New adventure

Mallory, Her Teacher, Me, and My Teacher

Next Saturday, I will begin my adventure at Casa Bernabe. I am ready to be with the kids and I am interested to see which tasks I will do at Casa Beranbe. As always, I have a lot of ideas of what I would like to do and hopes for my stay at the orphanage. It should be interesting to see what The Lord has in store for me. I can't wait. I am ready for a change of pace and not having to memorize around 40 words or phrases each night. A break from cramming sounds wonderful!

I still have a very real desire to continue learning the language but I know it is my time to move on to the next portion of this adventure. To put my Spanish language skills into perspective for you, I am now in the third level of Spanish out of seven. I will finish level three this Friday and travel to the orphanage on Sunday. I now know the basics but I am nowhere close to truly understanding the language and being able to speak with ease.

My two desires are to begin working at Casa Bernabe and to continue learning the language. Here are my thoughts of how to do both things...the ideal situation is to be able to come to Antigua for a day or two during the week to take classes. The biggest problem with my plan is transportation. I have contacted a travel/shuttle agency and I have 2 friends in Antigua that are guides. Hopefully the transportation issue will get cleared up this week.

This weekly trip to Antigua would also give me a break, a time to recharge before diving back into work with the kids. I have met 2 people in the street that worked at the orphanage for sometime. Literally we started chatting through mutual friends and discovered that we both knew Casa Bernabe. Both people mentioned with great enthusiasm that I need to schedule a break within the week so I don't get burned out. It seems burnout is a common problem.

I truly want to be doing what the Lord wants me to do while I am here in Guatemala. At this time, I just don't know the MINOR details of what he wants me to do. I'm so happy I'm not in charge of my life and I don't have to scramble around to figure it out. I'm just waiting on the Lord (acting, listening, and responding) to let me know my next step.