I know Christmas is coming for two primary reasons. The first is that I am freezing my butt off. Second, I feel like I've done more Christmasy stuff in the past couple weeks than the past two years combined. Last Wednesday I joined a few dozen guys at the Hilton to serve at the girls' Christmas tea. I didn't do much because there were more guys than there were tables. My table was at the very front, but it was empty for the first few minutes. I wound up fighting Tyler for it when the ladies finally filled it. When we weren't praying or serving, Dirk wanted to argue about something; not anything specific, just something to pass the time. I thought it was funny that a lot of guys asked Jessica if we would be serving sweet tea Sonny's style. The thought never crossed my mind. This was a ladies' tea party for crying out loud, not tailgating or a barbecue. I have long felt that even though I was raised in the same country, I come from a culture distinct from that of my friends here. That only drove it home. Anyway, the tea was very nice and Christmasy. Best of all, there were plenty of leftover brownies, cookies, and other pastries for us to munch on after we were done serving.
Yesterday I joined the home group to watch the SEC Championship game at the Dicuses' house. The picture projected onto the wall was so big that the players were as tall as myself in real life. I was a little scared at first because it was a close game through the beginning of the fourth quarter. ESPN reminded us that Tebow had never won a game after trailing in the second half. That didn't help. We eventually gained and maintained our momentum. I really wanted to play Texas for the national championship so I could trade trash talk with Angie and Amy over the next month. But Oklahoma destroyed Mizzou so Texas is stuck in third place. Oh well.
I had volunteered to bring cookies for the Christmas party that followed. It was my first chance since I came back to try out the chocolate chip cookie recipe I had started using in Pamplona (I couldn't cheat and buy refrigerated cookie dough over there). I spent at least an hour gathering the ingredients that morning. Sweet Bay did not have M&M's for baking, and Publix did not carry the holiday colors yet. The cookies had to look somewhat Christmasy. I wound up buying the regular M&M's from Publix and only picking out the red and green ones for the cookies. After all that work, they did not come out as well as I had hoped so I was a little nervous about bringing them to the party. The batter was too thin. I think it was because I used light brown sugar. The stuff I bought in Spain was darker. Nevertheless, about three quarters of the cookies were gone by the end of the night. Maybe they were not so bad after all. I am really looking forward to giving it another go. Maybe I can use the orange and blue M&M's, and bring them to the Dicuses' when we play for the championship.
We kicked off the party by caroling around the block. I had not been caroling since my freshman year of high school when I went to the fancy retirement home with SCYWORD. Those were some of the nicest old people I had ever met. Anyway, our song sheets had a few errors and sometimes we did not know which verse to sing, but it did not matter. It was a lot of fun for us, and the few people who heard us really enjoyed it. We then returned for some food and a gingerbread house competition. I tried to write "Feliz Navidad" on one side of the roof. I wrote feliz in M&M's and with the z backwards. I wasn't able to fit Navidad underneath. Instead I wrote "x-mas" with the discarded gingerbread edges so it read "feliz x-mas."
This morning was Gator Christian Life's Christmas service. I cannot remember anything from either of the Christmas services my first two years except the lights lining the aisles, but I think this one will stay with me for a long time. The theme of the service was keeping Jesus in focus during the Christmas season as you celebrate as a family. The Villorias, Trujillos, and Gordons went on stage, kids and all, to tell us about their traditions. Mark Trujillo told us about a box of paper ornaments they use to teach their daughters spiritual lessons related to Christmas. Everyone laughed and awed as the girls shyly and reluctantly answered Mark's questions. If I did not know any better, I would have thought the Villorias' youngest son was trying to emulate the sound of flatulence with his mouth as his parents tried to explain their family's traditions. I had such difficulty concentrating on what they were saying that all I can remember is that their kids open one present on Christmas Eve. The Gordons showed a video of their children performing the nativity story that drew a roar of laughter. The highlights included Joseph riding on a giraffe and a dog under a white towel playing the sheep.
This emphasis on family came at a pretty good time for me. I have long been frustrated because I feel I am being told to be "content," but at the same time the whole wife and kids thing is pushed as the ideal life that a good Christian is supposed to have. At the beginning of the semester, I threw my Daylights devotional on the floor because I was so tired of it. Why would I want to read about how to raise kids? I'm not even out of college yet! I've hardly read it at all since. While my peers are virtual parents-in-training, I've been more cautious, trying not to assume too much. Having a family of my own seems like such a long way off, and not so important in the midst of classes, exams, work, football, and figuring out what God wants me to do just over the next year. But perhaps that is no excuse to just ignore any opportunity I have to learn from godly parents. I would certainly like to be one some day. It's time to take notes so I don't have to cram in the last minute. As for Christmas traditions, I will cross that bridge when I come to it. The pastors gave me some great examples, and I thoroughly enjoyed learning from them. Also, maybe it's time to give Daylights another chance. I like the cover of the winter edition. It looks very Christmasy.
Sunday, December 7, 2008
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Am I "unChristian"?
I just finished a book called UnChristian. It was written by David Kinnaman, who lives in my birthplace, Ventura, California, and attends South Coast Fellowship, where I went to youth group my first year and a half of high school. In fact, my youth pastor, Doug Colby, was mentioned in the book and in the acknowledgements.
The central theme is that Christianity has an image problem, and if want to win the hearts of today's youth, we need to rethink some of our strategies without watering down the Gospel. Kinnaman works for the Barna Group, a firm that conducts researching relating to Christianity in the United States. They collected data regarding what teenagers and young adults think about Christianity and Christians. They found that "Mosaics" and "Busters," as they call them, are widely abandoning or rejecting the faith due to painful personal experiences or things that have been said and done by Christian leaders. According to surveys many of them believe that Christians are hypocritical, too focused on converting people, antihomosexual, sheltered, too political, and judgmental. Kinnaman devotes an entire chapter to each one of these labels. Prominent Christian leaders including Jim Wallis, Rick Warren, Chuck Colson, and Brian McLaren share their thoughts at the end of each chapter.
Most of all I felt challenged as I read this book, but I was also motivated and encouraged. The authors are saying things that have been on mind for a while now. When Dom interviewed me on the campus of the Public University of Navarra, I said that the students there seemed to be very counterculture so becoming a Christ follower would probably appeal to them because you cannot be any more counterculture than that. The book's arguments did not offend me at all because I already agreed with many of its main themes. I was very excited as some of the authors called out the church on putting too much emphasis on homophobic political activism (as opposed to building friendships with gays) and encouraged us to tackle global climate change, excessive consumerism, AIDS, war, and extreme poverty.
I finished reading less than an hour ago. Now I am pumped. I am ready to go change the world. But how? Easier said than done (and I think the authors are well aware of that). I have been saying in life group for months now that I want to reach out to people this semester, but it has been only talk so far. My classes are filled with girls, who are not as easy to reach out to. I never have made much of an effort to make friends in my classes so perhaps it is about time to develop that skill. At Subway I am constantly working so I do not have much time to talk to my coworkers. I am quitting that job so I can have time for outreach. I do not really need more money anyway. I am applying to work as a language assistant at UF's English Language Institute. Mike Hasebrook and I have been trying to think of ways to meet international students. Perhaps this can be a good way to build relationships with them. I can even make new friends through my coworkers. Then again, outreach may be more effective somewhere else. I have just a couple days to decide. Perhaps if I get turned down a second time that would be a good indicator.
The most stirring part of the book was where Kinnaman recounts a drive he took with one of his clients. As they drove past the same strawberry fields that I have passed numerous times, the client wondered aloud who is going to share Jesus with those migrant workers out there. Kinnaman admits he had never thought about that. Neither had I. Granted, I was a mere teenager when I lived in that area. I have a long way to go in developing a heart for the lost, but I think I just took a good step forward.
The central theme is that Christianity has an image problem, and if want to win the hearts of today's youth, we need to rethink some of our strategies without watering down the Gospel. Kinnaman works for the Barna Group, a firm that conducts researching relating to Christianity in the United States. They collected data regarding what teenagers and young adults think about Christianity and Christians. They found that "Mosaics" and "Busters," as they call them, are widely abandoning or rejecting the faith due to painful personal experiences or things that have been said and done by Christian leaders. According to surveys many of them believe that Christians are hypocritical, too focused on converting people, antihomosexual, sheltered, too political, and judgmental. Kinnaman devotes an entire chapter to each one of these labels. Prominent Christian leaders including Jim Wallis, Rick Warren, Chuck Colson, and Brian McLaren share their thoughts at the end of each chapter.
Most of all I felt challenged as I read this book, but I was also motivated and encouraged. The authors are saying things that have been on mind for a while now. When Dom interviewed me on the campus of the Public University of Navarra, I said that the students there seemed to be very counterculture so becoming a Christ follower would probably appeal to them because you cannot be any more counterculture than that. The book's arguments did not offend me at all because I already agreed with many of its main themes. I was very excited as some of the authors called out the church on putting too much emphasis on homophobic political activism (as opposed to building friendships with gays) and encouraged us to tackle global climate change, excessive consumerism, AIDS, war, and extreme poverty.
I finished reading less than an hour ago. Now I am pumped. I am ready to go change the world. But how? Easier said than done (and I think the authors are well aware of that). I have been saying in life group for months now that I want to reach out to people this semester, but it has been only talk so far. My classes are filled with girls, who are not as easy to reach out to. I never have made much of an effort to make friends in my classes so perhaps it is about time to develop that skill. At Subway I am constantly working so I do not have much time to talk to my coworkers. I am quitting that job so I can have time for outreach. I do not really need more money anyway. I am applying to work as a language assistant at UF's English Language Institute. Mike Hasebrook and I have been trying to think of ways to meet international students. Perhaps this can be a good way to build relationships with them. I can even make new friends through my coworkers. Then again, outreach may be more effective somewhere else. I have just a couple days to decide. Perhaps if I get turned down a second time that would be a good indicator.
The most stirring part of the book was where Kinnaman recounts a drive he took with one of his clients. As they drove past the same strawberry fields that I have passed numerous times, the client wondered aloud who is going to share Jesus with those migrant workers out there. Kinnaman admits he had never thought about that. Neither had I. Granted, I was a mere teenager when I lived in that area. I have a long way to go in developing a heart for the lost, but I think I just took a good step forward.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
San Fermin Continues
I was planning on taking the bus to Pamplona Saturday morning, but the night monitors Raul and Lunia offered to give me a lift in their van. Raul told me that if the police were to pull us over, I would just have to pretend I don´t speak Spanish and he would tell the police I´m a tired, lost pilgrim he picked up. I grabbed my credential from upstairs to further prove my case if needed. It´s a good thing we made it to Pamplona without having to lie to the cops. I´m a horrible liar, which is probably a good thing.
The first thing I did was head to the photo shop to print my photos from the trip to Switzerland, Germany, and Portugal. I really wanted to get those into the alblum before I get back to Gainesville, where I know I would take a long time to get it done, if I ever do it. A lady helped me who spoke English perhaps equal to or a little bit below my Spanish. Some of her assistance saved me a couple euros, but at other times she just confused me more. It was strange how the Pamplonians all of a sudden began to either speak English or assume that I could not speak or understand Spanish. Then I went to my favorite pastry shop, Beatriz. I had been in there enough times that they knew I could understand them, though they´re faces told me they probably had to think for a couple seconds before they understood what I said. The garrotes and muffins were perfect that morning.
I headed for the bus station to see about leaving my backpack in the left luggage room. Nothing could have prepared me for what I saw at the bottom of stairs leading down to the underground station. I thought the new station was the most beautiful facility I had ever seen when I first walked in there the weekend it opened, but now it looked as dumpy as any inner city public transportation hub. Everywhere I looked people were sitting or sleeping on the floor. Abandoned beer bottles stood against the walls. It was louder and smelled worse than ever before. This was the new bus station´s first fiesta de San Fermin. Let´s hope it can be restored somewhat close to its pre-tourist invasion condition. When I went up to meet Anele and Alexia outside, I saw that the grass in the open area between the bus station and the ciudadela had also had a rough couple of days. It had changed from green to yellow because the grass had either died or been worn away.
From there I took them to the Plaza del Castillo, which of course was filled with people by now. We wound our way through the plaza and the streets to the ayuntamiento, or city hall. It is easily one of the prettiest buildings in Pamplona, but green banners draped from balconies made the building even more beautiful than usual. I still had not bought a pañuelo, or handerkerchief, traditionally red. I bought one from San Fermin´s official store called kukuxumusu because I thought that the ones with the shiny Pamplona coat of arms embroidered on them looked tacky. I really like the cartoony style of the kukuxumusu apparel. The t-shirts are too expensive, starting at fifteen euros, but the handkerchief was only 4.75€.
All the restaurants were pretty crowded so I took them down to the kebab restaurant near my apartment, where I had gathered with my American friends many times. In spite of the mayhem in the old town, it was for the most part business as usual in the residential area to the south. The biggest difference was that the main drag, Sancho el Fuerte, had been changed from a four lane road to a two lane road with two lanes for parking in the middle.
By mid-afternoon Pamplona was covered by clouds and the sky was sprinkling the already damp streets. As we strolled from the park to Calle Mayor we found two guys carrying a canvas sign over their heads. They invited us to join them in their makeshift shelter to stay dry. I asked them where they got it from and one of them said they tore off of a wall and had been carrying it around all day. They were from Atlanta. Alexia said she had no idea they were speaking until we ducked under the canvas with them. I understood them just fine because, as I told Alexia, I speak guy. They told us they had ran with the bulls that morning.
Around 2 am, we started to look for a place to sleep. Nobody had reserved a hostel. We were all expecting to sleep outside. Anele and Alexia did not even have backpacks. Anele wanted to sleep in one of those rooms adjacent to the banks where they keep the ATMs. When I went into one booth in the old town to withdraw money, I noticed immediately that the floor was wet. But the repungant smell did not hit me until Alexia broke the bad news- somebody had urinated in there. I thought that even if we could find one that´s clean and and not crowded, the police would kick us out. Nevertheless, I decided we should look for a place on Carlos III, the pedestrianized shopping street branching off the Plaza del Castillo.
We found a large, clean Caja Navarra ATM room and settled down. Alexia rested her head against the ATM by the window. Anele tried to use cardboard as a sleeping pad. I did the same with newspaper, but all it did was protect me just a little from the cold floor. I switched off between wearing my hooded jacket and using it as a pillow. Eventually I tried using my shoes as a pillow. That was the most effective method, giving me half an hour of sleep. Another guy came in a few minutes after us and settled down. I had long since figured out that with so many crazy drunk people wreaking havoc in the old town, Pamplona´s police department had far bigger fish to fry than removing three otherwise law-abiding Americans from an ATM booth. Another guy came in a few minutes later and settled down in a different part of the room.
Everyone who walked by seemed determined to keep us awake. One guy came up, stood right over me, and started singing loudly as if he also wanted to wake up the residents above. Another group came in yelling through a megaphone. Countless people knocked or banged on the glass trying to get our attention as if we were caged lions in a zoo. By five o'clock in the morning Anele and I were so tired that we were no longer planning on running with the bulls, but we still wanted to see them run from a safe spot behind a fence.
We started walking toward the old town at about a quarter to seven. There were already so many people outside, donning their white shirts and red scarves as always, that it felt it like the middle of a typical Pamplona day. We saw four people still sleeping in another ATM room about half the size of ours. By the time we reached the round-a-bout about six hundred meters from the old town, I could tell there was no way we would be able to get a spot along the fence judging from the number of people already walking on Carlos III.
When we finally reached the fence separating the runners and the bulls in the city hall´s plaza from everyone else, it was about seven o´clock. The top of the fence in the front was already lined with people and a crowd had already gathered behind the rear fence. A couple policemen were arresting a young, resistant drunk man in the space in between. Anele was determined to see something so we followed her under the two fences and into the plaza. It was clear by now that we would not be able to see anything unless we were on the other side of the fence- in other words, unless we ran with the bulls.
We found a few guys talking in English- a tall, almost bald guy in his thirties from California, another thirty-something man from Pittsburgh, and a father and son from Michigan. The guy from California convinced me to stay with little piece of advice- "F&%$ the bulls, watch the people! There are about fifteen hundred of you and maybe five will get hurt. If you get hurt, buy a lottery ticket." He explained the procedure. At about twenty to eight, they push everyone into the plaza. Then at a quarter to eight, they let us loose so we can go to the section where we want to run. He told us to avoid the hard right turn from the plaza onto Estafeta because that is where most of the brutal footage of bulls slamming people against the wall is taken. The ground is slippery because they spray the streets in the morning and the bulls have (litterally) a ton of momentum as they slide around the corner. Also, don´t stop and don´t look back. If you fall, cover up and hope for the best.
I wanted to at least run with the bulls for a little while, not just run ten meters into the bull ring. Alexia went to the other side of the fence after agreeing to meet Anele and I in front of the toilets near the bullring. I walked to the end of Estafeta, about 150 meters from the bullring. Then I waited. Of course everyone was looking toward Estafeta, from where the bulls would come. People started running so I started running. But a couple seconds later I, along with most everyone else, stopped after we realized that nothing was coming. This happened three or four times. Then everybody started running so I knew it was for real. By now I was past Estafeta in the middle the road separating it from the bullring. I ran as fast as I could, never looking back. I assumed that the bulls were far behind me so I thought there was no need to look back anyway. Following some advice from the Atlanta boys, I tried to stay close to the edge but not right up against it.
About twenty meters from the door leading into the bullring, the atmosphere was total madness. Everyone was running at full speed but at the same time stopping to look back at the bulls. The crowd forced me closer to the edge than I wanted to be. I saw a brown and white bull (which I later found out was one of the less dangerous castrated ones) right next to me, so close I could have reached out and touched him. But that was the last thing I wanted to do. I tried to suppress my fear and only stare straight ahead. I hit the ground hard a second later. I had collided with one of those people or one of those people who had ran into one of those people who stopped and looked behind. The guy I met in the plaza had encouraged us to use our elbows to knock people over, but that did not occurr to me at the moment. Even if I managed to knock anyone down, I could still trip over him or he could cause somebody else to trip. The footsteps of the people about to fall on top of me made so much noise I thought I was about to be trampled by bulls. One guy tripped and fell on me and another one on top him and so on. I thought that if the bulls were coming, at least they were more likely to be trampled because I would be protected near the bottom of the pile-up. A guy pulled me out of the way a couple seconds later. Iwas quite thankful for that. My white pants were torn at the knee on both sides. The left side was stained with blood from the scrape on my knee about the size of a quarter. I was hoping to keep those pants. Oh well. Still a little shaken, I looked for a way out of there. I couldn´t find one. After about a minute, I remembered that I could jump back in and run into the bullring. Unfortunately, the door shut as soon as I started running toward it. Disappointed and upset with the people who had to stop and look back, I walked toward out meeting spot.
A couple hours later, we went to Foto Auma in the Plaza del Castillo to look for ourselves in the photos posted outside. I immediately found myself in three of them. Until I saw the pictures, I had no idea that only was there a castrated bull to my left, there were three more right behind me and a real bull just behind them. I bought one of the pictures, which I photographed wth my camera. It now serves as my facebook profile picture. I later bought three large copies for my parents and grandparents.
The first thing I did was head to the photo shop to print my photos from the trip to Switzerland, Germany, and Portugal. I really wanted to get those into the alblum before I get back to Gainesville, where I know I would take a long time to get it done, if I ever do it. A lady helped me who spoke English perhaps equal to or a little bit below my Spanish. Some of her assistance saved me a couple euros, but at other times she just confused me more. It was strange how the Pamplonians all of a sudden began to either speak English or assume that I could not speak or understand Spanish. Then I went to my favorite pastry shop, Beatriz. I had been in there enough times that they knew I could understand them, though they´re faces told me they probably had to think for a couple seconds before they understood what I said. The garrotes and muffins were perfect that morning.
I headed for the bus station to see about leaving my backpack in the left luggage room. Nothing could have prepared me for what I saw at the bottom of stairs leading down to the underground station. I thought the new station was the most beautiful facility I had ever seen when I first walked in there the weekend it opened, but now it looked as dumpy as any inner city public transportation hub. Everywhere I looked people were sitting or sleeping on the floor. Abandoned beer bottles stood against the walls. It was louder and smelled worse than ever before. This was the new bus station´s first fiesta de San Fermin. Let´s hope it can be restored somewhat close to its pre-tourist invasion condition. When I went up to meet Anele and Alexia outside, I saw that the grass in the open area between the bus station and the ciudadela had also had a rough couple of days. It had changed from green to yellow because the grass had either died or been worn away.
From there I took them to the Plaza del Castillo, which of course was filled with people by now. We wound our way through the plaza and the streets to the ayuntamiento, or city hall. It is easily one of the prettiest buildings in Pamplona, but green banners draped from balconies made the building even more beautiful than usual. I still had not bought a pañuelo, or handerkerchief, traditionally red. I bought one from San Fermin´s official store called kukuxumusu because I thought that the ones with the shiny Pamplona coat of arms embroidered on them looked tacky. I really like the cartoony style of the kukuxumusu apparel. The t-shirts are too expensive, starting at fifteen euros, but the handkerchief was only 4.75€.
All the restaurants were pretty crowded so I took them down to the kebab restaurant near my apartment, where I had gathered with my American friends many times. In spite of the mayhem in the old town, it was for the most part business as usual in the residential area to the south. The biggest difference was that the main drag, Sancho el Fuerte, had been changed from a four lane road to a two lane road with two lanes for parking in the middle.
By mid-afternoon Pamplona was covered by clouds and the sky was sprinkling the already damp streets. As we strolled from the park to Calle Mayor we found two guys carrying a canvas sign over their heads. They invited us to join them in their makeshift shelter to stay dry. I asked them where they got it from and one of them said they tore off of a wall and had been carrying it around all day. They were from Atlanta. Alexia said she had no idea they were speaking until we ducked under the canvas with them. I understood them just fine because, as I told Alexia, I speak guy. They told us they had ran with the bulls that morning.
Around 2 am, we started to look for a place to sleep. Nobody had reserved a hostel. We were all expecting to sleep outside. Anele and Alexia did not even have backpacks. Anele wanted to sleep in one of those rooms adjacent to the banks where they keep the ATMs. When I went into one booth in the old town to withdraw money, I noticed immediately that the floor was wet. But the repungant smell did not hit me until Alexia broke the bad news- somebody had urinated in there. I thought that even if we could find one that´s clean and and not crowded, the police would kick us out. Nevertheless, I decided we should look for a place on Carlos III, the pedestrianized shopping street branching off the Plaza del Castillo.
We found a large, clean Caja Navarra ATM room and settled down. Alexia rested her head against the ATM by the window. Anele tried to use cardboard as a sleeping pad. I did the same with newspaper, but all it did was protect me just a little from the cold floor. I switched off between wearing my hooded jacket and using it as a pillow. Eventually I tried using my shoes as a pillow. That was the most effective method, giving me half an hour of sleep. Another guy came in a few minutes after us and settled down. I had long since figured out that with so many crazy drunk people wreaking havoc in the old town, Pamplona´s police department had far bigger fish to fry than removing three otherwise law-abiding Americans from an ATM booth. Another guy came in a few minutes later and settled down in a different part of the room.
Everyone who walked by seemed determined to keep us awake. One guy came up, stood right over me, and started singing loudly as if he also wanted to wake up the residents above. Another group came in yelling through a megaphone. Countless people knocked or banged on the glass trying to get our attention as if we were caged lions in a zoo. By five o'clock in the morning Anele and I were so tired that we were no longer planning on running with the bulls, but we still wanted to see them run from a safe spot behind a fence.
We started walking toward the old town at about a quarter to seven. There were already so many people outside, donning their white shirts and red scarves as always, that it felt it like the middle of a typical Pamplona day. We saw four people still sleeping in another ATM room about half the size of ours. By the time we reached the round-a-bout about six hundred meters from the old town, I could tell there was no way we would be able to get a spot along the fence judging from the number of people already walking on Carlos III.
When we finally reached the fence separating the runners and the bulls in the city hall´s plaza from everyone else, it was about seven o´clock. The top of the fence in the front was already lined with people and a crowd had already gathered behind the rear fence. A couple policemen were arresting a young, resistant drunk man in the space in between. Anele was determined to see something so we followed her under the two fences and into the plaza. It was clear by now that we would not be able to see anything unless we were on the other side of the fence- in other words, unless we ran with the bulls.
We found a few guys talking in English- a tall, almost bald guy in his thirties from California, another thirty-something man from Pittsburgh, and a father and son from Michigan. The guy from California convinced me to stay with little piece of advice- "F&%$ the bulls, watch the people! There are about fifteen hundred of you and maybe five will get hurt. If you get hurt, buy a lottery ticket." He explained the procedure. At about twenty to eight, they push everyone into the plaza. Then at a quarter to eight, they let us loose so we can go to the section where we want to run. He told us to avoid the hard right turn from the plaza onto Estafeta because that is where most of the brutal footage of bulls slamming people against the wall is taken. The ground is slippery because they spray the streets in the morning and the bulls have (litterally) a ton of momentum as they slide around the corner. Also, don´t stop and don´t look back. If you fall, cover up and hope for the best.
I wanted to at least run with the bulls for a little while, not just run ten meters into the bull ring. Alexia went to the other side of the fence after agreeing to meet Anele and I in front of the toilets near the bullring. I walked to the end of Estafeta, about 150 meters from the bullring. Then I waited. Of course everyone was looking toward Estafeta, from where the bulls would come. People started running so I started running. But a couple seconds later I, along with most everyone else, stopped after we realized that nothing was coming. This happened three or four times. Then everybody started running so I knew it was for real. By now I was past Estafeta in the middle the road separating it from the bullring. I ran as fast as I could, never looking back. I assumed that the bulls were far behind me so I thought there was no need to look back anyway. Following some advice from the Atlanta boys, I tried to stay close to the edge but not right up against it.
About twenty meters from the door leading into the bullring, the atmosphere was total madness. Everyone was running at full speed but at the same time stopping to look back at the bulls. The crowd forced me closer to the edge than I wanted to be. I saw a brown and white bull (which I later found out was one of the less dangerous castrated ones) right next to me, so close I could have reached out and touched him. But that was the last thing I wanted to do. I tried to suppress my fear and only stare straight ahead. I hit the ground hard a second later. I had collided with one of those people or one of those people who had ran into one of those people who stopped and looked behind. The guy I met in the plaza had encouraged us to use our elbows to knock people over, but that did not occurr to me at the moment. Even if I managed to knock anyone down, I could still trip over him or he could cause somebody else to trip. The footsteps of the people about to fall on top of me made so much noise I thought I was about to be trampled by bulls. One guy tripped and fell on me and another one on top him and so on. I thought that if the bulls were coming, at least they were more likely to be trampled because I would be protected near the bottom of the pile-up. A guy pulled me out of the way a couple seconds later. Iwas quite thankful for that. My white pants were torn at the knee on both sides. The left side was stained with blood from the scrape on my knee about the size of a quarter. I was hoping to keep those pants. Oh well. Still a little shaken, I looked for a way out of there. I couldn´t find one. After about a minute, I remembered that I could jump back in and run into the bullring. Unfortunately, the door shut as soon as I started running toward it. Disappointed and upset with the people who had to stop and look back, I walked toward out meeting spot.
A couple hours later, we went to Foto Auma in the Plaza del Castillo to look for ourselves in the photos posted outside. I immediately found myself in three of them. Until I saw the pictures, I had no idea that only was there a castrated bull to my left, there were three more right behind me and a real bull just behind them. I bought one of the pictures, which I photographed wth my camera. It now serves as my facebook profile picture. I later bought three large copies for my parents and grandparents.
Monday, July 7, 2008
San Fermin Begins
Whenever I told anyone last fall that I had been in Pamplona once before, they would ask me, "For San Fermin?" Everyone talked about it as if it is the best thing ever. Well, finally, I got to see what the fuss was all about. Actually, my reasons for for going back to Pamplona were two-fold and some would say contradictory. I also wanted to go to church because the CNAI camp is a spiritual dead zone. I love my coworkers, but at the same time it is very hard to stay strong in my faith everybody else is either an atheist or not practicing. I figured while I was in Pamplona, I might as well join the party. Responsibly of course.
In spite of the mayhem starting in the town centre, it was business as usual at Parroquia Cristiana Evangelica. I was very glad to see everyone again. It was far less crowded than most weeks. A lot of people had probably already fled Pamplona. After the service I met a guy named Javier who had only started attending the church a couple months ago. He asked me if I was in town for San Fermin. That was half true, but I said no. He lived in England for eight months so he knew some English and was very excited that he could practice with me. He treated me at the kebab restaurant, where even he had trouble communicating with one of the new guys there. It made feel better to know that my past problems with the new people there were not caused by my bad Spanish.
In spite of the mayhem starting in the town centre, it was business as usual at Parroquia Cristiana Evangelica. I was very glad to see everyone again. It was far less crowded than most weeks. A lot of people had probably already fled Pamplona. After the service I met a guy named Javier who had only started attending the church a couple months ago. He asked me if I was in town for San Fermin. That was half true, but I said no. He lived in England for eight months so he knew some English and was very excited that he could practice with me. He treated me at the kebab restaurant, where even he had trouble communicating with one of the new guys there. It made feel better to know that my past problems with the new people there were not caused by my bad Spanish.
I went to Pamplona on a whim without any place to sleep that night. I wasn´t sure if I would even try to sleep. I brought my sleeping bag in case anything presented itself. After eating dinner with the youth, I told them I could walk to the town centre to look for some friends, but they insisted on driving me home. I had Ruben drive me to my old apartment on Calle Iturrama. I did not tell him that I no longer lived there. I didn´t feel too comfortable not telling my friends the whole truth but I wanted to avoid explaining my plans (or lack thereof) for the night. In hindsight, if they cared enough about me to prevent me from walking in the chilly weather, maybe one of them would have given me shelter on such short notice.
I walked from my apartment to the Plaza del Castillo tracing the same route we always took from Soleil or Brittany´s piso. As I entered the Plaza del Catillo, I saw that the party had already started. A small crowd on the right side near Calle Estafeta was drinking, singing and dancing. No surprise there. I walked over to Calle San Nicolas, where I found some Erasmus students the week before. I found plenty of people, but nobody I knew. After trying most every bar we regularly patronized over the past six months, I decided to just walked around the Plaza del Castillo. After all, watching the singing and dancing in the Plaza seemed far more entertaining than watching or even doing the standing and drinking in any other part of the Casco Antiguo.
Luckily I found some people I knew- Paige, another girl whose name escapes me because I never had any classes with her, and her little sister. Then three Italians suddenly appeared, Giorgio, Lorenzo, and Emilio. After dancing with the drunk people for a little while, the Americans and Italians went home and I thought about what to do next.
I had never slept in a public park of any kind before so I was pretty nervous about it. With my luck, I was afraid the police would find me and throw me in jail. I walked to the wall on the north side of the old town to check out the park sleeping situation. There was one large tent set up under a tree. I thought sleeping near other people would be safer because the police did not have enough room for all of us in their cars or even their stations. But then again, being near many people would increase the risk of being mugged. Two of my coworkers, Charlie and Yanna, just happened to find me near the bridge that runs high over the road and connects the old town with the park on the other side. Charlie assured me that in Spain they don´t care if you sleep outside.
This sliver of the park is always one of the calmest areas of Pamplona. It is bordered on the backside by bushes and the wall side by a little sidewalk, in front of which stands a fence that protects from the fifty foot drop below. From the fence you can see the entire north side of Pamplona and mountains on all sides of it. In between is a grassy area dotted with benches and shltered by the branches of the trees above. The beginning of San Fermin had not changed it at all. There were no empty beer bottles lying around. Many of the benches in the area were still dotted with small puddles, but I found one in the middle of the grass that had escaped the rain. I spread my sleeping bag on the bench, using it as a blanket and my backpack as a pillow. I did not take off my shoes because I was afraid of losing them while I slept. I also feared somebody would try to scare the living daylights out of me as a joke. The night was cold; I did not bring a jecket because it was so hot during the day that I thought I would not need it. A few times I could hear people walking on the sidewalk but fortunately nobody even came near me much less touched me all night. I went to bed around 2:30, woke up around 3:30 and then again at 6:30. I ate my breakfast of a bruised apple and some small donuts that had been smashed by various objects in my bag´s outer pocket.
I had nothing to do until at least 9:30, when I was supposed to call my friend Sabi, so I ordered a cup of cafe con leche from a coffee shop located kitty corner from the department store El Corte Ingles. I stayed at my seat by the window for at least two hours after I had finished my coffee. I had bought a copy of Hermingway´s The Sun Also Rises the night before so I continued reading it. It was the novel that made San Fermin famous in the first place. The first part is set in Paris, but the second part is set in the very neighborhood where I was sitting.
I finally called Sabi at 9:30. He told me to meet him in the Plaza del Castillo at ten to ten. I actually found him at ten past ten. Meanwhile, people wearing read scarves had started to fill the Plaza del Castillo. I followed Sabi and another boy I recognized but whose name I could not remember through the narrow streets of the old town. We stopped at an old wooden door with no numbers or markings of any kind. Sabi opened the door with a key and led us in. It was the kind of place that defines the expression "hole in the wall". The room was narrow, probably not more than seven feet across. The decorations on the wall included pro-Basque propaganda as well as posters of Disney movies like The Fox and the Hound. Sabi´s friends were setting up a table in the middle of the room. A couple others were smoking. Sabi introduced me to all of them. They all shook hands with me and asked me where I was from. In the back room we watched coverage of the follow-up to the official start of San Fermin on TV. The mayor of Pamplona was shown a couple times. I was the only one in the room not yelling and swearing at the screen whenever her face appeared. I asked Sabi if she´s bad and he told me she´s very bad, to the right.
Then we sat down to eat or amozar as Sabi put it. The food was very good, though a little cold. When I asked for a fork they laughed and told me that Basques use bread instead of cutlery when they eat. I don´t think they were kidding. Nevertheless one of them gave me a plastic fork which I snapped when I tried to cut the meat with it. Somebody accidentally spilled a bucket of food on the floor, which everyone ridiculed by chanting, "Español! Español!"
After lunch, we walked outside for the opening. We swerved in and out of the crowds until we got as far up as we could without having to literally push and squeeze our way through, though many others chose to do that. Sabi introduced me to his mother, who was standing near us wearing her pañuelo, a handkerchief, traditionally red for San Fermin. Many people were drinking, but not everyone. It was mostly adults because it would be near impossible to keep track of a kid in a crowd like that, but they were not all there to get drunk. Everyone held both ends of their handkerchiefs in the air, as a triangle pointed down, until the rocket was fired off. Then the crowd went wild, singing and spraying wine all over the place. Before long, I had more alcohol on the outside of me than on the inside.
Then we went to a bar that resembled a fast food joint. They served patatas bravas and bocadillos, but my new Basque friends only wanted to drink. I watched more footage of San Fermin on the TV. We sang and danced to some traditional San Fermin songs which I told myself I have to learn before I come to this party again. After we left that bar we went to this fountain that I had heard about before. Some daredevils like to jump off of it and hope the crowd catches them. And there was quite a crowd of mostly boys in their twenties. I soon found out why. One girl lifted her shirt to reveal a bikini top. I was assumong that was as far as she would go when I suddenly had to avert my eyes as she exposed her bare chest to the crowd before she leaped towards them. It turned out that every girl was expected to flash before she jumped. The boys around were chanting, trying to pressure every blonde girl in the plaza to flash, even the ones who were not jumping off the fountain. I don´t think the eating, singing, dancing, and drinking in moderation is necessarily bad. San Fermin is as much a tradition as the American 4th of July, but this flashing from the fountain is definitely something I could have done without.
Afterwards we went into a few bars. Or rather, they went in and I walked in only to walk out a minute later. When the bars are underground, the smoke gets trapped inside so it´s hard for me to breathe. On top of that they´re hot because so many people are crammed into a small space and smelly because most of those people are dripping with sweat. This was probably the second worst part of the afternoon. Finally, we went to a bar that had both the front and the back doors open and was not built underground so the smoke was not as bad. It had a poster on the low ceiling with a hundred or so postage stamp sized mugshots of Basque political prisoners.
Friday, May 2, 2008
Things I Miss In No Particular Order
bagels
Honey Bunches of Oats
Kix
large pizzas for eight dollars
Gator Nights
my cat Missy
free movies in the Reitz Union
free midnight breakfast
free dinner at St. Augustine Student Center
Sierra Mist
refrigerated cookie dough
my family
movies in English
drivers who don't seem hellbent on killing me
people who wait until I get off the elevator before trying to get on
people who know how to maintain a single file line
watching Meet the Press live on Sunday mornings
the good people of FYA
not having to multiply the price of every item by 1.54333 or more
Gator Greenbacks
Ben and Jerry's
secondhand stores
Gainesville's bike lanes
UF Libraries' DVD selection
Red Vines
Reese's
the daily lunch specials at I Heart New York Pizza
talking to people without fearing a sometimes inevitable critique of my pronunciation
928's wireless internet
meatball subs
Things I don't miss:
UF Bike Police
homework
going to class five days a week
Honey Bunches of Oats
Kix
large pizzas for eight dollars
Gator Nights
my cat Missy
free movies in the Reitz Union
free midnight breakfast
free dinner at St. Augustine Student Center
Sierra Mist
refrigerated cookie dough
my family
movies in English
drivers who don't seem hellbent on killing me
people who wait until I get off the elevator before trying to get on
people who know how to maintain a single file line
watching Meet the Press live on Sunday mornings
the good people of FYA
not having to multiply the price of every item by 1.54333 or more
Gator Greenbacks
Ben and Jerry's
secondhand stores
Gainesville's bike lanes
UF Libraries' DVD selection
Red Vines
Reese's
the daily lunch specials at I Heart New York Pizza
talking to people without fearing a sometimes inevitable critique of my pronunciation
928's wireless internet
meatball subs
Things I don't miss:
UF Bike Police
homework
going to class five days a week
My Language Can Kick Your Language's Butt
This a blog I've been thinking of writing for a very long time, months actually. While spending the last seven months learning another language, I've learned a lot about language in general and the value of English outside the United States. There is now a lack of English teachers here in Pamplona, both trained and untrained. Given that the going rate for an English tutor here is upwards of 20 euros an hour, it blows my mind that we didn't fill the room when we offered a free week-long English class at the Public University of Navarra. I got a tutoring job through an Irish lady at church. A Spanish lady in her neighborhood wanted somebody to practice with her daughter for an hour and a half every Friday. Oddly she wanted to me to give her a price. I told her ten, and she looked at me as if I were out of my mind and offered twenty. I couldn't argue with that.
We take it for granted because it's our native language, but some Spanish people would love to learn it and don't mind paying because they know its value. When I landed at Brussels Charleroi Airport, it would have taken me much longer to figure out how to get out of there if I only spoke Spanish. The guy at the information desk spoke English and probably French and Dutch. But it's unlikely that he spoke Spanish or Italian and certainly not Korean or Arabic. The same goes for most any country. Everyone speaks that country's language and many of them speak English. Of course some countries, like Germany and the Netherlands, have more English speakers than others, like Spain.
My pastor Dom once told me that you can't separate language and culture. That explains why people like the Basques and the Irish are fighting so hard to keep their languages alive. If their languages die, part (if not all) of their culture dies with it. If I grew up immersed in a culture with it's own obscure language, I would probably want to know it, but as far as many Americans are concerned, English is the only language that exists. My ancestors spoke Gaelic, but I would much rather learn German than pour so much time and energy into learning a language that hardly anyone speaks anymore. Besides, Gaelic tutors are few and far between in the States. The same goes for Polish, which is on the other side of my family. But no matter how worthless a language may seem, everyone is proud of their native language and would like to spread it. That explains the wild cheers from the Spanish group following a Dutch girl explaining at Awaken, "Well my person didn't really speak English so all I learned was '¿Como estas? Bien, Y tu?'".
I would like to say that since writing my last post over a month ago that I've been boldly sharing the Gospel with everyone I meet, but that just hasn't been happening. I finally got around to asking my friends Koldo and Sabier what they think about God a few weeks ago. I was a little disappointed but not really surprised by their answer- everything is relative. A week later I asked Joel, one of the pastor's sons, about his experience reaching out to his friends at the university. He told me that since the students try to rationalize everything, the best evidence he has is his life and his testimony. Not being a native speaker of Spanish was my excuse for being "ashamed of the Gospel" for a while by not talking about it. Did Joel just give me another one?
Yes and no. We do need to share it verbally at some point with words so our peers make the connection, but perhaps 60% of it is our lives and testimonies as Joel told me. As for the other 40%, I just realized recently that the church was built on foreign missions so perhaps being in a foreign isn't much of an excuse. The apostles stepped out of their comfort zones to preach the Gospel everywhere between Jerusalem and Rome, maybe even further. In fact, much of the New Testament, including the Gospels, was written in Greek, a second language for many of the authors. If they can be effective in a foreign land, maybe I can too with a little prayer and perseverance. It has taken me this long to adjust and even start to think about stepping out, which is normal. Now that I've been here for nearly eight months, it is time.
We take it for granted because it's our native language, but some Spanish people would love to learn it and don't mind paying because they know its value. When I landed at Brussels Charleroi Airport, it would have taken me much longer to figure out how to get out of there if I only spoke Spanish. The guy at the information desk spoke English and probably French and Dutch. But it's unlikely that he spoke Spanish or Italian and certainly not Korean or Arabic. The same goes for most any country. Everyone speaks that country's language and many of them speak English. Of course some countries, like Germany and the Netherlands, have more English speakers than others, like Spain.
My pastor Dom once told me that you can't separate language and culture. That explains why people like the Basques and the Irish are fighting so hard to keep their languages alive. If their languages die, part (if not all) of their culture dies with it. If I grew up immersed in a culture with it's own obscure language, I would probably want to know it, but as far as many Americans are concerned, English is the only language that exists. My ancestors spoke Gaelic, but I would much rather learn German than pour so much time and energy into learning a language that hardly anyone speaks anymore. Besides, Gaelic tutors are few and far between in the States. The same goes for Polish, which is on the other side of my family. But no matter how worthless a language may seem, everyone is proud of their native language and would like to spread it. That explains the wild cheers from the Spanish group following a Dutch girl explaining at Awaken, "Well my person didn't really speak English so all I learned was '¿Como estas? Bien, Y tu?'".
I would like to say that since writing my last post over a month ago that I've been boldly sharing the Gospel with everyone I meet, but that just hasn't been happening. I finally got around to asking my friends Koldo and Sabier what they think about God a few weeks ago. I was a little disappointed but not really surprised by their answer- everything is relative. A week later I asked Joel, one of the pastor's sons, about his experience reaching out to his friends at the university. He told me that since the students try to rationalize everything, the best evidence he has is his life and his testimony. Not being a native speaker of Spanish was my excuse for being "ashamed of the Gospel" for a while by not talking about it. Did Joel just give me another one?
Yes and no. We do need to share it verbally at some point with words so our peers make the connection, but perhaps 60% of it is our lives and testimonies as Joel told me. As for the other 40%, I just realized recently that the church was built on foreign missions so perhaps being in a foreign isn't much of an excuse. The apostles stepped out of their comfort zones to preach the Gospel everywhere between Jerusalem and Rome, maybe even further. In fact, much of the New Testament, including the Gospels, was written in Greek, a second language for many of the authors. If they can be effective in a foreign land, maybe I can too with a little prayer and perseverance. It has taken me this long to adjust and even start to think about stepping out, which is normal. Now that I've been here for nearly eight months, it is time.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Two Lessons Learned
Before I set off on my travels between the first and second semesters, I needed a little encouragement. I did not feel particularly on fire for Jesus Christ. At times, when the head pastor of the church here would walk on the stage, I would think, "Oh, crap! We're going to be here for three hours again!" In fact, I still feel like a dud every Saturday night in the midst of such a passionate bunch.
I heard about a book called One Thing You Can't Do in Heaven by Mark Cahill. I think I heard about it from somebody at GCM's Leadership Training in Colorado, but I'm not sure. I ordered the book from Amazon UK because it's impossible to find it in English here in Pamplona. I could have bought a Spanish copy from the church , but my purpose in reading it was to learn about witnessing, not to improve my Spanish. I'm taking four classes at the university to do that.
I finally finished the book yesterday. It is perhaps the most useful book I've ever read other than the Bible. From what I gather, the author shares the Gospel with everyone he meets. I mean everybody. In the book he gives accounts of witnessing to a lady as he was placing an order by phone and handing out tracts to everyone waiting in line at an airport. The stories he tells really opened my mind. For perhaps the first time, the fact that the Gospel is the greatest gift you can give somebody really hit me. In my mind, I think I've always seen it as an intrusion (albeit a necessary one) because that is what the world tells us.
He really challenges the reader by boldly stating that if you're not doing something to grow the Kingdom of God, then you're not living for him. It further impressed on me the importance of the Great Commission, which I've only begun to see since joining Gator Christian Life. The Christian life is all about the Great Commission.
Then there is another book that I read a little more than a year ago called Wild at Heart by John Eldridge. Some Christian websites tear the book apart (I couldn't find any criticism of Cahill's book online), but I think he makes some valid points. One of his main points is that Christian men need to follow their hearts and do what they love rather than lead a safe, church-based life that most people would call boring. But if everyone just did what they wanted, then the Great Commission would have to be forgotten, right? Possibly, but it does not have to be that way.
I've found a way to blend the lessons from both books in my own life. I've discovered what I love to do over the past year- travel to places where I've never been and meet interesting new people (I met a guy from Sri Lanka in Logroño. I had never met anyone from Sri Lanka before!). In the book, Cahill describes many conversations he has had with people while traveling. He always tries to talk to the person in the seat beside him on an airplane and approaches total stranger in airports. Since arriving in Europe in September, I have been on eight flights and have never initiated a spiritual conversation with the person sitting beside me- or any conversation for that matter. I have at least six flights left including my return to the States. Hopefully I can make them count. God has given me this opportunity that many people would kill to have, and at times I feel as if I have blown it. But I don't think I could have learned everything I am writing here had I not left the United States.
This leads me to the second (not quite as important) lesson I've learned here. I wrote a blog a few months ago titled "Writer's Block". I really wanted to write a great story, but couldn't think of anything. It's only come to my attention recently that most writers don't just pull their stories out of their butts. I learned from a documentary I saw in England that even elements of the Harry Potter books were inspired by J.K. Rowlings' life. For example, she gave Harry good father figures like Hagrid and Dumbledore because she never had one of her own. Bottom line- I need to have some interesting experiences of my own to draw from if I am ever to write anything good. But how?
I was just skimming through a Paris travel guide in preparation for my trip on Tuesday. There is a page in the back listing books describing or set within Paris. I didn't know that both Ernest Hemingway and George Orwell both spent some time in Paris and wrote books about their experiences. Hemingway also spent some time here in Pamplona and wrote For Whom the Bell Tolls in the Plaza del Castillo, one of my favorite spots in Pamplona. I saw another documentary describing the many writers that have journeyed to Vienna. I joked with my extended family that I want to go there and be inspired too. I have not completely ruled that out.
I still cannot say that I'm a very a bold witness for Jesus Christ, but one day I will be. I think it's kind of like jumping into a cold swimming pool. It's freezing when you simply touch the water, but when you jump in and stay for a while, it begins to feel warmer and you're glad you jumped in. I'm going to look for opportunities to witness to my Spanish friends, Koldo and Sabier, and to people I meet all over Europe. Unlike the YMCA of the Rockies, lost people are not difficult to find here. Now more than ever I really want to take up an English teaching job in Pamplona after I graduate. Maybe growing the Kingdom of God while doing what I love will give me enough experiences to be the next Hemingway.
I heard about a book called One Thing You Can't Do in Heaven by Mark Cahill. I think I heard about it from somebody at GCM's Leadership Training in Colorado, but I'm not sure. I ordered the book from Amazon UK because it's impossible to find it in English here in Pamplona. I could have bought a Spanish copy from the church , but my purpose in reading it was to learn about witnessing, not to improve my Spanish. I'm taking four classes at the university to do that.
I finally finished the book yesterday. It is perhaps the most useful book I've ever read other than the Bible. From what I gather, the author shares the Gospel with everyone he meets. I mean everybody. In the book he gives accounts of witnessing to a lady as he was placing an order by phone and handing out tracts to everyone waiting in line at an airport. The stories he tells really opened my mind. For perhaps the first time, the fact that the Gospel is the greatest gift you can give somebody really hit me. In my mind, I think I've always seen it as an intrusion (albeit a necessary one) because that is what the world tells us.
He really challenges the reader by boldly stating that if you're not doing something to grow the Kingdom of God, then you're not living for him. It further impressed on me the importance of the Great Commission, which I've only begun to see since joining Gator Christian Life. The Christian life is all about the Great Commission.
Then there is another book that I read a little more than a year ago called Wild at Heart by John Eldridge. Some Christian websites tear the book apart (I couldn't find any criticism of Cahill's book online), but I think he makes some valid points. One of his main points is that Christian men need to follow their hearts and do what they love rather than lead a safe, church-based life that most people would call boring. But if everyone just did what they wanted, then the Great Commission would have to be forgotten, right? Possibly, but it does not have to be that way.
I've found a way to blend the lessons from both books in my own life. I've discovered what I love to do over the past year- travel to places where I've never been and meet interesting new people (I met a guy from Sri Lanka in Logroño. I had never met anyone from Sri Lanka before!). In the book, Cahill describes many conversations he has had with people while traveling. He always tries to talk to the person in the seat beside him on an airplane and approaches total stranger in airports. Since arriving in Europe in September, I have been on eight flights and have never initiated a spiritual conversation with the person sitting beside me- or any conversation for that matter. I have at least six flights left including my return to the States. Hopefully I can make them count. God has given me this opportunity that many people would kill to have, and at times I feel as if I have blown it. But I don't think I could have learned everything I am writing here had I not left the United States.
This leads me to the second (not quite as important) lesson I've learned here. I wrote a blog a few months ago titled "Writer's Block". I really wanted to write a great story, but couldn't think of anything. It's only come to my attention recently that most writers don't just pull their stories out of their butts. I learned from a documentary I saw in England that even elements of the Harry Potter books were inspired by J.K. Rowlings' life. For example, she gave Harry good father figures like Hagrid and Dumbledore because she never had one of her own. Bottom line- I need to have some interesting experiences of my own to draw from if I am ever to write anything good. But how?
I was just skimming through a Paris travel guide in preparation for my trip on Tuesday. There is a page in the back listing books describing or set within Paris. I didn't know that both Ernest Hemingway and George Orwell both spent some time in Paris and wrote books about their experiences. Hemingway also spent some time here in Pamplona and wrote For Whom the Bell Tolls in the Plaza del Castillo, one of my favorite spots in Pamplona. I saw another documentary describing the many writers that have journeyed to Vienna. I joked with my extended family that I want to go there and be inspired too. I have not completely ruled that out.
I still cannot say that I'm a very a bold witness for Jesus Christ, but one day I will be. I think it's kind of like jumping into a cold swimming pool. It's freezing when you simply touch the water, but when you jump in and stay for a while, it begins to feel warmer and you're glad you jumped in. I'm going to look for opportunities to witness to my Spanish friends, Koldo and Sabier, and to people I meet all over Europe. Unlike the YMCA of the Rockies, lost people are not difficult to find here. Now more than ever I really want to take up an English teaching job in Pamplona after I graduate. Maybe growing the Kingdom of God while doing what I love will give me enough experiences to be the next Hemingway.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Two Weeks, Two Pilgrimages
I have a pretty nice exam schedule this semester. Globalization, Cooperation, and Development does not require an exam. My history professor told me to read a few books in place of the exam for her class. I took my first exam, Spanish language, January 23rd. Since then, I've been translating notes for "Introduction to Social Work". I'll take that exam on Tuesday. The next semester does not officially start until February 14, but since I will not have classes on Fridays and few students attend classes in the first week anyway, there is no point in going until the 18th. What am I supposed to do with all that free time?
That question has been on my mind for some time. The answer was obvious- I'm going to ride the Camino de Santiago (Way of St. James), almost in its entirety. My grandmother first told me about it four years ago. It's a hiking trail of sorts that stretches more than 450 miles from St. Jean-Pied-de-Port in the southwest region of France to Santiago de Compostela in the northwest corner of Spain. Cyclists use freeways that run paralell when the actual trail is too rough to ride on. Legend has it that the body of James, brother of Jesus, was taken to Santiago from Jerusalem. A version of the legend that I read in Spanish said that the body came back to life, acending to the sky and startling a group travelers.
I have changed my itinerary for the trip mutliple times. At first, I wanted to start the Camino from France so I can say I actually have ridden the entire thing. That would require me to take a bus to San Sebastian and then at least two more trains to St. Jean Pied-de-Port. In the end, I decided it was too much of a hassle on top of the extra cost.
Besides, I already rode the second stage stretching from Roncesvalles to Pamplona, where I live. I wanted to test my readiness for the Camino. I figured out once I started that I had already ridden part of the route back in October. I felt fine until I got over the first major hill. Then I really had to push myself just to reach Roncessvalles, about 28 miles from Pamplona. I took a break for an hour once I got there, trying not to think of the trip back. I was hoping to buy the pilgrim's credential there, which is required to stay at the hostels that line the Camino. It's a little pamphlet that you need to have stamped at each town along the Camino. I couldn't find the guy in charge of the hostel and pilgrims' office. Actually, he found me. He pointed to my bike locked outside his office. At first, I thought he was telling me I was parked illegally. I was relieved that on the contrary, he wanted to ask me if I was sleeping there that night. He was obviously willing to help in any way he could.
The way back, going the direction in which the Camino is meant to be walked or ridden, was much easier. After that test ride and my next one to Puente La Reina it hit me why the Camino is only marked going one direction. The answer is that while many people think riding or walking the entire westbound route is crazy, going eastbound would be self-torture, pure and simple. I faced nasty headwinds coming back up to Pamplona from Puente La Reina. Also, the eastbound way on average seems to be far more uphill.
I decided after the first test ride that starting from Roncesvalles is good enough. That ride took quite a bit out of me. The average day will be much easier than the Pamplona-Roncessvalles ride, but I still wanted to give myself as much time as possible. I managed to pull the average day down to about 54 miles, with the exception of the last day being 25 miles. That should give me enough time to explore the cathedrals and other landmarks along the Camino and give me a cushion for any unforseen incidents. Here is the final schedule:
February 5
Pamplona-Logroño
55 miles
February 6
Logroño-San Juan de Ortega
55.8 miles
February 7
San Juan de Ortega-Frómista
53.32 miles
February 8
Frómista-Reliegos
53.94 miles
February 9
Reliegos-Rabanal del Camino
56.42 miles
February 10
Rabanal del Camino-O Cebreiro
51.46 miles
February 11
O Cebreiro-Ribadiso
57.04 miles
February 12
Ribadiso-Santiago de Compostela
25.42 miles
I was planning on riding some of Spain's northern coast in the following days, but I found a better idea. As I was scanning the website of budget airline Ryanair, I saw that they offer flights from Santiago de Compostela to Rome. A visit to Rome sounded a whole lot better than cycling even more after what can be a tough week if the weather isn't nice to me. I'm going to find a safe place for my bike in Santiago de Compostela and fly to Rome on the night of the 13th. I'll fly back to Santiago de Compostela on the 17th and take an overnight bus to Bilbao. Then I'm taking another bus from Bilbao to Pamplona. It'll arrive at noon, just in time for my 1:00 class.
I do have another, certainly more important, reason for riding the Camino. At Leadership Training in Colorado in 2006, a couple of the speakers and a book we read, Celebration of Discipline, encouraged use to spend extended time alone with God on a regular basis. For example, one of the speakers told us of his experience camping by himself. I have never done anything like this. I won't be completely alone on the Camino de Santiago, but I think I can call this my pseudo-solitude time. I will not have access to my computer that week. I'll have my cell phone for emergencies, and I'll use it to call my mother in the middle of the week to let her know everything is going well. Other than that, I will be cut off from my everyday life. I'll have my Bible, the prescense of Jesus Christ, his Creation, and possibly a person or two to talk to in the albergues. I'm really looking forward to it. If you can pray that I can get the most out of this time, I would really appreciate it.
That question has been on my mind for some time. The answer was obvious- I'm going to ride the Camino de Santiago (Way of St. James), almost in its entirety. My grandmother first told me about it four years ago. It's a hiking trail of sorts that stretches more than 450 miles from St. Jean-Pied-de-Port in the southwest region of France to Santiago de Compostela in the northwest corner of Spain. Cyclists use freeways that run paralell when the actual trail is too rough to ride on. Legend has it that the body of James, brother of Jesus, was taken to Santiago from Jerusalem. A version of the legend that I read in Spanish said that the body came back to life, acending to the sky and startling a group travelers.
I have changed my itinerary for the trip mutliple times. At first, I wanted to start the Camino from France so I can say I actually have ridden the entire thing. That would require me to take a bus to San Sebastian and then at least two more trains to St. Jean Pied-de-Port. In the end, I decided it was too much of a hassle on top of the extra cost.
Besides, I already rode the second stage stretching from Roncesvalles to Pamplona, where I live. I wanted to test my readiness for the Camino. I figured out once I started that I had already ridden part of the route back in October. I felt fine until I got over the first major hill. Then I really had to push myself just to reach Roncessvalles, about 28 miles from Pamplona. I took a break for an hour once I got there, trying not to think of the trip back. I was hoping to buy the pilgrim's credential there, which is required to stay at the hostels that line the Camino. It's a little pamphlet that you need to have stamped at each town along the Camino. I couldn't find the guy in charge of the hostel and pilgrims' office. Actually, he found me. He pointed to my bike locked outside his office. At first, I thought he was telling me I was parked illegally. I was relieved that on the contrary, he wanted to ask me if I was sleeping there that night. He was obviously willing to help in any way he could.
The way back, going the direction in which the Camino is meant to be walked or ridden, was much easier. After that test ride and my next one to Puente La Reina it hit me why the Camino is only marked going one direction. The answer is that while many people think riding or walking the entire westbound route is crazy, going eastbound would be self-torture, pure and simple. I faced nasty headwinds coming back up to Pamplona from Puente La Reina. Also, the eastbound way on average seems to be far more uphill.
I decided after the first test ride that starting from Roncesvalles is good enough. That ride took quite a bit out of me. The average day will be much easier than the Pamplona-Roncessvalles ride, but I still wanted to give myself as much time as possible. I managed to pull the average day down to about 54 miles, with the exception of the last day being 25 miles. That should give me enough time to explore the cathedrals and other landmarks along the Camino and give me a cushion for any unforseen incidents. Here is the final schedule:
February 5
Pamplona-Logroño
55 miles
February 6
Logroño-San Juan de Ortega
55.8 miles
February 7
San Juan de Ortega-Frómista
53.32 miles
February 8
Frómista-Reliegos
53.94 miles
February 9
Reliegos-Rabanal del Camino
56.42 miles
February 10
Rabanal del Camino-O Cebreiro
51.46 miles
February 11
O Cebreiro-Ribadiso
57.04 miles
February 12
Ribadiso-Santiago de Compostela
25.42 miles
I was planning on riding some of Spain's northern coast in the following days, but I found a better idea. As I was scanning the website of budget airline Ryanair, I saw that they offer flights from Santiago de Compostela to Rome. A visit to Rome sounded a whole lot better than cycling even more after what can be a tough week if the weather isn't nice to me. I'm going to find a safe place for my bike in Santiago de Compostela and fly to Rome on the night of the 13th. I'll fly back to Santiago de Compostela on the 17th and take an overnight bus to Bilbao. Then I'm taking another bus from Bilbao to Pamplona. It'll arrive at noon, just in time for my 1:00 class.
I do have another, certainly more important, reason for riding the Camino. At Leadership Training in Colorado in 2006, a couple of the speakers and a book we read, Celebration of Discipline, encouraged use to spend extended time alone with God on a regular basis. For example, one of the speakers told us of his experience camping by himself. I have never done anything like this. I won't be completely alone on the Camino de Santiago, but I think I can call this my pseudo-solitude time. I will not have access to my computer that week. I'll have my cell phone for emergencies, and I'll use it to call my mother in the middle of the week to let her know everything is going well. Other than that, I will be cut off from my everyday life. I'll have my Bible, the prescense of Jesus Christ, his Creation, and possibly a person or two to talk to in the albergues. I'm really looking forward to it. If you can pray that I can get the most out of this time, I would really appreciate it.
Sunday, January 6, 2008
First Impressions of Awaken and My Resolution
Originally written January 3, 2008.
John Hever, the pastor of H2O in Orlando, is the main speaker of Awaken 2008. Isn’t that ironic? I came all the way to Europe to listen to a pastor from Orlando. After speaking with him briefly this morning, I learned that his oldest daughter is a senior at my high school and is hoping to go to UF next year. Another speaker, Joe Dunn, also lives in Orlando.
The ironic proximity of the main speaker aside, the conference has been well worthwhile so far. The theme for Awaken 2008 is the Story of God. Last night John gave us an outline of the Story of God from the Fall all the way to Christ’s return. The title of this morning’s session is “Waking Up to the God of the Story.” He gave us some advice on how to grow in a relationship with God. He said something toward the end that I’ve heard before but forgotten. John asked the speaker at his first conference a question, and he answered with, “Read the Scriptures every day, and I promise you it will change your life.” That was not what he wanted to hear, but he’s found years later that it’s true.
I almost never read the Bible on my own until I entered the University of Florida and got involved in Gator Christian Life. In the past two years, it certainly has changed my life. The problem is I’ve never been able (or maybe willing enough) to read it every single day. I often read it daily for a two or three weeks and then start to fall apart. Then I’ll stop for maybe two weeks until I finally get to a point where I just have to do it. It’s not out of guilt. It’s because I genuinely want to. That’s a sign of major change because that never happened four years ago. The feeling is intensified in Spain, where I do not see GCL comrades around every corner and hear the Gospel preached loudly on campus.
I actually made a New Year’s resolution for this year. I don’t think I made one for last year. If I did, it must not be very important because I can’t remember it. I’ll certainly remember this one because I’m writing about it now, and those of you reading this can remind me if I ever appear to forget it. I actually didn’t think of making a resolution until New Year’s Eve. I was at a party at the home of Daniel Goering, the pastor of The Bridge in Cologne. They put up three paper Christmas trees. The plan was for everyone to cut out an ornament and write on the back a wish for the new year. I thought “wish” and “resolution” were synonymous, and I needed to think of a resolution anyway. On the back of my lousy attempt at a Gator-shaped ornament, I wrote this, “to maintain contentment and focus on God.”
In other words, I want to never forget this year that I only need Jesus in my life. I never want to lose focus on Him or lose sleep over something trivial because I forget He is in control of everything. I could have made a resolution to read Scripture every single day, but I know that will not happen. Also, I don’t want to find myself reading the Bible just to read it and then immediately forgetting what I just read. In contrast, prayer, friendships, and other books can help me maintain focus on God. Scripture is very powerful, but I often find that I need other things to supplement it. That is why God gave us the church. Nevertheless, sticking to my resolution will no doubt require more reading of Scripture, more prayer, more of everything really.
John Hever, the pastor of H2O in Orlando, is the main speaker of Awaken 2008. Isn’t that ironic? I came all the way to Europe to listen to a pastor from Orlando. After speaking with him briefly this morning, I learned that his oldest daughter is a senior at my high school and is hoping to go to UF next year. Another speaker, Joe Dunn, also lives in Orlando.
The ironic proximity of the main speaker aside, the conference has been well worthwhile so far. The theme for Awaken 2008 is the Story of God. Last night John gave us an outline of the Story of God from the Fall all the way to Christ’s return. The title of this morning’s session is “Waking Up to the God of the Story.” He gave us some advice on how to grow in a relationship with God. He said something toward the end that I’ve heard before but forgotten. John asked the speaker at his first conference a question, and he answered with, “Read the Scriptures every day, and I promise you it will change your life.” That was not what he wanted to hear, but he’s found years later that it’s true.
I almost never read the Bible on my own until I entered the University of Florida and got involved in Gator Christian Life. In the past two years, it certainly has changed my life. The problem is I’ve never been able (or maybe willing enough) to read it every single day. I often read it daily for a two or three weeks and then start to fall apart. Then I’ll stop for maybe two weeks until I finally get to a point where I just have to do it. It’s not out of guilt. It’s because I genuinely want to. That’s a sign of major change because that never happened four years ago. The feeling is intensified in Spain, where I do not see GCL comrades around every corner and hear the Gospel preached loudly on campus.
I actually made a New Year’s resolution for this year. I don’t think I made one for last year. If I did, it must not be very important because I can’t remember it. I’ll certainly remember this one because I’m writing about it now, and those of you reading this can remind me if I ever appear to forget it. I actually didn’t think of making a resolution until New Year’s Eve. I was at a party at the home of Daniel Goering, the pastor of The Bridge in Cologne. They put up three paper Christmas trees. The plan was for everyone to cut out an ornament and write on the back a wish for the new year. I thought “wish” and “resolution” were synonymous, and I needed to think of a resolution anyway. On the back of my lousy attempt at a Gator-shaped ornament, I wrote this, “to maintain contentment and focus on God.”
In other words, I want to never forget this year that I only need Jesus in my life. I never want to lose focus on Him or lose sleep over something trivial because I forget He is in control of everything. I could have made a resolution to read Scripture every single day, but I know that will not happen. Also, I don’t want to find myself reading the Bible just to read it and then immediately forgetting what I just read. In contrast, prayer, friendships, and other books can help me maintain focus on God. Scripture is very powerful, but I often find that I need other things to supplement it. That is why God gave us the church. Nevertheless, sticking to my resolution will no doubt require more reading of Scripture, more prayer, more of everything really.
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