I'm a gringo spanish vocal artist

Just kidding. But it appears that last night I somehow became a member of the Santa Isabel Church praise band.

Okay, now that the laughter has died down, I'll explain how that happened. Basically, I had been hanging out at home yesterday evening alone. Raquel and Javier had left earlier -- I assumed they were going out to do some sort of Valentine's Day activity. The doorbell rang, and it was two people asking for Raquel. I told them she was gone and that I didn't know when she'd be back. So after they left, I decided to give Raquel a call to see when they'd be back. They told me they were at the church singing praise songs and invited me to come join them. I didn't have too much to do (it being Valentine's Day and me being in Peru), so I decided to go join them. What they were ACTUALLY doing, which I didn't understand from the phone conversation, was rehearsing the music for the worship services the next day. (Raquel and Javier are two of five people on the church committee for music and praise.) So as soon as I walked in, they were putting a microphone in my face and telling me to sing with them. I tried at least 3 times saying no, but they kept persisting, so I took the microphone (those of you who know me well know that I can only resist having a microphone shoved in my face for so long).

The praise band group varies between about 4 and 7 people every sunday (plus one more now, if you include me I guess). When all 8 are there, we have a keyboard player, drummer, guitar player and four singers. It's basically your typical contemporary christian praise band -- the singers have microphones, but they're not technically "performing," because the whole congregation sings along. And after being here for 6 months, I pretty much know all of the songs we normally sing -- plus the singers usually read the lyrics of sheets while they sing anyway so they won't forget the words (Santa Isabel doesn't use power point yet, but that's definitely in the future) . And having me there allows Javier to play the drums (he normally sings and plays guitar, but the drummer is sick or out of town or something), because without me there would be no other male singers.

I sang and practiced with them for the entire 1 1/2 hour rehearsal. And they kept assuring me that I was a decent singer. So in about two hours I will be singing with the rest of the praise band group for the 11 o clock worship service (we're all wearing jeans and black t-shirts). I'm not sure how the congregation will react, but I personally think the concept of a gringo male who has never really sang in front of people before suddenly singing contemporary christian music in Spanish through a microphone in front of a group of Peruvians is nothing short of hilarious.