Our Colombia Experience

It has been a spectacularly busy week.  I spent most of the week at school, meetings, etc. getting ready for school starting this Tuesday.  But there have a been a few funny times as well as some educational.  While I hope you’d like to read about Church, don’t skip the last 3 paragraphs. 

     Last Sunday we attended the local Episcopal church, Catedral del San Pablo.  It is not the easiest place to get to by bus, so we took a taxi.  Good thing we left early as we didn’t know about the marathon that was being run down Calle 7.  The taxi had no way to go across so let us off with directions how to walk to the church.  Well, that would be fine if we could get across the race! 

After walking a few blocks and observing the technique we decided to attempt it.  We stepped off the curb, in our church clothes, and started jogging with the crowd, slowly making our way to the median.  On the other side of the divided road was a bike ride that followed the marathon course.  While a little more dangerous to cross it was really easier because most of the bikes had already gone by.

     Even Kirsten really enjoyed church.  It was all in Spanish but being liturgical was fairly easy to follow.  The electric pianist is blind but he does a fantastic job.  That Sunday they were short on singers.  We met a gentleman named Delbert who is American but has been working overseas for a, I believe, non-profit co. in Europe and now here in Colombia.  The kids met a young girl named Julie who speaks fantastic English. Unfortunately she lives south of the church and we live way north.  It was really comforting to be doing something you understand…benefit of liturgical worship.

     The church itself is really pretty, it is on a fairly steep hill with wrought iron looking gates, white stucco type exterior and tile.  The dark wood pews are set up in 4 sections creating a semi-circle around the front of the altar.  The kneelers have no cushions and apparently are not often used…usually stand.  Some of the hymns have been translated into Spanish and the words only are in a small 3 ring binder that is handed out along with the prayer book.  The altar is white, possibly marble, as are all of the walls.  There is a crucifix over the altar with multi-colored streamer hanging down behind it.  The flowers are beautiful and on each side of the altar, hung from the ceiling are these large round balls with roses on them…like, I guess a topiary, but hanging.  The congregation is a bit small and the service is very informal.  We all really enjoyed it and hope to be back often.

    Today we returned to the Catedral.  The bishop was there today; apparently he is usually there but was absent last week. He is a very nice man, speaks very good English and has 2 lovely daughters.  Elizabeth, his youngest daughter also speaks very good English and spent some time with Andrew and Kirsten.  She is a senior this year.  Her older sister does not speak as much English and is a freshman at the university.  I also met Rev. Gonzalo’s family; his wife Joanna, son Miguel (3) and the baby, Jacob (2 months)  I found out today that he is from Medellin, but didn’t have a lot of time to talk.  He does not speak much English.

     We were surprised to meet the visitors today.  The priest from the national church office in NY who is in charge of Hispanic ministries was visiting.  He and his wife were actually on vacation visiting Ecuador and Venezuela, but visited the Catedral today.  He preached about his ministry and about not hoarding your possessions…Luke 12.  He very graciously spent 5 minutes summarizing his sermon in English for Kirsten and Andrew.  I was really thankful for this as he preached about exactly what I am trying to do…to give and to share what God has blessed us with.  There are many times when the kids don’t really get this, or maybe choose not to understand. His wife and I spent a bit of time before church talking about lots of little things from home.  I hope we will keep in touch.

     After church I spoke with a young guy who I thought had passed the peace in English.  Sure enough, he was an American from Maine.  He is a master’s student at GWU in Washington down here working on his thesis.  He is examining the role that the church has played in the national problem with the separatist groups..FARC and the narco-terrorists.  (I hope I explained this right, I am sure he will correct me if not!)  He is here with a friend also from the same school who is Colombian.  They will be here until the end of August.  I hope to get to talk with them more.  The civil war situation in the country is very complicated with so many different aspects.  I imagine the church has a large role to play but I don’t yet really understand what that is.

     After church, while I was talking, Andrew and Kirsten talked with Elizabeth who told them a great place to go to find a restaurant was Parque 93 and they convinced me to take them.  It is really a neat little square at the foot of the mountains at about Carrera 93 (the church is at crra 53 and we live on crra 146.  Surrounding the park are lots of nice restaurants.  We eventually spotted the TGI Fridays and the kids begged for a little taste of home.  The fancy McDonald’s café just wasn’t going to cut it.

     Now, once you were inside you would recognize it, but from the outside it looked like most other local restaurants, the main building set back from the sidewalk with lots of outdoor tables in front covered with a retractable….what do you call it, like tarp.  The entrance steps went up the center and on the left of the stairs was a wheelchair ramp.  I was actually a bit surprised at this, there are not a lot of laws to give handi-capped equal access and I really haven’t seen any thoughtful accommodations by shop owners.  I decided that maybe it was the American influence even though the restaurant is in
Colombia.  I was ready to just walk on in, but leave it to Andrew to see the truth of the situation.

     It really was a wheelchair ramp; it paralleled the stairs at about a 15 degree angle down to the sidewalk.  But Andrew pointed out that at the end of the ramp there was a 10 inch drop off down to the sidewalk!!  I suppose it is better to bump down only one step as opposed to 10!.  We laughed about that ramp for a good 10 minutes.  Only in Colombia!

    

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 5th, 2007 at 9:10 pm and is filed under Daily Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.