Bogota and beyond!

So, since my last post, I have had the most AMAZING weekend! It was a long one because Monday was one of the 18 public holidays they have each year here (compared to the 8 we have in England!) We spent Saturday at the botanical gardens, which was so peaceful and relaxing. There is a beautiful rose garden, which was my favourite part, but they also have a huge greenhouse with different rooms for each of the climates found in Colombia, which was super cool ('cheverisimo' as they would say here).

On Sunday, we went back to the Vineyard church where we went the previous week with Abi. They have it at the top of a Persian restaurant, and everyone sits on comfy benches along one wall, or on cushions on the floor against the other. The service is in Spanish, but someone often translates the sermon for us, and the songs are often ones we know in English, like Blessed be your name or Come, now is the time to worship, but sung in Spanish, which is great fun! The service 'starts' at 10.30 (aka 11) so we turned up at 10.20 to find no one there and went for an awkward walk round the block until someone recognised us from the previous week and asked if we had forgotten where the church was! We had no plans for lunch but the same couple (Maciel and Alvero) who invited us for lunch the previous week found out about this, and quickly invited us round for lunch again. Colombian hospitality in incredible. Us Brits could really learn something from their generosity and spontaneity. After a delicious lunch, they took us to a neighbourhood of Bogota called Usaken, which has a beautiful artisan and crafts market on a Sunday, where I bought some lovely earrings.It was such a nice way to spend an afternoon, and I was overwhelmed by their hospitality, and that we could have such an amazing day considering we had no plans first thing that morning.

Maciel and Alvero said they would be visiting a lake out of the city called Guatavita on Monday and asked if we would like to join them. It was on our list to see, and as it is a 2 hour drive from where we stay, it was going to be difficult for us to get there, so we gratefully accepted. Monday was an amazing day. The lake has a lot of history and is fundamental in the legend of El Dorado. It was a pretty walk up to the lake, although the altitude of 3000m made it a little challenging, but the view from the top was worth every step. The lake is a beautiful turquoise colour and the mountain scenery around it is amazing. They then took us to the new town of Guatavita which is very pretty and bought us a delicious lunch of trout and chips. I have never had such a big plate of trout before!

The rest of the week has also been good, but very tiring. We had 5 music lessons this week, the first of which was a slight disaster as we didn't manage to communicate anything we wanted them to do, but they got progressively better, and we were so pleased with how the last one went! Our cooking lessons have also been good fun, making bread with all the classes. We have started work on tidying some cupboards and storage rooms that desperately need sorting but no one here has the time as they are desperately short staffed. It's a big task but we are more than happy to do it.We are continuing with the board games lessons, and this week I taugh the kids Pass the Pigs, which is one of the Preston family's favourite games!

On Wednesday we had the chance to visit another project in the south of the city, called Children's Vision International, who have 3 children's homes, a school and a medical centre. It's great to see other projects that are going on in the city, and their story is so encouraging. It started out with a lady taking in a baby she found abandoned under a bridge 20 years ago, and now it is a really well run organisation with one of the best stocked medical centres I've seen in a developing country and 195 kids at their school. It's encouraging to see how much of a difference can be made, from such small beginnings.

Once again, my photos from the week are on blipfoto :)

Prayer requests:

• For the school lisence which needs to come through ASAP. The school have done all they can and are just waiting on the government.
• For Felipe,  a Colombian we met and became good friends with, who has gone to Leticia (a city in the very very south of Colombia, in the Amazon) to do a YWAM discipleship training course. Pray that he settles in well and really knows God's presence with him.
• For Alvero and Maciel, thank God for their kindness, and pray that he will bless them as they try to start a family
• For team relations, that minor disagreements would not lead to bigger arguments