December 30-January 5 Feijoas and 2014

Arising early Monday morning, we packed up our suitcases, stripped the bed, then enjoyed an egg and potato dish for breakfast with the Cely family. Some of our group left in the car to travel to a nearby town to visit some other family members before we were up and about. We didn't know when they would return, so Mike and I went on a walk up the road where we met our host's little (really little) neighbor lady walking towards her home with a five-gallon bucket full of food scraps. The eating place down the highway saves the peelings and stems from the vegetables they use, and she goes each day to collect them to feed to her sheep (which graze in her front yard). Mike offered to carry the bucket as we walked back to her house while visiting. The sheep hurried towards her as she took the bucket from his hand and tossed the scraps onto the ground. They must know how good vegetables are for their health, as they chomped away at the carrots peels, potato chunks and assorted green things. Our chatting was interrupted by a loud burst of music which emanated from somewhere on the little lady's person. It was almost surreal as she reached into the front of her blouse and pulled out a cell phone. Earlier that morning, I was on the roof watching her haul buckets of water to her pila (cement washing area) in her backyard, where she scrubbed her clothes and her big, heavy rug, then hung them on a wire line to dry. It was so odd to think that she had a cell phone and we just watched her jabber away in amazement. We finally got on our way about noon, making a quick stop to meet Pilar, Andres and Estefania, who were staying another day with Andres's family. After arriving back at our apartment, Mike and I took a nap in our very own, comfortable bed, then got ready for Family Home Evening at the Colombia South Mission Home with President and Hermana Lozano, the Andelins, the Wakefields and one missionary recovering from an appendectomy. When we arrived, we were happy to discover dinner was on tap, as we hadn't had time to eat before walking to their apartment. The focus of the lesson/discussion centered on helping members who struggle. It seems there are always new programs rolling out, but afterwards, both Mike and I agreed that if the basic programs of Home and Visiting Teaching were faithfully done, new programs would not sometimes be needed.

Mike's New Very Small Friend

Her House

Her Ovejas

Washing Her Rugs

We Try Every New Fruit We Come Across - Here is
a Feijoa Right off the Tree - More Tart than
Mike Expected

Yellow in the House for Good Fortune
in 2014

Feijoa Smoothies

Our Wonderful Hosts

The Onions of Boyaca

Selling Wheat for Prosperity and Grapes for
the 12 Wishes

Lake Sochagota With Paipa, Colombia
in the Distance

Kristi Savoring Her Bizcocho

Monday Family Home Evening

 

Tuesday we worked our last day at the office that is minutes (walking) from our apartment. Starting Tuesday, we will be taking a taxi to work every day. The office closed at noon for New Year's Eve, but we worked until 1:00 p.m., wanting to get our list of calls completed. A long nap was in order, since we had big plans for the evening - joining the Gomez family to celebrate a traditional Colombian New Year's celebration! At 8:30 p.m. our "chauffeur", Bro. Gomez, arrived to pick us up. He previously instructed Mike to NOT wear a tie or white shirt and for me to NOT wear a skirt/dress. This sounded fun! When we entered the door to their home, the heavenly smell of something delicious in the oven made us stop and take a very deep breath - kind of like on Thanksgiving when we get to Grandma's house. A turkey wasn't in the oven, but I did see a pig! We were going to feast on homemade lechona. I was glad the head had been removed so it would fit in the oven. There is something inherently creepy about eating an animal with it’s head still on and it’s eyes looking at you. The Gomez's little grandson, Benjamin, entertained us for the next hour or so with his cute antics and expressive faces. All I could imagine in my mind for awhile were our grandchildren's faces, and thoughts of home washed like waves over my heart. Being with such wonderful friends did much to alleviate our loneliness for family. About 10:30 p.m., their daughter’s husband’s family arrived and the party began in earnest since Benjamin's aunties are in their teens and early twenties. Dinner tasted as delicious as it smelled. Lechona (basically a pig stuffed with yellow peas, green onions, yellow rice, and various spices, and cooked in an oven for about 10 hours) is such a popular holiday food that there are literally pages of places in Bogota’s phone book (lechonerias) where you can order a pig, sized to the amount in your party.

At midnight, the Colombian traditions began to unfold. First, the bowl of grapes came out. You must eat twelve grapes in a row, making a wish as you eat each one. Next, you grab a suitcase or a bag, go outside and run around the block carrying or rolling your suitcase behind you. This is to assure yourself and family good travels in the coming year. We didn't participate in this activity, as we were too busy watching and photographing the Gomez daughters, grandson, and all the neighbors running along the road dragging their suitcases and bags behind them. When everyone was back inside, Sis. Gomez produced a bowl of cooked lentils and dispensed a spoonful to every single person assuring sufficient food for the coming year. My very favorite tradition was the beautiful family prayer offered as everyone knelt together. In addition to thanking God for all things great and small, appreciation was expressed for things which occurred during the past year. Specific blessings according to the needs of each individual family member were then petitioned and the list was not short - blessings regarding work, school, health, heartfelt desires, and dreams. It was a tender and precious memory I will never forget and we plan to make this tradition a part of our future Anderton New Year's celebrations. Every culture and every people can bless our lives in different ways. It is one of the reasons why serving missions is so important. We also noticed two other things over the final days of the year that were interesting. Wheat stalks for prosperity and the color yellow for riches adorned most every home. Finally, we kept seeing stuffed, scarecrow-type bodies sitting along the roadside, on porches, and on rooftops. Apparently, the “people” are filled with fireworks and scraps of paper (on which are written descriptions of any bad thing that happened during the year) This had a familiar Honduran feel to it, although I don’t remember the fireworks. The figures are dressed in articles of clothing from members of the family. At midnight, the figures are set ablaze and all the past year's troubles go up in smoke and flames (and it also creates the need to go buy some new clothes). The Gomez family created their own variation of this tradition by placing the slips of paper into a sock (which was inscribed with a smiley face and the year 2014). Sometime after midnight, they throw it into the fire.

Lest you think the night ended there, the karaoke began about 1:00 a.m. and we finally ended about 3:00 a.m. Our videos and photos contain some excellent extortion material. Mike and I were very happy we had the foresight to take a nap! Back in the apartment at 3:30 a.m., we fell into bed and slept until 11:00 a.m. the next morning.

Wednesday, the first day of 2014, was spent entirely on sorting and filing our photos, catching up on correspondence, and working on our blog since everything was closed up tight.

Work, work, work was on tap for Thursday at the new office. Workmen arrived early and removed a wall, then reinstalled desks in one half of the room. Mike and I packed up the entire offices of Bro. Fernandez and Bro. Gomez, since they will not be working there anymore and are still on vacation. They will return to a room full of boxes to go through on Tuesday. Surprise! We didn't feel like cooking dinner so we went out and searched the streets near the apartment for a new place to eat. (There are tons.) To our surprise, not a half a block away, we found a Tony Roma's. Big signs are not the norm here, so it's easy to not know what is out there. We ended up choosing a little restaurant in the hotel we walk by every day. We were the only patrons, and ordered soup and pizza which were both delicious.

Friday's Tappsi taxi turned out to be blue, not yellow - a first! Apparently, blue taxi's are electric and there are only fifty operating in this city out of 60,000. One would think the government would provide major incentives for taxistas to purchase these non-polluting cars, but that is not the case. The taxi was the size of a small SUV (much larger than our normal taxis). The best things were the backseat legroom and unburied, functioning seat-belts! After each Tappsi ride you are asked to rate the ride online and offer comments. I have a standard comment in the "notes" app on my phone which I cut and paste into the reply. It reads (in Spanish), "Friendly driver, but the SEAT-BELTS DO NOT FUNCTION!" Today, dressed in jeans and T-shirts, we cleaned the new, CAS office (Centro de Auto-Suficiencia) from top to bottom. Every file, every drawer, every shelf, every closet, every cabinet, every EVERYTHING was emptied out and scrubbed. The office cleaning lady who is there each afternoon was smiling brightly as she carried bag after bag of trash out the door, including the broken microwave oven. Bro. Gomez has had so much on his plate for so long and it is difficult sometimes to know what to keep and what to throw away. That's our specialty:) Now that we have all the equipment and supplies organized into one place, we realize we have a supply of staples to last through the millennium. While all this was going on, an enthusiastic young man, Jonathan, came to the center and sat at a computer all day searching for information on college programs in the U.S. He wants to get further schooling in his area of study to help him in his desire to counsel recovering addicts. We are so eager to get our new office up and running. We are ready for the holidays to be over since everything shuts down (including all Church offices). We found out at the end of our work day that there is ANOTHER holiday on Monday – the day where Colombians celebrate the arrival of the wise men or “El Dia de Los Reyes”. This one we did not see coming and it seems that there is even more of shutdown than Christmas or New Year’s Day, because most of the businesses close. This results in a mass exodus from the Bogota urban core to the countryside.
 

Mike Hard at Work

The Office Being Torn Apart and Put Back
Together

 

On Saturday I did laundry and then we headed out to get some exercise. We stopped at a little café

around the corner for lunch. All the employees had a brown, Chevrolet logo on their shirts. We guessed that the owner probably has a car dealership, in addition to his little chain of cafes. Afterwards, we ventured out to HomeCenter store to purchase some items I have been wanting, like a sifter (the internet says this helps with cake baking at high altitudes by taking out 2 T. flour for every cup used and replacing it with 2 T. cornstarch, then sifting the mixture five times). Now if I can only find cornstarch! We also got spare keys made for our apartment. Our landlord told us to only make keys at HomeCenter because "other places don't make good keys." We did not listen and he was right. We tried making copies at two different places on the street (very cheap) and neither set worked. So we decided to heed his advice this time. I also bought a cooling rack (high hopes for good cookies), some more hangers, laundry detergent, etc. Next we went to Exito hoping to find sage, bay leaves, and cheddar cheese, which they have had before. I don’t like the flavor or texture of the traditional Colombian cheeses. I didn't find sage or bay leaves in the spices, but did find them in fresh form, so I am now drying them. We stopped on the way home to grab a bite to eat and as we were finishing, an American man came in carrying a LARGE, two-foot-long piece of an aloe vera plant. He explained that his wife was very sick in their hotel room and that the doctor told him to get a piece of aloe vera and get it blended into a drink. Man did he find a large piece! We were pleasantly surprised at how accommodating the restaurant was with his situation. The employee carefully sliced it in sections, peeled off one side of the tough, outer skin, then scraped the gooey flesh from the inside into a blender. She then added some other ingredients (who knows what), then poured it into a glass pitcher for him, gave him a glass and said, "que le vaya bien" (hope all goes well). Mike said the restaurant must have a "BYOC" policy (“bring your own cactus”) - it did look like a cactus. 

The Very Tired and Thrilled Shopper in the
Checkout Line

 

Sunday we made took a long taxi ride to the north end of Bogota to attend the Villa del Prado and Granda Ward meetings. That will be our routine (attending different wards) for the rest of our time here. Our goal is to use Sundays to introduce the concept of the new Self-Reliance Center, show the members there are real people there that can help, share with the ward leaders what we have to offer, and find out if the ward has a functioning Self-Reliance Specialist. We actually knew about four or five families in the two wards (some being employees at the Area Office and others being family members of missionaries we work with) so it was fun. Fortunately for us, we were introduced to the Granda Stake Self-Reliance Specialist (the Stake that included both of the wards) and talked for two hour with him. Happily, he seems very excited to work with the "barrios" (wards) in securing a specialist for each one. The Villa del Prado testimony meeting was as inspiring and heart-felt as any testimony meeting one could attend anywhere on the planet. Such fine people. We were very impressed. The reverence during the sacrament portion of the meeting was exceptional. even with lots of children. What a great Sabbath.