TEACHING-WEEKS 2-3

(Here is a link to the next set Facebook album I put up. Once again I put most of my photos up on Facebook--> http://byu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2140476&id=17821729 )

Teaching
Teaching the class has been amazing and to say it is a blessing would be a euphemism but as that is the best word I can think of I will stick with that. This week is the second week of me teaching on my own. Our center has had SO many people coming in to attend the workshop that we have had to divide into to rooms so we each teach 20-30 students. We were told today by a volunteer the waiting list is now at 700 people! Truly, the response has been a tender mercy from our Heavenly Father.

The first week, I struggled. We didn’t have the participant manuals and I was in the smaller room. True the room isn’t as nice but that wasn’t the problem, the smaller room has been the overflow room, and as we have learned since we have changed rooms this week (hallelujah!) those who come later tend to be those who aren’t as serious about the course—go figure. :) So without the books for the participants I really had to wing it and have the secretaries furiously making copies from the one book we had I some of the activities for my students to do. Turns out the books had been confiscated as contraband, thought they were drugs or something, much to their surprise when they actually opened them up they were full of Christ-centered self-reliance manuals so they sent them right along. Ha ha. In all this chaos order in my little classroom started to fall apart and it was a trial of my faith. I was getting up before 6:00am to prepare for my class in hopes to do better and after a thorough reprimand on the 3^rd day everything came together better and I felt that the last day was significantly more effective. (Who knew I would deliberately go to bed at 9:30pm and get up at 5:30am? Those who know me feel free to scoop your jaws up off the floor).
This week, meaning so far just the first two days, the whole spirit of the class is different and I can tell everything is going to be so much better. I know I am being blessed and I know the Lord’s hand has been in my life; of course having the workshop books now helps. :) I love the chance I have at the end of lessons to, in an appropriate fashion, share my testimony. That little extra spirit goes along way, even if it helps me the most.

“Snakes”
Some warned me, some told me took make the best of it, but for better or worse, despite my best efforts the “snakes” have come out of the woodwork. For those few of you who are not familiar with this term, it is what the missionaries and members here in South America call the girls who go after the Americans. It has been bad, I have been given several numbers, near confessions of love in emails (and I don’t even remember who they are when I get the email), and volunteers interrupting me while I am trying to use the computers at the centers to tell me a girl has decided she is interest in me and wants to know if she can talk to me! For those of you who have thought my already astronomically sized head was already so big that an inflation of this sort would have surely caused an implosion of cosmic proportions. Probably leading to the formation of a new black hole and the destruction of the earth, I am happy to report I have realized it all for what it is and am not letting it affect me. It is weird though, it is like some mixed up weird form of reverse racism. I am being treated different for the color of my skin but in a nonviolent kinda creepy sort of way… or at least they are treating me different the nationality on my passport. :) Now before I go and burst all my bubbles, let me say I do feel I have had a chance to stand out here for more than just the color of my skin, and if this is not the case than I have not been doing what I set out to do while I am here.

The End
So much more to write, and so little time… ok, desire. I actually have more time but this will suffice. Tchau!

(Yes, my friends that is a chocolate pizza! My first reaction to the pizza was, "why did we buy this". Of course later is was, "where have you been all my life!")