Friday - 3/27

Friday, 3/27/09

pictures at http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/album.php?aid=2020239&id=1296262065

Everyone was up and moving by 5:30 and we had the sleeping bags packed by 5:45. Pastor Martin and the family and Ruth and Luis from Mexicali all got up to see us off. After many more hugs, a few more tears and a couple of group photos, we were out of the parking lot by 6:20. It’s only about 10 minutes to the border and it only took us about 40 minutes to wait in line and get across. Our waits have probably averaged a little over an hour so this was a quick year. Last year the border guards (Americans) got out all of the passports and matched up owners with each ID. This year they pretty much waved us all through.

We made it through San Diego and LA pretty much effortlessly. The weather was great and probably got to the mid-80’s. We maintained our usual stop every 2 hours or so alternating between gas and rest area. The kitchen ladies packed lunches for everyone so we ate on the grass beside a gas station. Jason, Jane and Robin all bought tamales from one of the vendors while we were in line at the border – a traditions started last year. Excellent tamales!! We shared a few of them at lunch.

We’re back in the land of pump your own gas and wash your own windows. Because labor costs are relatively low in Mexico, there were what we would consider a lot of employees at many places. At Wal Mart there were baggers at the end of every check-out register and at least two or three times the number of usual employees on the floor. At the gas stations there seemed to be at least one person for every two pumps and they did service the old-fashioned way. Even offered to check the oil! Our gas prices have been pretty consistent in the low to mid $2 a gallon range including the gas we bought in TJ, if my liter/peso/gallon/dollar conversion is right. We aid $2.60 at one stop but that was because some one had to really, really use the restroom.

We arrived at the Redding United Methodist Church at 7:15 and ordered pizza delivery. After 12 hours in the vehicles, everyone was glad to get outside and stretch their legs in the sunshine. After team meeting, worship, a devotional led by Jane, and a time of sharing and remembering, we headed to bed with lights out at 10:00. Our goal is to be on the road by 8:00 tomorrow morning to finish the final leg of the trip. We should arrive back to Keizer around 3:00.

Thursday - 3/26

Thursday, 3/27 - pictures at http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/album.php?aid=2020239&id=1296262065

It dawned another great day but as we ate breakfast we could see a bank of smog rolling across the city. However, as the smog approached us, a wind picked up and the smog dissipated. The team was all up and working by 8:00. We skipped team meeting and worship so that we could focus on completing our projects. Everyone was pretty excited about having the afternoon to spend at the beach shopping. By 11:30 we wrapped up the final work and cleaned everything up. In addition to finishing painting the parsonage and painting the trim on the church, Jimmy successfully installed a light and Jason put a new door on the outside bathroom. Robin and a crew pulled weeds and picked up stuff all over the grounds, Wyatt and Tyler painted over a taggers handiwork and Mitchell and I spent the morning hanging upside down on the back of the church replacing facia boards. Last night one of the kitchen ladies brought her son (4 years old?) and he leapt into the sandbox in the new playground so the gray van men were able to see their time and effort payoff.

We had sack lunches and were on the road to Rosarito by 12:30. It’s a beautiful 45 minute drive out of Tijuana and along the ocean. As soon as we parked we split into two groups – one to go shopping and one headed to the beach for football with the intention of meeting back at the cars at 5:00 to find a place for dinner. After a couple of hours of football, the sweaty, sandy and sore group headed to the shopping area. The shopping area is about a 2 square block collection of around 100 small shops carrying about 25% of the same stuff for about the same price. It’s great fun to watch people hone their negotiation skills to varying degrees of success. Everyone is quick to compare purchases and prices and oohh and ahhh over the people who got the best prices. The hot item among the boys this year was what Brandon termed “goat coats”. I used to know them as Jergas. It’s like a hoodie made out of rough material. We went around and around the shops pitting the shop owners against each other for prices. The cost started at $25 each and I think most of the guys ended up paying $10. What fun!

The two groups met up a couple of times in the shopping area and folks changed from one group to the next. Finally at 5:00 we all came together at an outdoor taco stand and enjoyed a feast of carne asada, fish and pork tacos, tortas and burritos accompanied by ice cold soda out of glass bottles. The 29 of us ate our fill for a total of $96. Great value! After ice cream at another little shop, we loaded the vehicles at around 6:00 for the drive back to Tijuana. Our goal for the evening was to get packed, load the vehicles and get the church cleaned up. We accomplished it in record time and had a powerful worship service at 8:30 with a message of thanks from Pastor Martin and Martha and many tears and hugs. They had put together packages of treats in a nice coffee cup which they presented to each team member. Pastor Martin talked about the year after next being the 10th year that we’d worked together and is planning on a celebration. Karen and Jane already have come up with a list of ideas on how we can mark the anniversary.

While some of the team enjoyed their last shower for a couple of days and cleaned the sand out of their hair, Andrew, Luis, Brandon, Robert and Jimmy entertained us with feats of magic, juggling and comedy. Wyatt demonstrated his double-jointed elbows and Tyler flipped his eye lids inside out. Pastor Martin, Martha and the kids left for the parsonage at about 10:30 after much laughing and camaraderie.

Our goal is to be on the road by 6:00 tomorrow morning (Mexico time which is 7 US time) so there is a lot of bitter sweet to the last night together as we don’t really have much chance for lengthy goodbyes Friday morning.

Wednesday - 3/25

Wednesday, 3/25

pictures at http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/album.php?aid=2020239&id=1296262065

Yet another beautiful morning in Tijuana! After breakfast, worship and team meeting we all got started on our projects. The painting continued on the parsonage and the church trim. Jimmy fixed a couple of light fixtures in the church and Jason worked on patching the outside walls of the parsonage. The gray van boys finished the gate into the play area and trimmed a few trees. The rest of us spent the day with paintbrushes in hand. Luis, Andrew and I were on the roofs leaning over painting trim. It would have been really pleasant since it was 80 degrees or so outside but since we were crawling around the roofs, we had jeans on so it got quite warm. However, the views of the city were amazing! Jane spent the day on the scaffolding which we moved to beside the house and Tyler spent the day on a ladder. We need his long reach!

The only shopping I did today was at a carpet store with Pastor Martin. We found some carpet that looks really nice in the sanctuary and had it installed today for $150. A lot better price then the earlier store we checked! The storefront was a 10 X 10 room with a few piles of remnants around and three books of samples. After negotiating a price, we picked a color we liked, paid and drove back to the church. About an hour later a small pickup showed up with 3 men and the carpet. We were carpeting the main aisle of the sanctuary - a strip 46 inches wide and 42 feet long. They cut up the piece of carpet they brought with them into numerous pieces and laid it all back together without wasting an inch of carpet and had a piece about 12 inches square left over. Kind of a reverse puzzle. It took them about 45 minutes to finish the project and they were on their way again.

We held VBS at the church today. Pastor Martin wants to reach more people in this neighborhood. We distributed 150 flyers on Monday and had about 10 or 12 kids show up for VBS. Not a huge crowd but as I told

Pastor Martin, if we reach even one with the love of Jesus, it will be worth the effort. At least one of the families talked to Pastor Martin about coming to church so… success! Having VBS at the church eliminated travel time so after we wrapped up VBS the youth- ours and the locals, got up a game of hockey in the parking lot using an old pair of golf clubs and a tennis ball. Very entertaining and no people or property damaged in the process!

After dinner we had an hour of kick back time until we had our evening worship/team meeting. We have a tradition of doing a prayer/healing service on Wednesday eve. After some opening singing and prayer, Pastor Martin gave a great message about recognizing God’s sacrifice and seeing His hand in our lives and then we gave everyone the opportunity to have a time of prayer with Pastor Martin or Kelly or with other members of the team. It was a powerful time of healing with much praying and many tears. The service ended at about 10:30 with lots of hugs and, after taking a collection for the church here, everyone trundled off to bed.

Tuesday - 3/24

Tuesday, 3/24

pictures at http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/album.php?aid=2020239&id=1296262065

Today dawned clear and beautiful again. Nights have been chilly – probably upper 40’s, and there isn’t any heat in the church so it’s plenty cool when we’re sleeping but the days are very pleasant. It was probably in the upper 70’s today and very little wind. Once again, everyone was up early and ready to go to work. After breakfast, team meeting and devotions, we started our projects.

Jason and I set up the scaffolding. I’d ordered 3 sections and figured I’d stand on a ladder at the top of the third section to reach the top of the steeple. However, God knew what we needed and, even though we only paid for 3 sections, the rental company delivered 4 sections which took us to the top perfectly. Pastor Martin, Luis and I spent the better part of the day climbing up and down the scaffolding and succeeded in getting 2 coats of paint on the entire steeple. Jason and I took the scaffolding down after lunch and we’ll use it tomorrow to paint and repair the upper parts of the parsonage. (Jason said Mindy will never believe he was climbing that high as he has a little nervousness around heights.)

We had a half dozen of the local youth helping again today including another young man we know from Mexicali who is at the University of San Diego so came to work with us for a couple of days. We hadn’t seen Carlos in 3 years! The church trim crew finished the front of the church and tomorrow will start on the sides and back. The parsonage paint/repair crew patched numerous holes and painted all of the lower parts of the house and the very time-consuming bars in front of each of the windows. Wyatt became a master at operating the electric weed eater and spent most of the day whacking weeds around the grounds. Jason fixed the kitchen sink and worked on replacing the bathroom door to the outside bathroom. Major project!

The gray van men (Andrew, Brady, Brandon and Robert) , as they’re now called, finished the sandbox and hand carried buckets of sand from the parking lot, through the church, down the stairs and out the back door to fill it. They also finished covering the back fence a plastic barrier. The play area is beginning to look very nice and they all have blisters from the digging and bucket carrying. Jimmy finished replacing the back door which, of course, required major reconstruction of the door frame.

At 12:30 we wrapped up the work and had chicken mole – a favorite! We took a short siesta and gathered at 2:00 to organize the crafts, skit and puppet shows and left for the colonia at 2:30. Again, Vacation Bible School went very well. Everyone worked together and the neighborhood kids (and adults) all appeared to have a great time. We solved our missing puppet show cd dilemma by having Dad grab the cd from the church and get it to Chaz who ripped it and emailed it to me. I downloaded the puppet shows we needed to my MP3 player and we hooked it up to the amp. So many conveniences we can enjoy!

Pastor Martin said as he and Martha were watching the news last night, they heard that of the 500 or so neighborhoods in Tijuana, 300 of them are going to be without water until Sunday as the government is doing some water system upgrades. They said it’s not an uncommon experience to go a few days without water or other utilities. Wow! That would be a challenge to get used to! Fortunately neither the neighborhood of the church or of the chapel was affected by the outage.

On the way back from the colonia today, one vehicle stopped at the grocery store to pick up some more milk and ice. Brandon bought a mega-size jar of gel that he and Chaz discovered a few years ago. This is super strong gel that last for days in their hair. Only in Mexico!
Since tomorrow we’re doing VBS at the church, today was the last day at the colonia. After the crafts, songs and puppet shows we gave away the Bibles. As usual, the kids went nuts for them and were very appreciative. I’m sure that many of have gotten new Bibles from us every year. We got back to the church at 6:30, had yet another fabulous meal and the team had an hour of free time before team meeting, worship and lights out. Although we set 10:00 as lights our, many of the team members are asleep by that time.

Everyone is getting along great and no one has gotten sick, Praise God!, although I’m sure if the weather tomorrow is similar to today, we’ll have a few sunburns in the making!

Monday - 3/23

Monday, 3/23 pictures at http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/album.php?aid=2020239&id=1296262065

The morning was so bright that the team was up before 6:30 am and ready to go by 7:00! After breakfast, worship and team meeting, people dove into their various projects. Candace led the church trim painters – Libby, Wyatt, Luis, Ruth and Mitchell, and they made great progress. Jason worked on a variety of handyman projects including pulling a sock out of a sink drain. Jane, Tyler, Karen, Kelly and an armada of others worked on the outside of the parsonage. Jimmy (with a “y”, not an “ie”) worked on installing a back door that leads to the new playground. Brandon, Brady, Andrew and Robert worked on creating a sandbox, fixing the fence and digging holes for the gate posts for the playground. Robin worked on touching up the sanctuary paint and focused on fixing ceiling patches. Her work made a huge difference!

Pastor Martin and I set out to rent scaffolding for painting the steeple of the church and to reach the higher walls of the parsonage. Mexico seems to be a country made up of many micro businesses. There are literally thousands of small mom and pop, one room shops, extremely niched and with very little inventory. There doesn’t seem to be an organized system of tracking or locating various stores. Yesterday I asked a few people including the folks at Home Depot and another hardware store, where we could rent scaffolding and no one seemed to know if it was possible. Pastor Martin stopped by a construction store this morning and they gave him “directions” to a place not too far away. We headed in search of the place around 8:30. When we got to the vicinity, we asked someone else for directions and followed those instructions. When we got there we asked someone again and then again. After our 5th or 6th stop we found a rental place that directed us to the branch of their company that handles scaffolding.

Renting the scaffolding was a little like buying a car. The rental company was 2 rooms in an remodeled house and apparently only rented scaffolding. We were ushered into an office and sat in comfortable chairs in front of a desk. The lady proceeded to ask a battery of questions and fill out multiple forms. We had to drive back to the parsonage to get some additional ID and paperwork that the rental company needed from Pastor Martin and change American money to pesos. (Everywhere here accepts dollars but the exchange rate offered at the rental company was not very good.) When we returned to the rental company, Pastor Martin had to sign 3 copies of a multiple page contract and initial numerous other forms. 45 minutes and dozens of pieces of paper later we left. The company delivered the scaffolding later.

We stopped to look at carpet for the main aisle of the sanctuary. (It’s quite worn and has numerous holes.) Again, we found a tiny place with one desk and one or two employees. They had 3 books of carpet samples to show us. If we picked one, they’d go to the carpet warehouse, buy the carpet and deliver and install it for us. We thought the price - $320, for one strip 48 inches wide and 42 feet long, was high so we didn’t order any. The carpet is just going to be glued down and we can do it ourselves if we can find a store that will sell it to us. We’ll keep looking.

We didn’t have time for our usual siesta after lunch. Most of the team went out in the neighborhood around the church to deliver flyers advertising the Vacation Bible School that we’ll hold here on Wednesday. Pastor Martin and the skit team stayed behind to practice the David and Goliath skit starring Tyler and Wyatt with Pastor Martin narrating. We discovered that we left the cd with the vocalization for our puppet shows in the church cd player in Keizer so we recruited Ruth, Luis and Mitchell to translate and read the scripts, written in English to Spanish, while the puppeteers did their thing at VBS. It worked quite well although we missed having the background music.

We had a good size group of kids at VBS. We set up crafts for the first hour, did some singing, then had a puppet show and skit and concluded with a short message from Pastor Martin. The weather was terrific – not too windy or too cold. There were around 8 people from the chapel including the pastor who also helped us plus a contingent from Bethel - Pastor Martin’s church.

After VBS, Luis and I took Dolly to Home Depot to hang out with other big trucks for a while. Karen was afraid that with all of the girls who’ve been riding in her this week, she might be feeling a little too prissy. We picked up a few needed supplies and lumber while we were there and made it back to the church just in time for dinner. Spirits are high this evening. After worship and team meeting, the team had an hour of hang out and personal time until lights out. Brandon, Brady, Andrew and Robert have discovered 4 part harmony and spent part of the time standing in a circle singing classic rock and roll songs. Very entertaining! Brandon sings the high parts.

I haven’t been able to find a strong enough internet connection to upload pictures so I’m afraid your stuck with text only for now. Hopefully the link at the top of this will give you access to pictures on Facebook.

Sunday 3/22

Sunday – 3/22/09 pictures at http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/album.php?aid=2020239&id=1296262065

Worship started at 10:15 so we all got to sleep in this morning. The praise team started practicing at 9:30 and Brandon, Libby and Jimmie joined them. Brandon on Djimbae, Jimmie on keyboard and Libby on bass. They really got the place rocking! Pastor Martin shared a great message about stepping out in faith and answering the call God places on our hearts and how He leads us through tough times. Our team sang 2 songs for the congregation - We Want to see Jesus Lifted High (us in English, the congregation is Spanish) and Montana - (all is Spanish) one of Pastor Martin's favorites. Andrew translated the entire service for everyone and did an amazing job! Very fluid! The service ended at noon and we shared a potluck meal with the congregation.

After lunch we started a myriad of projects around the church. Andrew, Robert, Jimmie, Brandon and Brady started cleaning the tumbleweeds, concrete and gravel out of the area behind the church and started creating a play area for the young kids. Robin, Candace, Heidi, Morgan and Lindsay started painting the hall and entryway to the sanctuary. Jane and a slew of folks started prepping the parsonage for painting. I spent 3 ½ hours at Home Depot and Wal Mart.

Shopping is always an adventure. Stores are generally oddly organized with one variety of any item and only a few of each item in stock. The lines are usually long and people are not in much of a hurry. It takes me two to three times as long to accomplish the same amount of shopping as it does in Oregon.

At 3:30 most of the team along with a number of church folks, drove out to the colonia to hand out flyers advertising the VBS we’ll be doing tomorrow and Tuesday. The drive out was a bit of an adventure as a number of our usual roads were closed for construction but, after some wandering, Pastor Martin led the team to the neighborhood. Quite a bit of work has been done on the chapel since last year and it’s been expanded. The pastor at the chapel helped with the flyers as well.

The painters were engaged in their project and stayed at the church to work. They wrapped up their project at the same time the flyer team returned. We had dinner at 6:45 and worship and team meeting at 8:30. The rest of the evening was spent showering, playing soccer and chatting. Lights out at 10:00.

Saturday - into Tijuana

Saturday - 3/21

pictures at http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/album.php?aid=2020239&id=1296262065

We started Saturday a little behind schedule as all of the guys slept a little later then planned. We hit the freeway at about 7:45 after a breakfast of cereal and strudel bread, cleaning the church and enjoying devotions led by Tyler and Wyatt. The drive was very uneventful. Weather was great although a little windy. Jason and Tyler are the drivers for Dolly – Tom’s truck. Dolly’s a little sloppy to drive and, fully loaded and with the wind, she kept the drivers focused.
We lunched at our usual park in Santa Clarita. The weather was overcast and fairly cool. When I loaded the vans on Friday morning, I made the mistake of putting the bread for sandwiches in the boys’ van and I have never seen a flatter loaf of bread then what came out of the van. So we stopped and picked up some new bread for our chicken salad (thank you, Arlene!) and egg salad (thank you, Karen!) and pb & j sandwiches. We also had left over enchiladas and tamales from Friday night. Some of the team members could’ve used a shower after a rousing game of basketball (using a soccer ball).

We crossed the border without any issues at about 4:30 US time. (Mexico does not recognize daylight savings time so there’s an hour difference.) For the first time ever we drove directly to the church without wandering around hunting. Pastor Martin, Martha and family greeted us when we arrived at the church.

After unloading, Jane, Andrew, Martha, Marian and I drove to the hardware store (Sorry, Chuck and Janette. Not a True Value..) and picked up 28 gallons of paint for the various projects. We also stopped and picked up a couple of cakes as today is Pastor Martin’s birthday. We got back to the church just in time for our usual taco feed (Excellent!) and spent over an hour lingering, talking and laughing. It’s great to be here!

Team meeting and worship at 9:00 local time and lights out at 10:00.