Santiago

Wednesday a small group of us went into Santiago to do some treasure hunting (ministering to individuals on the street the Lord highlights to us) and sight seeing. On the way into the centre (2 buses and a metro later) Ben had a word of knowledge for someone walking with a cane and pain shooting up their right leg. He saw people with canes all around him so prayed and shared with them, the second lady started walking perfectly healed, having never walked like that before. She left with her cane under her arm ready to give it away, rejoicing in her healing. 

Santiago is a great city, I felt really comfortable here, maybe because after the craziness of my last 7 months of living on the road it gave me a sense of normality, I did live a very corporate lifestyle in London for 4 years after all so being in a business centre is very familiar to me.

Lunch in Santiago with Ben, Kurt, Liney and Liz

A view through Santiago

Thursday was an early start to drive to the airport at 5am - got lost, drove down the wrong side of the road twice, numerous turnarounds, competing with the GPS and where we thought we should go, asked the car next to us for directions at a freeway offramp... No stress as the time for my flight got closer and closer! Got to the airport perfect timing thanks to Liz's amazing driving, Kurt's impressive navigation and Liney's fantastic help with Spanish, in time for a flight delayed by an hour. 

You know you've been on the road for too long when you're excited about airplane food. It was good, even got a fresh bread roll warmed in the oven, plus real butter! Haven't had that in months. My interchange at Buenes Aires didn't go as smoothly - possibly to do with the fact that I was trying to check into the Iberia direct flight to Madrid at 1:05pm instead of my 1:20pm flight to Rome (and then Madrid) with Alitalia. Easy mistake to make considering I'd been up since 4am after 3 hours sleep. Also a good time to discover I'm actually in the wrong terminal, not just at the wrong boarding gate. Oh, and I don't have a boarding pass as I'm in transit and haven't actually checked in. Great, not challenging to communicate this in Spanish at all. All's well that ends well and I got on the flight, all 13 hours of it. 

And now I'm on a much needed holiday to Spain to spend some time with family resting and recuperating. Living as I have been for the last 7 months has taken its toll, it's been an unforgettable experience, but it's also been exhausting. Two continents, 13 countries, thousands of kilometres travelled by car, bus, train, airplane, taxi, motorbike, metro, tuc tucs, hitched rides on the back of pickup trucks, boats and of course walking, living in very close community with between 20 and 33 people at any given time in very challenging conditions, not to mention all the ministry we've been part of, no wonder I'm tired. And ready for a break. I'll meet up with the team again in Argentina in May. Well that's the plan... If I've learned anything over the last 7 months it's that what we plan and what actually happens is generally 2 different things...