A very hot hot summer

I was invited to teach for a month in the University of Navojoa. Sonora is a terrible place to be in the summer, but at the same time it was a great opportunity for me to have more experience in teaching. So despite the high temperatures and the long hours of intensive teaching, I had a good time. Even had the chance to play two special songs at church and be with the family (my dad's side).

How to succeede in your studies

This is a post written by one of my students from English Composition I during the summer at Universidad de Navojoa. I had to do lots of editing, though.

The three steps that people should follow to succeed in their studies are organization, punctuality and communion with God. Organization should start with writing the errands and writing down what has been achieved. If you do it at night before you fall asleep, you can set what time you will wake up and what needs to be done the next day. There is a sayings that goes something like this, "he who knows not where he goes, already arrived." Second is the punctuality (to be on time for your classes, to get to the dinning hall or church, etc.). Punctuality is needed to perform small everyday tasks that in the end make a whole. And most important of all is communion with God through worship, Bible study and meditation. Ellen G. White says that fellowship with God must be first in our day, it should be our first work. If we follow these easy steps, sure we will succeed in our studies this summer.

Major updates

Ok, so here I am, updating this blog once again. It had been a very long time (more than a year), but I will summarize it in a few pictures. From my time working in Montemorelos, I don't have any pictures (maybe because it was all the same routine!).


First of all, a little bit of my second trip to Brazil, this time to the state of Sao Paulo for a month.

I went back to Brazil in January 2010. This was a short visit to UNASP.

With my TESL trainers from England/Australia.

One of the lectures at the Music Festival @ UNASP.

And I had a chance to visit the Jewish-Adventist church in Campinas, SP.
Great church!

And I could not miss it, the Livraria Cultura in Sao Paulo.
I wanted to stay there the whole day!!

Back in Mexico, I retook my French lessons, this time at the Alianza Francesa Monterrey. I had great lessons and great teachers. And I also got the chance to pass the first DELF test. I still have a long way to go in French, but I'm happy I'm on the right track!

I went to a lecture given by Jack C. Richards, from Cambridge University Press. I even got him to sign a book for me!

A nice visit

I love how God keeps surprising me making my life in Brazil a total adventure. I was starting to feel sad because I had not had a chance to revisit Maraial and see the church that started with our mission work during January. However, last Friday evening I received a phone call from Mrs. Sandra, the wife of the Mayor of Maraial, telling me she was sending a car to pick me up in Recife so I could be in her husband's baptism!

Not only did I get to be in the baptism, but I also got to see some church members and the new church that is growing there. It was a blessing!

With Mrs. Sandra and Vitoria (her daughter). I taught her violin for only 15 weeks, and she is already playing in church :)

Some church members. All a result of the mission project in January :)

The church in Maraial. This was taken at the beginning of the service. Later, more people came in. It was packed!

Mr. Marcos getting baptized. He's the Mayor of Maraial.

A sweet naughty boy

Jean was one of my English students during Caleb Mission. He was not supposed to be in my class because of his age, but somehow I could not reject him in my class. I felt like I had to accept him  even though he was older than the rest of the kids. Soon I discovered he was a naughty boy! He also had a look of a little gangster boy lol but somehow he would always come to class. Sometimes his older friends would come and tell him to go out with them, but he never went (I also did not let him lol).

The last day I was there, I sort of had a party with the kids. When Jean came, he just opened the door but did not get into the classroom. I could see in his face that he wanted to get in, but I did not understand why he wouldn't, so I left the kids inside and went to talk to Jean. I asked him to go in but he did not want to. He looked sad, so I asked him what was happening, I told him it was my last day with them and that I wanted him to enjoy the party together with the rest of the kids. Then he said something that almost made me cry. He said that he hates goodbyes because he does not like missing people. I tried to convince him to go in the classroom but he did not want, so we took a picture together. Then he finally accepted to get in, but he just sat there and did not really enjoy the party. I could tell he was really sad. In the end, I had prepared special gifts for the kids who did not miss any class during the 3 weeks, and luckily I had an extra gift, so I gave it to Jean.

Jean showed me that every kid has a sweet side, even the naughtiest of them all. He also made me remember that every single kid is important to God and that we should love them because Jesus loves them.

"And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me." 

(Matthew 18:5)

Missao Calebe 5.0

Maraial, Pernambuco, Brazil

I'm finally posting some pictures of Caleb Mission (previous post about it).

The whole month of January was a blessing in Maraial (and I'm sure it was a blessing all around Brasil where the "Calebs" were). I was the first to leave the group (I came back to Recife on Jan 31st); therefore, I did not have any information about the number of baptisms they had. However, to my surprise, Mr. Marcos and Mrs. Sandra (the Mayor or Maraial and his wife, who is adventist) came to Recife yesterday and decided to visit me at the Union. She told me that 16 people were baptized and that her husband is getting baptized this coming Sabbath. It totally made my day, my week, my month!

I left without seeing the fruits of the mission there. All these time, I had only been praying for them, but yesterday the Lord allowed me to hear just a little bit of what He's doing in that town. The Lord is pouring his blessings unto those people and is guiding them to the light. I thank my Lord for allowing me to be part of that story, but most important, for allowing me bring people to Him.

Calebs in action (L to R: Mauricio, Naide, Sendy, Mr. Itai-the evangelist, Rafael,
Wesilany, Cizinha, Jessica, Sister Vade-the cook!, Cristina and Jedson.)

My kids!! I taught them English every evening for three weeks.

Maraial

Inviting the people of Maraial to the community service project and evangelistic meetings

Major updates - Christmas & New Years

Christmas this year was great, though simple. My friend Cherry, a missionary from the Philippines, was on her way to Thailand after working in IAENE for a year, and decided to visit me in Recife :) It was fun! It was great speaking fast/fluent English with her without having to worry about speaking slow or explain some terms lol.

It's was also the 2nd time I spend Christmas in a tropical area, so guess what!? We went to the beach on Sunday :)

With Cherry & Pr. Ivanaldo. He's the one in charge of the AVS in this union.

Christmas program @ the church

The only good picture I have of our Christmas Dinner lol

New Year was indeed great!! Cherry invited me to go with her for a week in Rio de Janeiro. Rio is probably the most famous city of Brazil, and especially during the Reveillon (New Year's), so with the excuse of having to renew my passport, I did not have to think twice when Cherry invited me. Our host family, Pr. Marcio Nascimento, Angelica & Arthur, was extremely kind. They were a true blessing for two missionary girls that wanted to do some sightseeing lol :-)

L-R: Angelica, Arthur, Cherry & I
behind us, the Pão de Açúcar (Sugarloaf Mountain)

We got to stay at one of the nicest (and safest) neighborhoods in Rio > Recreio.

Maracanã Soccer Stadium, one of the biggest and most famous in the world.
*The Stadio Azteca is still bigger though.

Christ the Redeemer. Do I have to explain more? lol :P

With Cherry (left) and the Nascimento family.

Major updates

I just realized that my last post is from mid June, and I kind of feel bad that I haven't updated this blog like in ages. Sometimes I feel like I want to write something, but then laziness comes to me and I keep on sayingtomorrow... tomorrow. But finally I'm writing again and this time it will be about new adventures. I realized/decided that life does not really have to be that normal and monotonous. That's like looking at things with a negative perspective. Instead of doing that, all I do and all that happens to me will be an adventure, even the most simple things.

The beginning of my adventures date from July 2009. I found myself heading to Memphis on July 3rd knowing just a bit of what it was going to be all about. After a couple of weeks of babysitting I found out that there was going to be an unusual adventure. Some friends tried to discourage me saying that I was being exploited, but somehow God had prepared me to see the good side of any situation and that helped me not to give up. On the last week of July I found myself in northern Florida enjoying the beach and playing with a 4 year-old boy that was scared of the waves. Finally,August came and my USA/TN adventure ended. I was glad that it was over because I was ready for whatever was coming next, but at the same time I felt like I needed to stay longer to fully enjoy what TN could offer to me.

August 11th, I was on my way back home, excited because I was going to see Sara again. She did not know what I had planned and that was even better. Our Houston-Monterrey flight was the same, so while waiting for my connection flight in Houston, I decided to go look for her on the other side of the airport. She was surprised to see me and I was so happy to see her! After that we had 6 great days together to do some cooking, paperwork, meeting friends, eating out, shopping, etc.

On August 16th the big adventure started. This time it involved 3 more friends, so it makes it even more interesting. Somehow I was sad to leave because I wanted to be with Sara, but I was excited as well because I was going to see some of my friends again. After long hours of waiting, running at the DFW airport, sleeping and walking around planes, we got to our final destination, AIU (formerly MC). This big adventure will end in January, but I'm sure there will be more to come, small or big but there's always new adventures to enjoy.

Thank God my adventures ended up being great ;)

A summer of CONTRASTS

This summer started just great, but then in July it became HECTIC!

June, oh it was great!! Cancun the first week!! so it helped me to go through the whole month. And I was teaching only 4 hours a day so it wasn't that bad. But then, it came July = teaching English 8 hours a day and taking one summer class. At the end of every day, I just needed to sleep and do nothing else. But I finished my summer course (with an A+!!!) and tomorrow I will finish my summer job! CAN'T WAIT!!!!!

here are some pics of my not-so-busy times, weekends basically:

saturday afternoon with my cousin

Basketball game in Monterrey. It was great!

Before the game, with some cousins and my aunt and uncle.



with my English students - surprised bday party for me ;)

Cancun!!

I finally got the pics from Cancun!! here are some of them, and you can go here(flickr) to see the rest.

It feels GREAT not to have exams or classes anymore!! finally I'm on BREAK again.
Summer is here and so it is the terrible heat that I don't like :( not at all!!!

not feeling like posting anything else in here
next week will be in Cancun, that's all I wanna say for now lol

my brain is just not working properly. Need to get some sleep now!

Pics with Sara!

Trying to make Vico smile, but I guess I didn't succeed :(

A little blur but I still like this pic.
And yeah, you can laugh at my baby teeth if you want lol

Not bad after all ;-)

with Sara @ Mission College
Originally uploaded by <SeNdY>

I was starting to say that this summer was terrible, and actually I do have a point on that. It has been kinda boring and my work wasn't that nice after all. I've been counting the days when I will get out of work (which shouldn't be the case) and to make it worse, today I found out that I have to go until the 15th of August. I tought this was my last week at work :(

Ok, this is not the whole point of this entry... Today I opened my e-mail account and saw this new e-mail from Sara. Then I read the title and couldn't believe it. She's coming!! When I finished reading, I went to my brother's room and told him about what I just read. I'm still excited cause I will get to see her soon! So sad Shannon can't come (she was planning to come also), but happy cause will see Sarita!

Well, this is all for now... will try to upload some pics (though I don't have a camera now) and keep blogging often. Not a promise but will try my best lol

Another year to...

laugh cry enjoy get frustrated smile eat teach learn play read listen talk study love help fall stand live sing have fun pray
...and lots of other things. I thank God for letting me enjoy another year (19 now).