Rough with the Smooth

There´s treasure everywhere you look. Bolivians are beatuiful people inside and out and I find myself constantly moved by the Father´s heart for them on a regualar basis. So it´s incredible to have the privelege of working with some of them despite some of the hard things they face.

The south part of the city is the poorest and the roughest. Sometimes they have no running water and dont´s have toilets so they go in the streets.  The average person in this area earns about 200 -400 Bs a month but probably most earn closer to 200Bs if not slightly under. That´s about 25 pounds a month to feed a whole family.

My project is in the west. Here is where the beauty crashes against the rough sharp edges.

There is ´A´ who is 15 years old. Her mother became friendly with a guy but it was only a matter of time until he made his move on her. She was 12 years old when it first happened.

´J´ celebrated her birthday last week. Her daughter who is 1 and a half years old  is in the school next door. Up til last week I thought ´J´ was 17 or 18 years old. Turned out she was celebrating her 15th birthday.

´L´ is a lovely woman at my work at the school. She is a mother of two girls. One daughter is 1.5 yrs and the other 7 months. L was married last year in October but the husband was unloving and eventually turned round to her and said he was going to kill her and tried to strangle her.

One girl came to school one morning last week and on her way in her mother said that she should better behave otherwise her mum would throw her away. ´V´ is only 2 years old but she is such a sweet child. The sad part is children are abandoned if they are not wanted so it was never sure how serious that threat was by the mother because it wouldnt be too hard to beleive if it were true.  Only the other day I heard that a child who was a few days old was left by the parents in the back seat of a taxi because she was not wanted.

These are a few of the stories that could be repeated many, many times over. But despite this they have a warm and gentle nature and they are so precious.

The work that the project does really is helping them to rebuild their lives and enable them to become confident independent individuals. Makes the little I contribute feel like it can make a difference.

The Fast and the Furious: Fiesta, Blockades and all things retro.

So it turns out in Bolivia they celebrate A LOT! pretty much any reason to celebrate and they will do it!
They have the usual of mother´s day etc but also friendship days, boyfriend/ girlfriend days, women´s days and other random things like celebrating the changing of the seasons! So 21 September marks the beginning of Spring and so it´s time to celebrate at school.

complete with a brithday wish.

 But also they have parties in squares and night time it can turn into anything. It´s hard to get over how varied the place can be. In the day time the squares and plazas are very peaceful and beautiful places to sit and be surrounded by the fountains and beautiful greenery but by night they turn into busy market places and have random things happening such like this:

VW Camper Van with some ghetto stylee!

 








Also they like to protest which is a good thing in some ways but it means that every few weeks there is some sort of strike which normally means the transport system shuts down for part or all the day and means people dont go to work (!)so we end up having random days where we have time to enjoy the sunshine!

And if you´ve ever wondered where all the VW Beetles disappeared to ... they love them out here!

 

50 shades of brown

Well with all the sunshine and summer just about to start, i seem to be acquiring some very interesting tan lines and mutiple shades of brown. It's going to take quite some skill to make it all blend!

Getting to know the city much more now and discovering new hot spots of where good coffee shops are so the new 'costa treat times' will be good fun!

Went to my first church service yesterday. Was great to be back with church family and getting to know more about the culture here. The church is an international one with a mix of US and Bolivian leadership so half the songs are in English and half in Spanish. Lot's of fun to sing and get to learn the language even more! Heard a great preach by an American pastor who spoke about having an undivided heart and the fact that God's heart is that none should perish and that He longs to heal our hearts and lives and also that the church should be a place where healing takes place, where we care for our own wounded in the church instead of sending broken and wounded team out to broken people which will only cause more hurt.

Went to lunch with some other USA and New Zealand-ers and had a great time getting to know them. Was such a blessing to start to meet other Chrisitans here. They work in an orphanage which was set up and run by christians and they are all christians who work there so this wil be a great way to get to know more Chrisitians in the city. The lady who set it up moved from the USA when she was 21 and started an orphanage in Cochabamba and now has a  boys and girls house as well as a baby house for abandoned babies.  They have been running it for 10 years now and are in the process of adopting three 10 year old boys at the same time as well as about to have their own baby in a few months. So challenging to meet someone who was courageous enough to step out in serving God at 21 and living out true love. incredible people. So grateful to meet such people. I think this will be a great place to be joined to.

Also they spoke of one of the leaders who co-ordinates baby washing once a week. What's baby washing? good question! Turns out that it is a time of the week where the street people can come with their children adn they get washed and are given something to eat and drink and if needed more clothes. Jesus right there i the streets - made my heart sing so I thin I will make this a regular place to serve as I loved this idea. Makes me tearful even writing this because of the love that God is showing through His people in this way. I love the gospel. Hope for all the world. 

Let´s create!

So i have got stuck in with vaious bits of my project and I have been in the dance studio choreographing bits for the girls classes and today withteh kids we learnt about the stars, the moon and rain. then we got messy. I loved it!

 

So a bit more about the projects I work in. They do a lot in both the school and the women´s house. In the school they have teaching and creative playtimes but they also feed them everyday and teach them about cleanliness and prevention of diseases with both the children and their parents. They also brush the children´s teeth everyday to make sure they remain healthy.

Montessori School for children

They made this ceramic mural a few weeks ago

In the women´s house they have prevention programmes in the community, skill workshops, teaching the girls about domesticity and how to look after their young children, workshops about how to get support if women suffer with violent families and now they are looking into working with men and potentially the violent husbands themselves. It´s amazing work for a secular charity and NGO that has no funding.Much to learn from these great people.

Reunion

Well I am not a fan of working a Sunday but for a good cause I am glad to oblige... (just wish I hadn´t gone to bed at 2am that morning!)

But here´s why. They shared their stories, they fellowshiped, they were authentic and they were beatuiful. I was humbled, moved to tears, honoured to be there and made friends. I know God´s treasure is stunning but I just hadn´t realised how much.

Leo - She was lovely. We became friends.