Week of Craziness

The camp ended amazingly. We had olympics on the last day, with each team representing a random country. MaryHelen and I organized the Bible story station- we had the kids act out the story of the good Samaritan, complete with donkey and violent robbers (very entertaining). The parents somehow got together and gave us the most amazing spread of food to thank us for the whole week. The Italians were amazed by this; apparently this is very uncommon. When the kids were getting their medals and singing songs in front of the whole group a lot of the parents were crying- it was hard for a lot of them to believe that the whole thing was free.

This past week had a significant amount of ridiculousness. Tuesday was supposed to be one of the roughest days; the group did the "rescue" mission, where in two teams they were left on the top of a mountain and had to carry people down on some sort of stretcher they had to build, complete with people sabotaging them the whole time. I, however, had some sort of disagreement with food/drink I put inside my body. I would have liked them to stay there; they insisted they come out. So I was up for at least 24 straight hours having fun with this, and on Wednesday I was super weak but could actually get out of bed a little.

Wednesday night David read us the passage about the disciples falling asleep in the garden while Jesus was praying. We then took one hour shifts staying up praying until 6am, when we all met. From this point until 9pm, we played sports nonstop. The entire time in Italy we've been learning that to have true strength you have to make yourself weak; this is the first time I was forced to do that. I had no strength after the first run at 7am, but all I did was pray for strength for the next activity, and each time I would get just enough to continue. It was amazing, although amazingly hard. The final task was a run up the mountain to a bridge. Along the way, Gabriel had to sit down, and all of a sudden he was on the ground and barely coherent. At this exact moment, a car came by (who happened to be our neighbor) and did everything they could to help us. This was difficult because there was no cell signal on the road, and none of us really speaks Italian. We all got in the back of the goat truck, and Austin carried Gabr in the front. He was getting worse, so we stopped on the road and called an ambulance. Clayton and Brian started sprinting down the mountain to get David and Amanda to translate; we found out later that they about died after the first turn. Somehow they were able to keep this suicide pace all the way to Forterocca, and they were running in step and even in the same breathing rhythm- when they arrived they weren't even out of breath. It was a miracle how everything worked out with timing, remembering his allergies, and a million more things. It's been amazing just to see how God takes care of us daily.

So besides that we've been doing training every day, playing whatever when we can (calcio with the local kids), and world cup-ing to the max. That's super fun in the village, and it was ridiculous when Italy got out. I think the whole country will be a little angry about that for the next few years. Anyways, I uploaded some more pics, but internet is crazy slow here so the ol blogspot doesn't really wanna cooperate. Go check em out.

Vai!

Last week was a lot of training- a Welsh and a Brit (both awesome futbol players) were here. We spent a lot of time learning Biblical basis of sports missions and other such things. They kinda boiled it down to the simplest ways to do everything, and that in itself was mindblowing. We had a lot of practical training, and that week we also got to play outside a lot. I don't actually play soccer too much, but my volleyball skills have transferred to the keeper (portillero) position surprisingly well. We've been working through a lot of issues individually and as a group; there's been so much I hardly know where to start. But the main points for me have all stemmed from "getting over myself" as David says. My theme passage lately is James 3:13-18.

This week we've been doing a sports camp for the kids in Torre. It's crazy different from any camp in the states. I'm in charge of volleyball, but they're so young a lot of times it turns into just running around, them teaching us Italian games and us teaching them American games. We have had to be cooped up in the tiny gym with everyone for most of the week because of rain, but that means we just get to see more amazing taekwondo demos by 4-time world champ Vladimir. Today I only had a couple girls, so we actually hardcore worked on some skills. Sometimes Amanda translates, but when I'm left alone it's a bad mix of Spanish/Italian and the kids throw their hands up and say NON CAPITO! when I can't understand them (in a nice way). It is really funny watching them interact- they do the stereotypical Italian yelling with the hands when they're mad, and I've heard "Mama Mia!" many times. But my girls have been opening up a lot, and some of their English is really getting better (they do English classes in the afternoon after we finish with sports and lunch). There has been an older special needs girl, and yesterday she was playing some games with a ball and cups and basically all the kids were crowding around and cheering for her- the joy on her face was unbelievable.

Most of the kids at this camp have never known someone who believes in Jesus besides a priest or someone who's over 70. So a main point is showing them that people they look up to, who are interested in sports like them, and who are "cool" young-20's Americans actually pray and read a Bible. Someone's been giving a testimony-ish every day during the break. The questions these kids ask are crazy; they really have no exposure to church or much talk about God. Yesterday when Eliseo asked someone to read a bible verse they were all fighting over it and crowding around to see what it said.

The rest of our time this week has been filled up with FCA training from Dan, getting gelato, playing basketball and/or soccer in the rain, and watching world cup games (insane to be in Europe, I'm sadly becoming a bigger soccer fan). Last night we met with some kids in Bobbio who are actually Christians, although pretty much none of them come from a Christian family. We just talked and played with them; they also asked a bunch of questions and then they all crowded around for our autographs afterwards.

I've been able to meet a lot more of the OM Italy team, and I've talked to Amanda about when she played here. I'm not sure what level I'll be at (Logan Tom played for a club here), but David has apparently been telling people I could go pro. We'll see, but I might even make money off of it some day. I'll probably be staying at Forterocca at least for a while, then who knows. Also, I found out I'm running a basketball camp for Arab kids in Bethlehem with Austin and Clayton. No big deal. Kinda stoked outta my mind. Two more weeks.

Pikchaz

I started a photostream: http://s937.photobucket.com/albums/ad220/chevy1035/Impact/

password is eurochevy

Here's a taste:

This is where I'm living- Forterocca. Top floor.

View out our balcony thing:

First gelato from Sergio's:

Walking back after our 22 hours of silence; Forterocca on the left.

This is a few of us after a hike up them mountains in the French direction.

Trainings

So turns out this valley is super famous for having the first evangelistic missions training like 800 years ago. Pre-reformation Waldensians were here; their main point was just that everyone should have access to the Bible. So basically the Pope's army hunted them down, there's a cliff right behind Forterocca (the building I'm staying in, means strong rock or fortress) where the Waldensians were brought to. They were told that they could either resubmit to the Pope or be thrown off; most of them chose death, and the river that runs through the town was red that day. We also went to their school (Colegui di Barba) where they would memorize scripture for 3 years, then go out into the towns basically until they were martyred. They took us to a cave where they would meet and where they were ambushed one day- craziness.

We've been working on teamwork ridiculousness. It's really frustrating at times, but it's really doing its job. Today we had about 4 hours of straight physical competition. On each team, one person was blindfolded, one couldn't speak, and one couldn't touch the ground. I ended up getting blisters from doing at least 300 pushups- at one time when we were about to pass out, Dennis (ex navy captain) told us to look up at that cliff where the Waldensians died, and asked what we would be willing to do. We did about 20 more then. Insane.

Food is still crazy good, although not enough meat as all us athletes are used to. I've also been meeting a lot of the people I'll probably be working with at least over the next year. They're all really awesome. Going into the market tomorrow & hopefully working on language!

First Day

So. Finally here. Airport/planes were a fun experience. 5 of us met on the flight to London so we actually got to talk to people. We were then in Heathrow pretty much all day (playing blanket ball), which is the fanciest airport I've ever been in- only designer shops and no fast food. We ate at the Giraffe and bought Clayton his first drink since it was his 21st, and the waitress was frustrated when we had to ask what "rocket" was (it's little lettuce). We drove through the mountains at night, so it was amazing to wake up at Forterocca and actually see them out the window for the first time.

The valley is stupid beautiful; we wandered around today and played soccer and basketball on this field and court that is right next to a river that comes straight out of the alps. The whole valley only has about 9,000 people in it, who speak a weird dialect of Italian and French. We're only about 15 km from the French border.

We had orientation stuff today; it's gonna be crazy awesome but we won't ever get a schedule, we'll just find out where we're going/what we're doing on a day to day basis. Also I can't put up pics of people on facebook due to security issues for people who it might be dangerous to be affiliated with missions (possibly me especially). So I'll probably start a photobucket once I find a cable to upload my pics with.

Had our first Italian pizza and gelato tonight- absolutely amazing. I'm gonna try to study Italian a lot- I can understand some but I need to learn the rules to adjust my brain away from Spanish. Pictures hopefully to come soon.