in the world

Brianna was so thrilled that I was invited to a party being given by the mom of  her friend, Marena. That is because Brianna is a party girl! But, unfortunately, I am not. Nevertheless, I  baked mini-cinnamon rolls for the dessert that I was asked to bring, called the remise, arrived 45 minutes late because that’s what they do here, put on a happy face and entered the house.

Marena’s mom is Brazilian so many of the women were speaking in Portuguese, which shattered my confidence at first. I was truly hoping that I could understand some of what was going on. I turned to someone next to me and said, “Please tell me that they are not speaking Spanish!” If you could imagine a modern day Tower of Babel, this was it. In actual fact, there were very few English speakers, although almost everyone knows enough English to say hello, followed by the traditional Argentine kiss.

There were three tables of us, so about 50 people.  I learned about the husbands that are diplomats and those that watch over the Proctor and Gamble, Colgate, Ford,  Bosch  and various other enterprises here in Argentina. Of course, we shared information about our families and pretty much everyone had 1 or 2 children.

I soon became aware of my distinctness. The first surprise--that I have 4 children! the second surprise-- they are all girls! the third surprise -- 3 of them are married! the fourth surprise --I have 10 grandchildren! (I might as well have said that I have 100 grandchildren because the shock value would have been the same. LOL) The final and ultimate surprise--we aren’t here for business, but as missionaries for our church.

Truly, everyone couldn’t have been nicer. There was lots of food (traditional Brazilian and a gazillion desserts), picture taking, music and even some dancing. Yes, I ate and no, I did not dance. In the end, I stayed three hours before I did the rounds…kissing everyone goodbye, of course!

 This is Lara’s mom. Next to mine, her story was the most unusual. She is a single mom with one daughter. She a business executive for a worldwide automotive parts supplier. They are from Germany and have lived all over the world. I think that she speaks 6 languages, but she claimed that she is only fluent in 3. English was certainly one of them. They will finish three years in Argentina in November and probably be sent elsewhere.