This is great seeing people it's really helping me think through my brain

So i've been chatting it up with a bunch of people state side. They have asked me about random stuff that I hadn't really thought about on the plane. It's really been great and I can't wait see you all. my mom wanted everyone to know that i have had a great time seeing her and being home. Love ya ma.

But I think one of the biggest break through today was talking to one person and then talking with the big man up stairs. It just so happens that one of the books I read was talking about the importance of prayer. yada yada he said you should carve out 5 minutes every day. no more, no less, just make sure you do it every day and at the same time same place. So I set my time today and it just so happened that "we" had a good chat.

I asked him why I felt so close to him in mexico and why I felt so close to him in many other big adventures in my life. So when tried doing argentina, Why did it feel different? There were many times in the that trip where I kinda felt "fafa" alone. I know I wasn't alone he was deffinately with me the whole time and actually with me for eternity. So as I was having a this conversation out loud in my bed room. I realized that times when I feel close to God are when I persue him with a passion. Maybe I'm on a mission trip or life is really hard and I had to rely on him or than ever. But in those times when I take a big adventure it's much easier to persue and feel him. When you go state side you can pursue with crazy intensity but you may have that feeling of distance, like he is just out of reach. That is where a little faith comes into play and we cement ourselves in for a battle and the lord comes through in the end.

FEELING GOD AT TIMES

*Before Mexico hard but do able
*During Mexico it was easy pizzi
*Right after mexico still easy
*2 years after a little bit difficult at time
*In Argentina it was a time a battle to feel like i was getting more than 20 minutes of good being next to God. (deffinately times where I just kinda let myselt rest without him instead of resting in him) after all i was on vacation too, i wanted to rest. The worlds yoke just appeared litter and the yoke I
was pulling for him. Sad excuse, everytime I shop around for the worlds rest I find it to be less than satisfying. Resting in my heavenly fathers arms is 10000% better than the worlds form or R&R.

Why did I have to battle so much to find and be close to God. Even though I feel like I was down there for the right reason and want to go down to get closer to him and not have any distraction of work or friends. It doesn't matter if I'm workng 40 hours a week farming or 40 hours on the mission field. Being close to Jesus is a battle in a busy world, and Argentina was plenty busy. Mexico is busy, just at a different speed. the US is busy, and hangs out with his friend Busier on the weekends. We need to slow down sometimes. and fight for some special God time. I wish I could say we can do it at full speed and it will be great but I'm thinking God time is spent best at God speed. Even if he still feels distant, persueing him will a furvent energy proves that you believe he will have a lasting impact on your life even if you can't feel like it's happening. God has a funny way of teaching, I don't think Job felt like he was learning much in his troubles, Or David when he was hiding in caves writing all those psalms. Some stuff will pop up on God time, not on our time. Cuz honestly i didn't feel like I learned anything big or life altering while I was in Argentina. There was some stuff that I forced out of me but nothing hugely impactful. That is why I did'nt write to many spiritual blogs. But now that I am home I'm am having that little mole hill of lessons turning into a Mount Everest of rock your socks of life changes.

So i will just keep the dialog going about argentina until god has finishing teaching me everything.

Scott

Last post coming tonight

I'm going to try and put like last thaughts on my blog tonight. So if I don't talk to you right away you will atleast be able to catch a glimpse of my trip.

Scott

Hope you haven´t taken away my new favorite part of Oregon since I´ve been gone.

Seriously you don´t realize how much you enjoy fresh oregon green air until your live on two main drags that have crap for air restrictions on cars and motorbikes. Salta, Argentina wasn´t to bad cuz i lived in nice area and off the main drag. Actually i lived acrossed from a school so they didn´t have cars driving by all hours of the day because there was nothing there for a large portion of the day. San Nicholas had crap air. Buenos Aires has crap air like LA. Seriously it´s bad.

This is how I know I can´t wait to get back to oregon even though i just saw the weather forcast and i´m not looking forward to having my thinned out blood shocking to the temperatures. I can count my blessing concidering it won´t be as bad as when i came back from mexico. When I was in San Nicholas i started to get to scratchy throat about a week into it. Then when I was in Salta my throat was fine and I actually went to the gym 2 times and it felt good to breath deep and not choke. Now i´m in BA and i thought i would go to the gym down at the bottom of the plaza but i´m afraid i´ll just hurt my throat more if i try to breath deep. cuz my scratchy throat is back and now i´m not excited to get on a plane for the next 16 hours.

pa pa

scott

love ya all

So i forgot when I was at the internet place here in buenos aires that I still had to keep up my blog. I was here like 3 or 4 times yesterday getting activities and addresses. So here is a quick shopping list of what I have done in buenos aires since i have arrived in this big big city.

< i arrived at the bus terminal and then took a taxi to my hotel= i was way over charge for the taxi and the guy totally knew he played me but i don´t really care i made it to my hotel. What goes around come around

< did another study out of my max lacado book. Real good book, wow

< Explored the 2 main drags that interected very close to the hotel. Av. de Julio is one of them and is actually one of the wides streets in the world. 1 street equals 22 lanes, Ya it´s really big and if I wanted to run across it I could make it in one seccion of pedestian walking. but it ussually takes me to because I like to walk with caution because cars have right of way not pedestrians.

< While i was exploring i walk past a theater and saw they had a show. it wasn´t to late it started at 8. It was an opera which was a new experience and it was weird but still entertaining, for the first half atleast. i don´t remember what happened in the show after intermission because i was falling asleep in my wooden upper deck seat. i guess i was more tired than i felt when i bought the ticket.


< went to the tango shoe place that my teacher in San Nicholas suggested. I got some new shoes and I really like them. it was great every guy shoe in the place was 300 peso. like 75 US Very nice especially since i didn´t even have to get a cab or ride the subway. My hotel is 1 block up and 6 blocks over, what luck i have cuz i didn´t feel like getting hose again with a taxi.

< walked around explored the back streets and found a delicious bread shop. Saddly i can´t remember where it is now so i´m still kinda hungry, today. while walking i figured out where i was going to go for dinner

< i ate a pizza then went to a place i sellected for dessert. they didn´t have the delicious argentine desserts i was hoping for but I was actually there for the show more than the food. they had a tango quartet playing that night and since i had bought shoes i thought it would be fitting. i didn´t dance partially because i shoed up in tennis shoes and partially because they tucked the single guy in the corner away from the 4 or 6 people that did have a little floor space to dance. it was still great. 10:00 to 1:00 may have been a little long i got a late start this morning.

< this morning i got up and was determined to find my fancy bread shop. but gave up when i realized that everything was closed still. apparently they city doesn´t start moving again until 11:30 sunday morning. cuz the town was still hopping at 1:00 and i was going to bed.

< now i´m going to go to the zoo. i´m going to need to ride the subway. i really don´t like riding subway but i think after looking at the subway map for 3 days i understand it. everyone has told me it´s one of the best way to move about the city and that it is a very good train. but that is still yet to be seen because i´m nervous to go into the hole.

other than that i don´t know what to tell you. . . . Hiedi was right this town is filthy. she told me when she came here the city was dirty. i have seen dirty before i work on a farm but this is a different dirty. the city has people walking around sweeping scrap paper and cigarette buds and garbage into little buckets. but it doesn´t really matter because every night a homeless man will walk around an stick 6 to 15 call girl stickers on every post, phone, sign, maybe even a slow moving stray dog. That is one thing i will not miss when i leave tomorrow. i don´t really enjoy the little call girl tornados that swirl up in the wind. Because they are yanked off thrown of the ground the next day by people wanting to lean on poles and make calls on pay phones. Other than that it´s still a dirty town.

I think salta is still winning in the nice quiet a tourist town cuz i could have stayed there for another month. i think i will be stuffed and had enough buenos aires at around 6:00 monday afternoon. hope all is well stated side, have a nice day in the cold cuz i haven´t had a night get colder than 50 and the average as temperatures have been 87 with 50 humidity. That one day of rain was kinda a bummer cuz i lost my phone that day but i can´t complain about the weath

sorry i didn´t proof read this blog i hate paying for the internet by the minute

Last day of class

Last dance class today when I get back from class I will try to have a couple pictures to put up and let you know about all the stuff I have learn about tango in the last 4 days. I have the pictures of my last dance class but you will have to wait to see them. It was super fun and I can't wait to dance with Emily, Sammy, Christy, and Judy. I took some video so we can practice all my new moves. After class I hung out with my teachers and drank mate(green Tea). Some random guy that is part of the art show that is going all month grabbed his guitar and played some traditional folk music. My teachers actually do folk dance so they grabbed some little clothes and did a quick show for me and a couple people that had walked in earlier. It was a fun like hang out time, so glad I stayed in town instead of trying to find a teacher in Buenos Aires. But this way I got to meet some nice people and navigate a town I know much better than the hustle and bustle of BA. And I got to hang out with the kids at the hogar for an extra 5 days.

I want to tell you about my experience at the local butcher. It's called EL LOCO. I bet you can't wait to know why. So usually I tend the car so that Tom can double park and run around town. But Yesterday we went to a different butcher outside of the busy part of town so we parked and walked in. We did the common "What is you Name / Where are you from?". I was wearing my English Flag T-shirt so all the people thought I was representing my home country. So we had to straighten that information out. Not surprisingly it turned into a the hot joke with the 4 people behind the butcher tables. Ask the conversation developed I started to relax. Then I knocked over a stack of crackers but only one actually fell off the counter. But everyone jokingly blew up and raise quick a rumble even though 3 other customers had walked in as well. Here is where the story gets funny. One of the butchers in the back area was half way paying attention to all the excitement when the light bulb popped on. As I watched him ponder off into the sky, he laid down his knife wiped his hands very quickly and walked over to one of the other product shelfs. He reached up to the top and grabbed a roll of TP. Joyfully and proudly walked up between tom and I to proclaim. "SCOTT = Papel hegenico." "Your Name is here," " The toilet paper his you name". Everyone laughed with such joy I decided to join in the fun.

This is not the first time my name has been assotiated with TP. Tom has made this a common topic when introducing me to people. And for the tv commercials down here Scott Toilet paper has a little jingled for all the little kids to learn. "Scott, es su buen amigo" Kinda like a Tom Shane or Lief's Auto collision center. Extremely catchy. So I rattled the jingle of and everyone had a good laugh in the butcher shop. What a day it was.

Scott Ekstrom

So I have lost my Wing Man

Yesterday when I was gong to my dance class here in San Nicholas I made a critical error. It was a wet day and one of the guys at the hogar needed a car to run to his jobs around town. As a result we were short a car anyways because we took the other car to the body shop earlier in the morning. I suggested I just take a taxi to my class because it was just a 20 or 25 blocks down the road. Yesterday was the first day of rain so a taxi seemed like the best idea. But apparently everyone else had the same idea to ride a taxi that day. SO the time table to get a taxi was late. So I was sitting in the kitchen playing words with friends waiting for the taxi to show up 25 minutes after we had called for one. VERY BUSY DAY. When he showed up I grabbed my backpack and hopped into the taxi. I told the driver where I needed to go and we were off. 2 or 3 minutes into the trip I felt like I was missing something. Where is my Iphone. In the rush I must have left in on the counter, no problem. but to be safe I did my standard, back pocket front pocket sweatshirt pad down. Empty empty empty. Only my wallets was to be found. After I had made it to my location I had decided the phone was at home. Which later on I would find out it was not. So I grabbed my back pack hopped out of the taxi and went to my class.

Needless to say here I am sending messages through words with friends hoping someone with a heart returns the phone. I put a little reward message on words with friends because that is the only way I can communicate with my phone because it is on airplane mode to save battery and reduce my text message and call load. Now I wish I hadn't have done that because my only option is words with friends. I don't like this feeling of being off the grid. I was feeling comfortable and now I don't feel as comfortable. I really don't know what I am supposed to be learning out of this lesson but i'm super bummed to be missing my 9 or 10 bible studies from my long bus trip and quick days in salta. Oh and I lost all my photo's from tren a las nubes. Kinda bumming about that one too. now I gotta get some pictures from someone else I met on the train.

all in all

I had another dance class today, bible study with the kids tonight, dance class tomorrow, and a feeling of limbo. It's odd to have a feeling of security from a phone but I really feel like I've lost a part of the plan without my phone. maybe it's cuz I leave for BA in 2 days but i don't feel as comfortable. I don't like it. I could always find north and south with my phone now it's like the town is flip 180 and I didn't even know. IT's a strange feeling because the book I was reading in salta was about what I was anchoring to weather a storm. How small is this gust of wind from loosing my phone but it feels like Katrina. Not in a literal sense but more in the comfort of it all. I know who I'm anchoring my salvation too. It's just here on this earth what is keeping north north and south south.

Sadly it took loosing a phone to realize God does. Some how this all works out, it's just expensive. some how God protects me in my travels and in my health and the keys to my heart. I will explain the keys to my heart tomorrow because it just brewed that up as I was righting this. Don't really know what it means yet. Either way I"m home on the 16th.

Scott

Above is dulce de cayote (sweet Pumpkin marmalade with nuts)
This is my blood sausage
This is Humatas (Corn meal cooked in a corn husk) but stays much wetter than a tomale and doesn't have anything inside of it. It's just just corn meal

Spring is pretty

back in San Nicholas for 4 more days

I just arrived back at the Feeney's and wanted to keep you guys posted on the trip so far. I am so greatful for the chance to go to Salta. It was a great time to decompress and catch up on some reading, and get a little sun. Salta in the Spring is amazing. Not extremely humid but a little bit more than Oregon. Considering it was 10 degrees warmer than an oregon spring I'm happy. 93 degrees for 5 days, ya it was great. I went to a gym 2x and that was fun. the clubs are not as Good as my local CAC. LOVE YA BEN. so I"m going to put up a few pictures of Salta in town and tomorrow I will put up some pictures from Tren a las Nubes. sorry if some of them are blurry or not the correct distances they were all taken from my iphone because my battery was dead no the camera

blood sausage tonight

so i´m up here in Salta, Argentina and this is more a town my speed. it´s really a could place. it has more than a couple hills larger than a mole hill in Dans backyard. unlike the rest of argentina which i must say has been like hanging out in texas with phil and tim butler. sorry guys i know you said texas melted down flat a couple years ago but that was rediculous. but i still love you and was super glad to see you.

i meet a nice lady on the bus yesterday and it just so happened that she was a good friend of tom feeney. sooo we shared a cab from the bus terminal and i said. lets has dinner. so tonight at 9 they are showing up at my hotel and i´m taking them to a fancy meat resturant that is half a block from my doorstep. i wanted to go last night but was to nervous that i would look like a loser eating a big chunk of meat alone. so i invited my new friends and i was try this argentina meat. oh you must try the meat everyone has been telling me. so far beside eating with the feeney´s we haven´t had anything besides lunch meats. i mean come on.

so i´m taking the situation into my own hands and buying a blood sausage and them i will try some othercut. unless they have goat. then it´s goat and blood sausage all the way