My trip to la Fuente

Oaxaca. A word that once provoked mental images of poverty and accompanying sensations of sneezing, headache, and watery eyes has become a word that means something completely different and something even beautiful to me. I have to be honest and admit that I was not looking forward to my week long trip to the poorest state in Mexico but I was willing and packed after I read the desperate message from my sweet friend, Debi, who is serving her year of practice in a town called Fuente Misteriosa (Mysterious Fountain). She was discouraged, heartbroken, and needing me and that’s all it took for me to make arrangements and pack some food to give away and my allergy medicine. I left the day the second and third year students went on their week of missions so it worked out that a second year student, Jesús, was going to the Fuente so I was able to travel with him gracias a Dios. Hermano Jorge drove a truck full of students including me as far as Tuxtepec, Oaxaca. Once we made it to Tuxtepec, we unloaded and went our separate ways as quickly and efficiently as possible. Jesús, Leslie, who was going to a nearby town, and I bought tickets to ride in a truck to la Fuente from Tuxtepec. After an hour of driving through the hills we arrived to the village where my best friend was living. I honestly don’t know how to creatively continue this blog all I know is that I want to document my past week. It’s hard to find the words to describe the amazing experiences I had. I know I was given a very unique opportunity to live and work alongside two Mexican missionaries. Some unforgettable memories from the week include the following: walking through the muddy streets with Debi and Jesús, visiting the elderly, praying for the sick, hiking to another town to have a church service on a front porch of a believer’s house, conducting different Bible Studies, living in a church member's house, depending on members of the church for every meal, swimming in the river, laughing until my insides hurt, singing praises on the roof under the stars, and learning how to make tortillas.

A couple of specific memories

1. Lately God has been convicting me and really working on my heart concerning His heart and desire to help the poor. Before I left I wanted to use some of the resources God had given me to buy some food to take to the village because last time Debi was at MITC she told me about a destitute family living there. Of course, I went to Walmart and I shopped with my American mentality. What I mean is I walked through the aisles remembering the numerous times my church ran can food drives and the times at Disciple Now where we would go and buy food for different families in the community. So naturally I grabbed some bags of spaghetti, Prego sauce for the spaghetti, bag of dried vegetables, milk, juice, cereal, and of course two family size boxes of Macroni and Cheese, peanut butter, and strawberry jam. These are the essentials, right? It really helped that Cordoba had a Walmart because it was easy to find the food I was looking for. By the time I packed all the food I had bought, I hardly had any room left for my own clothes. It's safe to say that my suitcase weighed a TON. I knew it would take a miracle to get this suitcase where I was going. My miracle turned out to be stubborn but physically strong Jesús because he insisted on carrying my suitcase without any help up the hill from where the truck dropped us off. I really didn’t think he was going to make it but gracias a Dios he did. The funniest part happened when I unloaded by suitcase to show Debi the goods I brought. I could tell something was wrong as she tried her best not to laugh. She said, “Now Brooke this is really really really good. It’s all good. It’s ok. This is good.” I interrupted her ongoing praises as I said, “Debi, just tell me what is it. What’s wrong?” She continued, “Well Brooke, you bought all American food. People especially here in the village don’t eat things like this. They wont know what Macroni and Cheese even is. I don't know what this is. What is this?” We both just busted out laughing for the next couple of minutes. Then Debi said, "Brooke, you have been living at the school for seven months now cooking black beans every week and you didn't think to buy any beans?" We laughed even harder as I told her that I wasn't going to make anyone eat something that I didn't like and the curious thing is that it never occured to me to buy beans. Well all this to say that I tried but everything did work out perfectly in the end. The family we were staying with lived in the States for three years so we let them have the Macroni and Cheese and the Prego sauce. The mother of the family was ecstatic because she told me her little boy loved Macroni and Cheese and he hadn’t had it in a really long time and the last day we stayed at her house she cooked us some spaghetti with the Prego sauce that we gave her. It was excellent and my first American meal in a long time. Debi kept the peanut butter herself and we served cereal one morning with the children and some of them wanted the strawberry jam in their cereal so that’s what we did with that. The rest of the food we were able to give away to families in need.

2. I’ll never forget the day we went to visit Hermana María. She was an older lady with a face full of wrinkles and she lived in a palmed roof house with strips of wood as walls. The house was only one small room with a dirt floow. She had no family and almost no possessions. She hardly spoke any Spanish but it was amazing how Debi was able to communicate with her. Hermana Maria kept thanking us for coming because she kept telling us that she has no one. My heart broke as we were in her house. I gave her most of the food that I brought (except the American food that she wouldn’t know what it was) and after I gave her the food she went to the back of her house with a plastic bag. I wasn’t sure what she was doing until she came back and the plastic bag was filled with eggs, at least eight of them. She then stretched out her arm, giving me the plastic bag. I just stared at the bag and then looked back at her. There was no way I could take this gift. She had NOTHING and she wanted to give me from her the little food supply that she had. My heart broke as I received her gift. There was nothing I could do. I had to receive it and I did.



3. Something I have learned at MITC is that when you go out into these villages you have to eat everything they give you because a lot of times the people are giving you the only food that they have and it would be very offensive not to accept it and eat all of it. Without a doubt my biggest struggle while I was in Oaxaca was eating all the food at each meal. Each day Debi goes to a different house to eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Breakfast Sunday morning was a very different and unpleasant experience for me because it was the first time I ate a whole bowl of something while trying to figure out what exactly I was eating. It was eggs and hot sauce but it had some kind of meat in it that smelled and tasted fishy. As soon as we left the house my first question for Debi and Jesús was “What in the world did we just eat?” to which Debi responded "sardines". My stomach did not take it well that day. Then monday morning came with no compassion for my stomach nor my taste buds. This morning we headed to the main church leader’s house to eat breakfast. I remember sitting around the table as his daughter put a bowl in front of me with enough food for three people to eat. I studied meticulously the contents of my bowl and I then decided that it was cubed potatoes, hot sauce, and some unknown substance that had a fishy smell. I immediately thought sardines and looked around the kitchen for evidence until my eyes rested on the six opened canes of tuna and my heart sank. I hate tuna. Oh man, how I hate tuna! … and then for the tuna to be mixed with potatoes and then for that to be mixed with hot sauce and then enough of it to feed three people… I wanted to cry. I really honestly wanted to cry. I felt as if my whole body shook in repulsion as I loaded my mouth with the first spoonful. I was stuck. I didn’t know what to do. I knew I couldn’t refuse the food but I knew that my body would sure enough refuse it if I didn't. I prayed for a way out. Ten minutes passed. Fifteen minutes passed. Debi and Jesús were almost done eating all the food on their plates and I still had a bowl full. I cried inwardly for God to give me a way out then suddenly an idea popped in my mind. I knew for my idea to play out I had to go into stealth mode. I took my blue vera bradly bag that was hanging on the left side of my chair and moved it to the right side of my chair in one inconspicuous motion. You know where I am going with this Sweet Reader? Well I knew I couldn’t just dump the bowl into my bag because that would be too obvious but I also knew that I couldn’t sneak the food in my bag one spoonful at a time because that would take too long because there was too much food left on my plate so I came up with my own gameplan. I reached for one of the big tortillas that were in the middle of the table as I joined in on the conversation with a simple remark. Then as the conversation turned from me and flowed between my two missionary friends and our hospitable lady of the house, I wrapped as much potato/tuna/hot sauce concoction as I could into the corn tortilla and waited for the perfect moment to slide the overstuffed tortilla into my bag. The moment came and my bowl suddenly became half empty. I took another tortilla and with the same stealth mode I finished empyting my plate. I sighed with a breath of relief and my stomach rejoiced as I looked down at my now empty bowl staring back at me. Maybe I was cut out for this missionary work I thought. After we left, we weren’t ten yards away from the house when Debi looked up at me and asked me what I did with the food. I panicked wondering if she took notice of what I what I did. I voiced my concerns and she replied that she didn’t see me do anything but she knew me well enough to know that I didn’t down my plate of food in 2 minutes especially something I didn’t like. I told her that she did in fact know me well and Debi and Jesús both cracked up laughing as I opened up my bag and asked if anyone wanted seconds.