Christmas part 2: A Neighborhood Party

Our neighborhood had a Christmas party for the children.  We were excited to be able to go and meet some our neighbors.  Little did we know how the whole neighborhood would quickly know who we were.

Ready to go to the party

Like most Latin American events, the party was to start at 8:00, but didn't get going until about 8:30/8:45.

They had a trampoline, bounce houses, snacks and drinks for the kids, a puppet show, and Santa bringing gifts.  Nathan had become friends with some of the other children and they took him under their wing during the party.  They made sure he had a chance to bounce in the house and helped him answer some questions during an activity.  Keep reading for the story about the activity.

Nathan with is friends before the activities started. 

Juliana hanging out while we wait for the party to start

The celebration started off with a surprise.  A lady in the neighborhood read a 3 page paper about the real meaning of Christmas - not Santa, but Christ.  We were shocked.  She quoted scriptures throughout her presentation.  What a blessing to hear the gospel at a neighborhood event.

Listening to the gospel presentation

The neighborhood brought in a group of people to entertain the children with a puppet show, songs, and games.  The puppet show was very strange, but Nathan seemed to enjoy it.  He got right down with the other kids to watch while we sat in the back.  Juliana only wanted to sit with us and kept her hands on her ears the whole time.  She doesn't like loud things, even though it wasn't really loud.  (Sorry Juliana - you take after your mother in this area of life.)

Nathan enjoying the puppet show

After the puppet show, people dressed up as "clowns" came out to sing songs with the children.  You can see one of these people in the green suit in the above picture.  This is the part of the party where the neighborhood began to know who the gringos were.  The singers wanted audience particiapation and would hold the microphone out so children could sing part of the songs.  They were singing well known Chilean children songs in Spanish.  So the children could easily sing along and participate.  Except Nathan.  But this didn't phase him one bit.

I have to stop here a minute and go back a year ago to our time in Costa Rica during Christmas.  His class put on a little Christmas play.  Poor Nathan was so nervous, he just stood on stage with his hand in his mouth not saying a single word nor singing along with the class. Even the English part he just stood there, even though he knew every word of the poem they were saying. 

Fast forward one year - and as the microphone was put in front of him, he just rolled with it and made up something in Spanish for the song.  The clowns quickly realized he was a gringo and thought his answers were funny, so they kept giving him the microphone.   We were laughing so hard because he had no clue what he was doing.  But we were so proud of him - he jumped right in and participated.  So different than last year.  His buddies would help him to answer the questions.  They would whisper the answer to him and he would repeat it.  At one point, Nathan even got up with a small group of children and danced in front of everyone.

After the singing part, they had the kids up and moving by making letters, and using a parachute.  Nathan stayed right with the kids and did all the activities.  His new buddies helped him the whole time.

Kids making the letters

The clowns wanted to get some parents involved with the parachutes, so Jeff went down to help them.  At one point, a parent was in the middle of the parachute throwing a large ball up in the air for the children.  They made Jeff go into the middle since he is so tall.  The clowns interviewed the parents.  Thus the reason, the whole neighborhood knew our family by the end of the party.  Between Nathan and his performances and Jeff in the middle of the parachute - we were quite well known.

Another funny part of the evening - one of the questions they would ask the children and the adults - what do you/did you want to be when you grow up.  All the Chilean children and adults answered with nurse, pilot, teacher, or doctor.  Nathan's answer - American football player.  Jeff's answer - basketball player.  Way to go gringos.

The final part of the evening was the visit by Santa.  Each child had a ticket to give to Santa to receive their present.  We weren't sure at first the purpose for the ticket - was it to get into the party?  As we asked what we need to do with it, they told us it was to give to the Viejito.  If you read the earlier post, you know they call Santa the viejito - the little old man of Christmas.  We didn't know this fact at this time.  There was an older gentleman in charge of the event, so we kept trying to give it to him.  But he kept saying, no to the viejito.  We were thinking, but aren't you the viejito - the little old man?  Thankfully, I don't think he realized that we were a bit confused.

Getting their gifts from the little old man of Christmas

Another random part - Santa was accompanied by Minnie Mouse you can see here and also Doki, the Discovery Kids show character.  Because those guys are always with Santa right?