¿Dònde estàn mis pantalones jeans?

Greetings to all, and thanks for checking in. A few notes from the past week and a half...

MISSING CLOTHES
The first story relates to the title of this post. On Monday night, I left my window cracked when I went to sleep, as I am accustomed to do at times (though less often now with the weather turning cooler). When I woke up and began to put on clothes to go running, I noticed and wondered that the window was wide open. In the next moments, I realized in succession that my pants were and a couple of shirts that I`d worn yesterday were gone (I`d laid them on my desk near the window when I went to bed) and that, though I had only a few soles in the jeans, my house keys had been in the front pocket. At that point, I assumed that the burglar (whose tracks showed they`d climbed along our front wall from the roof of our neighbor`s house) had probably entered the house downstairs with the keys and taken whatever could be found -- my guitar, house money, TV/stereo, etc. Thankfully, though, this fear proved unfounded. To make a long story shorter, my friend Roberto helped bring a locksmith to the house later in the day, who removed the two door locks, changed the key system and made new keys, and re-installed the locks -- all for about $12. In the meantime I stayed at the house with the door manually bolted as a precaution, and we had our handyman Oscar bring a friend to do an estimate for putting in bars over the upstairs windows. Apparently the burglar either saw me sleeping there and decided not to enter further, or planned to grab from my desk whatever could be found (this also solves the mystery of several other missing clothing articles about four months ago, which I`d thought I`d lost but now realize were most definitely stolen as well -- only I didn`t notice the window open, since it was during the hot months). As I will be gone a few weeks during the next two months, we are moving quickly to install the window bars and to close in the open-roofed upstairs hallway as safety precautions. I still have enough clothes to wear, not to worry. :)

BIRTHDAY PARTY HOUSE
Lenin, a friend and member of our JUMIFRA youth council, celebrated his 27th birthday last Thursday and a couple girls from our group asked if we would offer our house as the party location. We agreed, and after our English class we enjoyed a small potluck of snacks and a gathering of 15-20 folks from the parish, all friends of ours. Roger and Elvis played guitar and sang some, those who wished to had the chance to honor Lenin with a few words, we drank Inca Cola, Anis tea, and sangrìa, and of course there was dancing to the radio of our small boombox. All in all, a very pleasant Peruvian evening, organized on a couple days` notice -- though it ended by 11:30 (with a little push). Lenin thought it best to have folks walk home before it was too late, esp. with the next day being a work day, and so we turned down the music and I announced that before everyone left, I wanted to get a group photo. It`s a cultural quirk that few people will leave early unless others do, almost a sign of weakness :) to admit one is tired. Another quirk is that people don`t serve themselves here -- a snack table buffet will basically go untouched unless you put the food on trays and serve it around. Apparently everyone had fun, because we were asked yesterday to host another birthday party tomorrow night, Saturday, for Juan -- also a friend and member of the Lima trip group.

MADELEINE`S FAMILY
At the specific request of the grandmother who came by my house, I made a return visit to Madeleine and her family, who I wrote about last time. They had asked for help for Madeleine with school English homework, so I brought a photocopy of Inglès Para Latinos that Michi had sent me. I stayed this time for an hour and a half (still they asked `Leaving already?`) and visited, though I couldn`t do much with the English worksheet, Madeleine needing a lot of background instruction to help her understand the concepts. Either she has missed days, really struggles, or the teacher did not explain/teach the concept well. The expected help from a local priest to fund their escape trip to south Peru fell through, and unsubtle hints were given as to how much money they would need to all five make the journey. I see their need, but also felt a bit manipulated and cornered. Also, I think the precedent of me being a money source is not a good one to establish. For now, I will visit periodically to help with English if they desire it.

CONFIRMATION CLASSES
I began a couple weeks ago to assist my friend Yuri with the two confirmation preparation classes, Tuesday and Saturday evenings for two hours each. He prepares the lessons (I think he gets a small stipend for coordinating the program), and I am enjoying getting to know the forty (total, both groups) teenagers, 13-17 years old. I`ve even shared a couple of my favorite youth ministry games -- maybe even more than US teenagers, they love to play group games (a few even wanted to extend the classtime on Tuesday to play another game at the end). The lesson on Tuesday I found intriguing. The topic was Moses/Exodus, and Yuri did a good job of relating this ancient story to the students` modern Peruvian experience by first having them reflect on their own reality. To his question of `How do the Peruvian people live?` they responded that Peruvians live in crisis, with a lack of justice, amidst violence, in poverty, show a lack of love/respect for others, and in increasing environmental pollution. He then drew the parrallel between the state of the Israelites in Egypt and many Peruvians today -- who is working to help liberate our people today? Do you think Moses was afraid? Asked about their dreams for the future, some were similar to dreams of US teens: family, house, etc -- but they also expressed dreams of the reality of life here changing, and agreed that if everyone did their part change was indeed possible. I was struck by their desires to make things better and by their sober evaluation of their own society (I`ve received blank stares upon asking Corvallis youth to reflect on their society in a similar way) and by the fact that nonetheless their youthful hope remains. I felt within a renewed desire to help them as I could to realize changes here -- maybe this could be a focus of my work here in the next 15 months (May 25 was 8 months in Chimbote).

On a different Confirmation-related topic, I have a goal of helping these Confirmation youth make connections with youth at St. Mary`s in Corvallis through exchange of letters, photos, stories, etc. I will also pursue this connection with the first communion children/youth here and coorsponding catechism kids back in Oregon, hopefully helping all involved to learn and grow through the cultural sharing.

ENGLISH CLASSES
Due to my upcoming absences (June 1-20, July 2-15) from Chimbote, we have put off beginning a new english class term. Still, we held our end-of-term field trip this past Sunday, taking the 1-hour bus trip to a garden/recreation area called Candamo near the small town of San Jacinto. Nine of us enjoyed the chance to visit a new place, play soccer on actual grass, and just relax.

One final note -- for a couple weeks now we have been enjoying running water in the house, the pump`s problems at least temporarily solved. Showers are warm enough to make it manageable as well.

That`s it for now. I wish you a great week!