Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Contact

Today, Carlos and I went to Edson's house for breakfast around nine o'clock. Edson is the Young Life Area Director in San Martin de Porres, where I'm living. We ate a large breakfast together, and later discussed some of the issues facing the Global Leaders, as explained in the last post. We spent some time praying for them, and then further discussed what I will be doing in the remaining weeks of my stay here in Peru. After that, Rafael showed up and we worked on planning the all area treasure hunt that we're doing at the end of the month. We'll have teams running all over North Lima, and ending up together at the beach. Think "Amazing Race," Young Life style.

By then it was two o'clock in the afternoon. We had missed meeting Emilio and his friends to play soccer in Santa Rosa, but Carlos had made plans with some other kids to play around four. So, Edson sent us home to eat and to rest. Carlos brought lunch over from his mom's house and we ate with our friend Lucho. After lunch, I fell asleep on the couch for about an hour, and then woke up and headed out to do some contact work.

But they don't call it contact work here in Peru. They just call it contact, or contacto. Vamos a hacer contacto. I like that. It takes some of the pressure off. After all, meeting kids, building relationships, shouldn't be work. That is, it shouldn't feel like work, it shouldn't be a labor. It should and does take effort. But so does playing soccer.

When we left the house, Marcelo was downstairs outside his house. We invited him to come along. He was very curious about what we were doing, and why people from San Martin de Porres were going to Santa Rosa to do Young Life. It was a joy to listen as Carlos explained why we were going to start club in Santa Rosa, and that Young Life is bigger than San Martin, that it's everywhere, including Fresno, Fowler, Sanger, and even Mongolia. We want to share what Marcelo has with the kids in Santa Rosa. Marcelo thought that was pretty cool, or as they say here, bien chevere.

When we arrived in San Martin, I watched as Carlos began to feel the nerves any Young Life leader feels as they walk into the world of kids, into the unknown. Eventually he found a kid he knew and introduced himself to his friends. After kicking a ball around and some small talk, we started a mini soccer tournament. Four teams of three to four people, best of three goals wins, winners move on. As more and more kids gathered to play and to watch, I recognized a few kids that had joined us at camp, including my buddy, Emilio. He joined my team right away, and was a pretty good little goalie. I'm proud to say that my team won. Afterward, Marcelo asked me where I'd learned to play soccer. I told him my Young Life friends back home taught me.

It was good to get out and meet some kids and be a part of forming relationships that could lead to starting a new club in Lima. It was good to see Emilio again. It was good to hear Marcelo's curiosity about why we do what we do.

Tonight, Carlos and I had a quiet night in getting some much needed rest.

3 comments:

  1. this trip sounds amazing i would love to do a trip like this someday ur so lucky :P see u soon

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  2. ""It is good!". God says that too!! Keep it up!

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  3. It's great that we can form relationships with people even on the other side of the world where their lives are completely different than ours here in the U.S. Keep having a blast and I'll be praying for you and your team!

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