"It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas..." somewhere in the world including at Pan de Vida - as long as that looking like Christmas includes decorations and trees and things, but not if looking like Christmas is supposed to mean freezing temperatures and snow.



They do decorate in the Dining Hall / Auditorium and they hang lights and garland on some of the dormitories. But for someone who has spent 41 Christmases in Manitoba, always surrounded by cold and snow, this really doesn't feel like Christmas. We seem to be stuck in August or September.

The one thing that is really neat about Christmas in Mexico is that I have heard of no battles regarding the placement of manger scenes as we so often hear about in Canada and the U.S. With Mexico's strong Catholic influence there is no question that Christmas is depicted in public places in a patently Christian way.

In fact in one of the main city sqaures there is a large Christmas display that features the entire story of God's interaction with humanity. Since we can't read and understand the Spanish plaques that describe the various scenes we have to surmize what they all mean.



In one corner there are statues of a number of demon-like characters which we suppose depicts the fall of Lucifer.



A little further along there are two idyllic looking people whom we take to be Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. However, it must be after the Fall since they are fully clothed in traditional Mexican dress.



Around the corner from Adam and Eve is a large serpant and a large, bright, red apple - which we assume depicts the Temptation that led to Adam and Eve's Fall.



There is also a village scene with children playing and adults sitting outside their houses. We're not sure if this is intended to depict life before or after the coming of Christ.


Then, of course, the centerpiece is a large stable and manger scene that feature Mary and Joseph with shepherds, kings and other people whose role I'm unsure of. There are even large elephant, horse and cow statues. As well there is a tent that looks like it contains a pirate's buried treasure which I surmise to be the treasure brought by the Magi to the Christ Child.

However, when we were there, the manger was empty, but I am assuming that the baby Jesus will arrive during the festivities of this coming week. I'm not sure if we will try to take this in or not since around Christmas we have found the Central part of the city is very congested with people and cars on very narrow streets and sidewalks; more congested than usual.

I am amazed that Mexican people in cars are in such a hurry to get to where they are going that they honk at the slightest provocation. This past week a pickup truck nearly blew a horn honking at me for not turning right on a red light. But you put Mexican people on a sidewalk and they saunter as though they have all the time in the world. I just don't understand.



In the middle of the main square downtown there is a large bandstand and even this bandstand is decorated with large poinsettas attached to the railing.



One block over from this large display is another square with a fountain that covers a large underground parking garage - which is also decorated with a Christmas tree and a manger scene. In this square there is a huge artificial Christmas tree.



All of the flower beds have been planted with Poinsettas. It is magnificently beautiful to see the many Poinsettas planted outside here at Christmas time. That reminds us that we are definitely not in Manitoba this Christmas.



In one of the government building courtyards located off another square in the historic downtown of Queretaro called the Plaza de Armas, there is a large Christmas tree constructed out of what we used to call "kuegeln". It's a unique and very pretty sight that is surrounded by other decorations.

So you see, while it may look a lot like Christmas, it still doesn't feel like Christmas, despite the fact that we have finished Christmas shopping much earlier and more simply than we have in any year in recent memory.

So if we don't write here again until a time that is too close to your Christmas celebrations for you to have time to read it before your celebrate - please allow me and our family to wish you all a very Merry Christmas filled with the peace and love that can only come from the Prince of Peace whose birth we celebrate at Christmas.

Well, this week there are two exciting experiences to report on. Each is exciting in its own way and each is an experience we will not soon forget.

On this past Friday morning our alarm was set for 5:30 AM!! Yikes, that's early no matter where in the world you are. The purpose of our getting up at that hour of the day was a trip to Teotihuacan which is located about 40 km northeast of Mexico City. Teotihuacan is an ancient Mexican native city that features two large pyramids - one called the Sun pyramid and the other the Moon pyramid. Teotihuacan is a major tourist attraction in Mexico and is featured in most if not all of the Mexican tourism books. It's a must see that Joan and I were able to see four years ago when we were here and we thought it was important for the kids see this place as well.

On this trip we were accompanying a grade five and six class from the Pan de Vida School on a field trip. For this trip one of the German volunteers, Mattias, accepted our invitation to join us for this adventure.

We were supposed to leave at 6 AM but as is often the case in Mexico the actual time of our departure was actually about 7 AM. Oh well, best to roll with it. On this day I often thought of the G.K. Chesterton quote which I included in our first blog, "An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered; an adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered."

They say getting there is half the fun on journeys such as this, but in this case, while getting there was more interesting than we had assumed it would be, it wasn't nearly half the fun we were going to have on this day.

It seems that Mexican government employees are as suspicious as employees of any other place. It seemed that despite the fact that we had a letter from the school stating that our children were part of the field trip, they refused to believe, without authorization from someone in command, that our children were part of Pan de Vida. I don't know what the problem might be. Why wouldn't three blonde children be part of Pan de Vida? Upon further reflection we did look out of place - our children don't have the school uniform of Pan de Vida and they are about 18 inches taller than the rest of the children. It did feel strange to be categorized because of the color of our skin and hair. But in the end enough of the right people vouched for us and we were able to get on with our tour.

Last time we were at Teotihuacan we parked near the pyramids. This time we parked at the opposite end of the city from the Moon Pyramid. It is a much bigger site than I remembered it being. We did a lot of walking that day. My GPS totalled that we walked over 4 1/2 miles on the day.



Eventually we arrived at the base of the Sun pyramid and given enough time all of us managed to climb to the top. Sure enough it looked exactly the same as it had four years ago when we were there. We were able to determine, via the GPS, that the Sun pyramid is 180 feet high. There were many steps to climb to the top and the steps had a large rise and narrow run to them - for people with such short legs they sure must have been willing to lift them a long ways to climb up the pyramid.



When we climbed down the Sun pyramid we found that the Pan de Vida students were not allowed to climb the pyramids because in the past students and young children in groups have climbed the pyramids, behaved like children and fallen and injured or killed themselves. As a result no students or unaccompanied children are allowed to climb the pyramids. Again, the irony of this struck me. Our children got in as part of the Pan de Vida group but were able to climb the pyramids because they looked like tourists.

After our adventure with the Sun pyramid it was time to find lunch. We came upon a hamburger stand near the moon pyramid and were able to order food for the family. After lunch the kids and I (Herb) decided that we couldn't go home talking about how we had climbed half of the pyramids at Teotihuacan. Four years ago Joan and I told everyone that we were too rushed to climb them both but this time that excuse wasn't going to cut it. So the four of us trudged up the Moon pyramid. Here the steps stop about 15 or 20 feet from the top. In total there were 111 steps that covered about 120-125 vertical feet of the 140 foot Moon pryamid. Again, for such short people they sure must not have minded lifting their legs a long way to climb to the top.



As you can see from the picture when the steps stop the remainder of the trek is rather rugged.



The view from the top of the Moon pyramid was just as spectacular as from the top of the Sun pyramid and from there we would see just how far we had to walk back to the parking lot.

Amid all of the sights and sounds of Teotihuacan probably the most enduring memory will not the the size and the accomplishment of the site. The most enduring memory will be the scores of peddlers selling the most annoying sounding flutes you have ever heard. If we had only heard one all day it might have sounded mildly pleasant, but after the 100th person offered to sell you a flute cheap - "almost free" was one of the sales pitches - and demonstrates the fact that it can only play four notes it becomes quite tiresome. We have made many jokes at the expense of the peddlars of Teotihuacan.

When we arrived back at the parking lot we piled into the vehicles and headed for home - we thought. We had been invited to Teotihuacan by a teacher and her husband and we told them that we would follow them because they probably knew the way better than we did. On the trip to Teotihuacan we travelled through some of suburban Mexico City and after asking directions a couple of times we arrived. While it was a little later than we had thought it would be, it turned out we didn't need as much time to tour Teotihuacan as we thought we would - a museum is barely tolerable for me when the descriptions are in English, but completely impossible when the descriptions are in Spanish.

We left Teotihuacan at 4 PM and those leading us decided that the way they knew best to get back to Queretaro started in downtown Mexico City. So while we followed them we drove right downtown in order to get onto the correct road so that we could go back out of Mexico City to Queretaro. They had driven this route before but on a Saturday or Sunday when it was no problem. However, this was Friday at 4 PM. Problem!! If Mexico City has a population of 30 million it seemed like about 10 million of them wanted to get out of the city on the same route as us on Friday. Consequently, we were in a traffic jam getting into downtown and out of downtown from about 4:30 PM till 9:00 PM. We have never experienced anything like it before in our lives.

Remember what Chesterton said? Well our adventures included a Mexico City version of increasing traffic flow. We could clearly see that at one time the street we were on had consisted of two lanes travelling in our direction. However, someone must have reasoned that most people drive small cars in Mexico and because of that they repainted the lines and now there were three lanes in the same amount of space. It all makes sense until some Canadian drives a Chevrolet Subdivision down that street. It is no small miracle that we didn't lose paint, squish somebody in a VW Beetle or both.

Yet another adventure included an uncontrolled intersection in downtown Mexico City where three lanes of traffice crossed in each direction. It looked sort of like somone weaving a mat with cars.

While in the heart of downtown we saw someone in the furthest left of three lanes of traffic make a right turn across two lanes of moving traffic and live to tell about it. I don't even think I heard anyone honk their horn at him/her.

When we hit the traffic jam proper the motorcycles driving between the lanes caused me no small amount of panic - but at least they all wore helmets. While the car traffic was stopped the motorcycles kept moving by driving between the lanes. Not only were there motorcylists to annoy and startel me but there were street peddlers selling food, beverages, phone cards (I'm not making this up) and trinkets to motorists who were stopped in the gridlock. If I had known this ahead of time I could have finished my Christmas shopping on the highway in Mexico City. The peddlars are amazingly discerning individuals, able to tell a motorist who is honking because he wants to buy something from a motorist honking because he is being squeezed in his lane. Not only could they discern the various honking but they could dodge cars and motorcycles while simultaneously hawking their wares and making change. Absolutely unbelieveable!

Then - yes there's more - we heard sirens! I was convinced there was no way an ambulance could get through this gridlock. I should have known better. This ambulance wove it's way through the traffic jam as cars squeezed from one lane to the next to make way. The ambulance driver wove across from one gap to another. He must have driven an extra 25% further than the actual distance to where he was going because of all the lateral travel through the gridlock. Again, no paint was lost, although I'm not sure how that happened or didn't happen.

When the first ambulance had passed us I again heard sirens and now a military looking ambulance was making his way through the gridlock and he passed us in an underpass sirens blaring, shouting in Spanish over his personal P.A. system for people to get out of the way. Now we could lose paint on either another car or the concrete wall of the underpass. I'm not sure what Chesterton had in mind but I don't think he ever drove in Mexico City during Rush Hour on a Friday.



The one piece of tranquility in this rather paniced event was that at one point Iooked into the next lane and there was a pick up truck loaded with Poinsettas. I then realized for about the 30th time that day that we were definitely not in Manitoba anymore.

We arrived back at Pan de Vida at 10 :30 PM exhausted and stunned at all that we had seen and experienced. Once we are fully recovered it will be a long time before we forget our trip to Teotihuacan.

This morning (Sunday) we wanted to go to a church we had helped with an outreach four years ago when we were here. The church is called Mount Sinai and when I asked people here for directions I was told that a group of girls here goes to the Mount Sinai church every week to help with Sunday School. We were assured it would be no problem for us to follow them and go with them to church. But this morning when I went to confirm the arrangements I found out that there is more than one Mount Sinai church in Queretaro and the group of girls from Pan de Vida go to the other one. But after some conferring we were told that one of the girls knew the way to the church and if we wanted she could come with us and show us the way.

We agreed but we didn't realize she speaks only a little less English than we speak Spanish. After several wrong turns and unplanned turn arounds we eventually found the Mount Sinai Church.



Mount Sinai Church is located in a very poor part of Queretaro. The pastor couple, Simeon and Heno, have faithfully served this church during the last four years and presumably for years before we first encountered them. They have slowly but surely built the building till it now is an enclosed space, walls completed to 3/4 height and a new tin roof. The dirt floor of the courtyard was being swept as we arrived and I assumed the dirt floor of the sanctuary had been swept earlier.God has provided for them.



The congregation this morning consisted of Simeon, Heno, their two sons, 8 or 9 neighborhood girls and one adult woman, plus our family. They were extremely glad to see us and we worshipped with them. I have not been as emotional during a worship service in our time in Queretaro as I was this morning in that little church in one of the poorest neighborhoods of Queretaro. For entirely different reasons than Teotihuacan and Mexico City we will not soon forget the Mount Sinai Church. I am so grateful that our children got to see this place where God's people faithfully serve and worship Him.

Well, that's the most memorable of this week. We wish you all a blessed 2nd Advent. May you remember what it is that matters most about this Christmas season.

Croissant Baking the Pan de Vida Way

Lest you think things become routine, even a morning in the kitchen can have some unexpected twists and turns. Due to a large donation of frozen items yesterday from a grocery chain down in Mexico City (which requires 3 hours travel each way to pick up, and several more hours to sort through and put away, the morning's market run was cancelled! (Only after Herb and Hannah & Jeff got up at 6:10, drove along with the team over to the lady's house who heads up the kitchen, and the conversation resulted in "No verdura" [no vegetables] today.) Highly unusual.

After I got laundry started and headed to the kitchen, I was assigned the job of baking up the croissants. Well, I hadn't seen the ovens used at all thus far, so I started off.



The dough was not packaged in the little containers you pick up in the store, however, but in very large plastic bags - oh, and all of the dough had thawed, already. So, another lady and I began. 6 very large pans, of which 4 fit in the ovens at one time.



First you spread margarine on each pan (fingers). Then you pull apart a portion of the dough, as best you can, hopefully still resembling a croissant. Each pan holds about 36 croissants.



Then you need to brush each one with a bit of milk. Instead of a pastry brush, you use a small piece of cardboard. I removed pieces of shrimp, chocolate cake and frozen french fries, as I worked my way through the bags of dough.



When they were done, you would never have known where they came from.



"Lord, for the food we are about to receive, may we be truly thankful", we prayed as we had fresh croissants for lunch. They were very tasty!! At 2:00 p.m., the last of the dough was on the pans, and Herb offered to finish up baking the last pans so that I could have some lunch.



Yield: Two Large Pots full. Just another morning on the job.

Well, today was the first Sunday of Advent. This morning was the first Sunday that we have attended a worship service in English since October 8th at Grace Church in Winkler. Since then we have worshipped in Low German once and many times in Spanish - Pan de Vida has worship services on Sunday mornings and Thursday evenings. In fact this last Thursday I spoke at the worship service. One of the other volunteers translated for me. I find it hard to keep my train of thought when a translator speaks - I keep listening for how certain English words will be translated.

I have learned that worship can happen even if I understand very few of the words, it can also not happen when I understand every word that is spoken (Oops, I'm sorry, I'm not supposed to preach until January).



This morning we worshipped with a group called the Queretaro Christian Fellowship which meets at a Church called The Rose of Sharon. I assumed that this English language group rents the facility from the Spanish group that meets later. Queretaro Christian Fellowship is a small group of about 40-50 (we only used the chairs/pews on the left side of the picture and the phone numbers of the whole church are listed on the back of the bulletin) and it was quite an informal gathering. We arrived fashionably late and the person who was leading the service made his way to the back of the building where we were sitting, welcomed us, and asked if it was alright to ask me to introduce our family to the group which I did.

Despite the fact that today is the first Sunday of Advent it does not feel remotely like Christmas. The weather today was cool (only got to about 16 with an East breeze), it was quite warm and sunny yesterday and the only snow we see around here is inside the freezer. It feels like it should be late August or early September not the first sunday of advent. This has been the longest summer of my life.

After church we had a quick lunch and headed out of town in the direction of Mexico City for another adventure - a hiking adventure this time.

We arrived at a small town called Bernal which has the distinguishing feature of being the home to the world's second or third largest rock - behind Ayers Rock in Australia.



The town of Bernal is a small village but like all Mexican villages it has narrow streets and because quite a few tourists arrive in the town there is an active market section. They feature lovely, colorful tablecloths and other crafts - Jeffrey got a dragon to hang on his wall at home (ours is to figure out how to get it home without it being bent out of shape).



On the way to the base of the rock we were only slightly confused by this particular piece of signage (Pena means 'rock' or 'large stone'). The drip of paint by the graffitti artist gave it away for us.

The rock itself is most impressive. Frankly, I have no idea what the difference is between a rock and a mountain (although I have been caught between a rock and a hard place, but that's different). All I know is that the trail climbing up the rock was definitely not the type that would occur in any national or provincial park in Canada.



This trail would be a Canadian insurance underwriter's nightmare to see the way in which this trail was arranged with very little effort seemingly given to minimizing the risk of injury for hikers.

There were two handrails on the entire trail. One was a steel two by six mounted in concrete posts about two feet off the ground (which is closer to the waists of Mexican people than it is to the waists of Canadians) with no spindles from the handrail to the concrete. The other handrail was two strands of barbed wire strung from rock to rock (we took that to mean "Keep Out"). In the end we all climbed as high as we could go without rock climbing equipment which is about where the trail ended.



As you can see from the picture the GPS read that we reached an alititude of 7845 ft. above sea level.



It looked as though the rock would go up a couple hundred feet higher than that.



But we all made it. When we got back to Pan de Vida and Joan and I were looking at the pictures she said, "Wow, that's awfully high. I would never go up there." But as you can see, she did it. On the climb up and down it was quite warm and we were glad that we went today and not yesterday when it was much warmer here. We started out wearing jackets but about 20 minutes into the climb they became a liability. However, when we got to the top we could feel the breeze and we were glad we had taken our jackets with us.

The calendar has turned to December and we know that this is the month when we head home. It's quite amazing how our thoughts have begun to turn toward making sure we get done what we want to accomplish before we leave. Joan is not sure the library work will get done. I know the concrete work won't get done but we are seeing the sights that we feel are important to see. This coming Friday one of the classes in the Pan de Vida school is going to Teotihuacan near Mexico city. It's a sight that features two large pyramids and was an ancient city of Mexican native peoples. We will write more about that when we arrive back from that adventure.

Until then, thank you for keeping up with us and God Bless you all.

We had the privilege yesterday of travelling to Guanajuato (pronounced, approximately like "wanawhato") with Justo and his wife Elia, and their infant son, Luca. He had mentioned that it was one of the most beautiful cities in Mexico, and they would be willing to go with us on a Saturday, to show us the place.



What an amazing place!!! Full of history, the Spanish were here by the mid-1500s, and the native tribes had been there long before - how do you explain to people with such history around them that our country is only almost 140 years old, and our province barely more than 100? That there are no buildings 500 years old, and 500 years ago there were no buildings at all in Manitoba??

Well, back to Guanajuato - it is nestled in some hills/mountains, and the range of elevation from one section of the city to another is very broad - however, no problemo - the streets simply rise and fall with the angles of elevation - some streets seemed to climb at incredibly sharp angles - and turn with any degree to the next street - the Suburban did admirably, but Herb had to navigate some corners with multiple moves (causing some irritation to the locals - which we were quick to hear).



Guanajuato is also famed for its narrow streets - yes, we had to pull in the rear-view mirrors to get through a few tight places, and watch for the front steps of some homes, as they were right up near the tires - the speed at which you navigate under these conditions is fairly "carefully". Our guides said we had a few more inches of room than the orphanages' vans do, so that was plenty of room. How some of these incredibly narrow, winding streets could be open for two-way traffic was highly questionable to us!



The city also has a mining history, and many of the underground tunnels have been converted to traffic thoroughfares, and so we spent some time driving through this maze - complete with merging traffic, from any direction, and parking areas underground. There are numerous access points, both for traffic and pedestrians, and so if you are new to the area, getting lost is pretty much a given. We were ever so appreciative to have local guides for navigating - and still had to back-track once or twice.



Tourism is a major industry here, and there were many, many shops and stalls to see. There's a great picture of the Street of the Kissing Balcony, where, in fact, the second floor balcony from one side of the street is close enough to the balcony across the street that you could, theoretically, kiss across the street. Only one balcony was open to tourists, so we were unable to test the theory.



The city is also important in their quest for independence, and there is a large fort in the centre of the city bearing gun-shot marks from a battle when the peasants tried to throw off the Spaniards (in the early 1800s?) - while the peasants did gain independence for Guanajuato for a time, they were not successful in that attempt to gain freedom for the whole country - this did come later. With the Spaniards locked securely within the fort, Pipila, the hero of the battle, immortalized in a statue overlooking the city, gained hero status by strapping a rock to his back so that he could not be shot and carrying a torch with which he burned the gates to the fort thereby sealing the Spaniard's fate.



A large church in the centre was hosting weddings, as it was a Saturday, so we witnessed a bride arriving with her family, for the 2:00 wedding.



The city has a delightfully colorful amount of houses, and the view from the statute to Pepila (the hero of the battle mentioned above) you can see marvelous vistas of colour throughout the city, interspersed with the beautiful green of the trees in the plazas. We enjoyed a wonderful snack of "fresas con crema" which is strawberries with a rich cream and sugar - we shared one for $1. A truly delightful adventure.

It's time to introduce you to some of the foods we have recently been having - some with greater and some with lesser degrees of success. Saturday evening Herb and I and Rey took in a supper downtown, at one of the restaurants offering the 4-5 course "cena". This includes a tiny appetizer taco (taquito) with an ounce of lettuce, a half ounce of a cream-cheese like filling and a half teaspoon of refried beans. This was followed by a soup serving, a cold serving of spaghetti or rice, then the main course of meat, (we had a choice from numerous), followed by a small slice of a nut coffee cake. All of this was $4.20 per person, and we added a Coke each, for $1.20, for a total, with taxes about $5.50 per person.

Then on Monday, we were included in a boys outing to a "rancho". All the boys, the boys' houseparents family, and our family climbed into 2 fifteen passenger vans. The one we were in had about 26, near as we could count. Thankfully I elected to hold a small boy named Daniel on my lap, and so my ride was still relatively comfortable. After quite some while travelling, and a few stops to confirm where we were going by the drivers, we arrived at a small village where we met up with another family, and then proceeded to what looked like a community soccer field, out among the mountains. There were no "facilities" or amenities, but the adults had packed a picnic lunch - which means rice, eggs with chiles, and tostados in large pots.



The other family had brought corn on the cob - served Mexican style, which means you slather mayonnaise over the whole cob, then roll it in some grated hard cheese (wasn't quite parmesan, but somewhat like that texture), and then, wait for it, sprinkled with chiles and lemon. In the picture above Pancho is enjoying his corn on the cob. When I had previously seen these corn cobs in the downtown region, I had wondered if they were rolled in coconut, but not so, it was a type of cheese, and Yes, I ate one. The other family members were not as committed to the corn as I was, so I was on my own.



Snacks seemed to come out every half hour, including Kelloggs nutri-grain bars, then some pomegranates (look like red kernels of corn, but with a tiny seed inside), sprinkled with, wait for it, chiles and lemon. The ladies serving the food started to snicker when I repeatedly declined the chiles, but I tried the pomegranate anyway. Not bad. Rey enjoys them. They also brought out cheezies, similar to ours, but, you can guess what they like on top of them - Hot Sauce. All the while, the boys, from small to large, (probably ages 3 to 43) were engaged either in soccer, or "wrassling". They don't need much sports equipment beyond a soccer ball. It starts to darken by 5:00 p.m., so everyone was packed back into the 2 vans, and we started the almost hour-long trek back to the casa. A good time was had by all. When we returned to our rooms, Herb headed straight to the local grocer to pick up ground beef, potatoes and cream, so I could make Menno style meatballs, potatoes, and schmauntfat for supper. We thought it only appropriate to balance out the cultures for the day.

Tuesday morning we were invited by the boys' houseparents couple to join them for a Mexican style breakfast, so off we were again - not knowing where we were going, or what was coming our mouths' way. In a part of town in which Augustine grew up, he took us to a street vendor for "atolle and empanadas". The first is a warm drink, which I discovered later is based on the sugar made from maiz, and tasted like a brown sugar, or a mild molasses. The drink is very thick, and dark. I could enjoy some, but the others, again, were cool to it. The empanadas are tortillas with a cheese filling (not like our cheddars), and then deep-fried. I don't often have a deep-fried breakfast, but we all tasted them. Suffice it to say we didn't ask for seconds. A third item for sampling were the sweet tamales, which looked like a rice and flour mixture, with a bit of sweetened flavouring, in pink, wrapped in corn husks and boiled. Thankfully our hosts were gracious and gathered up the left-overs to take home to a more appreciative audience. We also toured a large Catholic cathedral across the street, the kids climbed a very large tree, and we dropped in at a small out-door market, to browse. Here, Augustine purchased a few of the "tun" from a cactus - they grow a form of fruit, which is edible (actually, the plates of cactus, when fresh are also edible, but that's another story). These came in a red, blanco, and yellow form. Again, quite good. I purchased 5 mandarin oranges for 60 cents, so you can tell some foods are very inexpensive. We appeared to be heading back to the casa, when he pulled in at one more shop - the Donas y Churros. This brought the first smile to Jeff's face, as we picked up fresh doughnuts and churros - each rolled in sugar and cinnamon. This will be our Tim's for the next while. Unfortunately we forgot the camera for this outing, so you'll have to use your imaginations.

This morning (Wednesday) we joined the vegetable run team, which means you leave fairly early, approx 6:30 (which today was almost 7:00), picked up the lady in charge of the kitchen for the casa ("File"), and headed to a LARGE outdoor market. They take the older van and numerous empty crates, and then about 5 of us follow File around, while she inquires at the various stalls who will donate vegetables and fruits for the casa. The van keeps moving, in order for the distance to be kept to a minimum that you are lugging the crates full, and File keeps moving to another aisle everytime you turn around, so it's a bit of a circus knowing where you were, where you need to be and where you are going. This market takes up at least a whole city block, and there are many aisles, all with vehicles out front, the road left to maneuver in is just inches larger than your vehicle, and people are everywhere. Rey asked an apt question "how many onions stores could they need?" Every manner of fruit and vegetable is available, usually by the truck-load.





Herb took many shots, of pineapple (Yes,that's a whole truck full of pineapples in the picture), sugar cane(which he is carrying in the picture), onions, carrots, etc. It was a successful run, the van was almost full in an hour, and then we were off to check at the "chicharron" place, which is a large meat store, a ways from the market, where they boil pig-skin in oil - for human consumption. We picked up 4 very large bags full (about like your large-sized garbage bag). These are best fresh, by the way. A very large barrel of pork lard was available for purchase, but we didn't need any. Next, we stopped at a chicken place and received 6 chickens. All are gratefully received, and it was finally time to head back to unload the haul - virtually all the food the casa serves comes through donations, and some days the food is plentiful, and other days it is meager. Dario, the director of the orphanage, mentioned that in all of the years he had been here, they had never missed a meal. Prayer meeting is Tuesday nights here, so I know that there is some "divine guidance" in the provisions for the orphanage.



On the weather front, you won't believe this, but it has been COLD. Night-time temperatures have been near zero celsius, (there was frost on the vehicles and roofs this morning) and when the windows are drafty, and the doors have at least an inch of room to allow for cockroaches and other guests to come and go at will, and there is absolutely no heating facilities, and it's in a concrete building - indoors has been very chilly. Once Herb was sleeping in sweats and a shirt, I suggested we head to Wal-Mart, where they have, bless Wal-Mart, an electric heater for $20.00. Now, I have only to wear my jacket all day, over my long-sleeved shirt, over an undershirt, over ...., you get the picture. The boys slept in our room with us, so that we only heated one room over-night. Hannah has a smaller room on her own, and was comfortable with two blankets. The boys room, on the other hand, is an outer-corner room, has two windows, two concrete walls, and was quite cool. So, we are cozy. And this afternoon warmed up nicely, so that it was more comfortable to be outside than in. Normal lows are +10, and our local Mexicans are complaining just about as much as we do in Manitoba, about cold. Herb was adamant, however that under no circumstances were we heading home for Manitoba, because it was too cold in Mexico!!!!

Well, it's Saturday morning, the boys are at football practice, Joan is doing Saturday work and Hannah is moving into her own room - the first time she's not shared a room with her brothers and/or parents in over a month. The room became available when the two women who were visiting from Manitoba went home and as far as we know no one who will need the space is coming before we leave.

Our Internet connection here is quite sporadic so I'm not sure when this will get posted.

We think we have settled into a routine here in the last week. We still have our moments where we feel that we don't belong or that we're not sure we'll make it but those are becoming less frequent. But I do still notice that often when I wake up in the morning I have to remind myself that I'm not at home in Winkler.

In one of our blog entries I mentioned that we were planning a big concrete pour for Friday November 10th. That particular pour went sideways in many and varied ways. As we you can see from the picture the first task was to make sure the troweller was lifted up to the second level. I don't think they do it that way in Canada.



The concrete truck and Concrete pump were supposed to arrive at 2 PM. At 3 PM the pump arrived. At about 3:15 one of the pump operators cell phone rang and we were told that the concrete truck would not arrive for another hour. At 4:45 the first truck arrived. We emptied that truck and waited for the second truck to arrive. It arrived at about 5:45 just after it got dark - the driver had gotten lost. In the meantime the first load had begun to set and we could hardly mate the new concrete to the previously poured concrete. We tried the power troweller but it just chewed it up and then the throttle cable broke. Some people began to try to fix the troweller and the rest of us continued to pour but by then it was looking fairly bleak.



Eventually, at about 8 PM, well after it had gotten dark we finished pouring, with another significant break between truck number 3 and 4. By that point the troweller was fixed and Malchor started to trowell and wet some of the concrete in hopes of fixing the ridges. He did amazingly well and I tried to stay out of the way and hold a light for him at the same time. The light I was holding was one of those halogen lights flood light things that are usually mounted on a stand. Like many things here it is no longer in its original condition and like all things in Mexico it was wired with single strand wires that were marretted together and maretted to the main cord that plugged into the extension cord. It's important to know that there were only two wires - no ground wire. At various times during the trowelling process it had rained a bit - with wind coming from two different directions - but about 30 - 45 minutes before we quit trowelling it began to rain with a stiff breeze from the northeast. My hands were wet and I was holding this light by the two wires in the rain waiting for a jolt of electricity. I got several imaginary shocks but thankfully no real ones. For the first time I can remember I was cold in Queretaro when I was somewhere other than in the shower.

Unfortunately the rain didn't let up and our newly poured concrete got rained on and the finish is not that great - "Mase Meno" Malchor politely calls it. They had hoped to get a good enough finish that they wouldn't have to tile the floors. They'll be tiling. Malchor's son Juan and Nico, the other construction worker, spent all of this week attempting to repair the finish to the floor. I got inside, "Pluetz Noat" after 10 PM. Justo, the director's son was on the roof holding the other light and he said to me, "What a job and you don't even get paid for it." I told him that I might get paid some day in the future.

This week Malchor and I worked at building a set of stairs to the second floor. On Friday, once again we poured concrete only this time instead of trucks and pumps we used a more traditional and more commonly used Mexican method of concrete pouring - the five-gallon pail. As you can see from the picture Rey helped with this pour and it turned out quite nicely. While this method is more labor intensive and harder on the body - I have bruises on my forearms from the pails - it has the advantage in that the concrete arrives when it is needed.



Joan has been busy teaching English Tuesday and Thursday mornings, working in the kitchen slicing everything from cactus to lettuce to peeling potatoes. She also began a project that has ignited a passion within her. As you can see from the photo below she is organizing the school library here at Pan de Vida. There would be more than a thousand books in the library, and while some of the books were set up according to theme, many, many have been added or mis-filed, so it's pretty much a disaster. She has also found such useful library equipment as a deflated basketball, and a length of one-inch chain, discarded textbooks (half completed), a box of elastic bands, and goodness knows what else, in and among the shelves. They will need more shelves in order to get all of the books onto the shelves (numerous boxes are strewn throughout). They are using the Dewey Decimal system, which puts all the world information into categories, by number (000 - Encyclopedias, dictionaries, etc.), 100 is philosophy & psychology, 200 is religion, and so on, til 900. So far they have one stack of encylcopedias on the right shelf, with a label for its number, as well as they have been typed into a master list on the computer, which can be sorted by the number category, author or title. She has had Hannah, Rey & Jeff helping, as during the afternoons they have time, and that gets it done much quicker. Her aim is to get through the whole library by the time we leave, but we're not sure if that's feasible. We also shudder to think of what will happen to the organization they have worked on once we leave as there is no librarian here to ensure that the system is continued. Well, like everything else we do here we do the best we can and give it to God and the people of Pan de Vida when we leave to do with as they see fit.



Last Sunday afternoon and evening we had some neat tourist experiences. Queretaro is a city with a great deal of history. It was the seat of the Mexican Revolution against the Spaniards as well as figuring prominently in the authoring of the Mexican constitution. One of the outstanding features of Queretaro is an aqueduct that was constructed between 1726 and 1735. It stretches over a mile and consists of 74 arches that are as high as 28.5 meters at their highest and the bases of which are 20 meters square. It is a beautiful and impressive sight.



After we had been to Los Arcos we went downtown into the oldest part of the city. We were unable to park in a parkade downtown because the streets were blocked off. The reason, as near as we could figure, was that there was a cross Mexico car rally in the area and the cars were on display in the square downtown. So we parked our Suburban on one of the narrow streets downtown. The streets are so narrow that most of them are one-way streets where large vehicles like ours park with the side mirrors folded in so as to leave more room for travel. We had not realized that the mirrors should be folded in but someone did us a favor and folded ours in for us while we were away. On the way out of downtown we were driving down one of these streets when we came upon pick up truck that had parked a bit too far from the curb. We couldn't back up and go a different way because there was impatient traffic behind us. So we folded in both mirrors, I drove close enough to the curb that the tires were rubbing against the curb and I had about 4-6 inches of space between the pickup and our Suburban.

We were able to have pizza for supper that was excellent and after supper we wandered into one of the squares where there was a bandstand set up. We found that there was a concert going on. The band was excellent and the people were having a wonderful time. They were dancing and enjoying themselves. It was a beautiful sight to behold. It was just a wonderful time to enjoy people in a different place.