Ecuador Day Eight -- Sunday

"Some people are so poor that the only thing they have is money."

"God's love is meteoric, His loyalty astronomic, His purpose titanic, His verdict oceanic. Yet in His largeness, nothing gets lost; not a man, not a mouse, slips through the cracks." -Psalm 36:5-6

Today was a super long day filled with awesome fellowship...

Everyone that went on the perimeter hike had to leave at 5 o'clock sharp. I knew that there was no way my lungs could make it. So instead, I woke up at the same time as them and went to sit outside in the quiet looking at the llamas and garden. Just soaking in the beauty. (It reminds me of a quote: "In hopes of reaching the moon, men fail to see the flowers at their feet.") All the hikers got back just in time for breakfast. Bren and Mary said that it was really tough, but super worth it. They could see the snow capped glacier from the top. If I ever get the chance to come back to El Refugio I'm forcing my lungs up there to see it all.


Breakfast this morning was egg and toast (I think). Right after eating, the Manada Pequeñas had to go home so that they could get ready for church. While we were all getting ourselves ready Erica came into the girls' room with a balloon. She wanted to know if any of us knew how to make a balloon dog. It is apparently Anita's daughter's 5th birthday and they were have a mini-fiesta for her. I volunteered, loving that I could use what I leaned in Juarez here. I made a few dogs and gave my regular balloons so that everyone could decorate them. We did this until we were ready to leave for church.


All the staff and us walked in to the middle of CalaCalí to the Santos brothers' church. It was a regular looking building, (with really pretty purple flowers) and it was about the size of one the churches I went to in Mexico. We sang about 5 or 6 Spanish praise songs. For some reason I always feel the Spirit more in Spanish even if I don't understand word for word. People clap, raise their hands, dance, fist pump, etc it's completely genuine and amazing. We sang a song called Tomaló which means "Take it all." We scream, "Te doy todo lo que soy...Toma, tomaló!" which means "I give you everything I am. Take it, take it all." After we sang a couple more songs, a couple from the church sang two beautiful songs with awesome harmony. The pastor then gave the sermon entirely in Spanish. The only reason I could follow a little bit was because we read a lot from the Bible. In this church everyone looks up the verse. When you find it, you stand up so the pastor knows when everyone's ready.


After church I quick changed and our team and the Manada Pequeñas headed over to the square where there is another "Midad del Mundo/ Center of the World" monument. We took pictures there and learned that this is the original one, but they moved it to where we went because of tourists. The realreal center is somewhere in the mountains though. From there we loaded onto a nice bus so that we could head into Quito. I sat behind Cristian and Wilmar and next to Kat. We got a lunch on the go of ham and cheese, an orange, a Sunny D like drink, and yummy coconut cookies. Esteban, who studied to be a tour guide, went up to the front of the bus and told us about everything we were passing, about CalaCali, about Quito, and about Ecuador as a whole. Israel translated for him. We also learned a bunch of fun legends. We learned about how CalaCalí got its name, a whole bunch of history, and some stories about how mountains got their names. One was about a jealous guy mountain wanting a girl mountain. Mary asked how you can tell if a mountain is a girl or boy. Apparently, if a mtn. has a crescent shape at the top it is a girl. Our response- "Uhh...Well, sure. That makes sense."


Eventually we arrived at the Basilica. The Basilica is the oldest Gothic style church standing. It was legit beautiful. Courtesy of Esteban, we learned some of the history of the church, the carvings, etc. One interesting fact is that the Basilica has been under construction for hundreds of years. They say that the because of this, the year that all construction is finished the world will end. Anyways...we finally got our tickets and headed in and up the seemingly never ending stairs. There was a beautiful huge stained glass window, an organ from Paris, and an over hang thing. The overhang looked out over the cathedral which was amazing. The ceiling is super high and domed. When we were done in that 'room' we broke into groups to explore the rest of the place. I went up some stairs and went out onto a porch that looked over Quito. You could see houses and mountains for miles in all directions. Then Anna, Lydia, and I walked across this bridge type thing and up a ladder to one of the towers. Up there was super high again looking over Quito. We found Bren and Christian already checking everything out and more of the group soon joined us. A few people chose to go up a level higher but I was too afraid of the steep ladder. I got to go inside one of the clock towers, up some spiral steps, up a few ladders to the bell tower as well. On the way down Christian, Brenmarie, Anna, Lydia, and I all raced down to the first level (we only had like 5 minutes to our meetup time). So many steps. Haha, but the Basilica is a beautiful place with some amazing viewing places.


From the Basilica the group walked a few (quite a few actually) blocks to the Plaza de Central where there is the President's house. It was super crowded there and we could spot a few tourist groups as well. Esteban taught us some more legends about that area while a few local Ecuadorians stopped to listen. Harry then decided to make up his own legend about a nearby building. He made up a story about some brothers having a seaturtle farm inside the building. Lydia translated it for everyone. It was super funny especially because the local Ecuadorians that weren't with our group were listening intently as well. When the learning moments were over we went to the other side of the square where a band was playing some traditional music. Someone, I'm not sure who, decided that they should dance so most of the PBUers started doing the Electric Slide. Esteban, Wilmar, and Lydia joined in as well while I just videoed the whole thing. It didn't take long before everyone in the square had gathered around us to watch the white people dance. It was great and a few people actually asked us who were and what we were doing in Ecuador.




Then we walked up this one street called 'Calle de las Siete Cruces" or "Street of the Seven Crosses." The name is pretty self explanatory...Down this super long street is 7 giant crosses placed outside various awesome looking churches. Eventually we got to another more empty square which had the original stones in the ground. While there waiting for our bus a few young boys came along wanted to shine our shoes. Since it was only 50 cents a few people actually let them. Back on the bus everyone was pretty exhausted. Some people slept while a few of us continued to learn from Esteban. Him, Santi, Wilmar, and Cristian even sang us some Ecuadorian song for entertainment. We passed a few volcanoes with Kat and my favorite being Pululahua. (Just 'cause we couldn't remember or pronounce it.) When we got back into the center of CalaCalí the Manada Pequeñas had to get off to go home...This would be the last time we saw them. :( We didn't even get to get off to hug them so it was just a quick wave and adios and they were off. Super sad.


Back at El Refugio once again we had dinner of grilled chicken with ahi, pineapple, potato fries with cheese sauce, salad, kiwi, and passion fruit (which is super weird by the way). We also finally got introduced to the two cats there. I think we assumed that they were just 'there' but Israel introduced us to Sully and Pancho. Pancho was super shy, but Sully let us pet him. Tonight was Allie and Kat's turn for devotionals so first they sang some songs that Allie had written. Sadly, it started to rain so we had to move into the dining porch area, but it turned out good. Then we had communion together. There's like almost nothing that this team hasn't done together. <3 After that the team and Anna played this game called Telephone Pictionary. I won't go into details, but it was hilarious.


^I'm pretty sure we headed to bed after that, but I'm not positive.

Ecuador Day Seven -- Saturday

"For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of love." - 2 Timothy 1:7

And if our God is for us, then what could ever stop us? And if our God is with us, then what can stand against?

This morning we decided to get up early to see the sunrise. It came up right where we saw the moon rise last night. Since it came up quite slow over the mountains we took down and packed up our tents and stuff. The sky was beautiful. After it rose to a point we headed down the steep path back to base at El Refugio. It only took us about a half hour to get down and we talked and sang the whole way. Breakfast was pancakes and sausage.



For work this morning Mary, Bren, and Christian had the opportunity to go down the street to help with the construction of Anita's house. In this community they have what is referred to as a "Community Work Day." It meant that on this particular Saturday a whole bunch of men from the surrounding neighborhood came to Anita's house to help out. Imagine if every community worked that way? How much would get done?
Anyways, the rest of us went down to the garage to screw in some t-nuts...the final step to the rock wall process. Problem was though, that the bolts and blocks got stuck. Holger actually had to cur it our with an electric saw thing. When we finally got everything sorted out it had it down to an art.

For lunch Anita invited the whole team and some El Refugio people over for lunch. We all gathered into her house and sat in a square of sorts to eat the delicious food. (Have you noticed I say delicious all the time? Ecuador has my favorite food so far.) The first thing we ate was a soup with potatoes, chicken, and yummy broth. Second was pork, potatoes, and white stuff that starts with an m. Buen provecho!

After we got back from Anita's house we were going to take a break until the Manada Pequenas got there. They ended up coming much later than we thought they would so we got a huge rest time. When the last of them arrived we hopped into the back of the truck and drove back up to the cross place. It only took about an hour to finish the rest of the trees. I had the hang of it from last time so I got 7 done. At the end of our work we had 'reforested' the whole field. From there we rode back down and we're just in time for dinner. Dinner was beets (which were gross so I gave them to Jhonotan), 'steak,' and potatoes. Oh, and chocolate cake. Jhonathan tried to do some mindtwister puzzle with Anna and I, but we just couldn't figure it out. Harry played one called 'Numbers' and I couldn't figure that out either. Finally he told us, but I can't tell you guys the answers.


From dinner we went over to La Casa Grande for the Bible Studyish thing we were doing. We started off by singing "In the Quiet" in both Spanish and English. Then we moved into the Everything skit. It starts off with Jesus (played by Christian) creating the earth and then a person (Allie). He gives her breath and movement and then begin dancing. They dance together until Lust (Harry) cuts in. They dance for a bit and when he throws her to the Greed (Kacie) comes in and dangled money in front of her. After that Drunkenness (Mary) comes in and offers a bottle. When the bottle's empty Vanity (Bren) walks in, measures her, and makes her seem inadequate. Finally self-harm and death (Kat) come in and hands her a knife and then a gun. She begins to hold the gun to her head when the climax comes it says "You're all I need.." she throws the gun to the side and runs to Jesus who has been waiting for her the whole time. Only problem is though that everything in her life keeps getting in the way to push and throw her in the opposite direction. Finally Jesus sees that she has had enough and steps in to block all the things from touching her. When she falls to the floor in surrender Jesus throws His arms back and everyone else falls to the ground defeated. Jesus then helps the girl to her feet, dusts her off, and walks away with her in hand.

After the skit Bren took a quick minute to sum it all up and then we did cardboard testimonies. This is when you have one negative/before testimony on one side and then you flip it over to the transformation/after side. We did this to the song "Beautiful things" which says "You make beautiful things, you make beautiful things out of the dust. You make beautiful things, you make beautiful things out of us." After those testimonies Kat shared her short version of her whole life testimony. We then offered the floor to the Manada Pequenas to share. Jhonatan, Samuel, Santiago, and Wilmar all shared some of their amazing testimonies. After testimony time was done we decided to play Yahoola again. Harry explained the rules to the group and we got into a huge circle. We had a whole lot of fun. Bren had me in a full straddle before I finally fell while trying to reach Kat. Then later, Kat and Bren battled it out and Kat pushed Bren over. The final three were Esteban, Lydia, and another girl who were all pretty beast at this game. Esteban won. When the game finally ended (it lasted a while) Israel gathered us all around to tell us tomorrow's agenda with church and going into Quito. He told us that we had to listen, and play the part of tourist. He said it was late, that we had a long day, so we all said good night and headed to bed.