NIKO (shhhhhh....)

I just spent my week at NIKO. It's a camp that I'm sworn to secrecy about for the most part. It's a leadership camp, but the entire time you have to work in team. It was difficult for some. For me it was a little challenging, but almost everything was stuff that I love to do. It was restful even though we were wet a most of the time. The funny thing that was a big lesson for me was having to eat sardines. I really hate fish: don't like looking at them, don't like smelling them, and have only eaten them a few times when force fed. They were all we had for lunch one day, and I took one bite a gagged. The guy on my team gave me this look like, “Rachel, are you serious? You have conquered in everything so far and you’re not going to eat this...” I did eat about 2/3 of my share without hating it! Good thing too, because my outreach is on the coast where we’re going to have to eat fish a lot.

It’s funny the ridiculous things we think we can’t do and let get in the way of good experiences. “Thoughts have consequences.” A 13-year-old girl on my team didn’t enjoy any of our walks and adventures because she thought we always walked too fast. She cried every time we went walking (which was a good portion of 4 of the 5 days). It brought our whole team down because we all had to be encouraging her instead of getting the opportunity to enjoy the beauty around us or feel victorious at what we were accomplishing. She was healthy and DID everything, but didn’t want to enjoy a minute of it. It made me think about what stupid little things I pridefully let get in the way of enjoying my experiences or my life.

I love living in Colombia, wouldn’t exchange my life for an instant. The things I get to do and the ways I’m stretched more than make up for the cold showers, different food and language difficulties. But would I allow a plate with a fish on it put me in a bad attitude and hurt the feelings of a host on outreach? It was such an important lesson for me. One little grateful “thanks” can immensely bless someone and one sour face can make a heart sink. I don’t want to be that stuck up girl, I want to make choices to make the most of my time for myself and for the people I effect. I need to spend time searching for more things in my life that I decide to let get to me, and for that ruin the opportunity in front of me. Not many people have the same challenges as me, but I’m sure you have challenges daily too. I hope you decide to be a conqueror, an adventurer, a joyful disciple.


EASTER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I’m scandalized that they don’t really celebrate it. This was “holy week” but a big celebration is only for the Catholics. Most people were tired after NIKO and didn’t even go to church! Don’t worry... I got up and went to church. And my mom sent me and Desteni little egg candles that say “Happy Easter.” The two of us couldn’t help but be our crazy, American selves this morning:

We went out to the park and had an egg hunt. We got one of our friends to take the pictures, I think he was highly amused. For those of you who look at them, I know it’s hard to tell but we tried to spell “Happy Easter.” :) Hope you all had a wonderful time with God thinking about the new lives we can live.