Update #3

We’ve completed a month in Santiago and are becoming accustomed to a fairly normal routine as well as our new surroundings. We continue to participate in weekly devotional time with the university and high school students, Friday evening English class and Sunday lunch with the group after church. Our recent meetings with other interns and our intern coordinator have also been productive. We recently met to discuss a few changes to the program, mostly in an effort to help future interns adjust and get settled and into a routine as quickly as possible. Thank you for continually praying for us!

This past Saturday, we spent the day at the new church building painting the classrooms with the team and many Chilean members. We got lots of work done, painting the children’s classrooms downstairs and several adult classrooms upstairs as well as the jovenes (youth) room. We are supposed to be able to move into the building within the next two months, with the inaugural service scheduled for March 19, 2006.

John and Zane painting the children's classrooms.

The jovenes room...almost there.

Rodrigo, Amanda, and Renzo during cleanup.

We started our Spanish classes this afternoon with a school here in Providencia, the same comuna (area) that the church is in. We decided to take class together in a group setting so we can go at the same time, and because we finished our time in Guatemala covering the same material and are fairly equal in regards to what we have been taught. We are taking 4 hours per week, and our school is very flexible and can make adjustments if we feel the need to take separate classes.

Overall some days are frustrating due to the amount of language we don’t know, but this usually involves being around a group of Chileans in a loud environment and not understanding a word. There are other times during class at church or spending time with a small group that we feel very confident because we are able to keep up with the conversation. Most Chileans are patient and willing to slow down and help us out. Its been great living with Eduardo and Jill because they have been very helpful answering questions and giving us extra practice.

The holidays are coming up quickly for us! It's hard to believe that Christmas is just over a week away! This coming Friday night we will have a Christmas party with the English class group. We plan on having a gift exchange as well as lots of food and singing.

A little beauty...

Since we are in the beginning of summer, we thought we would include some pictures of the beauty we have seen around our neighborhood.

Sunset from the apartment.