Oaxaca with Covenant

 I (only Megan) went to a southern state of Mexico, Oaxaca, with a team of great people from our church, e,g. Anna, Rachel and Kayla.

I loved having time with Linda, Leigh and the rest of our team!

 Oaxaca City was a fun place to be!

 Especially when Jacinto and Sandy gracefully joined in on the dancing.

 What a team.

 The rooftop of our hotel was one of the greatest places to worship. Eric led us in singing praises over Oaxaca City.

The people of the Zapotec tribe are the folks we serve in San Bartolome. These are some spectacularly geometric ruins from their pre-hispanic ancestors.

 Ancient math is beautiful,

but of course I have a soft spot for a contemporary mathematician, who is researching the Dengue virus, which is all the "buzz" in Mexico.

 Chemistry is cool, too, as proven by this man whose family dyes wool with traditional dyes such as fungus from a cactus plant (with or without lime juice added, to transform the color.)

 How about God's power displayed through botany!?

 This cypress is the widest tree in the world!

 Sarita (in white) and her dad, Octavio, will always have a soft spot in my heart for being my first friends who are living in Mexico.

 If you haven't been enticed to look for flights to visit us in Mexico, maybe this buffet spread of deliciousness will convince you. (You can only see 1/3 of the the options in this picture.)

 Organizing the loads of supplies we brought (ranging from Bibles to colored pencils to spoons for ladies' night gifts) was a hefty task in the hotel hallway. Hooray for Kayla, Kelly, Amy, Justin and Gina!

 The stories about traveling up the mountain to San Bartolome tried to describe the beauty, but

 there is no way to make you believe that seeing this sight in 3 dimensions is breathtaking. Those super steep hillsides are even covered with corn fields!

 Tim (one of our Covenant pastors) was surrounded by kids as soon as we arrived in San Bartolome.

 I got started in the kitchen by helping to wash the apples in the sink,

 while Corey played with boys.

 Every morning and every evening while I brushed my teeth standing in this spot next to the church where we slept, I would be shocked that the breath-taking mountains were there.

 The women spend their time in this outdoor kitchen, cooking over the three fires outside

or the oven fire inside to feed all of us and practically the whole church each day.

 Meanwhile, the kids play together.

 My biggest Spanish mistake was saying, "Ella es mi maestra en la cochina" instead of "Ella es mi maestra en la cocina." The difference was between saying, "She is my teacher in the kitchen" or "She is my teacher in the filth." Thankfully, Rufina (in blue) doesn't speak Spanish, so when the laughing women around told her in Zapotec what I had said, she wasn't offended.

 The kids were ready for Vacation Bible school bright and early every morning! Go Octavio and Anna go!

 Aren't they just so precious!? I got to teach the Bible memory verse the first morning (in Spanish) and I think some of them even learned it, thanks to Sandy's help.

 Other parts of VBS were games,

 mime skits, (which the children loved), featuring Gina, Mattea, Rachel, and myself somedays,

 eager hand-raising to answer Bible questions posed by Constantino,

 and crafts, which touched my heart each day. Good job, Dorothy, Amy, and Peyton!

Uziel is smiling while decorating his backpack (which were prepared by Covenant Presbyterian kids at VBS last summer.) He was my little buddy, who learned my name from day 1 and was always willing to flash me that smile.

 I can't quite describe how happy the children were to have their backpacks! I still haven't figured out videos, to show you how they said "thank you Covenant."

 That was even before we filled them with an abundance of school supplies and gifts. Can you imagine how uncomfortable this disorganized girl (me) was about being in charge of equitable bag-filling!?

 I praise God that it all worked out in the end, with every kid receiving a bag filled with love. Right, Amy?

 Here is a glimpse of the joy kids had when receiving their backpacks! This occasion might have been the only time Kelly didn't have at least two girls sweetly attached to her hands.

After VBS each day, we had our big meal. Angelica (a member of our team from Mexico City) was amazing at feeding all of these people! This picture was taken early in the week, before the men put up 2 more tables for the many people who were joining us for meals. Apparently, eating together (Mexicans and Americans) hadn't happened much before this year, so all of us were excited to be breaking bread together as brothers and sisters in Christ.

 The highlight of the trip for me was probably when I was serving food with Jacinto (one of our Covenant pastors) and a few younger women. The young women were giggling with joy, saying how amazing that the older women (some of whom are in this picture) who always serve, would get to eat tortillas while they were hot!

 It turns out that it is one thing for men of our team to serve, but the San Bartolome women weren't quite ready for Mexican boys to be washing the dishes.

 In the afternoons (usually while it rained for a bit), most of us walked down to the basketball court in the center of San Bartolome to play with kids from all around the town.

 At la cancha, I played Uno for 2 hours every day (except for the day that I was sick.)

 So many kids wanted to play that I had to start alternating between boys and girls. I am leaning against construction materials.

It was awesome to be living beyond where the road ends.

 Wherever we went, we typically had a throng of people walking with us.

 Since they work in the kitchen while the children play, the women had a lot of fun playing Uno with me some afternoons. (LuLu, Mikaela, Maria and Rufina played with me this time.)

 Linda also brought some yarn and crochet patterns.

 Plus, the women have started playing volleyball during the afternoons! What I came to understand was that our brothers and sisters in San Bartolome can't take a vacation, but we provide the closest thing for them by our visit.

Jess also let me hold this sleeping 3 year old who seemed half the size of the 3 year old I left at home. (Whom I missed tremendously!)

 Here are some of the beautiful young ladies who came to youth night.

We had separate ladies' and mens' nights, which were great even without power.

 One day, we got to celebrate Elizabeth's birthday.

 Another evening, I went on a home visit to this dear family's home. They lost the roof of their house during the hurricane this spring, so they had to take out a loan to buy 12 sheets of tin for their new roof. Hmmm . . . the sort of thing we go out and easily get for one Saturday afternoon project. Thankfully, our church took a special offering for people who suffered from the hurricane, so our elders were able to generously bless the elders of the church in San Bart. This family continues to be on my heart, though, because Anna Yasi (2nd from the right) is about 14 and she has scoliosis such that her spine will likely collapse her lungs in her 20s unless she gets a surgery soon that costs about $4,000 out of pocket. Her dad is wrestling with the dilemma of coming to the USA (illegally) to make enough money to pay for it, or not. Hmmm . . .

 We are well loved in San Bartolome; an example is that this little girl in Sandy's arms is named Sandy. What a tribute! Will chiquita Mattea be the next with a namesake?

 One evening, we had an evangelistic event at the court in the center of town.

 The mime skit was amazing, our singing was worshipful and Jacinto's great talk was heard by people on their balconies, rooftops, and in the chairs around me, even in the midst of more interruptions than he probably experiences in an entire year of preaching in the USA.

 Saturday included time with some friends who were the most patient Spanish teachers.

 We also went on another home visit. Do I look like a giant to you?

 I thought Leigh looked like the traditional missionary in this picture,

 but this picture more accurately depicts her important work this year. She translated for Linda's insanely busy Doctor's clinic for hours and hours. Here, Maria is telling a particularly hard story from her life, which brings tears to my eyes every time I consider how someone could abuse such a precious woman.

 Here is another missionary picture, this time of Justin swinging the ump-teen-millionth child around.

 Here's my second picture of Tim surrounded by kids.

 On our last night, there was the third church service of the week. The elders and sisters of the church were overwhelmingly generous to us. They gave us an abundance of gifts. Wow.

 I enjoyed seeing the brotherhood between the elders of our church and San Bartolome. Constantino (on the right) is a loving pastor to this congregation that has servant-hearted leaders.

 Hector helped me buy a gift for Anthony -- a machete -- and he wanted to pose, even though his personality is as far from this picture as possible.

 Generosity extended to the point of having about 40 people show up at 4:30 in the morning to send us off! What? I am convinced that in the USA we would have a hard time finding a couple of people to give visitors a ride to the airport at that hour.

 The cattle truck of elders from the church followed us for hours until we got to the paved road, so that each time our bus got stuck in the mud, they piled out of the truck with their shovels and dug us out. Wow! Another amazing picture of Christ-like love!

One of the times we got out of the bus to lighten the load, I took a mountaintop photo of the father/daughter team of Greg and Kayla.

 On the bus, I was happy to have a sweet boy on my lap who was the age of Paul and the size of Sam. We gave him a ride to a town a couple of hours away.

 Beauty.

 Another highlight was going back to the buffet, but not because I enjoyed the tacos al pastor, but because I got to eat with this 14-year-old friend who got a ride from us to Oaxaca City where he was going to visit his sister. When we finally convinced him that he could eat this huge spread of food, he watched me and asked if the fork goes in the right hand or the left. You see, in San Bartolome, we only used bowls and spoons.

 Angelica is my new friend whom I can't wait to visit in Mexico City!!! While we live 8 hours away from each other (by car) I am excited to get to spend time with her!

I was in Harrisonburg for just one more week (at Roger's house) for Vacation Bible School at Covenant. I thought it was funny to feel like I was on a mission trip from Mexico to Harrisonburg! What do you think Micah thought of the grasshoppers I brought home for them to try? Actually, this picture was before he tried it; he thought they were good. We are all hoping that we can go from Colima to Oaxaca to play, sing and serve in San Bartolome next summer with the Covenant mission team!