Bienvenido a Buenos Aires!

Hi Family & Friends!

I'm very excited to say that I am writing you safe and sound from Buenos Aires, Argentina. (and YES, I'm saying it with a Castellano accent!!). Castellano is the language of Argentina...different than Espanol. I'm new to this whole blog thing...so let's see how it goes!

I left for B.A. Thursday afternoon and on the plane ride from Phoenix to Houston, I sat next to Ennie Hickman (old youth minister from St. Tim's). It turns out, he and his family are becoming missionaries in Houston, TX and have a very similar mission to the one I'm doing!!! It was so inspiring to talk with him. And major bonus...he had these special passes to go to the President's Club for Continental and he totally hooked me up for my 3 hour layover!!! Free food and coffee and comfy chairs...I was loving the missionary life so far :) The plane ride to Argentina went by soooo fast. It was a full flight and I sat window seat with NO ONE next to me. I got to spread out and sleep, write letters, pray, study a little Spanish, eat, watch a little CSI en espanol (which was just as good!) and then whalla! We landed.

Arriving in B.A.
The airport was absolute madness! People everywhere, castellano everywhere, and all I wanted to do was shower and brush my teeth. Anyway, customs was a breeze and praise God my luggage was arriving on the belt right as I walked up.
THIS is where the easy, loving life part of the trip ends!!! :)

Denis and Isabel (both French missionaries) picked me up. Denis speaks great English and Isabel speaks VERY little. They both commented on the fact that I packed a lot!!! I was a little bit embarrassed...but come on?? 14 months?! Well, it turns out, us missionaries, don't have cars. We ride the bus. And Lanus (the city we live in) is about a 45 minute bus ride. And these are no greyhound busses people...I mean the most ghetto things I've ever seen. The drivers don't even wait for you to hop on either, they start driving and you have to jog to catch up and get on...imagine us with all this luggage and doing this! Hilarious!

The bus ride was amazing. The castellano language is absolutely BEAUTIFUL...or muy lindo as they would say here. The country side was so green and there is seriously a picture/statue of the Virgen Mary or a Saint everywhere and on anything...a tree, a rock, soccer balls??? I noticed though, that as we kept driving the area around us looked worse and worse. As we entered our barrio, I wanted to cry. There is garbage everywhere. There is a river that runs along our barrio of Lanus and it is filled to the brim with garbage and there are people that live IN the garbage. I have never seen anything like it, except in pictures.

My New Home
And then the bus stopped and here we were...my new home. The smell was strong of garbage and poop and there were dogs EVERYWHERE! I seriously have never seen that may dogs in one place in my life. And you can imagine that their poop is also everywhere. The houses are shocking. Totally crumbling apart...I wondered how in the world they stay up against rainstorms...but they do. All of the houses our lined up next to eachother. I'm learning there is no such thing as personal space. Their doors are not really doors, but pieces of wood loosely attached together, yet you can see into their entire house from outside. There are no windows, expect linens covering up holes in the walls. As we entered our house, I honestly wanted to cry. I couldn't believe I was here...and that I was living here...and working here...and praying here...it all seemed so surreal for so long and now it was becoming a reality.

God Moments
1. We have no heat in our home. Nada. And it is around 20 or 30 degrees F at night, but the humidity is 100% which makes the coldness pierce right to the bone. I honestly have never felt this cold in my whole life. I was embarrassed for ever complaining about being cold, because THIS was freaking freezing. And we layer so much...but it doesn't help. It's like this constant feeling of being freezing. Anywho...shower time came and I was dreading it. There's nothing worse than being absolutely freezing and wet. No fun at all. Praise God, we do have a water heater for the shower only and it takes 30-40 minutes to heat up the water. And there's no such things as medium hot, it's either boiling or freezing...lovely :) The faucet is what killed me though. Literally, there are 10 drops of water that come out of the faucet dripping and the water we use runs out after a certain amount of time and so I'm trying so hard to shampoo, condition and soap before the water runs out...and before I could finish it totally was out. haha! And we don't have a drain in our bathroom. So water gets all over the floor and it just has to stay there in puddles!! Agh!!! Oh...and my converter totally doesn't work so no blowdrying or straightening my hair :) I so knew that was going to happen. I tell you this not just so you can laugh at imagining me!! But to share with you, that it's moments like this one that make me realize how much I have taken for granted in the luxury life I have been blessed with at home. And the thing is...I actually get to leave this situation in 14 months. My friends of the barrio do not. God really can use anything to make a point! haha

2. The welcome the people in our barrio have given me is amazing! All the little girls (chicas) drew me pictures to welcome me!! They just latch themselves to us and speak sooo quickly in their sweet little voices. My heart just totally melted. And, Brooke is very difficult for most of the people to say, so my new name is Belen...like Helen but with a B. So, they the chicas shout, "Belen, Belen!" It's sooooo cute.

3. I have 2 favorite little girls, Nicole and Selena. Selena comes to our house almost every day and is 6 years old. She LOVES to teach me words in Castellano and thinks it sooo funny that I can't speak her language. If she sees me from far away, she'll run full speed and throw her arms around me and kiss me on my cheek. I love this part of their culture! Everyone greets one another with a kiss...very St. Francis :) But when I miss home and get lonely, sure enough, Miss Selena will appear and brighten up my whole day. I can't wait until I am able to speak to her in her language and tell her how special she is.

Nicole is only 4 year old and she lives in a house with 16 people. Their tiny house is an absolute mess and there are kids everywhere. They are screaming and shouting and hitting one another. The parents and older siblings sit around smoking, drinking mate and watching soccer and do nothing when one of their babies starts to cry or falls and gets a boo boo. I have noticed so far, that the parents here have no sense of discipline. The children are pretty much allowed to do whatever they want. Also, the children mostly live off of candy. It's the strangest thing. The parents do not cook for their kids, but give them money to buy food and of course, being kids, they always buy candy and the parents just let them. Because of this, most of the children's teeth are rotting away. And then there is Nicole amidst all of this chaos. She is the most loving, peaceful well-behaved child. She is also a little snugglebug and welcomed me right away because she loves my long, brown hair and wanted to play with it. We visited her home for a couple of hours and she never left my lap the whole time. I couldn't even say anything to her except a few simple words, nor could I understand what she said to me, yet when it was time to go, I didn't want to leave her.

Final Thoughts
THANK YOU for your prayers. God has certainly shown me the power of prayer in a new way. There are MANY, MANY times when I want to give up (and it's only been 4 days!!!) and come back. I cry a lot. I have never been physically so uncomfortable in my entire life. I can't communicate with the people, my community or even you! Because of this, I'm truly experiencing lonliness on a whole new level. However, I do not say these things asking for pity. NO! I say these things because when this stuff happens, I think of your prayers, I read your letters, and I am filled with God's peace. PLEASE continue to pray for me and the other missionaries and the beautiful people we are privelaged to befriend. You all are absolutely in my daily prayers and thoughts.

Please keep in touch! Thanks for reading my blog! I'll be updating it weekly...("By the grace of God," as Fr. Jude always says).

Hasta lluego!!!
xoxo