We're Here!

This has the potential to be a really long blog because there is so much going on in my heart right now. Such a mix of emotion, excitement, insecurity. I have never realized being beyond my comfort zone more than this moment. It was about 30 minutes before the plane landed that I truly saw it ... Wow, I may be "trapped" here for 3 months. Like, what if we hate it? What if it is a terrible time and we want to leave, but we can't afford to change our tickets? I had thought many times of the possibility of changing our tickets if Holy Spirit lead us to stay longer, but never the possibility of leaving early. It was at that moment that I understood. We obeyed the call and we are in a completely vulnerable position and our lives are truly left in the hands of God. Wow, to be in such a place makes me realize how safe I have played the game my whole life! Sure, I have stepped out in a moment with the risk of being rejected or given money generously with faith that the father will provide, but last night I stood before an immigration officer and she asked me for $25 for our visitor's visa. I didn't have enough cash on me so she had to break protocol and walk me to a money machine on the other side of the airport to draw money off my credit card. I was so nervous. We set up our credit card with a pin number just before we left Canada, but I hadn't tried it yet ... What if it didn't work? ... What if I couldn't get the money? ... Who would we call? ... Would we have to ask our host family to spot us money the moment we meet them? Then when I got to the machine ... Guess what? ... Yep, it was all in spanish so the first time I tried I pressed some wrong buttons and it would not give me money! Ahhh, okay, let's try this again. I saw something at the bottom of the screen that looked like "credito" ... uh huh! That must be it. I tried it and it worked! Yay, God and thanks Jamie for going through drawing money in Redding with the spanish screen. Just done in fun, but it totally prepped me for this moment.

We went through and found all 11 of our bags within minutes. We even got to check our larger carry on bags for free because the plane was full and they wanted less luggage in the cabin. Thank you Jesus! Then we were walking out into the rest of the airport, wondering how hard it would be to find the 2 other people who were also arriving. We looked into a sea of Nicaraguan faces ... none white, but that was not really a surprise. Our contacts weren't supposed to arrive for 30 minutes. We expected to wait, but that was very intimidating because the waiting area was not that big and there were many people asking .. Taxi? Suddenly this Nicaraguan looking guy walked up to Graeme, pointed at him and said "The Morris family?" We were surprised that someone was looking for us. His name ... Nathan Hernandez, youngest son to our host family. He was told to look for a family with 3 kids, husband and wife and I guess we caught his eye ... lol. That happens a lot with Graeme :)

Suddenly I felt a lot more peace. He told us that our friends from Redding were delayed and that he had a bus outside waiting for us and all our luggage. It was awesome. The driver, Nathan and Graeme started loading our bags in and just as they had about 2 bags left a couple of guys came along to "help". I wasn't sure who they were or what they were doing, but after they helped the one guy walked up to me and said a couple words in spanish that I did not understand ... something like "tibs". Nathan seemed to walk right by them and invited me on to the bus. As we drove away I realized that they were asking for a tip! lol

It was quite a drive from the airport to Pastor Ricardo's home. They live outside of the city. The streets weren't too crazy. The bus driver used his horn a lot to tell other drivers heading into an intersection that he was not planning to stop for them and they seemed to politely oblige. If they attempted to pull out anyway, he turned his brights on too and they got the picture and stayed out of his way. Drivers weaved in and out of lanes without signalling, but not at extremely high speeds.

We pulled into a very bumpy driveway, surrounded by high walls, chain link fences and palm trees. Ricardo and Laida met us at the front door when we arrived. They are a lovely couple, all smiles, short compared to us, but who's not here? They were relatively quiet, but that could just be the language barrier. They spoke to us briefly about things we needed to know, but used their children to translate for them. Their kid's english is excellente! Their daughter, Judith, barely has an accent when she speaks it. We put all our suitcases in the 2 bedrooms that were set up for us. We also have 2 bathrooms! another Yay God :) They did some work on the second one to make sure we had it when we got here. Judith told me that they replaced the toilet and we had to wait a day to use it. We had some tea without milk. Graeme had some of the Yorkshire tea that Diane gave him before we left Redding. The kids watched "Bones" in the kitchen. The Hernandez kids were watching it in English with spanish subtitles. When the show was done we all went to bed. It was 12:30 local time. We left Redding at 2am and had slept on and off in the plane so none of us were really tired, or maybe we were, but our brains were going a mile a minute. Eventually we all faded only to be woken many times through the night by the curtains waving in the wind, the crickets that sort of chirped but not steadily or the different birds that started to sound as soon as the sun started to come up. I laid in bed still until about 9:30 local time (still only 7:30 in BC or CA), but Graeme wanted me to get up because Laida and Judith were making us breakfast.

I had to get right on all the vitamins (probiotics, papaya enzymes and pepto pills) to try to safe guard our tummies while we're here and then make sure that the kids use the purified water to brush their teeth. Breakfast was nice. Banana pancakes and orange juice. Bailey tried some green apple yogurt. None of us were very hungry. I think our bodies are just out of sync from all the travelling. So breakfast was short which made Ben happy because he was eager to go outside and meet the new puppy and discover the property. We went for a little walk down the long driveway. There are lots of dogs, big ones, small ones, but they are behind tall fences. Lots of pretty flowers, coconut trees and lime trees. I think we'll stay close to "home" for now. Caleb laid down after breakfast for a long nap and Ben and Bailey keep asking about the beach, but we are about 45 minutes from the beach and have no car so we hope we can work that out in the near future.

So far, the one thing that is intimidating me the most is the language barrier. Laida will say something to me through her daughter and I reply, but there is always this sense (I think I can see it in her too) that there is more to say. Please pray for divine intervention in learning spanish.

Will write again soon.

Blessings,

Chris

Here are a couple of links to more photos I have posted on facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=145485&id=560551503&l=70d624abd7

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=145401&id=560551503&l=c6c40e4e10