A story or two

To give you a little peek into my world here are a few of my favourite stories from El Centro throughout the year. I can certainly understand why Jesus values children so much. They are honest, compassionate, curious, fun, and a little crazy.

 

It's likely not hard for you to imagine that these kids are CRAZY! 

There’s one little boy named Eduardo. Gahh!! I cannot even explain how cute he is. He yells almost everything, can’t pronounce almost anything and is the messiest eater I have ever seen.  Doesn’t that sound cute?

Him and another little boy Olvidio are both very hard to understand. One day I was talking about how I was going to start teaching English in the daycare and a little boy named Alejandro tapped me on the shoulder and said “Olvidio and Eduardo already speak English so you don’t need to teach them”.  Unfortunately Olvidio and Eduardo do not speak English…. or Spanish apparently.

This is Olvidio…the little English speaker. 

There’s a little guy here named Gabriel and he too is darn-it-all adorable. There’s a very popular song here and the chorus is “I only want to give one kiss”. So I sing it and he starts running and when I catch him and give him a big kiss on the cheek he says “Wakala” which means gross and wipes it off disgustedly. Don’t worry he teases me lots too. Like when he is changing and threatens to rip the buttons off his shirt if I don’t help him unbutton it. What a character.

Gabriel…this is face is similar to the one he makes when I start singing dar un beso. 

One day while Lola was teaching a lesson I was on the side assigning homework. I was listening to the lesson while tracing circles and squares. The theme of the week was protecting the earth so Lola was teaching the children to respect animals and insects emphasizing that they have a right to life. The children were passing around a beetle, which escaped one of the girl’s hands. I was going to grab some more notebooks when I without any knowledge of the escaped beetle with the right to life ended up stepping on it. The class went silent until little Sayri said with a hint of shock in her voice “Rebekah killed the insect”. She then proceeded to give me dirty looks all day. '

Lola and some of the children I may have traumatized. 

Cesar is one of my very favourite kids in Pre-kinder. He has these huge eyes that let you know every emotion he’s feeling. After a week of not coming to the daycare I saw him and his mom in town and made him promise that he was going to come on the Monday. What I didn’t realize was that I was leaving that weekend for meetings and didn’t make it back to the daycare until the following Friday. All the kids were so excited to see me finally show up on Friday… but before Cesar would give me a hug he gave me a good scolding for not coming all week. Kids…won’t let you get away with anything.

 Daniel, another little boy in the pre-kinder class, has long curly beautiful hair. He could be a little child model….but all the other kids think he is a girl. On day the teacher very specifically explained that Daniel was a boy. “She is a he” she said, “he is a boy not a girl. HE’S name is Daniel”.  Cesar looks up with his big eyes full of legitimate curiosity and says “ohhhh Daniela”.  He was still a little confused. Most of the kids still are.

Daniel and his beautiful curly hair.

At the daycare we highly discourage the kids to play with pretend guns. You know…recent war… 1000’s of people died. It’s understandable.  So when Geovany was using a toy doll as a gun and shooting other kids I gave him “the look” (“the look” is often easier then speaking in Spanish), quite quickly he replied “No it’s just a water gun…I’m shooting water at them”. I guess that acceptable…right?

These kids are little bursts of laughter waiting to happen. I know I will miss them an incredible amount. But I was a little encouraged my something lately.

When I first came to El Salvador little boy named Jorge in the Kinder class gave me a VERY hard time. He never listened to me and one time even hit me. As time past he started to respect me as an authority figure and we bonded. So in the new year I was really excited to see Jorge again and all the other kids I had grown to love. But Jorge left to go to a different school and I thought I would never see him again. Jorge is back!! He missed El Centro Infantil and wanted to finish the year with us. I never expected to see Jorge again but I did.

As the days get fewer and fewer before I leave I do not want to have the same attitude as I had when Jorge switched schools. Seem’s silly to be upset about something you have no control over. I had no control over weather I would ever see Jorge again or not. Only the Lord knows my future regarding all my little friends in the daycare, in Perquín and Guatemala. It may be harder then it sounds…but I am going to try not to be sad or worried about the friendships I have formed here and leave it in God’s hands.

If you really did read all that… felicidades! Thanks for all your support and prayers this year!  

Su amiga,

Bekah