.

We came back at around 2 and essentially did nothing of value until 7 when we ate.
We just played Uno (which I dominated) and more Jungle Fever, which sends everybody crazy and into a great mood. Jungle Fever is truly the most appropriate name for a game, everyone goes primal and it´s contagious. It´s a truly epic game which I hope to buy in some capacity when I get back to GB.

We made some paninis for dinner - just put some cheese inbetween two bits of bread and whacked it in the panini grill and it tasted so good. I then realised that putting butter on the outside of the bread made it golden brown and crispy, so that was an absolute winner.

Albin then gave us an hour-long dance lesson - there´s a style of dance called ´merenge´ from the Dominican Republic which is used to dance to one genre of worship songs they have over here. Albin´s a real smooth mover and the look in his eye and smile on his face when he shakes his booty is absolutely priceless - it was one of the most fun hours of the trip.
The merenge involves snake-like hips and lots of flair so needless to say I was unreally good. Sorry, I mean I wasn´t really good.
I felt truly sorry for Bonnie (my lucky dance partner) but it was enjoyable so hopefully we´ll have anothe go tomorrow.
I definitely didn´t practise in front of the bathroom mirror afterwards.

It came to light that the ´boxer shorts´that Andrew picked up in Panama City are in fact women´s underwear. Without saying anything libellous, the number of square centimetres of fabric are insufficient for most men which leaves but one possibility.
It is an absolutely brilliant tool for mockery though, and at least he´ll look the part when we visit the tribes.
To be fair, that last comment was probably racist so I take it back.

But if you were thinking that this trip is an absolute doddle and we´re nothing more than tourists, think again.
Tomorrow and in fact for the rest of the week, we start training at 9am and finish at 630pm, obviously with a break for lunch and two for coffee but even so it´s an intense week. Each day starts with ´devotions´ which is a lovely phrase, more expressive than just ´prayer´.
But yeah, it´s going to be great to learn more about what we can get up to during the outreach, so I´m looking forward to it.
In fact, it´s midnight so I had better go and practise the merenge by myself, I mean go to sleep.

Buenos noches

JG