Intense.

Well, today was pretty intense. It didn't start out that way but it became increasingly so.

This morning, Giacomo spoke to us again. We talked about Luke 2:52: And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men. We discussed what Jesus did to grow physically, mentally, spiritually and socially, and thought about what we are doing to grow in the same ways and how we need to be sure that we have a balance between the four things because we are the window non-christians view christianity through.

After lunch (hot wings, potato salad, salad), the MA staff split up and some went out back and pulled weeds. Others helped with some cleaning, packed up extra bedding, and inventoried the mattresses in the rooms. Alex, Adam and I were the lucky people that got to put together two bunkbeds for one of the apartments. And believe me, it wasn't as easy as it would appear to be. The first bed went up without too much difficulty, but the second one, a metal frame, was a booger. One of the essential parts didn't fit- it belonged to a different bed. We had to improvise. It turned out ok. I think I probably made at least 10 trips between the apartment and the base- I was the gopher... Let me just say that I got really sweaty this afternoon.

After supper (chicken in some sort of sauce, rice, salad), we had a "community meeting". Basically all of the base staff met in the worship hall and had a time of worship. Then a guy from San Diego? spoke about injustice. That is when it started to get intense.

We were told to split up into groups of five (in my group was Alex, Adam, Libby, and Beth), then we took turns going to three stations. ***These stations were rather graphic, so faint of heart should just skip to the bottom, don't worry though, I am giving the G version. ^^^Also, this was all rehearsed, none of it was real, so don't take it the wrong way.

For the first station, we went to the stairs. That was the water station. Basically, it went like this: There are so so so many people that die from lack of clean drinking water. Some women in Africa walk 6 miles a day for water that really doesn't pass as drinkable. Then Beth and I had to carry four large containers of "nasty water" up two flights of stairs while everyone else followed behind counting to three(every three seconds someone dies from a water related illness). Once we got to the top, we each had to drink a cup of the bad water. It was really bad, indescribably so. Then we helped carry the containers back down, and it was off to the next station.

The second station was really disturbing in the fact that it depicted an injustice that happens everywhere in disgustingly large quantities, but is not really talked about much: Forced Prostitution. In this station, we were left standing in an area, near one of the YWAM 14-pass vans. Then a guy approached us(it was Josh, full time staff, but he was in character so...). He asked what we were up to-just making normal conversation- then he pulled us over to the van and opened the back doors. Inside was a scantily clad (only wrapped in a bedsheet) female. The guy told us that we could "have" her for $10. He "slapped" her around a bit and yelled to wake her up. (At this point, I was absolutely disgusted. We all were. I mean, I know that there is prostitution and stuff but I have never seen it up close and personal like it was tonight.) When we firmly said NO he yelled at us to get out of there. That was the end of the second station.

The third station was by far the most intense. After it was done, my heart didn't slow down for a really long time. In this station, we were brought into the staff computer room. It was dark and nothing was happening, then there was a gunshot, and another. Then two masked men (JP and Mitch- both full time staff) burst in with guns (either fake or not loaded) and yelled at everyone to get down. Then they put sacks over everyone's heads and led us to another room. There, we could hear a female (Lindsey-full time staff and quite the actress) wailing and screaming and crying. There was more gunshots and someone yelled at the girl to shutup. Then one of the men grabbed Beth and dragged her over to the girl and forced a gun into her hand and told her to shoot the girl(remember: FAKE GUN). Beth, having the guts that she does, yelled NO and refused to do it. The guy then grabbed the gun from her and pulled the trigger. Silence. They made us remove the bags and look at what had been done, then they yelled at us to get out of there. That was the end of the third station.

Afterwards, many of us were visibly shaken, others were shaken just not as visibly. I can't even begin to imagine what any of those situations would be like if they actually were real. Even as I am sitting here writing this, I still am not quite sure what my reaction is. I know that I am mad(that the world is this corrupt) and disgusted(that there is actually a market for prostitution) and sad(that all of us are so oblivious to all this tragedy) and horrified(that people actually go through this and worse) and confused(on how I can make a difference). I think there is more but that is all I am able to distinguish right now.

I don't know what we can do to change this but I do know that we can pray, and that is really all that we can do for some of the injustices in the world. As disturbed as I was, I really think that these stations were very good at scaring us out of our apathy and passiveness.

On a lighter note, the police force in Mexico is quite decent. In the midst of the night and stations, they showed up because they heard all the screaming and gunshots(actually firecrackers (; ). Once we explained what we were doing, they were ok and left. All in all, tonight was pretty epic.

Megan, the last person to arrive, should be arriving soon so I am going to go. Besides, I think I have written enough. Buenos Noches! Abi