TGIF!

I think this is week #3, if I'm not mistaken. Sometimes you can lose track of things like that when you're having too much fun. And fun we had this week with our second official workshop. What a difference in students we had! This week, we had more PEF students and most all were members. One, Renato, was not a member, but they all were so good to him explaining things about the church and about missions, because most of the guys in their were returned missionaries. By the end of the week, he offered the very last prayer after we taught him how to pray. It was such a neat thing to see!

They all worked very hard in their participation of the activities and we did our part in having much more activities for them to participate in. We improved 100% this week in our teaching. It also helped that the class members just caught on to things so quickly. They were a smart group. I think our highlight of the workshop was playing a game "Jefe, Jefe" (boss, boss) which involves rhythym and constant awareness of your number. If the boss calls your number, then you have to respond without skipping a beat. Then you call out another number. If you mess up, you move to the end of the line. For those of you who might now, it is also known as "big booty" or something like that. It was a hit! We asked them what they learned from the activity in regards to networking. They mentioned various things such as paying attention to who you're close to becuase you might miss opportunities. It was very useful, thanks to our pre internship training and an idea from a fellow intern!

I almost didn't make it for the last day. Wednesday night, I had gotten sick from one of two things: food poisoning or a flu that has been going around. I came into the workshop late, but was able to finish it up. Don't worry, I'm on the mend!

Jody and I have also spent our outside time doing splits with the sister missionaries in our ward which have been so neat. It's been nice to be a "full-time missionary" once a week (not to be confused with the idea that every member a missionary all the time. I just don't do street contacts quite like the sisters do outside of that time ;) ). We met a chilean who practices Islam and it was such an interesting conversation. We tried to do some teaching with him, but he was very obstinate. As we left him, he said "Que Allah les bendiga", a change from "Que Dios les bendiga" which is a common saying they tell people as they go (something similar to "God bless".) I had never heard that before, so one for the record.

I had my first competo last night, a hot dog with a mix of a green salsa and salsa of tomatos (not to be confused with ketchup). Apparently, it's not a "real" completo, as Jody was telling me, but at least I enjoyed it.
This is what a completo looks like, except the one I had didn't have guacamole. Oh well. Next time.

Sorry no pics other than the completo that I pulled off the internet ;) - Jody has all the ones I want and I haven't gotten them from her yet. Have a good weekend!

Weekend/ New week

Sunday was Jody's birthday! So Monday we had two parties for her: one in the office and one at home. It was so nice of the Hermanas in the office to prepare two cakes and a plate of jello for her. We all enjoyed each other's company, especially the dear Hermana Lily who made sure we all had our pieces of cake. Poor Hermano Nuñez has to spend all this time with women! He always makes comments about our "women talk". It's so funny! But the best part was when Hermana Lily was passing a piece of tres leches to Hermano Nuñez when the cake fell to the floor! We all gasped as Hermana Lily said "SH**!" Twice! We all laughed so hard (those of us who understood English!)

The second party for Jody was also fun as friends from her mission, from the ward and from the workshop came to our tiny apartment. Lots of friends, but too much food was left over. Why oh why?

Today was our second taller (workshop in Spanish) and we improved so much from last week! Most of our class consists of students who are members and then two non members - one man from Peru and a Chilena. I have high hopes!

Big sigh of relief

Another week has come and gone!

This week was our first time teaching the Career Workshop. Needless to say, Jody and I were nervous as ever. We were surprised at who were in attendance: two Columbianos, two uneducated Peruvian women (who arrived a couple hours late), three returned missionaries for the PEF, an older Chileno who was also uneducated, a young Chilena who just finished her studies, and two Hatian men who spoke very little English and Spanish. We knew we were in for a doozy. Our first day, we fumbled through the new ideas and concepts (to us, at least) in Spanish. Towards the end of the day, we realized that we rushed through the explanations a little too fast just to get to the activities, but in doing that, the class was confused and we would have to go back and explain again the objectives. It was harder than we thought.

The second day was so much smoother than the first, but then we ran out of time for all the activities we wanted. We started with filming practice interviews. They didn't like it too much to be videotaped, but they saw the importance of seeing themselves and what they could work on. We were also surprised when mostly everyone returned. All came back except for the Peruvian ladies and one of the Hatian men. That was a good measure of our "success". The last day, some made phone calls to actual companies and one PEF applicant left with an invitation to an interview! We were all excited.

Even though not everyone was as successful, I think they left with greater confidence. Some more than others, though. Since each one came from different backgrounds, it was a challenge relating to their specific needs. Pedro, the elderly Chilean man, was looking for work after being taking care of the bulk of his life by his parents. We are still unsure about how that exactly worked for him, but now he's paying for it by trying to get a job with very little work experience. Jean Goodson, the Haitian man, still can't work here legally (he moved here two months ago), but he made the effort with every activity we gave him, even with the practice interview! It was actually funny since I was the one "interviewing" him. The last question I asked was "Do you have a question for me?" (As if I were the actual employer). He said that he speaks very little English and very little Spanish, and then said "No cachai" a Chilean phrase meaning "get it." But how he said it was so sweet and simple, everyone laughed, including him. It showed he has what it takes to do everything in his power to get a job. One of the Columbians, Ricardo, wants to run for president of Columbia in 2012. His high ambitions will help him along his way as well.

At the end, I realized how much I cared for each one and their success. I hope that they will keep us informed as to their successes and even failures!