Today we were supposed to have our first spring sort-term team on the ground. Well, you can guess how that turned out.
Dario and I were on our way to Hostal Bosque in a taxi when we were informed that our team would not be arriving tonight, and we were unsure exactly when they would actually make it into the country. Stuck in Toronto, the team leader finally called to let us know when they had some semblance of an itinerary, and now we hope to be picking them up at the airport at 10:30 in the morning, which means we won’t be headed to Carmen Bajo for church.
It’s funny to look back almost two years ago to the first team I hosted with Sarah. We were in the same situation, having planned for a team that ended up being delayed almost a full 24 hours. I remember sitting in the kitchen at Dana and Ashley’s house, staring across the table at Sarah with absolutely no idea even where to begin dealing with the situation as we learned about it, and knowing exactly how lost I would have been without her. This afternoon, however, Dario got the phone call that our team hadn’t even made it out of Canada yet, and we both shrugged and went about our plans. I mentally pulled up the schedule and knew that the simplest thing we could do was to cut Carmen Bajo totally from our day tomorrow, and we’ll make the calls as we go along about how much touristy Quito activities we do, based on time and how settled our team gets. Dario (since he managed to get some saldo) called Fabian and Rogelio and let them know the revised plan and neither of them freaked out either.
In 2008 I wrote an entry called “Flex and flow”, a manta-like phrase around Youth World, and something Sarah Miller would say multiple times every day. She even has her own personal sign language for it. I think at the time I titled the post that way and talked positively about the concept more to actively teach myself to believe it more than anything. I’m not the most flexible person in the universe, but I’m certainly much more flexible now than I was two years ago. Part of that has been learning what solutions are even available when a schedule crisis like this one occurs. Part of it has been adjusting to how South American life in general just functions. And part of it has been having some really awesome examples.
After a day putting away groceries and setting up the hostal with absolutely no hurry (and then watching funny movies with Dario all night) I can really appreciate all three of those things.
