Mexican Adventure

I went to Mexico today! El Paso is literally right next to the border between the USA and Mexico. You can see Mexico from outside of our apartment and drive along the Rio Grande on I-10. It's nuts. One of the UMM students who student taught down here last spring (Shelly) has an uncle living in El Paso who does mission work into Ciudad Juarez (in Mexico). She crossed over with him and another teacher (Alicia) many times to help out with his work there. Alicia is actually still living down here, working and studying. Today Malorie, Alicia, her friend Heather, Ed (Shelly's uncle), and I went over to Juarez for about 8 hours.

It was a great day, started off with great music by Manu Chao (courtesy of Joshua and Naomi Caneff) in Spanish, Portugese, French, and English... gotta love it! We met at the mission house in El Paso, loaded up into Ed's H3 (yup... a Hummer 3) and drove across the border. It's really easy to get into Mexcio, you don't even have to stop, just drive on through! Despite the fact that it only took us a few minutes to get into Mexico, the difference is immediately noticeable. Houses are falling down / over... actually, I would not call them all houses. Many are shacks, boards in a pile with a tarp or tin roof over them, and a fence around it if they're lucky. We went through many parts of the city and it was amazing the difference that a mile or even a few blocks could make.

So, we're driving around, looking for someone to tell us where to find our first delivery point, and it started to hit me how akward this was. We're driving around an extremely impoverished area, and even though it's cool to be in a Hummer... this doesn't seem right. It's not like I don't already stand out enough in these Hispanic communities. :) We visited the first children's home briefly, got some lunch at a restaurant downtown, and continued on to our next location.

We arrived at our final destination at the end of their lunch time. We walked into the main dining area and found about 30 children eating their noon-time meal. The four of us women ended up sitting down with the kids as they finished and began talking to them. None of them spoke English, so for the first time since I've been here, I was really able to use my Spanish! (Malorie and Alicia also speak Spanish.) One of the staff said that they have from ages 2 - 18 sometimes, but the majority are from about 5 - 10 years old. While introducing ourselves to one another, I started talking with some of the little girls about names. They wanted to know my complete name (I usually go by Karina when I speak Spanish) and they loved saying it over and over again: "Karina Maria Isabel Coleman" It was a lot of fun. Some were fascinated by my blue eyes or my freckles, but mostly by my hair. At one point in time I had two girls and one little boy playing with it... it was an experience!
Malorie's digital camera proved to be a big hit, as is the usual case. All of these pictures were actually taken by an 11 year old girl from the Home who we spent most of the afternoon with. It's amazing how much can be translated through pictures and how exciting it can be to have your picture taken. They wanted to be remembered; they wanted to be in the camera, on the screen. For a while, they were all lining up so we could take a picture of each of them on their own... their moment to shine.

It was great just to be able to play with these kids and give them some love and attention. I think that they're pretty much on their own for playtime and don't interact with adults too often. You could tell that they loved every minute of it, and so did we. I was bouncing some of the little ones around, tickling them (see new profile picture), picking them up, carrying them around, and giving LOTS of hugs. I was talking to 4 year old Jose when they came over with the camera. I scooped him up and threw him on top of my shoulders. You could tell that he had no idea what was going on, and had probably never sat on someone's shoulders. He was squirming all over the place, so you can tell I'm cautiously holding him in the picture. He was all smiles though!
We were only able to stay for a couple of hours at this Children's Home, but it was worth it! We said our goodbyes to the kids and gave another round of hugs. I don't know if I'll get back over in the last 3 weeks that I have here, but I'm glad I was able to go at least once.

When we were headed back towards the Mexican-USA border, the traffic was nuts (as we expected). As previously mentioned, we didn't even have to stop to get into Mexico, we just drove through the gates. However, it was about 1.5 hours that we sat in the car, waiting for our turn to get through the gates, talk to the border patrol, and be on our way. Whew! It was interesting to say the least. But, it was worth every minute of that wait to bring the children their needed supplies. More importantly, it was great to give them some love as we are supposed to live our lives. This was painted on the wall of the dining room... not only should we let the little children come to the Lord, but we should bring Him to them through our actions.