Argentina- Entry 4

Bienvenido (Day 3-Part 2)

January 11, 2014

After we grabbed some lunch, we headed to the hotel in order to get ready for our respective group meetings. Aunt Sharon, Uncle Jay, Alexis, Carolina and Darrio went to the Rosario English group meeting sponsored by the Sur Español Jehovah's Witnesses congregation. Valeria and Diego picked me up for the Chinese group meeting sponsored by the Rosario Echesortu Spanish congregation. Their meeting was set-up very similar to my Chinese mid-week meeting in South Carolina. For the first half of the meeting, the Chinese group sits in the auxiliary room. I noticed right away there was no elbow room to spare. It was a struggle to fit all 17 members plus myself into the tiny 2nd school room. This reminded me of our group until we moved our mid-week meeting to the Lobby and Public talk & Watchtower study to Sundays. No Chinese attended Thursday night (I was told a good number of Chinese Bible studies attend the Sunday meetings) but nevertheless, these brothers and sisters worked very hard at commenting and giving their presentations that night. I was amazed at everyone's level of Chinese and they have only been a group for about a year. Their pronunciation was awesome. And compared to my shaky, nervous comments, they all sounded fluent. Most in the group are young ones learning the language. Some take Mandarin Chinese classes at the University, others have tutors, one single even went to China. Whatever method they choose, their Chinese is amazing. It kind of makes me wonder: "Am I really needed here?"

But those thoughts were at once shaken from my head, when I saw how excited and appreciative they were of me picking to come to Rosario. These friends are so warm. Even the friends from the Spanish congregation, who don't speak Chinese, approached to welcome me: "Bienvenido!" We talked Chi-an-lish for about an hour after the meeting. They even helped me make field service arrangements in the ministry for Friday and Saturday. I met so many people, it was hard to keep everyone straight.

I got back to the hotel around 10:30 that evening. I call Carolina just to let my aunt & uncle know I made it back safely but am told they just went to dinner with some friends in the English group. People eat dinner late in Argentina. So Alexis and Darrio swing by the hotel to pick me up. At the restaurant, there is a huge group of friends. I sit with a group of younger sisters, including Mariana (she's in the Spanish congregation) and cousins Thelma & Theresa. Mariana was learning Chinese a few years ago but I believe she got discouraged. I told her that I experienced something similar but things are much better now that I am apart of a group. I encouraged her to give Chinese another chance now that Rosario has a group. Then I gave her a mini Chinese lesson. Our whole conversation had to be translated by Thelma and Theresa because Mariana spoke little Chinese and no English. Is was amazing that we were able to communicate and hit it off so well. Mariana mentioned something about love being the universal language that our International brotherhood speak. Well, I definitely heard the love loud and clear :)