Mexican dinner

Thursday was a nonstop day. It started early with a fun District meeting, the last for Anziano Jensen, who finishes his mission next week. Our ZLs were also there, on exchanges with our Anziani, making it more lively. Dee and I were asked to do some brief tech training, focusing on backup of photos and emails. I was able to make a copy of the SD card from Anziano Jensen's tablet on to my laptop, with all his photos and videos. I will copy everything onto a flash drive to give him as a going-away present Sunday. Anziano Jensen gave some great motivational training. He read us a great story that you can find here. He will be missed. At the end of the meeting, we did the traditional chair stacking event, with each missionary on a stack with one chair per transfer completed, holding the number in our hands. It is very precarious for the elders who have been out the longest! So far, I just take the picture, but someday I want to be on the stack, too.

Here is a video of the "dismount". No one was harmed during the event, fortunately!

On our way to the Institute, we stopped at Lidl for a few last items to prepare for the big Mexican feast that evening. Unfortunately, they were out of the essential tortilla chips, so we found yet another Lidl on the way into town, where Dee bought ten bags! All the driving to new locations during rather heavy traffic can be stressful, but Dee is a lot of help as my co-pilot. I never knit while he drives anymore. It takes two sets of eyes to survive here.

During the drive to the Institute, we got a call from Noelle. She and Ashley were supposed to have been on vacation with the families they work for here, never to be seen again at the Institute. Fortunately for us, the plans of their families changed and they were in town again for a few days. They needed to print some stuff out and asked if they could come by the campus. Of course we said yes! Also, Chris, our newly baptized Nigerian immigrant, called to ask if he could come by to use the computer. His cell connection was horrible, and it would turn out that he had partially broken his cell phone. Phones are a lifeline for almost everyone these days, but especially for poor refugees, so we felt bad for him. Anyway, we had thought we would have some down time in the afternoon to prepare (lessons, meals), but not so much. It was a happy problem. Dee made sandwiches for all three of them, and we enjoyed visiting. 

Ashley and Noelle were working on travel plans, in particular how to get to the airport for their flights home in a couple of weeks. They leave the same day, after some traveling throughout Europe. The problem is that they each have an early flight, making it impossible to get there on public transit in time. I suggested that they get a hotel near the airport with a shuttle, which they liked.  They are trying to do this without spending much, but sharing the cost made it reasonable. Ashley also let her monthly cell phone bill here lapse, so she was about to go to Switzerland, Germany, and Spain without any connectivity outside of WiFi. I explained that, if she paid for one more month (20€), she would have data everywhere but Switzerland, which is not an EU member and thus not covered by the new cell plan roaming laws. She really liked that, as it was stressful for her to think of being abroad without connectivity. So the three of us walked over to the TIM store at the train station, asked some questions to verify my assertions, and then she forked over the money. I also put some money onto Dee's new account while I was there. We then hit a couple of supermarkets, looking for the final pieces of the food puzzle for the evening, finding everything but cilantro, which is not well known here. Fortunately it would turn out that Dee already had enough of that.

 It was fun spending time with these two very nice girls. At one point, after Dee and I had talked for a minute, with me calling her "sweetie", Ashley commented that she hoped to have a relationship like ours with her (future, TBD) husband. I took it as a compliment, but I did take the chance to explain that we do not always see eye to eye, and that it takes years to build a really good relationship, so to not give up when there are bumps in the road. Dee and I are getting along better and better the longer we are married, and I figure another 40 years should make us almost perfect together. 😉😀

By around 4pm, a number of kids showed up to help Chris (the Mexican Chris, not the Nigerian one) start cooking. There were people chopping and preparing for a quite a while, with Dee being an important support to the effort. We wouldn't eat until after 8pm (the event was announced as starting at 6pm -- Italian time!), so they worked for hours! Chris, Dee, and Margie in particular were indefatigable. 

Chris directing traffic

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

At one point, the power went out. Yikes! Because it had been flaky for the whole building earlier in the week, I assumed it was a large scale problem and just waited for it to come back on. Fortunately, from past experience, Jomar knew where our main circuit breaker was located downstairs in the courtyard, so he just ran down and flipped it on. Problem solved! It is good to know where the breaker is. We had had the oven, two burners, and several air conditioners running all at once, so that must have been the issue.

Our friend Pam also showed up during all this lovely chaos. Her MBA school is done for a while, and I had offered to help her do a backup of the laptop I had helped her configure months ago. We got the backup done and had the chance to chat for a while.

People kept arriving for the dinner, many after 7:30pm for a 6pm event. Everyone was getting really hungry by the time food was served. Amazingly, we got all the quantities almost exactly right, except for the black beans -- a lot of those left, but the Ganziani are willing to help us finish them off.

Playing games while waiting for dinner

Chris, Margie, and Dee never got flustered, juggling half a dozen balls all the time, but just kept working hard, with various folks stepping in to help all the time. Chris's last name is Campos, so we called the evening "Institute Campos" (instead of campus). He was born in Mexico and raised in San Francisco, speaking Italian now fairly well, so there were several languages flying around the kitchen. What a nice guy! He made chicken fajita quesadillas (fajitas in between two tortillas with cheese) as well as chilaquiles (kinda like lasagna, with chips instead of pasta). We also had horchata (watermelon juice), plus watermelon with lime and chili powder, guacamole, pico de gallo and salsa, all hand made. There was a ton of wonderful food. When everyone finally sat down and started eating, there was complete silence for several minutes, "a good sign" as one of the kids said. I took almost 100 photos during the day, so I can't include them all here, but here is a link to all of them.

Silence reigns

 

 

 

 

 

 

We had a big group for this season, about seventeen kids, of whom at least six were non-members (including Chris and Margie). After dinner, kids stayed late to play games in the library, which was completely full!

Our trash cans were also full, so I carried a big bag downstairs to the bin, which we almost never have to do between visits from our cleaning service. With another large dinner coming Friday, it was necessary to make some space. These ethnic food nights are probably our most popular events. We got home after 10pm, tired but delighted with the activity. Dee's feet were hurting after too much standing up all day. I brought her Advil and ice for her feet, while she collapsed onto the bed. A while later she got up and dressed for bed. When she finally came to bed, exhausted, she told me "there is nothing you can do or say now that I will like!" We both laughed really hard, but I knew not to talk, and we both then went to sleep.