Category: Teams

Good Omens

On the bus ride from the airport to the hostel, Caroline and I had barely learned the team’s names, but I already called that this was going to be a good, fun, low-maintenance team. It may be that I’ve just hosted so many groups at this point that I can pick up on their vibe like a guinea pig1. Or maybe they’re just that chill a group that anyone would notice.

The days have seemed pretty long because they have been so full, and because I was so low on sleep by the time I arrived via Houston. It has truly only been a small number of hours we have all been together. But even this morning as we received our welcome from Reverenda Nancy at Emaús, it seemed more accurate than normal when she told the team that this is their home. I’ve been thankful already for Lauren, the team leader, who is super calm, easy-going, and consistently expressing love to all around her. That kind of thing rubs off on a team in a big way, and I will probably continue to remark how much a leader can make or break a team. The other fun thing about our first few days is that despite it still being rainy season, it has been unbelievably clear outside. In the US, we talk about the sun being out. Here we talk about the volcanoes being out. On a particularly clear day, from here in Quito you can see the snow-capped volcano Cotopaxi, even though it is a whole province away. We had a gorgeous view of Cotopaxi for most of the way to Guajaló this morning. And when we walked up to the roof of the building we were even able to see the Panecillo from here. It is really not all that far away in the city, but the clouds or the fog usually stop us from seeing it.  

The Panecillo and the Virgin of Quito (way in the background between the trees) from the cross on the roof of Emaús.

It has been years since I could see Cotopaxi while I was in the bus with a team, and I told them what a treat it was to have the view we have even from the roof. Being in this place is always fun and meaningful, and I can see God’s work even when it pours so hard we get rained out of going to the park. But it certainly makes it easier to be in a good mood when all of God’s creation is on display so blatantly in every direction. 

A rare view of Cotopaxi during our commute.

I also think it’s a good omen when native Spanish speakers manage to correctly spell my name (both “N”s and no “I”).

The people at Emaús always find a fun way to make sure everyone on a team knows they are welcomed.

1People here say that guinea pigs can “sense auras.” When a group walks past a guinea pig pen, the animals will squeal if a group is anxious, but they’ll be quiet and still if the people in the group are calm. I never tell my groups this in advance, but I’ll tell them when we leave the pen if the guinea pigs were quiet when we were around.

Old Places And New Friends

I have variously described day one of a team’s schedule as Tourist Day, Question Day, and Forest Gump Day (“So I went to the Basilica… again”). This time around it has been more like Reminiscing Day. Caroline and I started talking early this morning on our walk to the hostel about all the Sewanee teams we have hosted together. We ate breakfast at El Descanso and I remembered all the people who have run this place over the years. I stood in the balcony of the Basilica sanctuary and thought of all the groups whose photos I’ve taken in front of the strained glass window. A woman there with her family even saw me taking pictures and said out loud “that guy looks like he knows what he’s doing,” and asked me to photograph them (which brought me back 11 years to Sarah Miller telling me how we’d all end up professional photographers by the end of that summer). As we gazed out over the city from the walkway under the tower I remembered how I felt the first time up that ladder (and how much out of my depth I felt most of my first summer as a host).

I’ve taken this photo several times over the years, but this time I got to do it repping Soapstone UMC.

As we walked down the Via de Siete Cruces, Roberto and I were talking about the streets that are now closed to vehicle traffic. That happened sometime last year, either before I was here in March or before I was here over the summer. And as I tried to sort those out in my mind, I remarked to him how strange it was that I was just here eight months ago. 

There have been plenty of moments over the last twelve years when I have been sad about all the people who used to be here that have gone back to live in the US or elsewhere. Or when I miss how things used to be when you didn’t have to wear seatbelts and could cram 19 people in a Chevy Suburban and didn’t have to stop at red lights after dark. Or I think about a restaurant that used to be somewhere, or the good old days when the Strawberry Soda had real sugar in it and they still made the spicy Doritos in the black bag. 

But then I walk into the youth world office and run into a group of people I mostly met and got to know within the last twelve months and they’re so excited to see me that we wind up with this:

A large contingent of our summer staff reunited. Apparently they liked me.

really And thinking through the changes I’ve seen I have to remind myself that so much here really I s the same. And so much of the change has been for the better. But either way, I’ve gotten to experience it with so many people. I can’t possibly tell my teams about all the different times I’ve been to the Basilica and Plaza San Francisco anymore. There’s not enough time to give them every bit of history and experience that I’ve gotten at each of those places. But I get to think about parejas who I’ve learned from, and students I’ve brought to share my beloved country with, and teams who have asked me questions, and leaders who many times had no idea of how much their personality would make or break a team. I smile thinking about Sarah and Amalia and Deborah and Jóse Luís and Kelsey and Dana and Darío and Emma and Gavriella and Joe and Julie and Marina all being with me at each of these places. But now I get to introduce a people and a place and an experience and a philosophy of mission to another new group of friends, who will go in twelve different directions nine days from now, into whatever and wherever God calls them in the post-field. And hopefully by then all of us will be changed. 

Lauren, Ezechias, Emma, Gracie, Maria, Jennifer, Ginnie, Olivia, Melanie, and Victoria (not in that order) climbing to the tower atop the Basilica.

This Place Breaks My Heart

Since Saturday night Roberto and I have been hosting a team from South Carolina. It’s a fascinating group because it’s centered around a couple who is getting married on Tuesday. Part of the team only thought they were coming on a mission team and didn’t even know there would be a wedding while they were here. Part of the group only thought they were coming for the wedding.

Having worked so long with an organization that focuses so much on doing short term missions well, there are some things about this that I struggle with. But this group has had particularly fresh eyes for the things around them. I think little-to-no preparation on the part of the team members was in this case better than bad preparation, because they simply didn’t have time to have any preconceived notions. This struck me the first time when a 50-something team member said during our orientation at Carmen Bajo “This place just breaks my heart.”

I initially wanted to push back on that, to tell him “no, this is a place that’s full of joy,” to argue with him what a difference it makes in the community. Knowing that I have served at Carmen Bajo for almost 10 years and whatever was going to come out of my mouth was going to be an emotional response, I held my tongue. And I’m glad I did, because while all those thing I thought are true, that doesn’t mean we can’t all (myself included) be heartbroken at the underlying need for a place like Iglesia Carmen Bajo and it’s school and social project to even exist.

We heard Pastor Fabian’s story of being called to the neighborhood. I’ve heard it many times before in orientations or at dinners at his house. We heard testimonies from church members and stories about the students from the staff. Most of those stories were things I’ve heard before. Tough, terrible stories of loss and hardship, but familiar problems in that area just with new names and faces to go with them. Those stories are shared so we can give glory to God for what he has done in the midst of it all. For healing and wholeness found in His Church, for hope that has come through educational opportunities, for a generation that is giving back to their community because of grace and mercy encountered through people sharing love, and for there being enough resources to solve social and economic problems because basic needs like food are being met through the compassion of teams and a church and a people who care.

But the relief that comes through that place doesn’t mean all the problems are gone. There is still endemic abuse and neglect in the neighborhood. We met a woman who is fighting to give four of her sons with disabilities a better life, but whose son’s disabilities were caused by fetal alcohol syndrome. There was a kindergartener who is happy and healthy and learning, whose education is funded through the scholarship program and whose lunch is funded by Compassion International, but who has to walk an hour and a half each way, each day between his home and Carmen Bajo. A kindergartener.

There are times when I’m listening to a story or translating on a home visit when I just sort of turn off my heart and only use my head. I change the words from Spanish to English and regurgitate them for the team so they get the information. But I do it with a certain sterility, not letting the emotion effect me in the moment. I become the task-oriented North American with data to get across rather than the missionary, the minister, the brother in Christ who should be broken-hearted by what I see.

And what I see is injustice. Brokenness. Sin. Those things are why we need the church. We we need missionaries. Why I’m here at all. I’m very rarely shocked at a story I hear in his place anymore. But familiar as this brokenness is, and optimistic as I hope I continue to be about all that is going on to fix it, my prayer is that i will continue to be as broken-hearted about it all now as I was the first time I came here.

Forest Gump day

One of my favorite movie lines is in Forest Gump when he says “So I went to the White House again. And I met the president again.” I quote that line, or derivations of it, often to express that sense of repetition in my life. And sometimes it’s with that attitude of boredom that Forest Gump had. But sometimes it’s to express that same sense of irony the audience should feel upon hearing such a statement. Who would ever get bored of the White House? But I most commonly quote that line when I’m hosting a Quito Quest team during their first week on the ground. I have been to the Basilica and the Presidential Palace and Plaza San Francisco. So. Many. Times.

But even while I brace myself for the monotony, I can’t help but remember Deborah and Roberto taking me to all those places for the very first time. And I can’t help but be excited that I’m with a group of new friends who have that sense of wonder and excitement that I had eleven years ago, and who I will get to know through this day and the rest of their time on the ground.

Today I also had a small sense of terror in knowing that I would be delivering Partnership Orientation tonight. Partnership is the most important orientation we do with a team, and it can be something very powerful to hear. I’ve heard it three dozen times at minimum, and I’ve given it to several teams, most recently a modified version to my Costa Rica team from the NCCUMC youth ministry. But if I gave Partnership a thousand times I still don’t think I could stop worrying that I’d screw it up. It’s a lot of pressure and I want them to get it. This is the very reason I keep coming back to Youth World, because I think we live out Partnership so well here. So this was important.

I think it went well. The team asked good questions about it. So I could breathe a sigh of relief. And thinking and planning for it added a little but if a beak to the monotony of the same tourist day I do all the time.

But I also had a couple moments in debrief that made this day memorable. The first was when we realized that all seven students in this team are introverts. My tribe is here! The second was an observation by Brett about myself and Caroline. He said we kept pointing out changes in the city, where restaurants used to be, or where there is a new building. He compared it to the story of the Basilica, which is always under construction and never technically completed because legend says when the Basilica is completed, the end of the world will arrive and they don’t want that responsibility. The basilica has to change and grow to stay alive, and the city does the same thing. We all are either growing and changing or we are dying.

Leave it to a Sewanee student to make an observation I’ll be incorporating into my orientations from now on.

Appreciating

Hosting a Quito Quest team, you always have at least one partner. This time around, I’m working with Jose Luis. This has been really awesome, because we know each other really well, he was willing to do finances, and any number of other reasons related to the fact that he’s a really great guy. But he wasn’t here for a big chunk of today.

I totally understood he had some major things to do today, and I’ve hosted enough teams that I can function on my own. Neither of those things meant it was easy. And I could have spent the afternoon being mad, but after all these years of Quito Quest, my natural instinct was just to miss having a buddy and appreciate everything he does. Because no matter how much experience you have, there are just way too many things for one person to remember, much less accomplish at 100%

Doing all of the host duties today also made me retroactively appreciate things other partners have taught me. How Sarah was always thinking about what was next. How Darío just faced conflict head-on. How other people have taught me to be a more effective decision-maker, leader, translator, and friend.

I also appreciated a lot of the “first day” activities. Maybe because it’s very close to the beginning of my own time here. But I saw the juxtaposition between the art and the statues and the insane amount of gold inside Iglesia San Francisco and the poverty directly outside. And it reminds me exactly why we are so intentional about the way we do ministry here. And on my umpteenth hearing of the Partnership Orientation, I still appreciated being reminded of the process I’m going through even now on my way to making this a fruitful experience.

First day in Photos




Just a couple…

Originally uploaded by danielwpeck

I suggested we get a couple of fruit salads to share. Apparently there was some difference of opinion as to how much sharing should be going on.




Engrish

Originally uploaded by danielwpeck

This is why you shouldn’t rely solely on Google Translate.




Inca dome

Originally uploaded by danielwpeck

These guys found out that this is where Incan ritual human sacrifice used to take place… So of course they had to try to see inside.

Spring Intern Retreat

I’ve come to the conclusion that I’ve gotten to be a lazy blogger lately. The benefit to y’all is that you get to see lots of pictures.

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Here we all are in front of canoes we took down the Napo River. I hope I never get over the beauty of Ecuador, but there are some moments where I realize how much certain things have gotten to be normal life for me. As I looked out over the river, I thought to myself, “This looks a lot like the Pasquotank.” Then I snapped back and remembered I was surrounded by all this crazy jungle foliage and palm trees and thought “Yeah… not really.” We all look oddly red in this picture, but nobody’s sunburned.

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On Tuesday, we planned to fly into Tiweno from the MAF field in Shell. Turns out it rained literally all day, so we spent some time doing a couple work projects around the hanger. Matt is holding a heavy-duty hair dryer to warm up the wall while Joanna strips the paint and Lauren is sweeping up.

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The people from Tiweno show us a traditional-style Huaorani dance and sang a couple of songs for us. Chet was the first of the gringos to get dragged into it, but we were all in the circle by the time it was finished.

This post originally published at www.dannypeck.net

A Day and a Year

Saturday afternoon the team and Carmen Bajo hosted a youth event at the Nazarene Seminary here in Quito, where the group was staying. Tons of people from different churches came, and several from partner ministries and from Youth World. When Cameron showed up around lunchtime, she told me “I feel like it’s been a day and a year since the last time I saw you.”

You totally lose your sense of time when you are hosting a team. I actually turned to Christy in the bus on the way home last night and said “Is it still Sunday?” It was several seconds before she answered, giving me the Jack Sparrow stare as she thought about the question. Running with a team means that your days are incredibly long, both because they are action-packed and because you really are awake for an ungodly amount of time. But then you drop off 35 people at the airport and hug and cry and smile and think “Wasn’t I just here picking them up?”

So here I am, back to work before 9am the day after a team. And there they go, headed back to Canada to lives that I hope will be greatly affected by a week and a half in Ecuador. I would say that for the 70ish people directly involved in this whole operation, we’re probably all a little stunned it’s over. For the last eleven days we’ve walked up hills that would be illegal in North America, painted, lugged bricks, and mixed concrete. And it’s amazing what you learn about people as you work alongside them. But we’ve also given out shoes and cooked food and shared testimonies and put on presentations and VBS and worshiped together in church services and just by living life. It’s amazing what you learn from people when you plug into each others’ existence. I hope this is not the last time I see the Pueblos Unidos team, but if it is, it won’t be the last time I think of them.