The most beautiful house in the world

I am staying in Phoenix in the most beautiful house in the world. It just keeps going. Everytime I turn a corner we find another wing. And they have a putting green in their backyard.

This morning, before we left, we took a tour of the Wycliffe office in Tucson. Normally American offices do not have translating going on, just administration. During the 80's when Mexico closed its borders to the US, translators found themselves back in the States and unable to get a visa to return to their regional sites. So, this office was born. For over a decade translators brought individuals from various people groups up to aid them in translations out of that office. Now, it is the home of retired volunteers and the literacy offices.

The amazing thing about their center is how total it is. There is an upholstery house and an automotive shop. Missionaries on furlough use donated cars to get around, but people rarely donate new vehicles. The auto shop workers spend their time literally piecing vehicles back together again. (I saw one half of a van being rebuilt from bits and pieces)

The audio department takes recordings of sections of scripture, edits them, and converts the reels to tape and cd. One woman listens to every word of a recording in a language she doesn't speak, and makes sure it is correct. In one particular recording, the spaces between sentences were over edited, and the breaths were too loud, so she was lengthening pauses and cutting and pasting new breaths in. Tedious work there.

Missionaries on furlough also need clothes, so there was a boutique of donated articles. Unfortunatly, like the cars, many of the donations are from vintages that will never be revived. No one goes to Saks 5th Avenue to stock the missionary barrel. Do people even realise that there is such thing as a missionary barrel this century.

Something to think about, if you are donating items after spring cleaning. Call a Wycliffe office, or any missionary organization and see what their needs are.

Quote

Overheard yesterday:

They like dead people and posessed women..

Hard day's night

Here I am finally! The last place I stayed had so many blockers and filters, it wouldn't let me blog.

Last night was our hardest show yet. It was an odd shaped room, and had two immovable stages that we had to work our stage around. Then, at mic check, three mics didn't work. So our 15 minutes dragged into over a half an hour. There was barely enough room backstage to maneuver (which caused several almost-character breaks as we walked onstage giggling at how we almost didn't make it that time). Then, afterwards, I lost a crew member during packing. She began panicking and felt like she was going to pass out. I sent her outside, but then I was down a crew member -- and she's the one who organises how things get put back into our tupperware tubs to get loaded back on the carts. It took a long time, and we had several dished break in the chaos. It's always the ones you don't have any extras of that get smashed. I was the last person out of the building by quite a bit. I'm sore this morning!

Today we're off to Northminster Presbyterian, where my church's old youth minister is now head pastor. We'll see if he comes to the show...

I'm alive

I am alive. We are in Las Cruces, New Mexico, and leaving this morning for Tucson, Arizona.

We had a show last night that was packed to the bursting point. The church decided to host us two weeks ago. I have no idea how they rounded up that many people! But someone had been praying for years that WDT would come to their church, so that was pretty cool.

I left my cds in the kitchen trailer, so it's going to be a long day!

"We all sat around and prayed. Or rather, Aaron prayed, and we agreed with him."

Courtesy of Walter

Vacation

Hey, ho, Kermit the frog here...

I'm blogging from Waco. Ashli and I decided to take a break from taking a break. All our other cast members wanted to "do things" on their days off. We opted to take the truck down to the Scobell's Bed and Breakfast. So all day today we've done as little as possible. Some laundry. Some emailing, postcarding and (for me) updating my spending logs and ledger. So far everything balances, and I'm able to pay next months bills yet again. Thanks be to God.

Wednesday we head to Big Springs, where we'll speak to a camp about what we do. Then Thursday it's off to Las Cruces, NM. We picked up one show last minute before we have to be in Tucson.

I think I would be more inclined to do things if we weren't going back over the route I've lived and driven. As it is, highway 20 is my old stomping grounds. Not even a roadrunner to break up the monotony!

Give me some time to apologise to the people I've offended, and I'll try to explain myself better than I did. I'm debating whether or not to delete a post...

Last night was our most interesting performance to date.

An East Indian Church was our audience. Originally we were supposed to be at their church, but the pews weren't movable, so they rented a community center. I don't think they knew what they were getting into. It was hot and bug infested. We spent a good amount of time cleaning during set up. The weather yesterday was well over 90, with very high humidity. No air conditioning at first, but at least they figured out how to turn it on before the show started. Scooping the rice from the kettle was torture!

The contact was late (probably because we set off the alarms in the building going through an unlocked door) and we were sweating like crazy. All of the girls turned their jeans into capris. We were told, when he arrived, that Indian women don't show leg, so we would have to roll our pants back down before we came into contact with the audience. We were worried because Balangaos wear skirts just below the knee, and in one scene I wear shorts playing a child. They said their congregation is somewhat acclimated to "Western Theater" and would understand that these are only costumes.

Then, we were short on circuits, so three of our nine lights wouldn't work. The air conditioning was loud, and our mics were cranked up, without much effect. Well, most of our mics were. Mine I turned off to run to the rest room, and forgot to turn back on. So I spent all of act one mute. I can project, but in a gym.....

That was the bad stuff, here's the good. The audience was one of our most responsive. Many of the congregation had recently moved here from India. They wore the most beautiful Saris (I think that's what they're called). They had two missionaries to India that they support, and the couple stood up and told of their experiences translating the Bible for the past 25 years. One man gave his life to Christ, and almost a dozen want to do missions work. One 8-year-old girl wants to be a missionary or a doctor. We told her she could do both. Afterwards, we got to talk with some of the ladies washing dishes. We had men standing around, but no one was sure if they would help in the kitchen, or take orders for a woman. They would, but we minced around that issue for a while. Julie said she did the same thing tearing down the stage. It was a very long night, and we got home well after midnight.

Tonight we're at a black church with 7,000 members. What a difference a day makes...

Reconciliation is a beautiful thing.