One More Picture From the Soccer Game

I thought I would put up the only photo we have from the soccer game that we saw in Mexico City. On my Oct. 28 post I mentioned all of the security that was around the stadium. You can see some of that in the picture here. To the left of Emma and Daniel you can see the Cruz Azul team practising and to the right, cheerleaders entertaining the mostly male audience.

Workday at the Retreat Centre

Friday, Moises and I went out to the retreat centre in Acolman to see some of the work that has been going on of late.

Fransisco and his men were putting ventilation shafts from the 8 family dorms rooms to the roof and one man was putting stucco siding onto the outside of the newly built dorms. It had been a some time since I was at the Retreat Centre but finally I have photos of the completed work that the Gateway team from Cleveland did. They tiled the new dining area, kitchen and three bedrooms, among many other smaller projects and what they did looks great! Now all we need are about five more Gateway construction teams for next year...hint, hint.

Pro Soccer...Mexican Style

Today, Emma and I along with Moises and Daniel went to a soccer game in Mexico City. It was Cruz Azul http://www.cruz-azul.com.mx%20visiting/ visiting the UNAM Pumas http://www.pumasunam.com.mx/ (Emma's favorite team) at Estadio Olimpico Universitario. http://www.worldstadiums.com/stadium_pictures/north_america/mexico/central_mexico/mexico_city_olimpico.shtml .

UNAM stands for Universidad Autonoma de México. In Mexico's premier soccer league, the university teams play along with other pro teams. It was a very interesting experience. We took a series of buses and the subway to the stadium and what I saw when we arrived was more than I expected. As we exited the subway, we were frisked and had our bags checked by the police. We walked to the stadium where there were more a lot more police including mounted police, hundreds of riot police, three police helicopters hovering above, and scores of police cars, motorcycles and about a dozen prisoner buses. I wondered what I was doing taking my nine year old to this game. At the gate we presented our tickets and walked through a gauntlet of police 20 deep on each side where we were frisked by several of the police and had a metal detector scan us. We then quickly found our seats and then I was not sure if we were in a sporting facility or a Mexican prison. From our seats on the 18 yard line in the northwest part of the stadium, I saw riot police surrounding the entire field of this stadium that seats over 74,000 people. Between the police and us was a deep moat, a small metal fence with with knife points on the ends and then a taller chainlink fence. In an area reserved for the opposing teams fans was a chain link fence that kept them in and riot police surrounded that area, shoulder to shoulder.

Eventually, there was a game that took place and it was fairly good. Mexicans have a unique style of play that is very fast and exciting to watch. The fans were very boisterous, constantly cheering and yelling in unison favorite fight songs. However, when the home team scored, the boisterousness became collective stupidity. People threw items from the top tier onto the bottom tier, beer was flying everywhere and a few times I wondered if fights were going to break out. A couple times I put Emma in front of me to protect her from the debris. Moises did not like the atmosphere of this stadium and I have to agree. He says other stadiums and fans are lot more sophisticated. He and his family recently saw a game in Toluca (a smaller city an hour and a half drive from here) and said it had a much more family like atmosphere. As much as I liked to be watching a live soccer game for the first time in about 20 years after the NASL (North American Soccer League) folded, I think next time I'll go to one of the other stadiums and enjoy watching the game and not the side show. Oh yeah, Cruz Azul won 2-1.

Christian Character Day

Thursday, it was a half day at the girls' school. They had something called Christian Character Day. They would dress as their favorite Christian character, from the Bible or modern times, and parents and students would have to guess who they were. Emma was dressed as Ruth in the picture you see.

The other picture is of David Ruiz playing goalie in the playground area of the school. I thought it was a cool action shot. Thursday afternoon we were to get together with some other missionaries from the US and Canada to celebrate Thanksgiving. We though it would be a good compromise to celebrate the two thanksgivings halfway between the Canadian Thanksgiving at the begining of October and the US Thanksgiving at the end of November. Unfortunately, the daughter of our American friends turned quite ill and ended up in the hospital so just the Ruizs and ourselves celebrated together. Friday was report card day from the school, the day parents are surprised about exam marks they were not told about since the previous report card. All the girls are doing well, we are glad to report.

Cold Weather in Mexico

For the last few days we have been wondering what the down side of global warming is. Despite being 19* north latitude, we are 7,900 feet above sea level in a high mountain basin and it gets quite cold here at night. Two nights ago it was 2*C; that's about 36.5*F outside. What's worse is that our homes do not have central heating and they are made out of concrete so they can get quite cool. The other night it was 10*C or 50*F inside our house. I understand that this is unseasonably cool for Mexico City. Such temperatures do not usually arrive until December or January (that is something to look forward to). Fortunately, we found compressed fire logs for the fireplace at the Costco and the Ruizes lent us several blankets. The Ruizes will be taking us to a market that specializes in blankets this next Tuesday so we can find some warm coverings. The days warm up a bit but the air is noticably cool.
The good thing is that the cool has also supressed the smog a bit and for the last couple days, we have had a good view of the volcanoes. The top picture is of both Itza and Popo from our veranda. The next is of Itza, taken from near the retreat centre, and the last is of Popo letting off a little steam. Yes, that is snow on the mountains and that snow is there year round.

More Hockey...and a Bit of a Rough Day

By popular demand I have added some more hockey photos from the league here in Mexico City. The girls have their first tournament this weekend. We are starting to talk to more and more people at the rink every time we go. I hope that this can be a place of outreach for us. The girls did well at hockey today and they found out that this winter they will be flying to Monterrey and Leon for hockey tournaments. They were quite excited about that. The one picture is of my eldest daughter Brittany and it appears she will be playing Center. Don't let her cute looks fool you. She is a fast skater and is not afraid to fight for the puck. She also likes to wear her favorite team's jersey, the Edmonton Oilers.

As for the rough day, let me explain. This morning Ingrid and I went to FedEx to drop off a package to be sent to Canada. When we left the parking lot, we got stopped at a traffic light. Then we heard the screeching of tires and a huge crash. I turned to look and I (Marcel) witnessed a semi trailer truck run over a motorcyclist. What is worse was that it was a motorcycle cop with the Tlalnepantla Transit Police. He did not move for quite a while and then he started to make small movements and took off his helmet. It was clear he was in an incredible amount of pain. With in two minutes a beat cop ran to the scene and shortly there after other police cars arrived. I had been a volunteer fire fighter in The County of Leduc, Alberta many moons ago and had seen many horrific crashes but for some reason, this was quite shocking. I would be very surprised if he lives after what I saw. All we could do is pray for the poor man and for the driver of the rig. It was a stark reminder of the frailty of the human condition. Yet even in the midst of situations as this, there is hope when we suffer if we are in Christ. It is the reason that we are here in Mexico City; that we may speak of the eternal hope that is in us, the faith we have in the person and works of Jesus Christ.

That's a Big Jesus

This gigantic statue of Jesus is on a mountainside in the north of Mexico City. As big as the statue is, we can't see it from our house because of two other mountains. This statue of Jesus overlooks a cemetary. Only one block away, we noticed stand after stand of flower vendors. Then we remembered: we are one block away from a large cemetary! How's that for convenience?

(There was also a tombstone stand and, of course, a little taco stand in case you felt hungry while shopping.)

Double click any picture that you'd like to have a larger view of. Click "back" when you are finished to return to our blog.

Talking in Spanish

Spanish is a beautiful language and it is one of the more easy languages for English speakers to grasp. We're really glad we were not called to learn Arabic or some tonal tribal dialect found only in the remote jungles of New Guinea. Language is difficult acquire the older one gets but it is not impossible. Everyday we learn new words and sentence constructions. Fortunately, Mexicans are a very patient people and when they know you are struggling with the language, they are eager to help you. They do love the fact that other people want to learn their language. Several people in the church have made it a weekly exercise to help us with the language, including Henaro pictured above, by just conversing with us in very easy basic sentences. It's a big help. The problem is we could really use a couple of people near our home in Atizapan to spend a few hours with us every week to just talk and correct our sentences.

Iglesia Biblica Cristo Vive (Christ Lives Bible Church) Celebrates 11 Years

Today was a special day for the Iglesia Biblica Cristo Vive in Ecatepec (NE suburb of Mexico City); it was their 11th anniversary! Moises Ruiz gave a history of the church and various people gave heartfelt testimonies of how Christ changed their lives through the ministries of this church. The youth sang a special song (a medley including "These Are the Days of Elijah" in Spanish) and Angel, a man who is one of the founding members of the church, preached. We enjoyed many varieties of tacos for lunch following the service. Then a giant Tres Leches Cake (3 Milks) was cut by the children, symbolizing the growth of the church. The kids just "happened" to be lingering all around the cake :)

Being the newbie missionaries to the North American Baptist's Mexico field, we especially enjoyed hearing the history of the church. They began with VBS, then started an AWANA program, and then women's ministries. They moved from meeting at homes, to a rental space, and then when that location was full to capacity, the idea was thrown out there that a building of their own would be wonderful. Over and over, the glory was given to God for the wonderful things He has done.

An Expensive Day

Yesterday, was one of those awful traffic days in our area of Mexico City. The night before we had a tremendous rain storm which caused some flooding and knocked out the power. None the less, we had to go through the rain soaked streets to pay our phone bill and pick up our kids and the Ruiz kids from school. Because of the rain and power problems that affected the traffic lights, a one hour trip took two hours! While we were driving to the Telmex building, a very kind man, stuck with us in the traffic, told us that our tire on our truck was damaged. Sure enough, a close inspection revealed it had a huge gash on the side wall. We were quite worried that we would not be able to make it to pick up all the kids from school. Fortunately, we were able to make it and then we drove to the tire repair place. The tire was beyond repair. We had to by a new tire and wait two hours until our vehicle was ready. Fortunately, there was a Starbucks across the street so we could wait out our time while we pushed back frappuccinos and read some books. I don't know what was more expensive, Starbucks or the tires? The pictures above are of the Starbucks near our home in the Arboledas district of Atizapan and of Brittany reading yet another mystery novel and Emma getting wired on caffeine. Otherwise, things have been rather slow lately. Marcel is still fighting a nasty cold that seems to be going into his chest and today, being Saturday, is the day the girls need to clean the house. We are also waiting for the gas truck to arrive to fill our propane tank so we can cook and have hot showers. Tomorrow is Sunday and it is a very special day. It is the 11th anniversary of the founding of Christ Lives Bible Church in Ecatepec. Happy B-Day CLBC!!!

Ride at Your Own Risk

Sorry about not blogging for the last couple of days. Marcel has been quite under the weather with a cold and we have been driving kids to the dentist and other things lately.

Mexico City is huge. Hence, there is a huge problem with vehicles. There are 30 million people and it seems like every one of them owns a car. Traffic is really crazy and despite the fact that there is one day a week when each car is not permitted to drive, depending on the last number of the licence plate, traffic is still nuts! Yesterday, we drove Brittany and some classmates to a different private school nearby to take a PSAT exam for college (our baby is getting big). The school was only 20 km (12 miles) from our house. It took an hour and twenty minutes to get there on the freeway! On Tuesdays when we can't drive, and on Saturdays when everybody can drive and the traffic is really bad, we like to take the bus and the subway somewhere. The problem is, if you take the bus, your life is at risk.

These drivers are crazy! They are really aggresive and consumed with driving fast. They cut off everyone. The drivers, instead of having a names like Miguel and Ramon, ought to have a name like Bubba or Billy-Bob because they ought to be driving NASCAR! Note the picture: headlight missing. Inside, the upholstery is a little tattered but the bus is packed full of people. When it's rush hour, people "stand" on the steps, holding on to the exterior handle that you hold when getting on. Their toes are on the step but the rest of their body is outside of the bus.

All buses become equipped with personalized Virgin Guadalupe pictures, rosaries, sometimes some little framed pictures of the kids, or some pornography. Every bus, no matter how decrepit, has a fancy gear shift knob. Some look like snow globes and others, sculptured metal like a skull. It's about 40 cents to ride (one way) just about anywhere and the subway is even cheaper -- 20 cents. On the inside of the windshield, destinations are posted with neon colored lettering.

In general, all drivers here are very aware of the dimensions of their vehicles. Often, a third lane is "created" were there are officially, only two. People continue forward while other cars are switching lanes. This results in various cars at 45 degree angles. Everyone drives in the direction that they want until they just can't move forward any further. It's amazing that more side mirrors aren't missing as they swoosh by at good speeds. We are learning that there is a system to this apparent chaos and there are, surprisingly, very few accidents. When we see someone sneaking towards us in the wrong direction on a one way street in order to get to another side street without having to drive all the way around two blocks, we look at each other and say, "Expect the unexpected." If a car can fit somewhere, someone may try driving there. Sometimes, you realize that some wacky manoever was an avoidance of a monster pothole and then the wild swerve makes sense. If everyone politely waited to obey all the traffic laws, grid lock would develop. Again, it's not what we are used to, but it works.

Another Day, Another Constitution Meeting

For the most part, when we are doing mission work, it is often more office oriented: writing support letters, updating the blog, communicating with kids that have been here on missions trips through Facebook.com. We are also helping at the retreat centre and helping with the leaders at Christ Lives Bible Church to develop their constitution. With time as we enter the community and the church becomes independent of missionary support, we will be able to task ourselves with our real goal of church planting. This last week the Ruizes and ourselves met with Gregorio from Central America Mission to better understand the geographical area where we want to plant and the challenges that await us. It was very exciting to hear of the possibilities that await us, too. Atizapan is a suburb of Mexico City and is thought to have a population of around 2 million people. There is a large community of poor and wealthy here and planting churches in this kind of community will be difficult. We are already meeting people from the community at the ice rink, when we buy our groceries and just by doing other daily activities. People are interested in talking to us because we are different and Mexicans really like Canadians. Some people just want to practice their English with us and we want to practice Spanish with them. We just learned that one of our girl's hockey coaches is a Christan as well and we briefly talked about maybe doing a hockey camp next summer as an outreach. Believe it or not, there are a lot of hockey players in this city and many of them go to summer hockey camp in the US, Canada and Europe. We'll see what God has in store for outreach.

Native Ritualism

As in Canada and the US, there is a movement underway get native peoples to reconnect with their pagan pasts. This seems to come largely come from academics and politicians that are antithetical to modern missionary efforts and want to redress the missionary efforts from the past. Sadly, the Catholic church has been largely silent and it is well known here that as long as one is baptized Catholic, one may participate in whatever other religious form(s) one desires. Some literature that we have read here in Mexico have been scathing towards missionary activities despite the incredible social benefits that have arrived as a result of missionary activity. One can see rituals such as the cleansing ritual in the above picture performed daily at the Zocolo right in front of the Metropolitan Cathedral, the largest colonial cathedral in the Americas. Please don't misunderstand me: I love all the different cultures found in the world. I love watching the native dance and the brightly colored costumes and I appreciate the fact that God made these cultures and sent His Son to redeem people, not from these cultures, but inside of these cultures. I feel privileged to be called to be apart of a divine program called The Great Commission where people from , "...every nation, from all tribes, and peoples and languages stand(ing) before before the throne and before the Lamb (Jesus)..."(Rev. 7:9 ESV) To turn back the clock and embrace paganism would be a horrible disaster for everybody, but for women and children in particular. As much as the Spanish conquest was unduly harsh on the native peoples of Mexico, it was a far cry better than was taking place before they arrived. Mel Gibson's acclaimed movie Apocalypto addresses this issue in some fashion. I don't recommend the movie to everyone because of the language at times and the bloody violence but one can get a taste, if not a bitter taste, of what life was like before the Spaniards arrived.

Casa de Azulejos

The colonial mansion that you see here is of the Casa de Azulejos or House of Tiles. It is one of the more popular places for Mexicans and tourists to visit. It is a Sanbourn's restaurant and store near the Zocolo (City Centre) and Marcel and I, along with Ahava had lunch here today. We have taken groups from Hamilton and Cleveland here this past summer and now we wanted to go for ourselves without a large crowd. The waitresses dress in traditional Mexican costumes and the interior of the building is a large courtyard area typical of rich estate homes. A large mural by a famous Mexican muralist, Jose Clemente Orozco, adorns the stairwell wall. Before you think we spent too much money here on food, let me say the prices are very reasonable; the three of us ate for just over $20.

What is really neat about this place is the history. The building was originally made in the 16th century (1596) as the residence of the Counts of Orizaba. The exterior tiles were added during the 18th century. The tiles are from the State of Puebla and are blue Talavera tiles. A story exists that this building was tiled on the outside out of spite. The owner's father had told his son that he would "...never live in a house of tiles", expressing the idea that the son would never amount to anything. From 1891 to 1914, the building was an exclusive Jockey Club. Then during the Revolution, the Zapatista army occupied the building. Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata did eat here and there is a famous photograph that is still a popular item today. In 1919, Americans Walter and Frank Sanborn turned the building into a soda fountain and the Sanborns chain had begun.

We're taking suggestions for a caption...

(By the way, this is a jaguar - a common figure in ancient Mexican imagery. Double click the picture if you'd like a closer look.)

A day at the zoo

Yesterday, being Saturday, we thought it would be good to go as a family to the Mexico City Zoo. The Zoo is in Bosque de Chapultepec (Literally "Forest of Grasshopper"), an urban park in a very beautiful area of the city. The zoo is free to enter but special exhibits might have a fee, such as the venomous snake display. The zoo is very professionally run, clean and huge. In the five hours that we spent there, we did not see everything. We found that some of the displays made it difficult to see the animals. Either way, we did see a lot and we feel we will have to make a second visit soon. One of the highlights was seeing the pandas. I think that was the first time any of us had ever seen the animal in real life. Well, we are off to church now. Ahava has a fever so Ingrid might stay home with the little one. Adios!

Church constitution business in the dark

Last night Moises and Marcel had a leadership committe meeting for the purpose of preparing the leaders on the rational and look of a church constitution. They were very receptive to the idea and they know that it is one of the final steps needed before the church is handed over from the mission leadership to the national leaders. The constitution should take several months of hard work ahead of us but it will prove to be a good experience. Near the end of our meeting, the power went out and it became a meeting by candle light.

This shirt deserves an explanation

This shirt deserves an explanation. I'm sure you all notice the word on the front of Ahava's jersey. It says Bimbo. The word bimbo in Canada, and I think in the United States, is a descriptive of a girl that is not very bright. So why get our daughter to wear a shirt with that word? After all, she is a very bright girl. Bimbo in Mexico is the name of a very large bread company and they sponsor several professional soccer teams including the Club America (a team from Mexico City), the jersey that Ahava is wearing. Mexican soccer jerseys are a very popular item of purchase when mission teams visit from the US and Canada because they are really cool looking. Ironically, the girls like to buy the ones that say Bimbo on the front.

The riches of the ancients

There is poverty in Mexico and I'm sure that comes as no surprise to anyone. Some days as we drive to church, we see areas of the city where people live in the most austere of conditions; cardboard and tin huts. What people don't realize is that Mexico is also a very rich country. I've heard it said that Mexico has among the highest amounts of wealthy people percapita in the world and that it has the largest silver reserves in the world. It also has a rich history and culture. This is evident when one visits the cultural centres in this city. So much has been well preserved for future generations to observe and study.

The first picture is of a game that was played by indigenous Mexican tribes that is similar to basketball called ollamalitzli (in reality Dr. James Naismith...a Canadian...did not invent basketball while serving at the YMCA in Springfield, Mass....it was the Olmec tribe). A rubber ball was thrown through the hoop and the losers of the game were beheaded. Over 600 of these sport courts have been found in Mexico.

The second photo is of sacrificing stone that is about waist high. The heart of a human was placed in the middle as part of the sacrifice ritual; note the trench where blood would run down. The ancients had it right in one sense. Sin does demand a human sacrifice but it was the once for all sacrifice of Jesus Christ (God Himself) that satisfied God's need to punish our sin. Sadly, so many Mexican natives had been forced to die because of beliefs that led to these human sacrifical practices. Jesus voluntarily went to be sacrificed on our behalf.

The third picture is a small glimpse of the wealth found in Mesoamerica. Gold was, and still is, very abundant, as is seen in this display of jewelry and gold bars.

Voladores

Outside the Anthropology museum in Chapultepec park are a group of men called Voladores (Flyers). This is an ancient ritual performed by the Nahua and Totonac tribes from the eastern Mexican state of Veracruz. Five men climb to the top of this very high pole (30 m or 100 ft). While the man at the top of the pole plays a drum and a read pipe, the other four fly to the ground, suspended by ropes. Each Volador decends circling around the pole 13 times before reaching the ground, making a total of 52 rotations. Some say this is to symbolize the 52 weeks in a years. Others say it's the 52 year cycles of the Mesoamerican calendar. The pole represents a vertical connection between the heavens above and the underworld below.

More artifacts from the museum

We took so many pictures at the museum that I will be able to do posts for many days in a row. I've been told by other missionaries that a missionary needs to understand a nation's past to understand the culture that it is today. That really struck us hard at the museum the other day. We were amazed at the similarities of Mexico's various pre-Spanish native cultures and today's culture. Though the Mexicans do not have blood thirsty rituals as in days past, ritualism is still very important and this can be seen in the many other religious practices today including sycretized Catholic and native worship forms.

The top picture is of Mictlantecuhtli, the god of death or the underworld. It was discovered in 1962 at the square in front of the Pyramid of the Sun at Teotiuacan. It was common belief in Mesoamerica that the Sun, when it set, stopped giving light to the world, but entered the world of the dead and passed through it to get to the east to light up the world again.

The second picture is of a necklace...made of hundreds of shells that were carved to resemble human teeth. Some real human teeth were used as well. This necklace was found at the Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent. Similar necklaces were apparently found at nearly all the burial sites at the Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent.

Aztec Calendar

Also known as The Sun Stone, the Aztec Calendar was a circular monolith that was used by the Mexica tribe as a sacred sacrifice stone. It is about 4 meters across or 12 feet and weighs 24 tons. The stone was discovered in 1790 in the Plaza Mayor (the Zocalo in downtown Mexico City) in what was at the time known by the name of the capital city, "New Spain". It has incorrectly been named the Aztec Calendar because of the names of days and other symbols on it. In fact, this was a gladiatorial sacrificing stone. Warriors would stage fights on the stone in what was called the Tlacaxipeuhualiztli ceremony (say that fast three times).

Allow me to explain the symbolism of this edifice from the inside out.

1. Emerging from the centre is the face of Xiuhtecuhtli who is coming from the earth hole. His tongue is in the shape of a sacrificial knife. He is surrounded by four suns (or ages) that precede a fifth sun, which is made up of his face, claws and rays. 2. There is then the circle of twenty days. 3. The circle with four directions of the universe and sun rays. 4. Feathers and ornaments probably related to sacrifice. 5. The final outer ring is of fiery serpents, the heads of which you see at the bottom.