One of the memorable
days this month was going to see the Rector major Fr. Angel Fernandez in Santa
Cruz. Fr. Angel Fernandez is the 10th successor of St. John Bosco.
At our dining room table in San Carlos, we have a bulletin board where you can
always find a picture of him at a Salesian school somewhere around the world. He
is either at a school in India, at a festival in Africa, or elsewhere. So I was
pretty excited to know that he was doing a South America tour. He winded up
making a stop in Bolivia for a few days. One of the cities that he visited was
Santa Cruz, only two and half hours from where we live in Yapacani. Two sisters
from Yapacani organized a bus for a group of women to go to Santa Cruz so
Connor and I tagged along. We went to the Colegio Don Bosco in Santa Cruz. This
high school is huge, like colossal. The gym was packed with kids who
wanted to see him. There were a lot of dances during the assembly for the Rector
Major.
After the assembly,
Fr. Angel celebrated mass in the church connected to the school. The message he
kept stressing in the assembly and in his Homily was that we need to be
witnesses of Christ at all times. It was a wonderful message, we can wear the
clothes and rosary beads around our necks on the outside, but we truly need to
be Christians on the inside. Later on during mass I received Holy Communion from
St. John Bosco´s Successor… That last sentence sounds so cool btw. I was
thinking so many Salesian priests and brothers I know would have appreciated
that time with the Fr. Angel more than me. Therefore I felt so grateful and
thankful to God for giving me the gift to meet such a Holy and righteous Man of
God, especially to be in the presence of the one who has taken the place of St.
John Bosco.
 |
| At the end of the assembly, Fr. Angel was taking pictures with groups of kids. Connor and I waited for the very end to get a picture with him. |
| Ok this picture was taken from Google images when Pope Francis and Fr. Angel were in Rome. But I think it’s kind of cool to have shaken someone’s hand who shook the hand of Pope Francis. No? |
On our bus ride back
that night we stopped at a supermarket. Connor and I were so excited; we didn’t
think the day could get any better. Side note: we do not encounter supermarkets
too often. There was an American food section and we bought imported Tositos
chips, salsa, cheese sauce from the state of “Tejas”, and guacamole. I even got
to hold a bag of Fritos in my hands but I didn’t have enough money to buy them,
it was either the Tositos or the corn chips. Before we knew it Sister Dolores
came in to the supermarket attempting to pull us by the ears because everyone
was waiting for us on the bus.
On our way back to
Yapacani, passing Montero, we encountered a blockade of cars in Puerto Chuello
at around 10pm. Teachers at a nearby university were responsible for putting up
the blockade. Apparently they don’t like the new administrator at the school so
the teachers decided to block off the one main road between the two cities of
Montero and Cochabamba in order to get attention. (Bolivia needs more highways).(Bolivia
also needs bulldozers) The Bolivian women on our bus wanted to wait out the
blockade on our bus, but the two sisters invited anybody who wanted to go back
to Montero with them and sleep at a salesian kindergarten.(connections). Close
to midnight, Connor and I decided to go back to Montero with the two sisters.
So after 1 motorcycle ride, and 2 taxis later, we arrived at the school. The
school had mattresses and so we just slept in the kindergarten classroom. The
next morning the two sisters woke us up and told us that the blockade was open
for a small window of time and so that we should leave now. Also the kindergarteners
wanted their class back. Long story short we cruised back to Yapacani no
problem and Connor and I had our nachos that next day.
Often that is what my
life is like; a wall is just put in front of my camino when things are going
well. Things can be going smoothly; I’m feeling grateful and then all of a
sudden Bam! An outside force causes my plans to change. Gratefulness quickly
turns into impatience. However over time the thought that knocks on my mind has
been well things could always be worse.
Probably a more virtuous state of mind would be to remain in a state of gratitude. I
still need to pray for more grace to get to that point.
