La Importancia de Familia - The Importance of Family

Sundays are always a special day for me and when I am in El Paso, Sarah and I start our day at church and then try and take some time to visit or have lunch out with friends. We started this family "tradition" while we were living in Santa Fe and we would go and pick up Sarah's Mom and head to church together and have lunch out with family as well. It was something a bit different for me growing up, as in my house Sunday often meant (at least for my Dad) a chance to play 36 holes of golf and then catch up with a little of the same on TV. For me, it probably meant football and a big breakfast, but not really pushing to make a connection with friends and family before embarking on the week to come.

Here in Santiago, it seems that Sundays are also an important day for spending time with friends and family as well. For example, yesterday Sarah and I went to the home of our friends Juan and Taty (and were also joined by Taty's daughter, Tamara) for a traditional Sunday lunch (el almuerzo). Here in Chile, lunch is by far the biggest meal of the day and is served between 1-3 PM and is a great time to take an extended break and catch up with friends and colleagues. On Sunday (domingo), this is even more important and is often a time when families converge and share this meal and catch up in person. We had a wonderful lunch of artichokes, fish, beans, broccoli and salad, as well as fresh fruit for dessert. Yet, we also had time to connect and discuss as friends (like family - como familia) and to pause and enjoy the moment in a real and uninterrupted manner. We also had a short outing to see the statue of the Virgen which sits atop the National Park Mount Saint Christopher - El Parque Metropolitana Cerro San Cristobal. It was a breathtaking site to behold and offered awesome views of the whole of Santiago, which is an incredibly huge city.

Yet, although we have embarked on new ground here in Santiago, we are still able to connect to our own friends and family back home in the US. For example, we were able to "attend" church services at our local church (Calvary Chapel Sun City) in El Paso, by being connected to the Internet and listening to the pastor's sermon online. We did have to listen to last week's message and will be 1 week behind our congregation, but we are getting the message right in our home in Santiago. We also hope to visit local churches and share this time with friends here in Chile, as well as broaden our own cultural and spiritual understandings.

As well, for example, over the past 2 years, my brother, Gordon and I made a pact to talk once a week on Sundays and catch up on everything going on in each other's lives. We have kept to that diligently over the past 2 years and haven't missed a beat even with me being in Santiago. I have used Skype to call him over the phone each week to the tune of about 2 cents a minute. Sarah and I have also started video conferencing via Skype with her parents and we get to talk and see each other weekly, something we were unable to do in the recent past. Yesterday, we also got to see and talk with Sarah's sister Liz, who was visiting her parents for the week.

So, the opportunity to stay connected really seems to be being facilitated here in Santiago and the example of our friends who open up their homes time and time again is a practical example of the type of person I hope to be from here on out.