Vamos al río

"A sense of significance that is rooted in the purposes of God cannot be lost in any situation." This line at the end of Shantung Compound [a book were reading for my ministry class] made me a bit more aware of my selfish ambition. It made me analyze how I'm evaluating the significance and purpose of what's being accomplished in this semester abroad. When I get discouraged and shut down because I can't figure out how to say something in Spanish, or because I've failed previously, or because my contributions to a conversation end up killing the conversation, I'm placing significance in my abilities as a communicator rather than the purposes of God. I'm still throwing this idea around in my head, so I'm not sure how much sense that big long sentence made. But, that quote was just a good reminder for me that when I'm out of my element and failing to communicate effectively or with any sort of depth, I'm not a failure and there's much to be gained from that humbling experience, for His power is made perfect in my weakness.

Our first group excursion Saturday was fantastic. We hiked across the river to the community of Los Higos where this precious little lady, who apparently is like the grandma of that community made an amazing lunch for us.

Its times like these when I wish communication was my number one strength [yes, even in the Dominican I stilll speak Greenville-ese and Kara is the only one who understands me] so I could better relay to you this incredible experience. Speaking of Kara, here's a picture of the Greenville girls from Saturday.

The water started out just up to our knees and as we crossed the first part Margie and I realized our extreme ungracefulness as we slipped on the rocks and sometimes caught ourselves. Also, we realized it helped to balance with someone else so Jen and I held hands for parts of the way [since Japón instructed us never to separate from each other, and yes, I got in trouble when Jen had a little splinter in her foot when we got home].

Crossing that river was a good leg workout and a lot of fun. Its unfortunate that we had to watch where we were stepping so much of the time because I wanted to be looking up the whole time at the sky, and mountains, and wild horses, and birds, and lime-green and lemon-yellow butterflies. It was absolutely incredible.

Speaking of wild horses, these next few pictures are dedicated to Hannah Ruth because I thought of her every time I took a picture of them. 

At one point Josh took our bags with our cameras to keep them from getting wet [thank you Josh for being so gracious] and we went out in the middle of the river and let the current carry us for a stretch of the river. SO much fun.

Once we got out there we mini-cliff jumped [nothing like Kincaid because the river was too shallow] and sun-bathed [yes, Mom and Grandma, I wore sunscreen :] and Mari piled our plates high with delectable arroz con habichuela, pollo, y ensalada. Then Jen and I washed our hair in the river, which was hilarious. Then, on the way back, the current was stronger or I was weaker so I lost my footing a couple times [thank you Rachel and Nate for pulling me back upright so the current didn't sweep me away]. Oh, also, we got to ride out to the river in this big open air truck thing. [Apparently this blog won't let me load videos so I'll show you that truck later, maybe on facebook].

Great.    Day.