PUC Life Now
Spiritual Life
From small-group dialogue to campus church services to solitary prayer, there are many ways for faith to grow.
Student Blogs | Elizabeth Rivera
Posted on January 16, 2009 at 10:51 am
It's really very rare to get exactly what you want. Last Christmas my dad bought me the perfect Guess watch. It is white and sleek with a square face. It probably helped that I sent him Google images of watches I liked and reminded him incessantly that what I wanted most for Christmas was a w-a-t-c-h.
This school year I'm in far-flung Argentina with the Adventist Colleges Abroad program, working on my Spanish and learning all sorts of things, like how to make empanadas and how very American I really am. It's a blessing to be here, one I'm aware of and thankful for. My mother and I and a bunch of other wonderful, supportive people prayed and worked hard to get me here, and I think of them when I want to skip out on homework or feel like whining about caf food. (PUC caf, I have never longed for you so!)
But after being here for four months, the novelty has definitely worn off. Still, sometimes it takes my breath away. Like last Monday after dinner I walked along a dirt path in the hot 8:30 p.m. sunshine, the Argentinean countryside on my left, endless fields of green grass and an asphalt road that stretches to the horizon. I was walking with two new friends, two lovely girls from Michigan that I never would have met otherwise. Our feet kicking up dust, the chatter of our English voices blending with the sound of stray cars passing by, birds chirping, the "hola's" of the runners and walkers who passed us by… Suddenly all of it, the utter astonishing reality of being here at this time in my life, with these people, hit me and it shocked me to realize that I had been so blessed, that I had gotten exactly what I wanted, that after months of praying and hoping and wishing, my heavenly father had gotten me exactly what I wanted. And I took another step into the new year happy, hopeful, and thankful.
PUC is a member of Adventist Colleges Abroad, a consortium of Adventist colleges and universities around the world where students can spend a summer term or academic year immersed in language and culture studies. ACA offers programs in Argentina, Austria, Brazil, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Mexico, Spain, and Ukraine.
Elizabeth Rivera
Studying at Universidad Adventista del Plata