Milpa Alta

We got be be tourists this week in Mexico City... a place that doesn't at ALL look like Mexico City - Milpa Alta.  This is a part of the city that has a very small-town feel to it, in fact, it's a lot of farm land.  Nopal cactuses and chiles are grown in Milpa Alta.  It's also well-known for it's mole (MO-lay) sauce, which is one of my personal favorites!

Here we are looking out over part of Milpa Alta

And these were probably the best mole enchiladas I've ever eaten - black, green, and red moles!

 

Then we were randomly in a mall by JP's dad's house one afternoon and Kikin Fonseca - who used to play soccer for the Mexican National Team - was there...  So of course we had to get a picture!  hehe!

Living Life Together

A big part of discipling others is learning about God's Word together.  Our Thursday night studies on the Life of Christ is exactly for that.  We enjoy going through Christ's life chronologically, and seeing how His teachings apply to our lives.

Another part of discipling is just living life together.  This means walking together through the good and the bad, the fun times and the sad times.  Thankfully, we've had the opportunity to share a lot of fun times with our discipleship group! Going out for tacos, to the movies, to play "futbolito" (fooseball), to hang out in the homes of the other group members, etc. 

 

Some of us drinking hot drinks on a cold afternoon

 

Having an improptu fooseball tournament after watching Avengers!

We are thankful to be able to have these good time with this group of people that God has allowed to become great friends!

El Animooooo de Queretarooooo!

Animo (AH-nee-mo).  It's a hard word to describe in English.  "Encouragement" is a close approximation of what "Animo" means.
There is a man in Queretaro named Pedro who goes all around town throughout the day screaming at the top of his lungs "ANIMOOOO"  He's some crazy guy (although people who don't know him think he is), he just decided many years ago that there was enough sadness in the world so he would encourage others.  People who don't know "El Animo" as Pedro is usually called, may get scared by hearing him scream ANIMO almost in their ear while walking down the street.  He also has a habit of not letting people continue on their way until they have scream ANIMO in unison with him!  He's a funny guy! 
Not everyone thinks El Animo is funny, he's been arrested on several occasions for driving down the street with flags hanging out of his car that "obstruct the view of other drivers," (the current governor of Queretaro paid his bail for that one), and for yelling Animo at President Fox several years ago.  The president's body guards don't take kindly to some random guy screaming at the president.  haha! 
El Animo was JP's neighbor for a few years before we got married.  So we know him fairly well.  One night, JP had parked a borrowed car in front of his house and someone came and pounded on his door saying the car was on fire.  JP stepped outside, and saw that it was actually the Animo's car that was on fire, but that was parked right next to the car that JP had borrowed from a friend.  Photographers from the newspaper soon showed up and took pictures of the Animo standing in front of his fully engulfed car smiling and holding up peace signs (his typical picture pose).  Someone who didn't like his cheerful attitude came in the night and set his car (that was painted bright yellow with the word "ANIMO" painted all over it) on fire. 
Anyone who's lived in Queretaro for a couple of years or more has certainly had a run-in with the Animo.  He's like Queretaro's answer to Portland's Uni-Piper.  Lisandro, a friend from Costa Rica met him a couple years ago when the Animo picked him up and yelled animo at him when he wasn't expecting it.  (I couldn't find that picture!)  And my parents met him a few months ago, he didn't try to pick my dad up though, haha!  He's quite a character!

 

Pedro the Animo is standing on top of his truck behind a cardboard cut-out of his preferred candidate for governor.  Me, Marcia, JP, Luis, and Cynthia are in the truck bed

 

Yo No Entender...

I've been in Mexico almost 9 years now.  And I wouldn't trade the experience of living here for anything!  But there are still those moments that are so unbelievable you just have to laugh.
For example, I don't particularly stand out in a crowd in Queretaro.  Yeah, I'm "blonde" (read: "don't have dark brown or black hair"), and I'm a little taller than a lot of women, but haven't reached the magic 5'9" that makes you "freakishly tall."  People generally know that I'm not a native-born Mexican once I start talking - my grammar isn't perfect, and people tell me I speak Spanish with a German accent (what's with that?)  Anyhow, in general, people don't focus on the fact that I was not born here.

But a few times per year I'll get a totally different response from people.  I may be going to a small store that I'd never been to before, or using a service that I haven't used before (new dry-cleaner, etc.)  And it's like the person attending the business sees me coming, and they must think ahead of time that I am a foreigner so they won't be able to understand me.  Because when I walk in and ask a question (and it always seems to happen on a "good Spanish day," when I know I spoke grammatically correct, AND without much of a foreign accent), they give me a blank stare and say in Spanish, "I'm sorry, I don't understand."  I'm confused as to why they didn't understand "how much do the tomatoes cost," so I repeat myself.  I know they understood this time, but they still kind of stare for a moment before responding, "Esteeee ("um" in Mexican Spanish) 12 pesos per kilo."  It used to really bother me that people would like mentally freak out upon having to deal with me.  But now it's just funny.  I still don't understand why this happens.  Especially when people from other parts of Mexico assume that I'm from maybe Northern Mexico, or somewhere that isn't where they're from.  This has only happened in Queretaro.  In fact, no one bats an eyelash in Mexico City when I'm asked where I'm from and say "Queretaro."  They just know that I'm not from Mexico City. 

It's just a funny thing that comes with the territory of living in a country that you weren't born in! 

The Market and the Pilon

The beginning of each month, I go get about 20 pounds of fruits and vegetables from the market.  This lasts most of the month, with the exception of some fruits that don't last long, I need to buy those again later in the month.  So I take my market bag and head off.  The place I go has really low prices (a head of broccoli for 20 cents US, 2 pounds of tomatoes for 50 cents, etc).  The thing that some people don't like about this particular place is that the guys who work there choose your produce for you.  You ask for a half pound of jalapeños, but they get to put them in the bag for you.  But I have rarely been disappointed - it's rare that I get any produce that I wouldn't have chosen myself, and you can see the produce displayed so if you see that tomatoes are squishy, maybe you shouldn't buy them that day. 

I tried taking a couple pictures of the produce place without being noticed, because people just don't take pictures of the produce place, that's weird!  haha!

Here are the market bags for sale, as well as bananas, tomatillos, oranges, mushrooms, cilantro...

And this one really didn't turn out well, but there are boxes of carrots, onions, broccolis, zucchinis, and cactus leaves.

This stuff comes straight off the farm, so it lasts for a couple weeks in the fridge since it didn't spend 2 weeks in a truck or grocery store!

Then there's the "pilon!" (pee-LONE)  They don't give a pilon at this particular market, but the lady who owns the little store on my street gives me the pilon frequently.  A pilon is: when you buy 10 eggs and she gives you an 11th for free; you ask for 1 pound of sugar and you get 1.1 pounds; buy quite a few things in the store and the owner asks you if you want the half head of lettuce that someone bought the other half of.  It's like your freebie for being a good customer.  I even got a free churro once because I was there when the churro delivery guy (yes, that's a thing here!) came while I was talking with the store owner. 
JP and I really miss the punch card system in cafes, restaurants, and stores in the USA.  But we have pilones here, so even though it's not a formal "buy 10 get one free" card, and you never know when you're going to get it, getting a pilon is always a treat!

Little Did You Know...

There are a few things that I sometimes forget to tell "first-timers" to Queretaro about.  Yeah, everyone always tells the person traveling to Mexico, "Don't drink the water!!"  Actually, in Queretaro, most likely nothing will happen if you drink a glass of tap water.  (It's kind of like drinking river water in Oregon - you shouldn't do it, but we all know you didn't let that water boil when making your ramen noodles for dinner while camping, and seriously, who doesn't accidentally ingest like a liter of water while water skiing?  Maybe that's just me...)

But there are some things that have become so normal, I just quit thinking about them!

• Don't flush toilet paper in public restrooms.  There is a garbage can next to the toilet for that - public toilets get clogged up ridiculously easily.  Lots of people from the States are grossed out about this one.
  
• "Rinsing" lettuce doesn't cut it.  Lettuce, raw spinach, strawberries, grapes, and any other leafy or tiny vegetable or fruit needs to be disinfected with an iodine or bleach solution.  Smooth fruits and vegetables (apples, carrots, etc) should be washed with soap.  Ain't nobody wanna eat themselves some non-disinfected lettuce!
• Another bathroom one - many public restrooms don't have toilet paper (or soap, or paper towels, or toilet seats...). 
• AND, you generally have to pay to use a public restroom, like between 25 and 40 cents USD.  Some friends of our road-tripped down from San Diego to Queretaro several years ago, and I remember one guy said, "Dude, I've paid like 30 bucks on this trip so far just to pee!"
• About the water...  You can brush your teeth, wash dishes, take a shower, etc. in our tap water.  For regular drinking water there's the 5 gallon water-cooler-type jugs.
  
• Just go with the flow when it comes to riding in a car.  We had 4 adults and 5 (not very young) kids in a Honda Civic to go to lunch the other day.  If you need to use a taxi, the driver will not wait for you to install your un-expired car seat (what's with THAT? that's the craziest thing I ever heard of!) in the car.  Just get in, sit down, and... yeah.  heehee!
  
• If you are gluten-free, vegan, paleo, etc. well, have fun with that.  CHEESE is the way of life in Queretaro.  
• Sadly, our city is totally unequipped for people with physical disabilities.  It's irritating because it's not like there's no one here in a wheel chair or with a walker.  There are wheel chair/stroller ramps in some places, but half the time they are too narrow for a chair to go up/down, or they don't give enough space for the person to turn the chair at all after going up, orsomethinglikethat.  

It is always fun to have people visit us.  But flexibility is the name of the game.  My friend Apryl is great example of that - the first time she came to visit, I had to be at the church at like 8am for a few hours and there wouldn't have been anything for her to do, so she stayed at my house.  I called a taxi to go get her, and she handed the driver the address of the church (she doesn't speak Spanish) and he took her.  She had never been to the church before, and just kind of trusted that it would be around the corner from where the driver let her off at.  (It was, by the way!)  Apryl was also totally cool getting tamales for breakfast from a lady riding by on a bike who was selling them.  Our families were wary when we told them where the tamales had come from!  heehee!

Anyhow, after 9 years of living here, it's weird to go to Oregon and drink the (cold, non-chemical-tasting, yummiest ever) tap water.  I automatically look for the trash can to put my used tp into in bathrooms, and think going to the bathroom in a mall without paying for it - and you get FREE toilet paper too! - is awesome.  It' amazing to see people in wheel chairs driving and going everywhere independently in the US.  And yes, unless you have an actual food allergy, I WILL roll my eyes at your list of things you "can't" eat.  (The finger quotes are of utmost importance around "can't" in this situation).  But I love my home, and I love going home from my home whenever we get the chance!

La Tienda - Random Memories

La Tienda means a little store.  It could be the 7-Eleven type, or a neighbor's garage that they converted into a small store, like this:

La Tienda is the center of activities for stay-at-home wives/moms, and it's where you learn what is going on in your neighborhood.  There is usually one person who is attending the tienda about 90% of the time - it's an unfortunate job because they don't get out much, as most tiendas are open from around 7 or 8 am to 10 or 11pm.  But, the tienda owner is usually the most informed person in the neighborhood.  Most people go to the tienda at least 5 or 6 times per week - it's hard to find 24-packs of Coke or family size bags of chips here, so when you need a snack, you just go to the tienda.  It's just down the street anyway!

When I first moved to Mexico and was living with Gaby and her kids, we always went to the same tienda, and we went everyday.  The owner looked EXACTLY like the rather obnoxious presidential candidate at the time, so we called him Peje (PEH-hay), which was that candidate's nickname.  Peje knew everyone who came into the his tienda, and what we liked to buy.  (He DIDN'T know that lots of people in the neighborhood had a nickname for him though!)  When I lived with Luis and Sandy, the nearest tienda was in a poorer neighborhood (Luis and Sandy's neighborhood was new, and didn't have a tienda yet).  I was the one who had a nickname there - Whitey.  There was an older couple that owned that store, and they would see me coming through the window.  I could hardly understand the man because he didn't really have teeth, and was hard to understand, so when he would see me coming he'd yell to his wife, "Here comes Whitey!" so she would attend me! 

At JP and I's first house, Chava and his wife Juanita owned the tienda.  This tienda had EVERYTHING.  Besides the normal chips, pop, yougurt, bread, etc., they also  had a wide variety of fresh fruits and vegetables (this is not common at tiendas), as well as anything else you may ever think you might want.  Juanita also called my the Whitey, which was strange because she and her daughter are as white as I am!  Juanita would spend time talking to me about their family's trip to Disneyland, asking when my parents are coming to visit again (my mom and Juanita had a great smile and point method of communication going on), and finding out what JP and I liked to do for fun.  She also always knew who moved away, who it was that stole the neighbor's car last week, and whose dog is the one pooping on the sidewalk all the time. 

Now, we're living in another neighborhood, and a guy named Luis is the tienda owner.  He and JP lend each other DVDs, and I always give him a bad time about his favorite soccer team.  We all talk about how bad the Mexican National Soccer team is playing, our favorite music, and snacks that existed in the 80's when Luis and JP were little, but don't exist anymore.

So, we're moving again.  Because neighbors tend to not be super friendly in Queretaro (they aren't rude, but everyone kind of keeps to themselves, except the tienda owners!), the tienda owners are the people I always miss when I move.  BUT, we're moving back to the same house we lived in 2008-2011, so I went yesterday to tell Chava and Juanita that we would be back!  So while we have to say goodbye to Luis and our soccer team bashing, we are moving to a place where we know the tienda owners and they know us.  And that's important here.  You belong in the neighborhood when you get to know the tienda owners! 

Anyhow, just some random thoughts from me today!

"Ir De Colados"

"Honing in on somebody else's gig"

Or in more educated terms, "going to an event you weren't invited to."
"Ir de colados."

Last night, JP and I went to Ruti's house.  Ruti and two of her sisters make amazing Queretano food every Saturday night, and sell it fresh from the grill in front of their house.  JP and I are good friends with Ruti's kids (Job, Sandy, and Sandy's husband Phil).  So we go every now and then for good eats.  Most of the non-family members who get Ruti's food take it home to eat it, but since we're *almost* family, we eat there.  We joined in a large room where lots of the family (many of whom we didn't know) were eating, and had good conversation with those we do know. 

Here's a GUAJOLOTE sandwich, the type that Ruti makes for dinner!  YUM!

All of a sudden, ladies started bringing in cakes, the lights went out, birthday candles were lit, and we were all singing the Mexican birthday song.  The cake was cut, and pieces were distributed.  I still have no idea who the birthday person was (I didn't understand the name during the birthday song, as there were too many people for me to see who blew out the candles). 

I immediately felt like we had "honed in on someone else's gig" by being present at a birthday party that we weren't invited to, and we were even eating their cake!  I voiced this to JP, Job, and Phil, that maybe JP and I should go, since this was an event that wasn't meant to include us.  Job and Phil looked at me and made comments about me having been in the USA for too long.  Then MORE free cake was slid down the table to us! 

It's true.  Here, you don't HAVE to be invited to the birthday party.  If you happen to be in the area, you can just come on in.  I've been to baby showers for ladies I'd never met (without bringing a gift!), and many birthday parties for friends of friends.  And we eat their food or cake and have a good time, even though we didn't know the celebrated person!  It's all about everyone being included!  Kind of nice!  heehee!

This picture is from our 30th birthday party a few years ago.  We knew there would be people coming who we didn't invite, so we bought two cakes, and asked some of our good friends to bring pop, chips, and small sandwiches to make sure everyone was taken care of!  :)

* One exception to this is weddings.  Many people give "tickets" to their wedding so only the number of people with a ticket can come.  This is because a lot of people have very expensive dinners after the wedding, and you HAVE to know how many people will come so you have the correct amount of seating and food.  We put everyone's first name on their wedding invitation so the family would know who exactly is being invited.  (So there was no mistake that their grandparents from Mexico City, or the cousin who lives down the street shouldn't show up for this one!) Although in small towns, sometimes the entire town is invited to the wedding! 

Back in Town!

Queretaro, that is!

Our first two weeks in Queretaro were filled with lots of phone calls to classified ads announcing places for rent, and driving all over our vastly larger-than-when-we-left city looking high and low for a place!  We finally decided to rent a room and bathroom until we find the perfect house to rent.  It's a big room, and there are abot 10 other similar rooms in the same area that all have the same gated entrance.  We all have our own bathroom, but share the same kitchen.  All the other renters are very nice and respectful - something that can be hard to find!  We're thankful to have found this place, and will stay here while we look for a house in the next couple months.

It  has been GREAT to see friends again here in Queretaro!!

Jessica with Karen and Pam at a crepe cafe!

We've also been able to get together with some of the people we'd been sharing Christ with before going to the States!  They are eager to meet up again, which has been encouraging!
This week, after setting into our temporary room, we were able to focus more on ministry and begin a plan for what this all will look like.  It's exciting! 
Much more to come in the nex few weeks!
We'll also be sending out an email update, and we put more details in those, since they aren't public on the internet.  Let us know if you want to receive those!

Our USA Time, In Numbers

Once we leave to go back to Mexico, we will have been in the United States for 16 and a half months.
It's been good!!

Number of states we've been to: 7 (Oregon, Washington, California, Colorado, Illinois, Tennessee, and Georgia)  If you count airplane layovers, it's 8 - Texas.

Seattle

Number of houses, apartments, and hotels we've stayed since leaving our house in Queretaro: 16 SIXTEEEEEEEEN!  This is 8 houses, 6 apartments, one hotel, and one cabin.  Thank you to all of you who housed us! 

Number of flights we've taken: 16 for JP, 14 for Jessi.

Large metro areas (like over a million people) we were in: Portland, Seattle, L.A., Nashville, Atlanta, Chicago, Denver.

Portland

Number of methods of transportation we've taken: 9 - Automobile, city bus, inter-city bus, taxi, airplane, subway/metro/elevated train, train, bike, foot. 

Number of churches we've been to: 13

Number of times people have invited us to Mexican food that was said to be super authentic: approximately 30.

Number of super authentic mexican restaurants we've been too: approximately zero.  :)  (Although our friend Lluvia made us some excellent super authentic stuff in their home!)

Coldest weather we experienced: 25 degrees at Hoodoo Oregon.

Hotest weather we experienced: 103 degrees, thank you Chicago.

Number of times we've seen people standing with their bikes on a street corner smoking and thought that it was people selling tamales: about 5. 
(People have bikes with little carts on them that they use to carry around tamales to sell, and when it's cold outside you can see the steam coming off them that looks like a little bit of smoke).

Number of cool new friends we've made: ??  (We can't count that high!!)

We are so grateful for the time we were able to spend here.  It's been great to see old friends, and make new ones.  God has been so good!

It's all about your perspective

You better have at least 10 spare minutes if you're going to read this blog post, because first gotta read THIS.  It's quite possibly my favorite post from my favorite blogger, Jamie the Very Worst Missionary (lives in Costa Rica).  It doesn't matter that she's my favorite blogger because that's the only blog I ever read, right?  hehe

Now that you've read that litte gem from Jamie (what?! you still haven't?! well go read it!), lemme tell you about my situation.  The other day I had had enough.  Just enough.  I'm not exactly sure what specifically I had enough of, but I'd had enough of whatever it was.  It all came to a head when I realized that absolutley ZERO of the bajillion allergy medications I've tried over the past few weeks worked.  I live in Mexico; I don't GET allergies anymore.  Until those little cotton nightmares started floating out of the trees by the Willamette River.  I knew I was in trouble when JP said one day, "What is all that?  It looks like snow."  Yep, piles of the cotton thingies.  AND the signal that my allergies are going to flare up at any given moment.  AND, I'd never lived in Oregon since pseudofedrine became a prescription drug.  I just knew all this was going to make for a miserable time. 

JP and I have been living "out in the country" at a great little cabin that was made specifically for missionaries to use while in the States.  Cool, huh!  It's a bit far out of town (with gas prices at over $4 a gallon, it seems like it's on the moon!), but it's a great place.  I was starting to get irritated at the distance we had to drive to reach civilization.  Now, I grew up in Salem, but was done with small towns the moment I set eyes on Queretaro, population 1.5 million.  I always thought that if we ever move back to the States permanently, we'd live in Seattle.  It just sounds cool.  It's big, and very Northwesty.  Although I may develop seasonal depression after about 3 days in constant rain...  Anyhow, I SWORE that I would NEVER live in a small town.  Salem is the absolute smallest I could handle.  So I may have been moping around feeling sorry for myself because we live so far outside of the city.

That's when the allergies came on full steam.  I cried.  (yeah, that just made my snotty, sneazy mess even messier)  I hated being "out in the country" where I have to drive a LONG time (like TEN minutes! gasp!) to even get to a pharmacy. 

Then, JP looked out the window and said, "We are SO blessed to actually get to live out here."  What?!  What are you talking about?!  Don't you see?!  My ALLERGIES are KILLING ME!  And YOU aren't the one who has to DRIVE all the time to get us places!  (Drivers' license situation to be fixed soon!)  And he was just so happy, so content to be living where we are living.  Because we get to see Mt. Hood from our house.  Because we have cherry orchards that change colors all the time right outside our window.  Because we can hear frogs outside at night instead of neighbors' disco-club-music.  Because God gave us an almost free place to live where it's just the two of us living in one house. 

So I felt like a moron.  We ARE "SO blessed to actually get to live out here!"  JP had the perspecive on the whole situation that I needed.  God TOTALLY provided everything we needed for our time in the States.  We really couldn't ask for a better place to live.  And I was complaining about it all. 

Well, God's given me a break over the past two days from my allergies, so that's helped my attitude a lot.  But I've also realized that I can't always be the pessimist.  I need to see the GOOD in our situation instead of the BAD.  And there's like a million times more good things in our living situation than there are bad things anyway, so that shouldn't be too hard!  God's good at getting my attention and making changes for the better in my life!

Rules of Visiting Others

In Queretaro, anytime I make a time/date to go somewhere with someone, if it's more than 24 hours before the event I will contact them to confirm our meeting.  People expect it.  If a friend and I decide on Sunday that we'll meet for coffee on Thursday night, someone must confirm that on either wednesday or thursday or it won't happen.  I usually text a "see you tonite at 7!" on thursday afternoon, and shortly get the reply "Starbucks in Jardines, right?"  That means we'll both be at Starbucks in Jardines at 7ish.  The majority of our outings are sponaneous in Queretaro - 9:30pm on Wednesday night after church, whoever is still there when the church is being locked up may hear "we're going to tacos in Tejeda, see you all there in 15 minutes!" and some people show up.  Or sometime between getting to church on sunday morning and the time the service ends, we're magically set to go to the "Airport Corn and Gorditas" (about a 40 minute drive into the countryside for the best corn on the cob and gorditas EVER).  Sometimes a 8pm phone call for something totally unrelated ends up in us going to friends' house for snacks and a movie immediately after hanging up. 

So, because I know that pretty much everyone who isn't a college student in the USA plans outings in advance, we've been calling people maybe 3 to 10 days in advance of meeting with them.  Then I call them the day before the event.  And most of the time I get, "Oh, can you guys not make it?" or "Did something come up for you?"  Maybe the fact that I call to confirm raises questions in their minds about our availabilty?  I'm confused...  So then we quit confirming and just showed up at peoples' homes when we hadn't spoken with them for a week.  And they were expecting us!  Amazing!  If I asked someone in Queretaro to come over a week from now, and I didn't hear from them and I didn't call them, I wouldn't expect them be there. 

I guess I'm just in the process learning my own culture all over again, this time as an adult, as I'd never been an adult in the United States before! 

Reading and Learning

I just read a REALLY interesting book - The Unlikely Disciple, which tells about the experience of a non-Christian guy's semester at Liberty University, which is definitely on the ultra-conservative side of Evangelical Christianity.  It was interesting to see what were the things that most struck the author as odd in a conservative Christian community.  Some of the things didn't seen weird to me (like that classes start with prayer, for example).  But others were things that I don't understand either, even after having grown up in a Christian family, and gone to a not-as-conservative Christian college. 

For example, the author mentions that he felt that a lot of Christians (in his experience) don't care about the environment.  Falwell gave a sermon (seriously?!) on global warming in the course of that semester at Liberty, saying that it was a big myth.  Do I think that as Christians we should be concerned about the Earth's environment?  ABSOLUTELY!!  God made everything on the earth for our use, and we should take care of it, so in my opinion, we should use God's earth in a way that's respectful to Him - the Creator of it.  I DON'T think that taking care of the environment is our #1 priority by any means, but it's important!  And in my experience growing up in a Christian environment (mainly in the 80's and 90's) I heard people even laughing, saying that it is dumb to worry about the environment!  That's shameful to me. 

The author had his run-ins with people who were completely ignorant and rude, as well as with those who were really, well, normal.  Reading this book has made me think a lot about how I am viewed as a Christian (especially living in a place where there are VERY few Christians!)  Do people see me as loving and accepting, or as some rude religious fanatic?  I'm pretty sure the "rude religious fanatic" isn't how people see my husband and I, seeing as how we are frequently invited out with people who aren't Christians and even those who don't want anything to do with Christianity.  But they like US as people.  I don't want to be a "religious" person - I want to be someone who truly loves and follows Christ and shares that love with others!  In all I do I want to love others, at the same time not compromising my values or sinning.  Sometimes it's hard to balance that, but we're learning! 

Done!

I FINALLY have all my documents to be able to leave the country and to go to the U.S.  I'm all set on my documents now for TEN years!  Yay!!!  (With the exception of my driver's license... which I probably need to get a Queretaro one but won't yet because it's another expense and we'll just wait to get it until we get back from the States.)

Resumé

Our friend, Alma, and her husband have been coming over to the house recently to work on Alma's resumé.  She went to school with JP and is looking for a job.  JP and Max, Alma's husband, were making fun of the picture she put on her resumé (here you have to put a picture of you on it), and told her she should change the picture. 

Unbeknownst to Alma, Max and JP DID change her photo.  To this one:

And, instead of going home and opening up her resumé file before sending it to potential employers, she just attached the file as it was when she left our house.  Oops!!  After sending it to one potential employer, she opened the file to see Krusty the Clown in place of her picture!  At least she only sent it to one place... and we figured, hey, maybe they'll call her for an interview just out of curiosity!  hehe!

Mexican!

On Friday, I officially became a Mexican!  My "birth certificate" was given to me (emitted on March 22nd, not sure why they didn't contact me sooner!), and says I'm from Mexico City!  Which is funny, because people from Mexico City ALWAYS ask JP and I if we're from "provincia," which means from anywhere in Mexico that's NOT Mexico City.  hehe! 

I'm getting my passport soon, and went in yesterday to get my "voting credencial," which, besides being what I need to show when going to the polls, is the primary form of ID for Mexicans.  And, unfortunately, I'm "supposed" to get a Queretaro driver's license too, but we'll see...  I have several Mexican friends who have a valid license only from the USA, and haven't had any problems...

Anyhow, we're excited for my double-citizenship!  No more paying residency, nor 4-hour visits to Immigration! 

The State of the State

Queretaro is the state in Mexico that has the most people who worship death, or satan.  There are a lot of churches here, and each one is dedicated to a saint - I think that's pretty normal to hear "St. Matthew's Church," or "Church of Saint Thomas."  But in Queretaro there is a "Church of holy death" in a town right by where JP works.  People make pilgimages from the city to the church.  One Christian girl from the US who came to study at the State University here was living with a family who told her "we worship death."  Before I moved to Queretaro, I would have imagined people who "worship death" to be creepy-scary-looking people who are outcast by society.  But not here.  That family that I know that worships the Santa Muerte is super "normal" - they have a cool house, good jobs, and the woman makes and sells yummy tamales in the house in the evenings.  I was going to put a picture of La Santa Muerte (holy death), but I don't want that on my blog.  But if you want to see what it looks like look it up in Google images.

Please pray for the people in the State of Queretaro.  Of course not all worship death.  But so many are lost, and worship things other than God.  Approximately 1% of the population of this state attends a Christian church.  And how many of those people actually have accepted Christ?  The family who I teach english classes to has an altar to their favorite saint set up in their living room.  Queretaro also has the highest rate of suicides in the country and the highest rate of single moms.  It would be a stretch to say "we're suffering for the sake of Christ," because Queretaro is (in my opinion, and the opinions of many queretanos!) the most beautify city in Mexico!  But even though this city SEEMS to be in good shape - athsetically, economically, politically - we are actually in a really poor state of being.  That's why JP and I are here.  And that's why we ask for your prayers - for us as we work with people here, and for the people we minister to. 

Tacos With Friends

In December calories don't count, right? 

Jean Paul and I have this taco place, El Corral del Taco, that we just LOVE.  And we've been going there a LOT in the past few weeks, with different friends everytime.  We've been going to this place since I lived with Luis and Sandy before JP and I got married (because it's not far from their house, which means that it's not close to ours!)  We kind of know the owner now. 

We went to El Corral del Taco for Karen's birthday:

Just JP and the girls...  myself included!  haha!  (COLD december weather in Queretaro!)

And we went this week with Ramses, who hadn't yet had the Corral experience.  The owner gave us a big plate of "burnt cheese" for free!  Sounds like a booby-prize, but it's the cheese that's left on the griddle after the cheezy taco has been taken off...  SO GOOD!

We love our friends!  And Corral tacos too!

Nuestra Casa es Tu Casa

Our house is YOUR house! 

It's very common here in Queretaro, that when you talk about your house, you say something like, "Yeah, at my house... which is also YOUR house... we like to... blah blah blah..."  Or if you tell people where you live, you say the address and then, "That's where your house is for whenever you want to stop by." 

We really DO want our house to be used by others for blessings!  We generally have a good deal of activity in our house... which is also YOUR house...  hehe!... in the evenings.  We have people that we disciple over for Bible studies, JP's famous guys' movie nights with friends, JP's teachers come over for dinner, sometimes we have youth meetings and/or planning meetings in our house.  We're also getting a rather large stash of STUFF for youth group piling up. 

I LIKE this!  It's DIFFERENT for me!  Since I'm from the United States, I was always acustomed to having people over when it's PLANNED.  And that was never very often. 

Here, we frequently have friends (most of them being guys from the "guys' movie night!") stop by the house "conveniently" at lunch time.  The polite thing to do is invite them to eat with us.  Even though we weren't expecting them.  And being the good mexican wife that I am, :) I always have more food on hand for when this happens.  The mexican kitchen should never be without: rice, beans (already cooked!), limes, home-made salsa, tortillas, and eggs.  With these items you can extend a 2-people meal to a 6-people meal in 15 minutes.  We generally have a good 3-liter bottle of coke hanging around too. 

Now we're excited for Thanksgiving too!  We've lost count of the number of people we've invited, and aren't sure who's actually going to come and who won't make it (it IS at 3pm during a work-day).  I figure we'll have somewhere between 6 and 25 people...  just need to make sure that we have someone bring one roasted chicken for about every 5 people who come.  (We do chicken instead of turkey... way easier and cheaper!)  And maybe say it's a BYOC day (Bring Your Own Chair!) 

JP showing off last years' banquet for 9:

So come on over!  We'll hook you up with some food and 2 square meters of floor space to sleep on!  :)

And you can help us out with this the huge pile of youth group STUFF that we acquired recently - these three HUGEEEEEEEEEEE bags of chips (they're about of third of what was there before the "Santo Relajo" event!), pingpong equipment, 50 hot dog buns and 6 kilos of hot dogs crammed into the freezer, and a vast array of random youth-game stuff. 

Note to Self...

When you see a familiar-looking, harmless caterpillar on the ground, stoop to pick it up, and your husband yells "NOO!  No lo toques!  Te va a quemar!  (Don't touch that!  It'll burn you!)..."  don't touch it.

I've seen these caterpillars around Queretaro.  They look a LOT like those fuzzy black ones with an orange middle that we used to have as pet in Oregon (until they either dehydrated or starved to death!).  Hence me wanting to pick on up. 

I heeded my JP's advice and didn't touch the caterpillar (although I secretly wanted to to see what would happen). 

I went to Bernal the other week and was climbing the big rock (photo above), and my friend Pam (the girl with red hair, above) was having a rough go of it.  She was worrying about slipping on the rocks, and me and others were assuring her that she wouldn't slip.  I was right in front of her... and I started to slip, but caught myself before she noticed.  In that process, my wrist brushed up against something and immediate pain went through my whole arm.  I thought some huge bumble bee or something had stung me.  But no.  I had lightly touched an "azotador" caterpillar.  The stupid thing was unphased and went inching his way down the rock, as I tried not to cry.  We got up to the top of the rock and I was still in pain.  Someone suggested I suck on my wrist and spit out the bad stuff.  BAD idea.  Then my mouth hurt too! 

That caterpillar burn lasted for like 4 hours! 

I learned my lesson.  Don't pick up random caterpillars.