Esh una Fieshta!

This week was the ultimate manifestation of Spanish holidays. Monday was a holiday called Lunes de Aguas (to be explained later), Thursday was Dia de Castilla y Leon. Friday wasn't a holiday, but the entire province decided that they had already taken two days off this week, that they might as well take a third, so they did.

Lunes de Aguas is a holiday in Salamanca that celebrated t he traditonal date of when the prostitutes were allowed to return to the city. Back in the day (i don't actually know how long ago), the Catholic church would kick all of the prostitutes out of the city for Lent so that all the students would concentrate on tehir studies and be good during Lent. The second Monday after Lent, they were allowed back into the city. Everyone in the city celebrates this tradition by taking a picnic of hornazo (a meat pie with chorizo, bacon, and lomo) down to the river to welcome the prostitute back to this side of the river. All in all, it's a wholesome-family friently holiday! haha, in all serousness, though, the picnic was really fun!

The rest of the week and our time here has mostly been us trying to sieze the day. We have just two weeks left, and want to leave here with no regrets!

(the picture is of 3 of us napping at the Lunes de Aguas picnic)

Semana Santa

Last weekend, we all returned from Spring Break. In Spain, and in most of Europe, Spring Break is taken during Holy Week. For the first half of the break, I went on a mission trip with a group of students from En Vivo. We went to a town called Braga in Portugal to work on a house for Habitat for Humanity. The entire experience was great-- the hospitality, the food, the work, and the gratefulness of the family to receive the house. Most of the work we did was to put up cement to smooth out the interior walls. Our group of 15 was the next to last group to come work on the house. There's one more group of students that is coming from the States to work on the house again and finish it up in time for the dedication on April 24th. All of the food was delicious (and super cheap!). The best, though, might have been “learning” a little bit of Portuguese. It's really similar to Spanish, but with more “sh” sounds. On-site, we learned phrases like bom dia (good day), mais rapido (faster, faster), and mais masa (more cement mix-- used as a question like 'Is there any more cement mixed?' or as a command 'Put more cement here'). All Portuguese was accompanied by lots of repeating, hand motions, and attempts at translating into Spanish or English. At the end of the three days, though, we had gotten more work done than they expected us to complete! Success!
For the second part of Semana Santa, I went to the beach in Valencia with Cassie, one of my roommates and Whitney and Ansley, two of the girls on staff at En Vivo. That was a super relaxing trip-- we cooked in the kitchen of the condo we rented, went to the beach, slept in late, played Phase10, and watched a lot of movies on the couch. Our last day, we went into the city center and met up with an old En Vivo student who's from the area. She showed us around a little bit, and went with us to Starbucks (a special treat, since Salamanca doesn't have one) and to eat lunch. I thought it wa really cool to see how much the staff were still connected with students and former students even after they leave Ssalamanca-- it's like proof that the hard work that gets done at En Vivo really does pay off, and these students really are being invested in and being built up.
Since coming back from all of our trips, we've hit the ground running with all of our normal events, and we've even tried to plan some extras to make the most of the time we have left here! Last night, some of the girls in the ministry taught us how to make sushi. It was delicious, and super easy! We followed dinner up with a dance party in the basement on someone's i Pod, and a game of Sardines. These are the kinds of things that really make memories.


(The first picture is of me and Cassie on the beach in Valencia. The second two are of our group on the worksite, and one is with the family who will receive the house. If the whole picture doesn't show up, just click on it, and it should bring up the whole thing!)

Barcelona

Last weekend, I had the wonderful chance to travel to Barcelona! Barcelona is on the coast of Spain, near France. From Salamanca, unfortunately the cheapest way to get there is on an 11 hour train ride. Which actually wasn't all that bad. We got to see a lot of Spanish countryside, and took some pretty long siestas!

In Barcelona, we shopped some, drank some Starbucks (a privilege we don't get in Salamanca), walked on the beach, ate some really great food, and saw a lot of Gaudí architecture. He designed the famous Parque Guell, La Sagrada Familia, as well as two houses (really, they're more like apartment buildings). La Sagrada Familia was my favorite. It is a cathedral, but is really unique because it's still under construction. I found it really cool, too, because all of Gaudí's inspiration came from science and nature (the columns are all designed to look like tree trunks and branches).

At En Vivo, the staff are starting to pose some hard questions of the students. This Thursday, we talked about truth. What is it? Where do we find it? How do we discern for certain what IS really true? At our Tertulia charla series, the staff have been talking about the world. What does the world need from us as a privileged people? What does it need from Christians? Why does it even matter that there is suffering in the world? The goal is to pose all of these questions to students, make them think, and show them that the Bible can help them find answers, and that faith can lead them to truth and meaning in life.

Fun facts;

• In Cataluñia, the province of which Barcelona is the capital, the language is Catalán. It's kind of a mix between Spanish and French.

• Spanish candy bars are better than their American counterparts because the Europeans put more cocoa in their chocolate than American companies do.

Hay tres cosas permenentes: la fe, la amor, y la esperenza

This was the theme for this weekend's Campamento (as long as you don't include the rivalry for the flamingo football game...). All of the talks this weekend were based off of this verse in Corinthians 13:13. The first was about love, and about how love is a choice, especially for people that are difficult for us to get along with. Hernan also talked a lot about how important it is for us to follow the call to love everyone, and what that means.
The second talk was about hope. In Spanish, there is only one verb for both English words, hope and wait. Hernan mostly talked about the waiting aspect, how life is a series of "waits" until we get to the end. In order to make it worth the wait,there has to be something at the end. For Hernan, and for Christians everywhere, that thing worth waiting for is Heaven, to be with and worship our creator for all eternity. To love and learn and know for all eternity. That is what makes life worth the "wait" and is what gives me hope. Espera y esperanza.
The third talk was a bout faith. I left this final group session with a realization of how intertwined these three things are. Without hope, faith and love are worthless. Without love, life is worthless and faith and hope are meaningless. Without faith, none of this life means anything. But, love is still the most important because it is what the world sees of us as Christian, of us as a people of faith and hope. They need to see that we can love.

This weekend was also filled with rousing games of Moose-Moose, star tipping, and the 4th annual Flamingo Football game. (Moose-Moose is a crazy group game with signs and sounds, and loads of laughter. Startipping is an esperience of spinning, flashlights, and falling. Flamingo football is a soccer game, boys vs. girls, in which the boys can only use one leg.) All in all, there was a lot of thinking, praying, worshiping, craziness, games, community building, and late nights filles with conversations and fun!

(The first picture is of all the girls getting ready for the Flamingo football game. WAAAACHA! The second two are of a group that climbes a little peak to get a better view of the surrounding mountians and rivers. I hope that you all can tell how beautiful it all was! If you can't see all of the picture, click on it, and you should be able to see the whole thing)

hacer galletas

My job at En Vivo is to make cookies for Tertulia (our lunch and chat event). Every week, I get a different student to help me out, hang out, and just talk. It's usually one of my favorite parts of the week. Since this is my job, though, I have learned a lot about the Spanish attitude towards cooking.
Spaniards typically live with their parents until they get married, because it's much more common to go to the university in your home town than it is in the states. Because of this, there are very few students that know how to cook. And there are even fewer that know how to make cookies or pastries. I think that this is because there are loads of pastry shops within walking distance, so no one has to learn how to make things like that.
Also, the culture here is much less focused on having a lot of friends over to your house for dinner. Everyone lives in small apartments, so there's not much room. For students, it's much more common for everyone to go out for a round of drinks at a bar and then go dancing. (This is what they do every night...). I think that this is one of the times that Americans do it better-- of having loads of people over to your house to hang out.

Also, in the life of En Vivo, our big Spring Retreat is coming up next weekend! I'm really excited about it, and we would definitely appreciate your prayers for this big event!

i'm gonna start a (bull) fight!

So, as the title would indicate, this post is going to be about bullfighting.
Well, not actually, because the corrida (bullfight) was canceled due to too many injuries in the encierro (running of the bulls).

Now, before I start on the story, I want you all to know that no one in our group was injured.

So, to start off, Meredith and I decided at midnight the night before that we were going to go to Carnival in Cuidad Rodrigo. Carnival is the Spanish celebration of Fat Tuesday-- a time of excess before going into Lent. Only thing is, that here, they celebrate it fro three weeks-- two before Ash Wednesday, and even into the weekend after!! Oh, Spain...
Cuidad Rodrigo is a tiny town about an hour away from here near the border of Portugal. There is basically nothing there, but it's the place to go in this part of the country for Carnival because of the encierro.

Now, for the story. So, in my culture class, we had talked about Carnival and encierros, but I had forgotten that there was going to be a running in Cuidad Rodrigo. So, first of all, it was a great surprise that there was going to be a run! First of all, we walked down towards the countryside near the start of the run and found places on the fence to sit and watch from what we thought was a safe distance. After we had waited for quite a bit past the appointed hour (as is customary in Spain), the run started. First, a group of men on horses started the run, and then there were two groups of bulls and horsemen running together, followed up by two more horsemen to keep the bulls on track. Everyone ran so close to us, even though we were up high enough to be safe.

After the bulls ran by, everyone thought that that part of the run was over, and just got off the fence to go up toward the bars and the fair again. Turns out, however, that at least one of the bulls had a mind of it's own, and did not want to run toward the arena in the Plaza Mayor. Instead, it wanted to go back toward the farm. In doing so, it ran into the crowd. I have never seen a street clear faster than at that instant. Hundreds of people were out of the street and onto the fences in less than a second. Literally. It was increadible! Such an adrenaline rush!

So, that was the only time I actually ran from the bulls, on accident. The boys in our group ran on purpose, though. Silly boys...

But, because the bulls were so crazy, the encierro took over 3 hours to complete. Two of the horses that are supposed to keep the bulls under control were injured and our of commission. Also the bulls got separated from each other, so that's part of why it took so long. And because it took so long, there was more time for stupid Americans to get injured "playing" with the bulls. Because of this, all of the ambulances were full and the corrida was canceled because there were not any free amulances.

All in all, it was a good trip!!!

And Sevilla followed us here!

This past weekend, Meredith and I (one of the other En Vivo exchange students), traveled to Andalusia. Andalusia is a province in the southern part of Spain. We went to Sevilla and Granada, two cities in the province. The whole province used to be occupied by Muslims until they were evicted by Ferdinand and Isabella in 1492. This makes for a really interesting mix of Moorish architecture and Christian symbolism along with symbols of the Catholic Kings (Isabel and Ferdinand). (I really love the geometric Muslim tilework that was in all of the palaces and churches that we visited).

The weather was beautiful and sunny and warm (like 22 degrees celsius!!), and there were orange trees everywhere. And there were old buildings, but they weren't all made of stone—a lot of them were painted bright colors, even! Now I understand why they say that people in the south of spain are much more cariñoso (that translates to carismatic, or open and kind-hearted) than those in the northern parts—because there's sun and warmth, and color in their world, and not just stone and cold wind. Don't get me wrong, I love Salamanca, but it's just a very different culture in the two different parts of the country.

It's great because this past week has been much sunnier and warmer than it has been the whole time we've been in Salamanca-- Sevilla came back with us!


This has also been a really good week to see the full circle of En Vivo! Last night at Bible Study, we were overflowing the space. What a great problem to have! Also, there were at least 5 students that came for the first time that we met through our English outreach events. This is exactally how En Vivo was designed to work, and it's beautiful to see it work right! Please keep praying over these students, that they will continue to learn from us and feel welcomed in this community!