Chilean 4th of July -- Times Seven and Body by Barbecue

The Warm-up: School programs

Traditional dancing and traditional treats including Mote con Huasillos (preserved peaches in juice with cooked whole wheat--sort of wheat "hominy." The peach can be fresh tasting or dried with the pit and stronger tasting.) Over the course of the week, we had this three times, at least. 

Branch Postre Party: Nothing but desserts!

We won't talk about the empanada party for the workers and the million cookies we baked to hand out to advertise our English classes the day before, nor the two "service project" days that week that ended up being work, but also being fed a huge hot meal each noon, nor even the barbecue for the farm managers two days later; but it has been Fiestas Patrias--the week-long celebration of Chilean independence, with kite flying, rodeos, school programs, parties, dancing, horseback riding; oh, and yes, eating. 

On the actual holiday, September 18th, we were invited to three homes and at all three places a boatload of meat was being grilled with all the accompanying side-dishes. How could we say no?

Flags fly everywhere--on homes and buildings and it only takes a little of the beauty out of it to discover that it's the law that people display the flag. It's a beautiful flag and many cars also are adorned with the red, white and blue.

I really love how barbecues are conducted here. The men hang around the fire throwing a huge variety of pieces of meat on the grill and flipping things around, salting and tasting. The women fuss around in the kitchen putting finishing touches on a variety of salads and potato and rice dishes. When a piece of meat is ready, off the grill it comes and everyone gets a chunk at the optimal moment. If it's chorizo or hot dogs, you get a bun warmed on the grill to wrap the meat in. When the beef is done, you get some to eat from a fork as you walk around visiting. Then pork and maybe lamb, and finally when the chicken that was probably put on first looks done, everyone sits down for the side dishes and more meat.

Round One--after an hour-long horseback ride through orchards and vineyards:

Round Two: just dessert, but they sent us home with a plate of meat that we were too full 

to enjoy at the time. More whipped cream than strawberries--que rico!

Round Three: more meat, empanadas, salads, potatoes and kite flying!

This is all the same day, people!!

At the end of the week, wearing my Sunday black thermal top and black Cuddleduds bottoms I looked long and hard in the bedroom mirror and admitted that I was looking at Body by Barbecue: just a bit too much indulging this month. 

If rain is your favorite weather

If rain is your favorite weather, you would have been happy at the farm the past few weeks. Some days it would rain without stopping. We still have standing water in lots of places and mini-rivers beside the roads, but the dove found dry land and didn't come back to the ark, so I think we'll be okay.

We hear that last year it didn't rain at all, so people are really happy to get the water and the many water storage lagunas are filling up. We have an English lesson on climate, and I usually ask the students what their favorite weather is. Frequently, they tell me they like rain better than anything.

The rain comes with some problems, though. Work essentially stops in the fields. We are getting ready to begin a new 12 week course of English lessons for the field workers out in the comedores at lunchtime, and prepared some flyers to advertise the classes. We made hundreds of cookies to share as we placed the flyers. We slipped and slid through the mud in our company mini-van to take our warm chocolate-chip, raisin, walnut, oatmeal cookies to the trabajadores. Alas! Not one soul to give them to! The farm seems to be experiencing a "rain delay."

Pasamos Agosto

Chile has all these sayings that I am just beginning to hear but I just love them, and love being "in" on their humor about life. As I was shivering at the church after our teaching session last night, some sisters told me about Pasamos Agosto. It's when old people (60+) sigh in relief that they've lived through August when fragile people sometimes die from the cold. Not that it's very cold, but inside drafty unheated buildings it is often colder than it is outside where the sun usually warms things up. So as I left, I said, "Just two more days," and they smiled and gave me a warmer than usual hug,
denying that I could be old enough to celebrate the day.

And speaking of drafty, I suggested to our missionaries and to Jay that the tragedy of two Elders dying in their sleep of carbon monoxide poisoning in Taiwan couldn't happen in Chile, but he is insisting on getting CO detectors for their house anyway. No worries about ours; our water heater is outside.

Another weather-related saying is "Be careful, it might just be veranito de San Juan." Verano is summer and veranito is a little summer in the middle of winter--a tease that tricks you into going out unprepared for the cold that will inevitably return. I've seen no one willing to brave the outdoors here  in the shorts that are common in Utah junior high schools as the snow is coming down. Quite the contrary: everyone is dressed as if they are headed to the south pole--face wraps, hats, layers of clothing including tights and overcoats.

So tomorrow I'm preparing to celebrate old people's El Primero de Septiembre Fiesta--assuming that we successfully pasamos agosto! Stay tuned..........

Charcoal

Burning wood to make fuel to burn for heat and cooking strikes me just a bit like curing radiation-caused cancer with radiation, but I can't argue with the result of either.

We stumbled upon this charcoal operation on one of our recent farm visits and were fascinated by the process. We had seen clusters of these large hornos elsewhere, but couldn't imagine what they were. This time, a number of them were puffing away and we had a chance to observe these large earthen ovens at various stages up close.

There were probably 10 or 15 of them--shoulder high from the top but taller than me from the lower door-like entrance in a small clearing in a remote area at the edge of orchards and farm land. A gentleman was overseeing the operation and had bagged up the cooled charcoal from some of the ovens. Others had stacks of espino (a thorny, protected tree in Chile branches. If you remove an espino tree you are required to replant another, though not necessarily an espino) branches and other raw wood ready to go into the ovens, and some looked to be filled with trash--perhaps the wood goes on top of household papers and burnable garbage. This one was actively cooking, with smoke coming from any number of porous openings, but primarily from ground-level. From the looks of things, the interior cavern is larger than the dome structure in the center. I asked what keeps the wood from burning up entirely and was told that they keep the fire very small.

From the picture below, it appears that they limit the amount of oxygen in the chamber by means of a metal door propped shut.

Being a bit of a pyromaniac and in love with the smell of wood burning, this was right up my alley and I lingered until I was so warm that I had to take off my newly knit sweater--now fragrant with smoke-- to finish the walk.

You see charcoal vendors all over, selling from the backs of pick-up trucks and in small stands. I have no idea what the yield of "carbon" ends up being for a ton of wood. That would be interesting to know. It would also be interesting to know what the impact these operations have on air pollution world-wide. But in a country where the stars are visible every single non-rainy night, and homes have maybe two light bulbs against the darkness, I will not blame rural Chileans for any holes in the ozone layer.

Simple Gifts

Audrey Hepburn said you can tell what kind of woman a man thinks you are by the kind of earrings he gives you. Only one man has ever given me earrings and I married him. (They required that I get my ears pierced so I guess he thought I was fancier than I am, but that's a story for another day.)

The gifts we've received recently have been so perfect you just have to believe that people know who we really are.

A morning at the farm where I got to dig my fingers into a kinky lamb's 

wool coat as he stood on his little wobbly two-day old legs.

Balls of hand-spun wool yarn, wooden knitting needles and a crochet hook with a hand-made clay cooking pot from one of our most diligent students that we teach and fix dinner for once a week.

An invitation to a typical almorzar (lunch, but really dinner) after a teaching appointment
in a home in the country. Yes, she cooks like this every day at noon.

We receive much more than we give on this mission!

The Miracle of the Berliners

....not to be confused with The Miracles of the Loaves and Fishes. This was DESSERT!

Last week we decided to ask new-member-George (Hor-hay) to make some of his specialty filled doughnuts for us to share at the Fundo. Why yes,  Chile is a perfect place to find German pastry of this variety, surprisingly.

We debated how many to request since so many workers have been laid off for the winter. When we took cookies a week ago there were about 25 trabajadores. I suggested to be safe we should have him make 40 or 50. In true Jay fashion, "Elder Bagley" (aka: "Bagley" or, at times, "Val," the previous missionary) ordered SIXTY Berliners and arranged to pick them up at noon today from his humble home.

The aroma was tantalizing as we sped to the first of two comedores where the workers eat lunch, but we restrained ourselves from trying one in the interest of getting to both places on time. We were amazed at the number of men and women that were working today. Tables and vans full of people just finishing their break who were so happy to see us bearing dulces! Many thanked us in English and we were on our way to stop number two.

The huge tub of pastries had diminished considerably. I counted only 13 remaining, and fearing it wouldn't be enough, made Jay go count the number of men. He came back to the car in 3 seconds saying, "It 'll be close, but we can figure out what to do if there are more people than that."

Nervously we began passing them out. Seven in the first area. Smiles all around. Six left. A bunch of guys are playing ping-pong and watching the game. I'm afraid it's more than six--I can't tell if anyone is in the corner of the room. Well, here goes. One. Two. Three. Four. The ping-pong players. Now the watchers. One, two......we scan the room, check out the corners, the porch....it's enough. Just barely.

We don't care a bit that our portion was the joy of having "suficiente." Oh, and that heavenly smell.

The Church in Chile: thoughts at the 6 month mark

Those who think that Mormon women don't wear pants to church have lived on the Wasatch Front too long. Here, it's maybe even more common than wearing skirts, or dresses. This winter, I've taken to both--well, really just yummy black long-johns under a skirt with fur-lined boots on my feet; but many or even most women are in pants. Nobody cares.

I love how every person greets every other person at church with a "como esta?" and a kiss on the cheek for women and children, even teenagers, and quite often men. As we have come to know people better, the kiss on the cheek comes with a tight and extended hug around the back, too. I. love. it. I did, however, buy the wrong kind of glasses before we left. These frameless ones invariably end up lopsided and smeared. Again; nobody cares.

Chile has a very low church activity rate--something like 16 percent. We see a good solid base of people at church, but there is also
 a percentage--maybe 30 percent--who seem new to us every week. With four sets of missionaries it's probable that some are investigators, but I just have to conclude that lots of members only come occasionally. This has got to be a focus as we move toward becoming a stake again. (Yes, Chile has a lot of branches and districts that used to be wards and stakes. We are working toward mature discipleship--my words-- and measured growth this time around.) Our great neighbor (in K-town) Jill Mills talked about the wards of the Church relying on STP (a fuel additive for cars), but in this case the Same Ten People; so in a way, it's a problem everywhere. We have a clot of folks who do everything, and others participate if they feel like it. BYU had a slogan, "fully committed," which is a good goal for individuals, families, wards and branches. There would be no having to rely on the STP if everyone were fully committed and carrying their little bit of the load. Wouldn't that be heavenly!? Fully committed, Not STP.

So I'm thinking about conversion. It's not really "carrying the load" that matters. It's enjoying the fruits of the Gospel. What does real conversion do to a person? It makes them different. Two of our students that have been members less than a year have told us at one time or another that they are "better" men. It is noticeable to others. These people radiate love and testimony and goodness. "By their fruits ye shall know them."

The young LDS managers on the farm--returned missionaries, often English-speaking college-graduates--are impressive to their peers. One man, not a member of the Church, tried to explain to us the quality of men he works with, "They are.... (he struggled in Spanish to find just the right word) ....noble." And they are. After a full day's work on the Fundo, they go out with the missionaries, or they lead in Branch Presidency Meetings, or they participate with their families in English classes, or they watch over a Young Men's activity, or fulfill the goal to attend the temple every week--returning home just before midnight. They are anxiously engaged. Unselfish. Impressive. Yes, noble.

The olive trees provide many metaphors, but for this topic, the care and attention to the newly planted trees is apropos. The new directions from the Missionary Committee are critical--watching over our converts for at least a year--preferably years--as they are assimilated into the ward or branch with friends, callings and being nurtured by the Good Word of Christ. Every member needs the care we give to an orchard we love and have hopes for. The hugs and kisses we receive on Sunday are but a start, and if a person isn't attending regularly, they miss even that (not to mention renewing covenants with the Sacrament and the spiritual nourishment available only in that sacred setting). The trees can't tell us when they need water, or fertilizer until it's way past time to apply it. Similarly, our members don't give off obvious signals that they are in need. This is our challenge throughout the Church and in our families. If we have tasted of the fruit, and know that it is good, how can we share it?