Antigua

Well our entire group has made it safely to Peru. When we arrived on Wednesday night we were all shuttled out to our host families. I had been under the impression that we would be the only person living with our families, but when I got to my “new home” I found out that I would be living with 8 other students. I was a little disappointed at first, especially when I sat down for dinner and everyone was talking to me in English, but it is actually really cool. In my home there are 2 guys and a girl from Belgium, 2 girls from Denmark, 1 girl from Switzerland, 1 girl from the UK, and one from the US. So it is a very international group and 2 of them don’t speak much English so we have been using more Spanish lately. Anyways, please keep my host family (father: Miguel, mother: Amanda, children: Alan, Diego, and Guillermo) in your prayers and that I would be able to develop relationships with them in spite of the boarding house like atmosphere. Also please be praying for the other students that I am living with. We eat all three meals together 6 days per week, so we should have a lot of quality time together.

Tuesday morning our group met at Appe language school for orientation and a tour of Antigua. It is a really beautiful city with colonial architecture and cobble stone streets. There is also a coffee shop on every corner and most with wireless internet. That makes me really happy as I’m sure you can imagine. At the language school we each have a personal tutor that we meet with 4 hours per day. My tutor is so, so wonderful. Her name is Claudia and please be praying for her and that we would be able to have good conversations as I learn Spanish. Yesterday she described herself as an evangelical catholic and we talked a little about the differences between Catholicism and Protestantism. Unfortunately I didn’t understand a lot of what she said but it was a good start.

Today most of our group was looking for coffee shop with wireless and the one that we wondered into just happened to be a Christian church. Our waiter shared his testimony with us and we are excited about helping out with some of their ministries.

Anyways, that’s all for now. I am so excited to be here and I feel like I am already making a lot of progress with Spanish. I love you all and miss you already. (just a little note – I will reply to any personal emails if you want to say hi… babyruthgt@gmail.com)

Bye until next time!