Helado!

Good Tuesday!

I can't believe I've only been here about 4 days. Talking with Melanie from my team, we feel as though we've been here a week or too. It's amazing how easily how bodies and minds can get into a routine without knowing it.

I'll quickly recap about the 2 days. Yesterday started our first day of sessions, which we have Mondays and Tuesdays. Mike Holland and Pastor Carlos Rodriguez, a Cuban pastor who just started a church in Tampa, Florida, came late Sunday night and were our "mentors," or session speakers for yesterday and today. The focus was all about prayer, which was really need. Just exploring how we can have a more intimate prayer life--talking about why we find it hard to focus and make time. We were session from 9 to 3:30, with several 10 minute breaks and an hour break for lunch. It was a very exhausting experience, as we were engaging ourselves emotionally and mentally, which can be just as exhausting as physical exercise.
The title of my blog today has to do with our immersion in Spanish! Carlos knows almost no English, so we got to practice our Spanish a lot. During our 1 hour break yesterday the 5 of us went with Carlos across the street from the church to find a phone card so he could call his wife, and we went to a store where he bought a tub of "helado," that is, icecream! We ate that later, which was fun. It's one of those words the team won't ever say in English again :)

Carey and I probably know the most Spanish, so we give little lessons throughout day, just with simple phrases and pointing out any nouns we know. We have started labeling things in the apartment, which is a great excercise in expanding our vocabulary.

Today we had more sessions, still on prayer. We talked more about different kinds of prayer and did some exercises in them(we did that yesterday too). I was pretty exhausted from staying up later talking with Mike and Carlos and then getting up early for Breakfast Ministry...so, my main prayer was for strength.

Keep my funds in your prayers, and me in your thoughts and prayers. If you aren't on my prayer list and wish to be, please message me on facebook, because I'll be sending my first prayer email our soon here.

Here is my address in the Bronx--please just send me letters unless I ask for something else, cause there won't be a guarantee that anyone will be around to recieve a package:

Evi Long
c/o Priority 1 Ministries/UDC
490 E. 181st St., Apt. 4A
Bronx, NY 10457

I love you all!!