Day 12

6/19/13

It's hard to believe that I've been here for almost two weeks! Work on the mural began around 10 yesterday; I set up the projector and started outlining the images I've chosen for the silhouettes. Santi arrived around 11, and we went for lunch at his house with his wife and daughter. I gave him a copy of my Spoken Word CD, though I think trying to understand it might just be overwhelming-- I know if someone gave me something like that in Spanish, I'd practically cry. But the words are included in the lil book, and reading along helps. We went back to the church and I worked on the mural til 5, since Mateo wouldn't be having English lessons on account of some after-school math tutoring. Santi brought his laptop downstairs and did his (seminary?) reading on the couch to keep me company. For some reason, understanding the things he was telling me was particularly hard yesterday-- I think my brain's just worn out. On the other hand, I've been thinking and mentally responding to most things in Spanish, and the thought of translating these musings to English kind of exhausts me. So I guess the exhaustion is just part of the progress.

Santi dropped me at Andrea's, where I worked on getting the video uploaded (I now have a zip file in a drop box, which will at least give someone with a better video converter access to it :/) and made an awkward dinner of the last two days' leftover breakfasts. By the time she got home, it was around 8:30. We lounged around the mom's big-bed room until 11-ish before parting ways to sleep.

Today's an exciting day-- it's both Andrea's birthday and the day that Nathalie comes home from the hospital. She'll be staying at Magaly's though, as her mother Fani will be home all day to tend to her. I'm also meeting my friend Josue for breakfast in a bit before heading over to the church to keep working. Fani loaned me an old Ecuadorian cell phone, so if I can buy a chip today, I'll be calling Gloria Matute again to try to schedule a visit. As always, I'll let you know how it goes!