The Call to Chile: Ice Cream for Lunch

(11/12-11/15) Well I’ve realized that there’s only three more weeks of everything left, very sad thought. The time has flown so very fast, it’s incredible. Back to my week of events. Monday I didn’t really do anything. I mailed my last letters which was exciting. I also did a little grocery shopping for the first time in about three weeks. When I got back I cooked the dessert really early which was snickerdoodles and then cleaned the mess up. Eventually some students came over a little early so I hung out with them. Two students thought it would be funny to draw earrings on me since my ears aren’t pierced so I let them. I thought it was kind of funny too. After that the small groups started and it was pretty good. Then Donce started and we had this pasta stuff that was awesome. A student named Mauri gave his testimony which was good, but I didn’t really understand a lot of it. Mauri is a cool guy who has a physical handicap. He’s stuck in a wheelchair and doesn’t have complete control over his motor skills. He is precious though. After that I played ping-pong for a while with some students and then everyone left. Tuesday was a pretty neat day. That morning I woke up and pretty much left with Claudia to go to a girls group that are discussion stories of the Bible of strong women. There were about 6 of us there and we ate leftover pasta from Donce and Claudia bought a bunch of ice cream and cookies for dessert. I understood everything even the parts I had to read before hand in Spanish. It was really awesome though just being able to hang out with some girls from the ministry. When I got back home we had our Café a lo Gringo meeting and our Exchange Student Meeting that both went well. After that I played ping-pong with my friend Koke for a while. Then Eli came and got us because she wanted help making the announcement video so we went with her. I had a part in it where I had to say this one word several times and I could not, for the life of me, pronounce or remember the word. It was a blast though hanging out and making it. It took about 2 hours. When we got back Koke and I played more ping-pong and then he listened to me while I read in Spanish. He helps me practice so we’ve been reading this book for a while two chapters at a time. He’s a great guy. He left after that and then I went to bed. Wednesday was awesome. First I went to the fresh fruit and vegetable stand that I have been neglecting for about a month. I bought so much that I was worried it wouldn’t fit in my backpack. But it did, it was just insanely heavy. After that I went to meet a student named Caroline for lunch. Caroline is the student who got baptized on the Retreat a couple of weeks ago. We met at two and then I let her pick the place to eat lunch. She picked ice cream and I was very happy about it. We went to this huge ice cream place called Bravissimo. We both ordered this huge sundae with a brownie, bon-bons, little white chocolate bars, and three scoops of ice cream. It was delicious and I didn’t feel guilty at all. After that we walked around to several parks, stopping and having conversations along the way. Eventually we wound up at the Santa Lucia market and just walked around window shopping. We also hit two other markets along the way just hanging out and talking. On the way back I went and bought a new toothbrush and toothpaste and Caroline showed me the cheapest place to do that. It was about 9 o’clock and we were both tired from walking so much so we decided to go home. Once I got home I made dinner, watched some Netflix, chatted with some friends online, and then I went to bed. Thursday I went to staff meeting in the morning like usual. Then I made a huge fruit salad with all of my stuff from the market that I shared with all the staff. I hung out with Eli while she worked on the video and I worked on my Café a lo Gringo stuff. Then I did my chore, made my brownies, and got ready for Café to start. There weren’t a lot of people at Café but it was still good. Phil started with grammar time and then we played my game which was Mad Libs. I created stories where they had to fill in nouns and adjectives and adverbs and verbs. It was pretty funny hearing them read it. Once that was over Brent’s game was having the students read a song being very dramatic…which was hilarious! The best group had the song Baby by Justin Beiber. Tertulia started after that and we had hotdogs for dinner which was good. I did the cover band with Katie and a student named Camila and we did karaoke to Call Me Maybe. It was so ridiculous it was funny. Frizz gave the talk about what happened after Adam and Eve ate the apple and how it affects us today. It was pretty good. The band was pretty awesome too. Then we watched the announcement video that was hilarious because I couldn’t pronounce that one word. Once that was over I hung out with the students. After a while I went and played around the world ping-pong with some of the guys which was fun. Then Koke wanted me to be his partner again Abraham and Katie. It was intense. Koke is so competitive. They won the first game but we won the two after that making us the winners. Which I love winning so I was ok with that. After that everyone left and then I Skyped my friend Aubri after that was pretty exciting because I hadn’t seen or heard her voice since September. So we talked for about three hours and then I passed out. Good week!