drawing bilingually

I’ve heard people talk about their experiences on mission trips before, and one thing that many people have said is that God calls them in unexpected ways. I don’t think I realized how truly unexpected one’s calling can be until I realized mine was giving tattoos to small children.

Everything started at church on Sunday morning. We attended a bilingual church, so things were presented both in Spanish and in English. When time came for the sermon, three people got up on stage. The first introduced himself and said he would be giving the sermon in English, then he introduced the translator who would be doing the Spanish, and then he got to the last woman, who he said would be drawing bilingually.

While the pastor preached about bearing fruit in English and it was translated to Spanish, she stood in the background drawing with her pastels. She started in the outer corners with three disconnected leaves, and as the sermon progressed, she worked inward, drawing the vine and finishing in the center with a bunch of grapes.

The drawing in particular struck me. I don’t know much Spanish, but art is something I can understand. I was reminded that there are more ways than just words to communicate, and the language barrier didn’t need to stop me. Not to mention, I got to see a wonderful drawing being made.

Fast forward to Tuesday. It was our second day at the school, and a group of us were working on setting up an activity for later that evening. Things were winding down, so a few of us were just sitting around, waiting while the others labeled pie pans with students’ names. As one of the ones sitting around, I did what I do whenever I’m sitting around doing nothing: I picked up a sharpie and starting doodling on the nearest available surface, which in this case happened to be my brother. I just drew this swirly pattern the side of his leg without much thought. It was just a pattern I draw when I’m bored. Surprisingly to me, Darby asked me if I could draw the same pattern on her, and after I did that, she gave me free reign to draw on her arm. I resorted to another one of my fallback doodles and drew and octopus around her wrist.

Later that day, we were interacting with the students again, and the kids starting noticing the drawings on Darby and Connor. Before long, I was surrounded by kids who wanted me to draw on them as well. It was a little overwhelming at first, especially because my Spanish is so shaky, but I figured out how to communicate with the kids, and picked up a couple new words, including pulpo (octopus). I was so busy, I began to joke that I should just stay in Guatemala and become a tattoo artist.

Over the past few days, I’ve spent a good amount of my time around the kids drawing octopi, swirls, hearts, and other doodles, along with the help of a couple other girls on our team. It reminded me of that drawing that I liked so much, but didn’t think would carry over into my week so much. Even though I didn’t speak the same language as these children, I could still communicate with them in a way that didn’t require many words, a way I could understand. Drawing has never been something I shared with a lot of people intentionally, and I never put too much thought into what other people thought of my random doodles, but that skill turned out to be very useful here. Before we got here, I didn’t really know how I’d fit in on this trip. I don’t know much Spanish, and I’m not that great at soccer, but God found a way for 


Hannah

bilingual painting from church

the original "swirls"