Piecing Things Together

This has been a lovely week. I've been at the seaside, enjoying the benefits of a lovely au pair family with good food, good wine, relaxed moods and the occasional day trip to Spain to go and visit the Dalí Museum - amazing! I even managed to spend a couple of days with my good friend Laura, as she worked for the same family last summer, which was lovely - particularly as she's currently working at a vineyard, and happened to bring us a present (drinkable, of course).

This week has given me the chance to chill out and bit and start piecing things together from what I've learnt during this crazy year abroad: yes, it has been a whole year! I won't do the full report, as it's not over yet - far from it - but having now come almost full-circle, back in France again, things are starting to piece together and take shape for what's to come next year, and perhaps beyond. Ideas about jobs, lifestyle and location are abounding, none quite certain as of yet, but certainly there in bud, ready to blossom and/or fade away. I'm thinking about interpretation, journalism, doing a lot more travelling, and possibly ending up in France... We shall see.

I think perhaps one thing that's lent itself to this momental creative thinking is that through this year I've seen that even the wildest things are possible and the highest of heights touchable when your heart is willing and God gets behind it all. I'm feeling pretty excited, not least because I know that whatever happens, be it amazing or catastrophic, if I'm with God I am certain it will be the best thing.

A Bible verse I was reading the other day sums this up for me:

Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God's work from beginning to end.
Ecclesiastes 3:11
New Living Translation (2007)

On the Road Again

Soundtrack: Down the Road - C2C (again, I know, but it's terribly apt)

Here I am, back on my travels again - never stay in one place for long! Having spent ten days at home in good old England it was time to get on with the last chunk of my Year Abroad, a second summer in France to keep up the art of shoulder-shrugging, refresh my essential knowledge of cheese and wine, and to make sure I haven't forgotten how to pout...

In fact, these past few days I really have been on the road again - after arriving in Lyon to meet my au pair family on Thursday, I barely had time to settle in or even unpack my suitcase before I was told to get packing again as on Friday we were going on holiday to Narbonne, three hours away on the coast! Having made it here, I have to say I'm very glad we made the trip - firstly, we've come to see my friend who worked for the family last year, but also we're in a beautiful chalet, right on the seafront and the view is amazing. Just what the doctor ordered.

With regards to work, the kids (two, aged 10 and 13) are really cute and the parents are very nice and keen to learn English. It's a little bit odd being on a holiday with a family other than my own and I'm never quite sure how much I should help out (when you're living with your employers even going to bed can feel like skimping out sometimes), but they're incredibly chilled out and work is not too challenging at the moment. All in all, things are going pretty well. I foresee a fairly relaxed summer with various exciting interludes (I'm going InterRailing in two weeks!). It's been strange adjusting to life outside of Betel again - so much free time! - but God knows what He's doing.

In a way, it's just back on the wheel of change - new place, new faces, new lifestyle - but now that Fourth Year is getting so close I can feel things slowly gathering momentum. This should be a nice summer to gather my affairs and get myself slowly back into study mode. By the side of the swimming pool, of course...

With love,
Nat xxx

Bienvenida a tu país (Home Again)

Hello again...

Back in the UK - it's been a long while since I last updated this blog, but I'm determined to keep it going until right at the end of this year abroad business, and there's still a little way to go! The end is drawing ever nearer, with many of my friends already having returned to home shores for the last time before heading off to Uni in September, but there's still one adventure left in my journey. I've managed to squeeze in a summer job working as an au pair in the lovely French city of Lyon for a couple of months, finishing promptly at the beginning of September ready to pack my bags for the return to Nottingham once more.

I haven't left quite yet, however. Before I talk about that (next post), I'd just like to talk a little about the remainder of my time in Betel, and the lasting impact it's had on my life. It was an amazing experience, if tough and a bit out of the ordinary (perhaps all the better for that), and there are certain things that will stick with me forever from that place.

Firstly, a simple appreciation of the smaller things in life. You quickly cotton on to the fact that the little luxuries from British culture aren't always present when you venture abroad, but something as basic as being able to talk to your family whenever you want and however long you want to becomes something special when it is limited (the Betelitos are only allowed to have 10-minute phone calls at weekends and, with no internet at the house, I often had to steal moments while I was at church to skype home and check in with the family).

Secondly, a whole lot of gratitude for what I've been given in life. I know this is a little cliché, but when you see firsthand how people's lives can be torn apart by family issues, domestic violence, abuse, unemployment, the crisis, or lack of stability in their lives, it gives you a strong impression of how important a loving, supportive family environment really is. A lot of the Betelitos that come into the centre simply have a massive need to be loved and shown how to live in a community that cares for them no matter what. They need a family. So yeah, I'm very grateful for mine. Thanks, God =]

Thirdly, the relationships I've developed over the three-and-a-half months I spent in the centre at Madrid. It really was wonderful to see the girls grow in confidence, in trust and in faith during the short time I spent with them. Each of them has a very special place in my heart - some were more challenging than others to get on with, especially being in their company 24 hours a day (living in the same house, remember?), but I can definitely say that it was worth the time I invested into every single one, despite frustrations, and the heartbreaking fact that some girls spent time in Betel but left suddenly without reason, presumably to pursue their former lives on the street, or taking drugs. However, I'll continue praying for them and, as for the girls that stayed, I look forward to hearing from them in the future (they promised to write)!

Fourthly, and slightly linked to the last point, the importance of sacrifice. It's not a very popular topic, and not one that I enjoy discussing very much either, let alone implementing, but it's there. It's necessary. It's God (and even if you don't believe in God, it's pretty much inevitable that you will have to sacrifice something at some point in your life). The things that I sacrificed to go into Betel - time, money, sleep, a certain amount of freedom (not being able to listen to my own music, not really being able to talk to the guys), and a large amount of personal space (you're never really alone in Betel), which cost me a lot of effort. However, the things I gained through those sacrifices - patience, acceptance, living/growing in faith, holding your tongue (a whole lot easier to do when you don't speak the language), appreciating the moment, and developing deeper relationships with the girls - were definitely worth the effort. I'm not saying I've completely mastered all these things (be pretty amazing if I had), but I'm certainly a whole lot closer on the way to getting to know them than I was before! And that makes the time seem that much more precious.

And with that, I draw to a close my comments on my life in Betel. As I mentioned on Facebook, Betel has changed my life, and I'm incredibly grateful for the support and love I found among the Betelitas and Betelitos. They are a truly miraculous people, and I'm so privileged to have been able to live alongside them and see the change happening in many of their lives. If you have the chance to do any sort of volunteering experience - a mission trip, a gap year, a summer placement - I'd encourage you to go for it! Especially if it's in another country. You won't come back the same.

God bless you (Que Dios te bendiga),
Nat xxx

p.s. If anyone has any questions, or just wants to chat more about Betel (or even feels called to volunteer...), please comment below on my blog or pop me a message if you have my contact details. Thanks =]

Day in the Life (of a Betel volunteer)

Hola! It's been a while since I've had the chance to write this blog, things have been mega-busy and with so much going on I didn't even know where to start! As I couldn't possibly fit in my entire month of activities into this little update, I'll do a quick shortlist of the top few highlights, then I'll go on to describe my typical day in Betel. Hopefully, it'll be an interesting illustration of what I get up to over here, and may answer some of the questions you may have about Betel and how it all works. I'll just add that, having been through that tough time at the beginning, I now love it here, and am really beginning to enjoy the work God's given me. There are still challenges (which I'm sure I'll mention later), but in general, things are going well.

Firstly, a quick shortlist of my recent activities:

1. Weekend visit to Germany for a friend's birthday and to meet up with my old assistant friends from North rhine westphalia (NRW). Oh, how we laughed!

2. Wedding bells! One of the girls from the house got married to a Betelito in our church and all the girls went along. It was a lovely event, and really heart-warming to see how someone's life can be so fully reconstructed, even to the extent of getting married.

3. The arrival of new girls in the house, and building relationships with the girls that are already here - it's great to chat, hear their stories and share in their lives.

And so onto...

A Day in the Life (of a Betel volunteer):

07:00 Woken up by the sounds of a 'Buenos Dias' (or Good Morning for all you non Spanish-speakers out there), as someone pokes their head round the door to signal that it's time to start the day. Rise and shine!

07:10 After 10 minutes of failed attempts to get up (otherwise know as falling asleep again and thinking that the 'Buenos Dias' was all a dream), someone turns on the light in the dorm and we all groan and cover our eyes. People gradually start emerging from their beds, sleepy-eyed and yawning.

07:15 Up and out! Having managed to (very gracefully) manoeuvre myself down from my top bunk with no ladder, I am in the process of preparing myself for the day. Clothes: check. Backpack: check. Makeup: optional...

07:25 Sitting in the dining room, waiting for everyone to arrive for breakfast so that we can say grace and make a start. A standard Spanish breakfast: coffee with cakes/croissant to dip into it. They do sometimes have cereal, but this they also decide to put into their coffee. Bleurgh.

07:45 A quick brush of the teeth and straight to the living room, where we have our morning devotional. We usually start with a time of prayer and praise, with one of the girls and I playing the guitar and the others singing along. Then comes the Bible study/thought for the day - this morning, it was from Roseane, who told us about her life before she became a Christian, and how God has been changing her heart towards forgiveness.

08:30 End of the devotional, and everyone runs to their rooms to grab their bags and those who went for the more glamorous look give their makeup a final quick touch, heading quickly out to the vans before the leader of the house comes along and tells you off for being late...

09:20 Arrival in the city, and things start getting busy. The madrileños are are up and ready to let out their angry sides, with honking galore, non-indicating drivers, sudden road-side stops and impatient speed demons who get annoyed if you take more than half a second to move once the light has turned green. Oh, Spaniards. The girls are encouraging me to 'Saca lo español', or 'Let your Spanish side out', otherwise known as driving very quickly and honking at every opportunity. It's quite fun! Although not something I'm going to take back to the UK. Probably...

09:30 After having dropped off a couple of girls to work at our charity shop, Blueberry (Calle Marcelo Usera, if anyone's interested), we arrive at church, unload the van and set to work. Some girls to to the kitchen, to prepare the food for lunch, and we head off to get on with some cleaning - oh, the joys!

12:00 Time for a break. It's at least two hours until lunch, so we grab ourselves a snack (pincho) and sit down in the dining room for 10 minutes or so, resting our tired arms from all that sweeping/ mopping/ cleaning windows (my speciality). If someone's feeling generous, we might even get chips from the Betel chippy round the corner. Then we continue with the good deed until...

14:00 Lunchtime! Lunch is a big affair, with all the pastors of the church, all the office staff, all the chicos working in the charity shop next door and various sites in the area come to have their share. It usually amounts to about 70 people, so you can imagine the preparation involved, and the tidying up afterwards!

14:30 After we've eaten, the girls head over to the sofas in the corner of the dining room, where we can enjoy an hour or so of rest in our siesta time - much appreciated, after a long morning's work. Time for a call with the family, or just a long nap - lovely!

16:00 End of the siesta, and everyone rubs their eyes and rolls back into working mode. Today, my colleague has a driving lesson (Betel has a serious lack of drivers), so I go to help tidy up the kitchen and dining area. This is usually done fairly quickly, so by...

18:00 We have a bit of time to read/relax/study. There is also time to have a shower, and get changed for later on, as, being Wednesday, we have a church meeting in the evening and everyone likes to look their best. Some may have slightly more interest in this than others, having boyfriends or other significant males in the men's houses, who they are only allowed to see during church time. A pretty important moment for many of them - church services are the social highlights of the week, for sure!

20:00/20:30 The meeting begins - always a bit late; we are in Spain, after all. There's worship (singing), prayer, and then a short talk from one of the Betelitos (male or female). A lot of them talk about their testimony, which is always an inspiration to see how much God's been changing them - there are some very complicated back-stories here in Betel, as you can imagine!

22:00 End of the meeting, and we say our last goodbyes, go out to the vans again and head home. There, dinner will be being prepared by the girls who stayed at home today (there's always 3 or 4), which we can enjoy eating round about...

23:00! By this point, most of us are knackered, so we head off towards our welcome-looking beds, although not before doing our night-time jobs/having a shower. I often stay up a little longer to write my diary and chat to the girls I haven't seen during the day time. This means that by the time I actually get into my PJs and snuggling down under the duvet, it's often...

24:00 when I collapse into my blankets and hope that the girls' snoring doesn't disturb my night's sleep. A quick prayer to dedicate the next day and the girls to the Lord, then it's eyes closed and night night until the next day, where it starts all over again!

So there you have it - a typical day in the life of a Betelita in the Casa de chicas, Madrid. Some days are different - it can be quite exciting to check the rota and find that you're going off to collect donations in the mountains! I hope this has given you an insight into my life at the moment - if you have any questions, feel free to comment/contact me :)

Much love - until next time!
Nat xxx

En Casa?

Currently sitting outside in the evening sunshine, scribbling a few notes for the blog and enjoying the last few rays. This is the life!

Having now been here a month (a whole month!! I can hardly believe it), this week has been what I see as the reward for those three weeks of slogging when I first came here. Each day has given me something new and exciting, and while it's still been exhausting and at times frustrating, I feel that I can now begin to call this place 'home'.

A brief summary of my activities:

• A couple of stints working at different second-hand shops run by Betel - this is good fun, as you can go through the donations before anyone else gets their hands on them and grab any items that catch your eye! I've picked up a couple of treats already.

• Lots of driving, including up to Aguas Vivas, one of the men's houses (or casas de chicos), which is up in the mountains and has buildings that are used as a holiday/retreat centre for groups that want to rent it out. It's beautiful up there, and a fun old drive, despite the ridiculously pot-holed and bumpy track you have to take to get up there! Look left to see a photo of the (rather cloudy) view from outside the house.

• A rather sudden introduction into the worship team (they don't really 'do' giving you much notice here). I was waiting for the evening meeting to start at the church on Wednesday, and the musicians were rehearsing their final songs for the beginning of the service. Suddenly, one of the leaders came up to me and said 'I heard you play guitar. Why don't you have a go?' (but in Spanish, obviously...), and handed me his guitar! Luckily, I didn't have to play for the worship there and then, but we had a quick jam and I helped to lead at our morning devotional the next day. Yay :D

• The arrival of a new American girl has meant that I have an English-speaking companion in the house, which is rather nice. Although I have to say, my friendships with the other girls are developing well - we had a mad evening the other day, where several of them were jumping on/tickling me, while others tried to mess up my hair, and yet more had already tried to hide my shoes. All in the name of love, of course. And my Spanish continues to improve, gradually reaching that level where I can have some quite serious conversations and actually understand what's being said/have a positive input, which is a big step foreward. I look forward to more of these chats :)

• Finally, my pace of life has adjusted to fit in with the Betel routine! I still get hungry at 12 and 7, when food isn't for another two hours, but I've got myself a reputation as 'the girl who likes to eat', and it is, in fact, quite common to have a 'pincho' (snack) at these times anyway. On another topic, the pure fact that I have nowhere else to be/nothing else to be getting on with means that I have had no choice but to slow down, chill out and relax a bit - for example, there's no point cleaning an entire church in a morning, if that then means you've got no work left for the afternoon. It's quite nice, this slowed-down pace -definitely a lot less stressful than rushing for Uni deadlines (oh, final year!).

So, that'll be it for this week - keep those letters/prayers coming!
Adios amigos xxx

In at the deep end!

Well, this week's certainly been different to the last one. I had a bit of a moment on Monday where I was, quite frankly, fed up and wanted to leave. But after that, things turned around and there were plenty of new things to keep me distracted! I went out driving for the first time on the other side of the road, which was an experience in itself. Add to that the fact that I've not driven for about half a year, I've never properly driven on a motorway, I was driving in a van and in a city where the citizens are renowned for being bad drivers, well, you can imagine! We survived, though. And I've been practising - I'll be a pro by the time I come back (just like volleyball...).

However, the main thing I wanted to talk about this week was my trip to Valdemingonez, otherwise known as La Cañada (narrow pass/ravine), or 'El Vertedero' (the rubbish dump). I went with a girl from my dorm (Patrizia) and a couple of guys from church, and headed out with a van full of supplies - sandwiches, drinks, etc. - ready to hand them out to the people we met there. Let me just add that this spot is a well-known area for drug taking and trafficking. I knew what I was coming up against, having read about it in books about Betel, but I still wasn't quite prepared for what met me.

We arrived at our destination and parked the van in a mud-covered patch of ground in the middle of nowhere, next to an abandoned church (the irony struck me, too). There were cars packed around the edges, and an open-sided square of vans set up by the Drug Awareness Agency, also giving out drinks and sandwiches as well as information. I saw a policy car drive in, turn round and drive out again at least twice. There were tents set up at the sides of the field and a shackle type of living abode that was obviously being used as temporary housing/a drug den by the more desolate people in the area.

It was quite a sight to see those mud-encrusted figures, mostly men, stumble across the uneven ground and hold their hands out for what little we could give. Some of them weren't so far down the line - a few even looked fairly normal: trendy glasses, leather jacket - but they were mostly dirty, smelly and truly pitiful characters. A few conversations were sparked off - Manolo, one of the men from church, knows a lot of the guys that go there regularly, so they knew what we were about. Some of them wanted to chat, listening to Manolo's reasoning but always giving excuses for why they couldn't come with us - 'I'm feeling better, I only do 2g a day now', or 'I've got to sort things out with my family, I'll come with you another day'. Some didn't stick around, just grabbed the food and left. Others were more vocal in their aversion to our message, calling God a 'cabrón' (bastard) and berating Him as being nothing but a rule-maker who likes to punish us. What was most heart-breaking was to see the men and women who came into this place with their children, dragging them into this mess of a world with them. One man had his son of about 10 waiting in the car for him. One woman even came up to us wheeling a pram. My heart goes out to that little boy.

Towards the end, however, came along a man who had obviously come before, and he told us about a problem he had with his lungs. Manolo offered to pray for him, and the man started to cry, telling us of his family, his wish to be free of drugs and his wish to join Betel. Manolo and Carlos, the other man from church, were ready to go there and then, but he said he had some things to sort out, and he would come tomorrow, he promised. I pray to God that he does. And so with this, we left that dark and desolate place behind and headed back home - to church - for lunch.

It took me a while to process all of this, and I'm sure it'll still be sinking in during the next few days, but it did one thing straight away - it made me much more aware of where many of the girls in this house have come from, how much they need God's grace and how much He is living with us today. This is what allows the works we do to be done by faith, as the people I saw in Torrejon wouldn't have been capable of cooking a meal, let alone running an international organisation. Praise God.

I'll write again soon.
God bless,
Nat xxx

p.s. I'd just like to add a quick thank you for your letters, those who sent them - much appreciated!

El Escorial