it's funny

A lot of hilarious things have happened this week. This internship has been very good for my pride, of which I have none left.

This week J. & I taught 12+ hours of self-employment goodness, attended an 8+ hour workshop on autosuficiencia laboral which I don't know how to say in English but has to do with making goals and becoming gainfully employed (rather than self-employed) and then you know, doing other stuff.

On Wednesday we met with our bishop who informed us that we would be in charge of music for the entirety of our Honduran duration (J. directs the music, I play piano) including teaching the entire ward for 10 minutes after (each) sacrament meeting how to sing. Whaaaa? Oh, and we would also be giving 15-minute talks that Sunday on a topic of our choice. When I informed my father of my piano-calling-assignment, he asked if I'd brought along my copy of Easy Hymns to Honduras. Just so everyone is clear, I have never owned a copy of Easy Hymns and while my sight-reading skills may warrant otherwise, I always play from the big-people hymn book. Kudos, however, belong to my father whose pithy truths have once again annihilated any semblance of ego.

This morning, J. & I woke up early so we could be at the chapel by 7:30a. I had to play prelude music, and oh yeah, we'd previously volunteered to bring the sacrament bread. Sacrament meeting didn't end up starting until 8:25a because the teachers/priests didn't show up until 8:15ish to actually prepare the bread. Classic. Also, there was a lot of confusion involving the transition of music directors and I got ousted for the opening hymn, but then reinstated for the prelude music since the opening hymn player was ready at 8:00 and we didn't actually start until 8:15. Good times. My talk actually went OK, in that I think most people understood my words, or were at least nice enough to pretend. The clincher came when I finished my talk and was heading over to the piano to play the rest hymn and J. notified me that there had been a change in schedule and we were to play hymn #163 instead of #72. Unfortunately for everyone, I misunderstood J. and began to play #162. I not only began to play #162, but kept playing #162 for its entire duration (all two pages, and four verses) much to the confusion of J., the bishopric, and the entire congregation. I would, however, like to say that I played that baby well.

So that was sacrament meeting. And it was awesome, because there were so many things to be worried about and so many things I did wrong, I didn't even have time to dwell on it. Instead I sailed through it all in a state of never-before-experienced serenity. I guess when you come to terms with the fact that you're in Honduras and have no clue what you're doing, you get to let go of a lot of things, like dignity and self-consciousness.