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Holiday, heat and a heck of a lot of adulting...

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I have been so bad at posting over the last month or so but I am excusing myself by the fact that my parents have been here for the last 3 weeks! What a joy and blessing. They are officially home now (boooo!) but it was so very nice. It will be good to get back into routine though and fully embrace my last 10 weeks! TEN WEEKS?! Where did the time go... No prayer requests in this one.. simply thank you God for my parents and that they could visit and we could have such a special time together! This isn't meant to be a humble brag but I actually feel quite exhausted post-holiday.. I think because I did all the adulting because my parents don't speak much Espa ñ ol! It was funny me telling them where to go and what to do and ordering their food for them at times, as well as talking to the taxi drivers etc. A nice feeling though to be able to show off my language skills! Tehe. We first went to Guatavita for the day - a little town with a lagoon about an hour and a half from B
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Back at it...

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Sorry it has been a while - due to various unfortunate circumstances life has been a bit of a whirlwind - but I am back at it! (Prayer points underlined) Having not been at the project for a few weeks, this week I was back (following our team retreat in Medellin). Our team retreat is Medellin was absolutely brilliant. We were fortunate to have Simon Guillebauld (some of you may have heard of him) with us talking about life in Burundi (having returned after serving out there for 20 years). It was eye-opening to hear about his experience and God hit me with quite a full bullets to think about! I have found myself being challenged here on 'enduring vs enjoying', and this last weekend on 'grumpiness vs gratitude'. I am challenging myself to enjoy each day, despite its struggles and despite being exhauuuuuuuuusted, and trying to see the positive before the negative. I think this is partly a very British culture - we love a good moan! I found myself this week thanking Go
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Samaritan's Purse (teeny weeny update)

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Just a little update to share my Saturday with you! I went to my project as it was a kind of party to welcome the new children to the comedor and share with them a little bit more about God. Part way through the lady who runs the comedor said 'and now Anisa and Rachel are going to share a bit about their best friend God'! That was the first we knew about it! Challenging in Spanish but I think we actually ended up doing a pretty good job (if I do say so myself). Anyway, the super duper cool thing was that all of the new children were given a box of presents from Samaritan's Purse! Those of you from St Paul's (and I'm sure many more) will know the significance of this - it is amazing to see where they end up and the joy they bring to so many children! The children were unbelievably excited to open them and loved all their presents.
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Break my heart for what breaks yours...

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Hola! Thought it was about time I gave you a little update, though to be honest this mostly involves some reflections rather than specifics about what I've been up to. I'm not even going to underline prayer requests in this.. it's pretty obvious. (Sorry if this doesn't read very well, it was quite tricky to write and doesn't flow easily.) Today was an interesting day. It was brilliant, in so many ways, but also interesting. Today my heart broke that little bit more for this city. On the bus, on the way to my project, I sometimes seen a lone prostitute stood on the street corner. Not often, but every now and then. There is a particular area that we go through where I see this (bear in mind this is at 8.30am). Today, on my way home at 4pm, I saw at least 6. It gave me a little more incite into the deepness of this problem - it isn't just on those days that I see 1 that 1 prostitute exists. This is happening all day every day. And my heart broke just that littl
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Today was the day!

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Hey friends... (Prayer requests underlined as per) Today I started my project! It feels super strange, and slightly ridiculous, that I have been here for 3 months and not started, but trust me.. I really needed the time in the Spanish School! I turned up today expecting lots of children.......however there were only 3 when I arrived at 9am this morning! This did increase to 6 throughout the day! The lady who runs the project said next week there will be many more and that it is unusual for there to be so few.  The morning started super chill, we were given yoghurts to have for breakfast... but we were quickly tasked with thinking of activities for the children . I switched straight into think-on-your-feet teaching mode and had the children draw the person to their left. Given I cannot draw I was quite impressed with mine.. here's the picture (don't worry, you're allowed to laugh!): Afterwards, I tried to explain the game where you draw the head, fold it, pass the
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A super short update..

Hey there! I haven't done a blog post for a while so I thought I'd give you a quick update... I was all set to start my project on Monday... but then (as I am in Colombia after all!) I found out the night before that there was a delay and therefore I'm not starting till Thursday (17th). I was initially a bit gutted as I'd hyped myself up but equally grateful for a few more days to prepare and relax a little before the fun begins... So yes, I should be starting on Thursday and will post another update then. In the meantime...enjoy this video of one of today's modes of transport...
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My project (y Feliz Navidad!)

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Hola amigos! I hope December is treating well and you are looking forward to Christmas! (Prayer requests underlined, yeah, I'm sure you get it by now!)  Yesterday I went to visit my project for the first time! It was amazing, overwhelming, brilliant and eye-openin g. I met the lady who runs the project and oh my days. She is amazing. She starts cooking for the children at 4am.. and the children are then often there a few hours later and she often still has children there at 7pm. 6 days a week. She has very little help and is an absolute trooper! Her heart for the children is so obvious and the things she does for them is wonderful. There have been times when she has picked children up from hospital because their parents aren't interested.. I am so excited to work with this wonderful lady and learn from her. We were told some of the children's stories... my goodness. Absolutely horrific. Some of them don't have parents because they've been murdered, or their pa
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