Trabajo a la Iglasia, or Work on the Church.

“ What are the odds of making friendships before you start work? It's all very surreal”

Before we arrived in Los Alamos we assumed that we'd start work on the church almost immediately. As most of you know however, it didn't work like that. We didn't lift a a finger to help with the building until a week after our arrival. That one week period helped us gain some perspective on what we were doing though. Instead of being primarily about building something material, it's also about building up the people. 

Friends.

Dad first went to work last Friday, by himself. On Saturday, which was a working bee day, Madd and Beth went with him. They were surprised but not a little relieved, when they were the only ones to turn up beside two older guys. It was a blessing being able to size up the work site, hear what the plans were and get into the rhythm of swinging a hammer again, without the added dimension of socialising! The property is quite small, and the prospective church will take up all the land excluding a pathway down one side. That morning we de-nailed and de-concreted some old forms (boards) from the middle of the grounds, and piled them along the fence for future use.

looking back toward the road. The door on the right leads to the dining room/kitchen (temporary church since the earthquake).

This past week we've been building molds out of the forms for concrete foundations to be poured into. The two older guys work well together, so most of the time they work on one thing while Dad and us girls work on a different part of the project. We overlap a lot, naturally, but with the language barrier it is easier if we don't try to help them too often. Our favorite phrase at the moment is 'No entiendo.' Which basically means I don't understand. Or, 'Lenta, Lenta' which means slow (down). It also means as slow as an old rooster walking down the street, so you can use it in a couple of different ways. Often times we ask people what the Spanish word is for an object, and people will sometimes ask us what the English words are. Madd and Beth translated 'nail bel't into Spanish and called it a Claves Calcetine. Unfortunately, if you look calcetines up in the dictionary it means socks! So in effect we said we wore Nail Socks to work. We're still living that one down...

Val, on a work day.

If everyone learnt English as well as Val did, then we probably wouldn't have to learn any Spanish. We're enjoying Spanish though, so perhaps it's a good thing most people aren't as good as Val. She's been a real blessing in the form of a translator on the work site. It must have taken a lot of nerve to come help us when she'd never done anything of the kind before!

Progress has been slow, but steady. We are getting to know the two older guys quite well as they are very faithful in their work. They are what Anne of Green Gables would call 'kindred spirits'.

Thus ends week two since our arrival...