the concert

ray on stage
Originally uploaded by faithful nomad.

today started off slowly, everyone slept in so the guys could be well-rested for their evening gig. laura and i went down for breakfast and met up with matt, steve, and brad. after some grub, the entire group met upstairs in a conference room where we had a prayer meeting. it was really nice; i love listening to people pray. then we went over to the venue to get things going.

the concert was really a youth rally organized by Global Connections. there were three speakers and two bands that went on before our guys. Brad, Matt, Steve, and Ray closed the show and it was fantastic. about a thousand kids showed up, everyone was on their feet for most of it. and Global Connections is great because they want to start doing these rallies all through Central America.

the day was a rambling spanglish progression of digital pictures and laughing kids of all ages. we were there until close to 11pm and then things closed down really quickly. we loaded up the gear into the cars and caravan-ed it over to Pizza Hut if you can believe that. our entourage had grown from about a dozen to nearly twice that, but the Hut handled us well. we were there for a while, it was ray, matt, and steve's last night, so we lingered a bit and i managed to get a good conversation in with Pedro about Che and Cuban politics.

back at the hotel we exchanged some goodbyes. i'm such a fan of these guys. matt and steve had never really heard of me before i introduced myself, and i only knew their names, but they were so absolutely gracious and sweet. and ray's awesome. he's just a great guy to be around. the boys went home early sunday morning...