From Jessica

CJ and Tara do face paints--the team.

CJ preaches, a typical neighborhood where the puppet show played and Jess and CJ learn how to work the puppets.

The past 3 days have been packed: we put on 8 puppet shows in 7 different places, painted hundreds of faces and made 300 balloon animals, spent 2 nights in police barracks with one working toilet, ate 4 meals a day (breakfast of white bread, lunch with white bread, merienda (tea) with white bread, and dinner around 10 pm), and reached 2000 kids with the message of the gospel. We spent our time in Pergamino (a town about 2 hours away from San Nicolas) with a team of 20 kids from the Hogar that presents a puppet show with music and dancing. Since it's winter break here, the city government of Pergamino had approached a local pastor, Samuel, asking him to put together activities for the kids. Samuel arranged performances for the puppet team and the government gave us free license to share whatever message we wanted.
Each morning, we went to community centers around the city that basically serve as daycares; kids come to the centers for their meals because there is nothing to eat at home. They all loved the puppet shows and clapped, yelled, and danced with the puppets. In the afternoons, the team performed at churches and we painted faces and made balloon animals for the kids afterwards. The kids got really excited about even our messy paintings and balloons that looked like large intestines: simple things bring them so much joy.
Many of the kids we met were enthralled by the fact that we were Americans. One little boy came up and asked me if I knew Nicholas Cage, Spiderman, and Batman because they live in the US. Yesterday, Tara and I went outside to play with some kids and were immediately bombarded with questions about our families surrounded by a semicircle of kids who just stared at us and asked questions.
We were all so exhausted by the third day that we learned to drink mate. It's an herb mix similar to tea but much stronger-- it's drunk through a straw and passed around to everyone. It's pretty potent: one little cup of mate kept CJ going all day.
We've had a lot of practice being flexible the past few days. Everything in Argentina starts at least a 1/2 hour late (Dad- you would fit in well here :)) and starting times are just suggested, so schedules are always subject to change. The Argentines are all really laid-back and patient. They are content to sit and talk for an hour while waiting for church to start, and the whole pace of life here is much slower and more relaxed.
We didn't have specific roles with the puppet program, so we had to play things by ear. We sat and danced with the kids, helped with set up and take down of equipment, spent time with the teenagers from the team, led devotionals in the mornings. Derryn and Claudio preached at two different churches (one was a hip-hop youth service of 250 and the other was a small pentecostal church) and I sang at both despite a few hairy moments due to sound equipment.
We all had a lot of fun together and got to know many of the kids better. Relationships are being built, so please pray for continued opportunities for connecting with the kids.