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As a few of us girls pose in front of a turquoise house for our male teammates to take an artistic picture of us, a truck driver pauses in the middle of the street, laughs and then drives away: this is Magdalena, Guatemala. Houses come in bright colors, people come with smiles and hellos, and mountains come in dark green everywhere you look. Across the cobblestone street from "Pizza Rica" is my host home, and by staying there I've already learned what it means to be a servant, which is what I asked God for on this trip.
When I played with my host siblings Gabriella and Carlos last night and washed the dishes for Marta this morning, I was motivated by my task-oriented mentality. If I do these things with them and for them, I am being a servant. In Guatemala, the philosophy is relationships first, tasks later. I have been both challenged and changed by this mindset. What I do for someone means nothing if I am not first serving his or her heart and mind.
As I begin serving the kids of Magdalena tomorrow at the Creative Arts site for Students International, I now realize it doesn't matter that I won't be able to give them a lot of advice on their paintings; what matters is that I love them and encourage them no matter what we do.