MARCH 29 "Shoulda gone Left"

Despite the ridiculous wind in Abilene when we took off, our flight to Dallas was relatively smooth (for that flight, anyway). The only time the flight got scary was right before we began our decent the pilot got on the P.A. to let us know that it might be really bumpy on the way into Dallas. As he's making his announcement, an imminent bad-tv-movie-style alarm beings beeping ominously behind him. He seemed concerned as he started to converse with his co-pilot as he got off the P.A. Despite the alarm and pilot warning, the flight was good and not too bumpy at all.

Dallas to Miami was pretty uneventful, though Abilene Regional is Buckingham Palace compared to Miami Intl. The gate area was lined every few feet with yellow trash-cans marked "NO TRASH" collecting all the leaks from the ceiling. Did I mention it wasn't raining? But the ceiling was still leaking.

We boarded a 777 bound for Buenos Aires at about 10pm Texas time. The flight was smooth and I was lucky enough to have an empty seat next to me. The lady just on the other side of that seat kept waving her daughter from farther back in the plane to come sit by her, but I had a plan. Every time I heard her walking up or caught her reflection in the in-seat monitor (I watched "Yes-Man"...good flick), I would close my eyes, hang my mouth open a little bit and breathe loud. Ya know, the old "sleeping passenger" trick. It worked every time and I got to have an empty seat to lean on when I finally got tired enough to sleep. After catching about 3 hours of sleep, some moron in the row by the window realized it was light outside and flipped up both of his window shades. The cabin went from a nice pitch-black to noonday sun. Not cool. That was the end of my sleep.

My adventure began soon after landing in Buenos Aires. We had a connecting flight to Montevideo, and thank goodness it was a 2 hour layover. As I exited the plane you I a choice to go left, or right. However there were no signs that I could see, so I followed the flow of traffic to the right. Not too long after that I saw the photographer, Ronnie Ruiz, coming my way so I figured I was on the right track. We got downstairs to Immagration and began the tedious caddle-herding back and forth through the ropes until we got up to the window. We never did see Scott Kilmer or Stephen Shumaker (the other half of our party) but we figured they must have gone a different way. Turns out, we weren't supposed to go through Immigration yet. After getting turned away from several helpful airport employees who flat out said "no" when I asked for help, we finally found our way back to the gate where our next flight was boarding. The only problem was, we had been admitted into the country of Argentina. So we had to pay a $8 exit fee to get back out! That's right. Ronnie and I visited Argentina for a grand total of 3 minutes and have the entrance/exit stamps in our passports to prove it!

Soon after we got to the gate we found Kilmer and Shumaker and had a good laugh of it. Then the 12 people going to Montevideo (it's a 30-minute, dallas to Abilene type trip), boarded the huge 767. That's right. The same plane I flew to Europe on was being used to transport a handfull of people 150 miles to Montevideo. I can't complain though. I had an entire row to stretch out.

After landing in Montevideo we were greated by Wimon and Rosalinda Walker who drove us straight to the Feria. The Feria is an outdoor market, similar to what I filmed in Spain, that only happens on Sunday. Lots of tables of fresh produce, clothing, pirated DVDs, and random crap. One table was even selling dental equipment! We met up with Shelly and Nathan Sanders and 3 students and filmed them shopping and talking to locals for an hour or so before meeting up at a restaurant to eat lunch. Great food. I had some kind of sandwich called a "chivo" something or other. It was just a cut of steak, egg, tomato, and lettuce on a bun, but it was great.

After a quick shower and unpack at the hotel, we headed off to Casa ACU to meet up with the students. It is a huge building that used to be a coffee processing factory. It butts right up to a church that the program seems to be able to utilize whenever necessary.

Immediately we met up with some folks on the roof cooking our amazing dinner and slowly but surely the students came up and introduced themselves. Let me say that my Spanish is NOWHERE near where I thought it was!

Dinner consisted of Steak, Chorizo, Ribs, Chicken, Bread & Salad with no dressing
and Dolce de Leche Ice Cream. Yes, I ate all of that. They don't take too kindly if you turn down food! It was definitely a memorable meal.

After dinner we returned to the rooftop for a devo. My camera light died so the McGuiver in me had the brilliant idea to open up a blank page in Microsoft Word and use the laptop as ambient light. It worked! Yet another use for Office! It was an amazing experience singing praises to the Lord in both English and Spanish on a rooftop overlooking Montevideo. There was a party going on a few rooftops over and they weren't much of a distraction due to the amazing praises being sung.

I can't wait for tomorrow.

Oh yea, I have no internt in the hotel (refuse to pay $6/hour) so I'll update as I can from the Casa ACU. I'll try to get some videos up each day.

Here's a summary of what I shot on Day 1.