Minga & the Mall

Today at 7:30 am we met Felipe for a minga. A minga is a work gang. People from the CMT (Centro Muchacho del Trabajor which is how one would say Working Boys Center in Spanish - I have been using WBC and CMT interchangably), get together on Sunday's and help each other with building projects. Today were were helping Felipe build the church in his barrio (neighborhood). Felipe is from Colombia. He and his wife have two children, some time ago, his brother in Colombia died of cancer, so he brought his sister-in-law and their children here, to live in Quito with him. They have all enrolled in the programs of the CMT. He is now trying to build a structure in front of his house so that he was house a business there. But today, we helped to build the local church.


We took a 45 minute bus ride into the hills - into a neighborhood called Pusili. The Church there is run by Salesians. The nuns have a school directly behind the Church building. The Church is called Iglesia Nuestra Senora del Ascension. The sisters are from Italy and very grateful that we were there to help.
Under Felipe's guidance, our group had two tasks. One: move a large pile of dirt from the land below the church, to a space in front of the church. This involved loading the dirt into a wheelbarrow, then pushing it up a steep hill and dumping it in the appropriate spot. They then used the dirt to make concrete for a wall that they were building. Felipe and some of his men had already dug the trench for the fence columns, they were fabricating the rebar to act as support. Fr. John, Laurie, Vivian, Katy, Steve and Sue worked on that project. Two: On the other side of the Church building, Chris, Victorina, Alex, Maria, Lauren and I had the task of moving some rocks from the side of the building to a "gran montana" of piedras, a grand mountain of rocks. I had a little trouble intrepeting Felipe's instructions, at first, so unfortunately, we had to re-do some of what we did. In the end, we got it down and make quite a difference.

At 10 am the parish celebrated Mass. It was packed! All the neighborhood folks got together to attend. Several people from the barrio saw us working and came to help out. At one point Felipe came and asked how many were in our group. Later a lady (who was a neighbor, I think) came with bologna sandwiches (they call them sanduches here) and soda for us! A couple, Jesus and Ines were some of the folks that came out to help. I have never seen such a skinny man be so strong! We picked up a boulder that must have weighed 80 pounds and hefted it over his head and threw it at least 30 feet into the "gran montana". Ines struck up a conversation with me as soon as she arrived on the scene. They have 6 children, 4 jovenes (teenagers) and 2 ninos. (Later I met one nino, named Jason). Her husband builds houses for a living, she is a street vendor, selling soda and aqua frescas. They had a dog that was milling about the site as well, Max. He looked hungry and was very friendly. Jesus fed Max his whole sandwich, I have never seen a dog jump so high!
Chris and Alex were trying to break up the rocks (which were move like clumps of rocks cemented together, I think I was a former retaining wall) with a sledge hammer whose head kept falling off. Jesus noticed this, took it with him, came back a few minutes later with the handle whittled down, ready to piece it back together for us. He continued to break up the majority of the clumps so that we could move them to the "gran montana".

 I was so impressed with the warmth and generosity of the people. Everyone that we have met has been very warm, friendly, helpful, caring and open. These people are so beautiful - out of nothing, they give all they have. This couple, Ines and Jesus left to go home before the work was finished. However, right before we were leaving, they came back with cut-off two liter soda bottles with aloe vera plants planted in them. They didn't bring enough for all of us and so wanted to go back and get more! Felipe came over and told us that we had to get going...the rest of the group were going back to the bus. We excused ourselves, said thank you and headed back to the bus stop.
One the bus, I sat next to a lady named Olga who immediately started up a conversation with me. She was so sweet!
Once we returned to the Center, we showered and rested a bit. Then we walked to the Condado Mall to have dinner. The CMT is closed on Sunday's for family day so the only safe place to get food is the Mall. It's about 5 blocks away from the Center. It is very Americanized, complete with food court, Payless Shoe Source, McDonalds, Tomy Roma's and Lee Jeans store. Prices were more expensive then in the states. We noticed that most of the people there looked relatively affluent, but still I wondered how they were able to afford the goods being sold.
When we got back to the  Center, we celebrated Mass at 6pm in the library. A new group from Wisconsin arrived last night, so there were here and greeted us. They joined us for Mass. For the homily, I asked everyone to share highlights, inspirations from their day.
Tomorrow we are going to Luann's