Stepping Across the Line

Stepping Across the Line
Ryan Brouwer
Yawn, waking up at 6:00 is hard, especially when you fell asleep at 1 A.M. the night or morning before after packing a suitcase for a week. I wished I could fall asleep in the car on the way to the Cities, but I forgot a pillow and I’m too nervous and excited to anyway.
Finally, my family and I pull into the airport. My mom, dad, and I hop out and walk into the terminal. I take off my shoes and belt and empty out my pockets to go through security after I checked in my suitcase. I walk into the aisle to get to the gates. I say good-bye to my mom and my dad says jokingly “Should I have brought my M4 along?” My mom says more seriously “I wish you would have!” I didn’t realize until later why she said that.
We got in easily and had 2 hours to burn. We ate at McDonalds and had a great McMuffin for breakfast. After that I drew and listened to my iPod while my dad tried to learn some Spanish words. My cousin called right before we got on the plane to Houston where we would meet the rest of our group. All he wanted to say was that he had a Spanish nickname for me. It was “Baño”, which means bathroom and I silently thought, “This is going to be a long week.”
The plane ride to Houston went all right except it was boring because my dad got the window seat. After we got to Houston we had dinner at a McDonalds and waited for the group that came from Chicago. They finally came about an hour later and I got some wisecracks thrown at me because I was wearing a Twins shirt.
We then got on an airbus to go to Mexico. When we got into Juarez there were soldiers all over with AK-47’s. I asked my dad why that was and he said that Juarez was the most violent city in the world and had high crime rates. Now I understood why my mom wanted dad to take his gun. Later that week, we saw a tank drive through the street next to the orphanage we were working at.
At the end of the week we climbed up a mountain that said, “The Bible is the truth. Read it!” It also had a cross on the top of it. When we got up there it was perfect, because when you looked at it from one side the sun was shining right behind it and it was beautiful. We stayed up there for about an hour to take pictures. We were also encouraged to pray over Juarez that was right under us. We could also pray for the U.S. city, El Paso, which is the same city as Juarez but is split by the border.
That day we went to a Mexican diner and to the market to buy some souvenirs. First, we went to the market and there were many Mexican souvenirs, from pocketknives to necklaces to sombreros to carved wooden statues. After an hour or so there we had Mexican food at a really good Mexican restaurant.
The next day we had one more day of playing with the hundreds of kids there so we didn’t do much work that day. At about 6 A.M. the next day we left for the airport. A lot of kids were crying because they enjoyed having us there. One girl even tried to run along with us and come with us to the airport.
While we were there, there were some different things going on. One was a handball tournament that they held and won. They were the champions out of the orphanage league of Juarez. Another was a soccer, or futball game. In the middle of the game, one of the girls from the orphanage got tripped and ran into a wall. She got hurt and might have even gotten a concussion. All of this was on a concrete floor with a concrete wall on one side and concrete steps on another. Also, there was a kid who was riding a Ripstick, a two-wheeled skateboard, fell, and broke his arm. Luckily, they have a doctors and dentist office on their grounds, along with a church and a dance studio.
I would recommend to go on any missions trip because not only is it fun but it also blesses the people you work for.