November 13-18th

This was the first Sunday we had one of the elders translate Sunday school for us. It was really nice! I'm amazed at how much I understood though without him translating. While we were at church it rained even more, but as soon as church was over there was a breach in the rain long enough for us to walk most of the way home. When we got to our neighborhood it started pouring and our food delivery guy picked us up in his little food truck and took us the rest of the way home. I love how well our neighbors look after us.

Monday morning I woke up really early and was coughing and couldn't find a way to make it stop except by leaving my room. So at about 5am I got up and went in the kitchen area and watched movies on Netflix. It was the first time I have got Netflix to work in this country without buffering every two minutes. It was a blessing for sure. I ended up talking to Amarilis about my room and coughing and we spent a long while cleaning the walls and the fan in my room. It helped so much.
We didn't have school again because of the state of emergency. It happened to be our neighbor's birthday too! They know how to party. We went over and joined the party for hours. We danced in the streets until it started raining then we all crammed into their house and sang happy birthday and danced more. When the rain subsided we moved back to the streets and turned the music up. It was quite the party! They also made this giant pot of soup for everyone to eat. I was so happy and content sitting in their house and feeling like part of the family. The people here are so friendly and inviting. I want to be like them in so many ways. Tuesday we didn't have school again and we thought we were going to lose our minds. So we went out around the neighborhood and took pictures. I took my Polaroid camera out with me and automatically became the most popular teacher. Every kid was begging me for one saying, " teacher me, me teacher" or "I want one". It was crazy, but also adorable. When I would give a kid a picture they always ran and showed it off the everyone they could find. I was stopped by some kids and the
 Drug me back down the road saying my uncle my uncle. When I got to the house this man was standing there and asked if I would take a picture of his baby. All he wanted was a picture of his baby. It was so sweet. He sat the baby up on his motorcycle and tried three different positions before he let me take it. He was so happy to have the picture. It really is the little things.
Wednesday and Thursday we had school pretty much as normal, though not all the kids showed up. The Thursday night it began to rain again and we went back to a state of emergency and schools were canceled for Friday classes. We are hoping it all clears up soon so the people can begin to get back to their lives or rebuild what was destroyed. Oh Friday afternoon a few of us walked around the neighborhood and played with kids in the streets. After a little bit Olive and I ended up at our neighbor's house getting our hair braided while they paints their fingernails and such. It was like a little spa day. I loved it!