So since the last blog something major has changed…the family moved!!! Well the parents and the youngest son anyway (and the other son for a week), which left me and the granddad. Before this happened we had lots of goodbye things with people coming round and we visited certain people. One of these visits was to the house of an auntie of the mum to see her plus lots of other aunties. We went there for lunch and for the goodbye thing for the afternoon. Now I've encountered some food that I haven't been too keen on but have coped with, however this day I encountered something I never want to encounter ever, ever again! It's called something like Chamfaina (I remember it because it sounds like Champagne, but sadly it is nothing like it!). I'll paint the picture for you…we sat down for lunch (remember I'm not familiar with these people), and lunch was served. My plate arrived with salad (winner), potatoes (winner) and this black, powdery looking, meat thing with bits of other animal bits in it, which was mince (never seen mince like this before), blood, liver, intestines and stomach. So what did I do? I tried it, I almost gagged, I ate some salad, I swigged some beer and I continued to force myself to eat this black food that lay in front of me. I have a philosophy that I'll try everything once, and in this occasion I tried it until it was all gone out of a simple thing called respect. Had I been just with my family, I would have tried it and left it. So what made it bearable, well the beer, the salad and the big slice of cake afterwards! The things you do for God ay!

That night Abi, and her friends Felipe and Cecil came over for some more cake (brilliant!) and to play a game. Mateo the youngest son was in the house so he joined in and we had a great time attempting to play Trivial pursuit (the Spanish version). Well I attempted to play and the others played and no it wasn't the language thing that meant I struggled; it was the fact that my general knowledge is appalling and I don't even know the simple things! Shocking really, but hey can't be perfect :-p!

Sunday 20th July I went to church as normal and asked for the translation so I could listen to the sermon in English and understand it. However, the guy forgot to bring it to me, so I ended up listening to the sermon in Spanish and understanding it! I was like, this is totally awesome, go brain! The sermon was on 1 Corinthians 3:5-9 where Paul talks about planting and watering the seed, but that it is God that makes it grow. It really spoke to me actually, as working as a missionary can feel like a lot of pressure thinking you need to be converting people left, right and centre, and how do you do this when you work in a Christian organisation!? But this passage talks about obviously planting the seed, which we can do by living like Jesus, watering it by continuing to live like Jesus and speaking about Jesus, but then giving it to God to let Him grow it. The Pastor also emphasised that our work needs to be in line with God, and we should seek Him in our work for guidance. I really enjoyed the sermon and obviously was grinning like a chesire cat about the fact that I had understood it.

I had a bit of a funny English intermediate class the other week to, where I learnt the lesson of 'make sure you read the materials before you distribute them'! I had planned a lesson to practice pronunciation and word stress so found a story I could use, but I didn't read it beforehand, just assuming it would be okay. Well, as we read the story turns out it probably wasn't all that appropriate for a Christian group, but it was quite funny and everyone took it really well. The story is called "the winepress" (bit of a giveaway really), and is about a man who is having a dinner party. He tells the story of the wine, and how the owner of the vineyard had made it. It describes an argument between the man and his wife and how she dies by falling into the winepress so becomes all mixed up with the wine. The people at the dinner party then start to get worried as they look at the red wine they are drinking. The host then adds that actually the wine of that year the wife died was the best there was, and the host always serves the best wine at the start of the night! I found it quite amusing as did everyone else, but next time I'm going to read the story first! I simply highlighted that I was opening them up to real life!

So as I said the week leading up to the family going was full of people coming and going in the house, which was hard going but great for them. I met more new people, and saw people who I already knew, which was nice. Not much else happened in that week for me, worked, went dancing at the academy, and went out with Juan the brother and some friends for a bit of a boogie. It was a hilarious night, and great to spend time with Juan out of the house, doing something fun and having some bonding time. This is something I hope to have more of now the family have gone.

So since the family moved, I have had time with the granddad. I have cooked for him and we have had time to sit and chat without anyone else around which has been really nice, especially now that I understand him. I cooked him Cottage Pie which went down very well and a chicken dish to, and I even made him Arepas which are Colombian and he enjoyed these to! He doesn't talk all that much, but I'm getting better at asking questions, so he has to speak. I've felt a lot more relaxed in the house knowing that I can come back and just relax, watch tv, read or write without distractions and lots of noise. I've slept a stupid amount now I'm not getting woken up early by noise, am I'm eating less and more healthily to, so feel like I've got more energy. I really appreciate not working on Monday and only in the morning for an hour or so on Thursday with a new English class for a couple from UCU. This means I can now cook for the granddad and catch up on other things. I really feel that God is teaching me more about serving others and this is a great way of practicing this. I'll talk a bit more about the serving thing in a bit.

I had another good time at my church the other week where once again I understood the sermon without using the translation. This time the pastor spoke on 1 Corinthians 3:9-15, which is about Jesus being our foundation and us building up from there. It was a good reminder that if Jesus isn't our foundation, our structure can come crumbling down at anytime, especially in a crisis. With Jesus as our foundation, he will teach us how to build our structure with strength and we can rely on him for our strength to. At the end the Pastor asked this question: If Jesus is not our foundation, what is? I don't remember much what my foundation was before I became a Christian, but I imagine it was society and the expectations it puts on us. I was pretty all over the place much of the time, felt a bit unsettled, and just wasn't sure who I was. I met back with God when I decided to give church another go, and slowly but surely found my identity and became more settled. I know my foundation is in Jesus, but yes, I still have those moments where I forget, put my foundation in something else and quickly realise that it isn't the same and turn back to Jesus. Thankfully, God is always there waiting with His arms opens wide.

So, as I said earlier about this whole serving thing that God is speaking to me about, I had another chance to serve. I'm still not entirely convinced about this serving malarkey but I think God is, so I'm trying to just go with it. The weekend just gone we had another retreat with my work, but this was a local retreat for the students and young professionals. There were 17 of us in total, and we went to a place called Villeta, which is outside of Bogota and stayed in a little place, with a swimming pool. I was asked to help in the kitchen with a mum of two students who came on the retreat, and so I did. At first I felt a bit put out, as I would have liked to have been in the talks, but then I realised that I might not have actually taken much from them anyway. As soon as I started to help in the kitchen I really enjoyed it. I started on the Saturday with breakfast, which due to slight gas problems, meant it was delayed, but I had a good chat with Rosalda (the mum) and was able to then serve the others. I enjoyed being on my feet doing things (uh oh, we're back to the doing thing!). After breakfast and clearing the kitchen, I had about 30 minutes to rest, and then we started on lunch. Nothing here is pre-prepared, like in England, so this meant chopping, peeling, preparing, etc, which is hard work and I loved it! I got to learn a new recipe and be busy for a whole 2 hours plus! I found the actual serving the food bit a bit hard, not sure why, but for me it's a bit stressful, but got through it and then was able to sit down and enjoy the food to. After clearing up, and sorting out the kitchen, a few of us hit the swimming pool and the slide! It was quite a windy day, but warm, so this was great. Later on I spent some time reading a newspaper in Spanish to learn new words, and was then back in the kitchen helping with dinner. That night we had a general presentation about the project UCU has about HIV and then we all crashed out, having had a long day, and not a lot of sleep.

The next morning I joined in the devotion and someone else helped with breakfast. The devotion was on John 20:19-23 about when Jesus goes to the disciples to show then his hands and his feet after he has been resurrected. He says to them twice "peace be with you", which really struck me, and I wondered why he said it twice (I'm still pondering this). The devotion focused more on hope and the feelings of the disciples in this moment, but I focused a bit more on peace. I wondered what peace is really, how we achieve it and whether we are actually ever at peace. If we feel annoyed at something, are we at peace? Again these are things I'm still pondering. When we met back as a group after breakfast, the talk was concentrating on hope and the hope Jesus gives us, but also what is hope in, if it is not in Jesus. I was reminded of when I worked in the prison and worked with suicidal prisoners. Something we focused on was what did they have to look forward to, because if they had something to look forward to, they had hope and if they had hope they had something to live for. I managed to communicate this in Spanish (my first time speaking out loud in front of that many people) and it was understood! Anyway, again it did really get me thinking of where is the hope if it isn't in Jesus, I honestly don't know.

Well the rest of the day was spent in the kitchen cooking up some more yummy food and then after sorting the kitchen and left over food, I was able to spend some time in the sun and top up the tan whilst we all spoke before heading back to Bogota.

The weekend was a really good weekend for me even though I wasn't in the talks. It was good because I was able to serve others, which meant they could receive the word of God, and see how grateful they were for the food. This is a change of heart for me, because I've always struggled, so I know that God is changing my heart. Jesus served those around him, so really we should be servant hearted to and I can now see where my heart is transforming to be more like this. This just makes me wonder what God has planned for my future! Might have to have a word and just make it clear I'm not up for feeding the 5000 single handed!