pictures worth sharing ****
Plaza San Martin - there is a plaza by that name in every city in Argentina it seems. Well, this day in particular was a holiday that marked 31 years since "the military coup that ushered in a seven-year dictatorship that killed or made to disappear 30,000 people." ... it is so hard to imagine that happened in such recent history. They string up the pictures of some of the people who disappeared, "the missing," in the plaza. Here is part of a really interesting article from a BA paper... "At the same time, tens of thousands of people joined in two marches to Plaza de Mayo in front of the Government House to demand justice. Similar marches, rallies and ceremonies were held throughout the country."I say to the courts: trial and punishment. We need the trials to be speeded up... There are military who are in hiding today, who are afraid of showing up in court. Military who were the masters of the lives of the Argentines who wanted a different country," Kirchner said at the La Perla army barracks — in central Córdoba province — which functioned as a concentration camp.Undeterred by a heavy rainfall, the crowd cheered Kirchner, who has made human rights one of the cornerstones of his centre-left Peronist administration.The President, on behalf of the state, once against asked for forgiveness."In this camp of horror that was led by cowards whose names are unmentionable, I beg the pardon of the Argentine people, of the grandmothers, of the children, of the disappeared, due to the (state’s) lack of courage to assume responsibility," he said.Similar remarks from Kirchner in the past sparked controversy because he failed to mention that the leaders of the dictatorship were imprisoned under the government of Radical president Raúl Alfonsín — an unprecedented move in Latin America, a continent plagued by dictatorships ever since most of its countries gained independence in the early 19 century." (props to JB)

on a lighter note...here are some great girls to be praying for (l to r: Jemina, Greta, Maira, Euge - Vida student, Kathryn - teammate). they are super fun to spend time with! they are all freshman this year - two are studying English and one of them Art.

the boys...with their Truco cards...that means their happy :) and this time even a whole pizza box to themselves! it really is a fun game, but quite complicated to learn - it's all about bluffing and betting...i think that's why the guys love it so much. ...and because it's Argentine!

a cool sunset sky...taken from our balcony

this picture was from awhile ago, before the weather turned cold...but it's so fun i wanted to share it. these are some of our sweet girls involved in the movement!!

this may be one of my favorites! this is Quino and Charo, our campus director's kids. they are hilarious. well, at the moment they're playing with these toys my parents brought for them - they're blowfish!! i'll have to put another picture up here later so you can see their actual faces but i just love this one.

you can be praying for their family - their grandpa, Mauricio's dad, just passed away yesterday after battling cancer for many years.

thanks for keeping up with our random postings of pictures with captions. one day we'll get better about telling stories and having themes for our posts :)

FALL, FINE ARTS and FAMILY...a picture update

i am amazed at the changing colors of Fall... we as texans are deprived of this gorgeous season... i am trying to soak it all in. yellows, oranges, reds...it's beautiful!!!

in case you can't tell, this may be my new favorite time of year :)

this is Bellas Artes (Fine Arts)...the campus that Kyle and I are focused on for our daily ministry, along with Natalie and Jenna from our team. this is the front door - it is actually a smaller building compared to some of the others at the university. yes, that is grafitti on the walls - that is actually a common sight throughout the city. at this campus students study all kinds of music, composition, directing and all kinds of art, art history, etc.

this is the "patio" behind the school - the building you see is actually a highschool that is attached to the campus. i am standing in the university building taking the picture, looking out. this courtyard area is usually where you can find some students hanging out - either practicing songs for class (singing, guitar, etc.), drawing, sculpting or drinking mate between classes. there's not usually a quiet or dull moment around here! it can be pretty entertaining :)

we had a great time with kindel and matt on their visit!! this was where we had lunch one day in uruguay...awesome fajitas...on my favorite corner in the city. our table was on the cobblestone street, a block from the coast, in quaint little colonia. we all really loved this place!

well, we know that we have a lot to catch you up on over the last couple of months but we also want you stay updated with the current day to day. here's what we've been up to this week and how you can be praying for the ministry....

The 2007 school year starts here the week of March 12 (or 19th for some)...and ends in November. So, we are about to begin our first full (school) year of ministry! The University in La Plata is free for any student, but as a freshman you have to take certain placement tests in order to be accepted to study for some of the majors. All of that is happening right now. The Humanities campus has the most number of students attending (and also the most English speakers).

We spent some time at the beginning of the week planning, praying and gathering materials to help reach out to these freshman - many who are new to the city! The rest of the week we set up a table at the entrance to the building to tell about our ministry, Vida Estudiantil (Campus Crusade's name in South America). We decided as a team that it is really important to get our name out there so that students recognize it and know who we are. Most of the people who set up tables or "promote" anything on campus are political groups who organize big parties and big protests. So...we wanted to distinguish ourselves and give students a much more life-fulfilling option :) Student clubs and organizations are not common here (unless it's a political group), so some people have a hard time understanding what we are.

Praise God that we were able to meet soo many students! Between the 9 of us, we were able to spread out around the campus and talk to students, do surveys about being a freshman at a new place, hand out information on Vida Estudiantil, gather contact information, start our list for English Club and give out the 4 Laws!! I was blown away by how many students approached us to ask questions!!

English Club is a free service we offer, as part of Vida Estudiantil, to help students who are learning, practice conversation. In the past it has proved to be a great way to build friendships and not just share the gospel but share what life is like following Christ. We already, this first week, have more students signed up for English Club than we had come the second half of last year!!!

Also, Praise God for bringing to us 2 Persons of Peace! We met 2 new friends, Gisela and Matt, who are both believers and who go to the same church we go to. ...and they were looking for us on campus! They just moved to La Plata and are trying to get into the program to study English. They heard about Vida Estudiantil somehow and were hoping to find us to get involved. It was a moment of joy and excitement for them and us!!!!!!! and they already have met some new classmates who are not believers and brought them to the table to tell them about Vida and English Club. We are so excited to see how God will use them in this city and on campus!

Please be praying over these next few weeks as we continue to meet new students and reach out to them with Christ's love. Sometimes these campuses seem like such dark places - pray that through the Holy Spirit many would see the light that Jesus is.
Pray also that the students who are believers and already involved in our ministry would step up to join us on campus, sharing with their own peers. We often feel out of place as foreigners and non-students...we want them to see the vision for their campus and to take ownership of this ministry. Pray that they too would be passionate for the lost and would take action, trusting in the Lord.

thank you for your partnership and prayers! we will continue to try to keep you posted

Living again in La Plata! We have had some amazing adventures and experiences, but we are glad to be back to our home in La Plata - to get to stay in the same bed for more than a few days at a time and to see our friends here.

Today is a day of rest and maybe some cleaning for us as we prepare to start work tomorrow for the new 2007 school year (here the school year starts in March and ends in November so it's all in the same calendar year). We have many updates and pictures to share, but we'll start with just a few. Hopefully we can figure out how to upload video also so that you can see firsthand what camp and project were like!

Campamento en el Sur - camp in the south:






we stayed at a Christian boarding school in this very small village, Villa Pehuenia, along the Argentine/Chile border. this camp was much smaller than the first, about 85 students here - more than half were from Chile!












this is Lake Alumine, across the street from the school we stayed at for camp. the water was so cold, but beautiful and super clean (this is Seth - he was one of the few brave ones to swim). Kathryn, from our team was baptized here that week!





Social Project - Mapuche communities










this was our team (2 teams combined) of 22 for the week of project. each team was placed in a different town to reach the Mapuche people. our team stayed in Villa Pehuenia, where we were for camp. the staff and students on this team are awesome - they are on fire for the Lord. we saw them moved by the Spirit in sharing the gospel







this is the bus that drives around the country showing the Jesus Film. it served as transportation for our team during project. this part was often an adventure in itself - most of the roads are unpaved, gravel, very very narrow and windy and often contained obstacles like unstable bridges. this day the bus helped carry one big Mapuche family to the home of another for Bible study and worship time.








this was one Mapuche family that we visited for follow up. One of the daughters, Pilar, accepted Christ last year - Amalia, from our team spent time helping her memorize scripture because she cannot read very well. she is growing in her relationship with the Lord. we spent time talking with them more and praying for them. we were also able to leave them with clothes and food donations.


Visiting with Jen's parents, Bob and Olga








this is the 4 of us at the Cathedral in La Plata. we had a great time with them - we are so thankful they were able to come visit! it was neat to be able to show them around the city - where we live, the grocery place, the sede, the girls and guys' apartments... they also got to meet some of our friends and the students and staff that we work with...it was such a blessing to share that first hand!













Bob and Olga were troopers and did a kayak trip with us in the south - it was so much fun and they did great! the scenery was beautiful!



ok, we'll be in touch with more details on each of these last 4 weeks. thank you for being a part of this chapter in our lives. we miss each of you!

A new year and a new post. Jen and I just returned home from a 10 day summer camp in Mar Del Plata for the students here in Argentina. It is the biggest camp of the year and a place where students from all over the country can meet and fellowship with one another. There were over 220 students who participated this year. The focus of the camp was a play on Mission Impossible and called, "Mission Possible." Meaning obviously that the task of missions is finishable. It was encouraging for us to see the excitement of the students and their dedication to reaching their campuses for Christ. There were many evangelistic outreach events during the 10 days and we were able to participate with Argentine students in sharing their faith on the beaches and in the city center.

We've attached some photos from our time there for ya'll to look through. We've got a week to rest and relax before heading down South to Patagonia for a similar camp with students who live too far south to participate in the camp in the North. It will be much smaller but followed by a two week long missionary project to the Mapuchee Indians of Southern Argentina and Chile.

to finish off our long friday post, here is another link for some other pictures :)

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=311&id=502138880

The Burrito Journey

I know that I'm backing up a little, but I forgot to tell a most glorious story. It all happened about two weeks ago when our team decided to trust the Lord and step out in faith towards finding a small and obscure burrito places in BAries. I had read about this company a few times, once in the states prior to moving south and once again in an english newspaper they have here in La Plata. The name of the Company is California Burrito Company or CBC. One thing I have been seriously missing while down here is the Free Birds burrito or Chipotle burrito. Both are incredible options! Well, due to the fact that we needed to travel to uruguay to renew our visas, and having to travel through BAries to achieve this, I knew it was a crucial moment to devour a much needed burrito. So I began to research this small restaurant started by three college grads from the US. They wanted to bring heavenly burritos into a country starving for something they know nothing about. It's much like the gospel! And we are deffiniately bringing that as well. But back to the story. We arrived in BAries by bus and hopped on the subway. FYI, we had never been on the subway thus far and that was an adventure! But we popped up in the right area and wondered around looking for our destination. It came up on us rather quick and we almost walked right past it. A narrow entrance to dinner and salvation lay before us! We entered and we ate. It was not the same as back home, but it rocked the house. We will make this journey again one day soon.

It's Friday and considered to be one of the days where we take care of the majority of our administrative stuff while here in Argentina. Along with that comes updating you folks on whats been happening here in the southern hemisphere. I must say, it's not a bad place to be living. There are certainly foods that we miss from the states, but they have been replaced by other foods here that ya'll may never get the chance to experience! I have found the primary staples that I need to survive though. Walmart is a 15 minute bus ride and stocks peanut butter most all of the time. The second and equally as important is cereal. They don't have near the variety, but that doesn't matter much to me. The hardest to get used to would be the milk. It comes in 1 liter bags intead of gallon cartons or jugs. And the milk is not processed the same either. It has a funny odor and flavor, but I'm getting used to it.

We had our coaches from Midsouth come in the week before this one to visit and gauge how we're doing. It was a great time to continue building team unity and focus on what our vision for this country and these people are. At the end of the week we took our coaches to BAries for the day on Saturday. We spent a few hours in the bario La Bacoca as well as a few hours in the bario Recoleta. Which happens to be my favorite. Recoleta is where the famous cemetery is and it just happens to be one of the coolest places I've been to here in Argentina.


This is a picture of myself, Jen and Brian with our two coaches Cam and Neale at an outdoor tango show in the bario La Boca.

La Boca is known for its wild colors and outdoor tango performances. They are also known for having some decent art for sale.

This is me and Jen posing for a picture in La Boca. It's amazing what a little makeup can do!

This was an outdoor drum line performance. Pretty sweet groove they were rockin.