My Adventures in Peru

ends and beginnings

2008-06-08T22:48:00.000-07:00

Well I guess it has been pretty much forever since I have last posted something. As most of you know, I have safely returned back to the United States all in one piece, much to the relief of my family. I have only been home for a month now, yet it already seems like Peru and all that I was blessed to experience was so long ago. Returning to life back here in the States has filled me with mixed emotions. It is so wonderful to be back home with my family, sleep in my own bed (which seems so incredibly huge, not to mention soft and clean), and be able to talk and communicate with friends and family a lot easier than through emails, unreliable internet calls, or calls from phone booths that had weird and often inconvenient hours. To be able to actually communicate in person or be able to just pick up your cell phone wherever and whenever and call still is crazy to me, despite my almost religious and obsessive use of my cell phone up until the day I left to go to Peru back in July. It's crazy how you just get used to not using things, because I'm still having to get used to having my cell phone around and that the weird little jingle that registers in my sub-conscious is actually a cell phone ring and not a taxi-driver honking his horn down on the street below my apartment in Pucallpa.

I arrived safely back home and the first thing my family and I did after leaving the airport was head to Taco Bell. I don't know what it is about the place, because Taco Bell is not exactly the best representation of fine Mexican food, but whatever the case, those burritos tasted simply amazing! Nothing like craving mexican food, and especially Taco Bell for the last 9 months and finally being able to bite into a delicious burrito from a fast-food chain store. It's not like I hadn't had enough beans and rice during my time but, I have realized refried beans are completely different from those beans down in Peru, whatever they're called.

Other novelties such as having hot water, electricity and light past 6p.m. (this whole sunset at 8:30pm thing is really confusing for my inner time clock), being able to actually blow-dry my hair, walking barefoot on carpet floors, simply throwing my clothes in a washing machine followed by a dryer and the whole process taking only a couple hours, sitting on chairs and couches that are padded and actually comfortable to sit on, being able to just get in my car and drive wherever (though the extremely high gas prices have seriously discouraged me from taking advantage of this opportunity), visiting the local grocery store and purchasing everything in one place (though I kind of miss the bargaining, not to even mention the more delicious, fresher, and much cheaper fruits and vegetables available in Peru), having a wide variety of foods to choose from (aka NOT having to eat rice for breakfast, lunch, and dinner). And this is only a partial list of things that I have quickly re-acquainted myself with over the past month.

At the same time I am experiencing all these "new" and exciting things, I realize that so many of the people I have just returned from interacting with are at this moment working under the hot tropical sun, trying to earn a living for their families, which amounts to about $5 per day. And the mother of the household is spending her day, as she does almost everyday, washing, scrubbing and wringing out her family's clothing items, almost all of which have permanent dirt stains and holes throughout. Between that, she is slaving away at the open fire next to her simple home, cooking rice, and frying up fish for the noon meal. These things and so much more make up a simple lifestyle that I have been able to experience firsthand for the past few months; but as I have recently returned to the States and been adjusting back to a lifestyle filled with school, work, career searching, friends, and all the other responsibilities and stressors that are placed on young adults like myself; not to mention the seemingly “luxurious” opportunities (at least that’s what it seems like in comparison) that living in the U.S. allows, I can’t help but feel a bit guilty. This is definitely the “land of promise” and no wonder so many people want to move to the U.S. and pursue the “American Dream.” How did I become so blessed to be born in a country where there is the opportunity to pursue whatever I want if I just put my mind and energy to it?

These past nine months have been an interesting and eye-opening experience. I have learned so much not only about myself, but also about different cultures and peoples, and how to live and work with others all with a common goal of service for others. I have been pushed to new limits, seen my strengths, realized some things I need to work on, and been so incredibly blessed to have worked with a group of young people who everyday challenged me to become a better servant of Him. I feel so privileged to have lived, worked, laughed, and cried with these people who have become more than just friends to me.

Looking back at when I first arrived, with all my expectations and ideas for what this experience was going to be like, I realize that it was all so much more than I could have imagined. Of course, if I had known everything that would have happened, all the challenges and struggles we were all to face, I don’t think I would have been able to handle it all. But God is good and realizes our apparent limitations and helps us along the way, giving courage and strength to faces the challenges and trials that come our way.

I think the greatest challenge yet best memory and greatest joy was taking care of Hector, the little Peruvian baby plagued with malnutrition who turned out to be HIV positive. Many a night I stayed up with the little guy, not able to get much sleep because of his crazy medicine-taking schedule, and quickly getting a taste of the heavy responsibilities placed on young parents (wow!!). I struggled with lack of patience with the little guy at times, but one night I finally prayed to God to give me the patience and energy to take care of him and give him all the love I could because he deserved the best! A peace came over me and I was able to care for him with patience and love. Ever since then, he has had a special place in my heart! Taking care of him was a full-time job for our team; thankfully there were usually lots of willing people to take care of him so Jenni and I could actually get some work done. Saying good-bye at the airport was one of the hardest things for me. Because of his condition, I just didn’t know whether he would last a few days or many happy years. Of course, we all hoped and prayed for the best, but in the back of my mind, there was always a reminder of the “statistics.” And realizing I didn’t know when I was going to be able to return to visit Peru, made it even harder. I still remember as I kissed him good-bye that last time, he had a little smile on his face, which of course just melted my heart. I had to turn away and wipe the many tears streaming down my face. Why did I have to say good-bye to so many people especially little Hector, such an amazing experience, and a place that I learned to call my home, all at the same time?! Coming back to the States and seeing so many other little babies, some with cries terribly similar to Hector, I am constantly reminded of him. And just a few short days after my arrival back in the States, Hector celebrated his 7-month birthday, which is amazing! God is incredible!! However much I wish I could say this little baby boy is still continuing to grow strong, I cannot. Hector passed away in his sleep in the wee hours of Sabbath morning, May 31. The little baby boy, the one who we had all laughed and cried over, the one who we had all had our share of sleepless nights trying to take care of him, was gone. Despite this incredibly deep sadness that we are all feeling and experiencing through this, I and the rest of my fellow team members know all of the time and energy spent caring for him was not in vain. Showing love and care towards this little bundle of joy was the most rewarding experience for me, one that I will never forget. This baby was completely innocent, knowing no wrong and living with no knowledge how much the odds were against him. Our whole team was dedicated to caring for him in the best way we knew how, showing him all the love possible to make his life as special as could be.

My time down in Peru is done for now. I am heading back to Southern in the fall to complete the courses required of me for my degree. But this doesn’t mean my mission is done. Instead it is just taking on a new front, among my peers, classmates, friends, and family. I am excited to share about my experience and also be able to witness for our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. And though I am terribly sad about leaving Peru, this country that became my home, and all the people that I was blessed to meet, especially little Hector, I can know with faith I will be meeting these people, including my precious little baby Hector, in Heaven very soon!! For Jesus promises that he will return soon again. I like how His return is spoken about in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17, “For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.” I can practically hear the loud shout right now! We can be comforted in the knowledge that when this day comes, Hector and everyone else with disease and pain will be given a new body. “He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” (Rev. 21:4). I can’t wait for this day!! I pray that each one of us will be ready for this glorious day to meet our Savior in the Heavenly clouds!!

Less than a week!!

2008-04-24T16:06:00.000-07:00

My time here in Peru is rapidly drawing to a close and it is with deep sadness that I am saying good-bye to the people I have befriended and the place I have called home for the past few months. It seems like just yesterday we all arrived here, but really nine months of crazy adventures and memories have take place. There is still much I need and want to do before I leave, but with God's help my stress will subside and I will be able to do all that I want before I leave.

The 3rd week of March we held a clinic in Nueva Era, a Shipibo community just out of Yarinacocha. The week was quite successful, with lots of people passing through medical and our dental team saw record numbers. Brent's family was able to join in on the fun and help out a bunch at clinic, so that was a huge help. Nice to meet you guys!! blessings

The next week, my family came down to visit, which was quite the time. I had a great time seeing them and it was awesome to be able to show them all that we have been doing, meet the team and make the project much for "real." On Friday afternoon, my dad tripped and fell on one of the streets in Pucallpa, dislocating his shoulder, so we had quite an adventure seeing firsthand Peruvian healthcare. My dad had to be put under general anesthesia and the doc put the joint back in place. Thankfully it all went well, God blessed us with some good connections to doctors, and we were on our way after a few hours. Unfortunately, my dad has since re-dislocated it and so is going to be having outpatient surgery the day before I arrive home, so please pray for him!! Well, my family was all good sports about the whole thing and the whole time here and they had a good time here!:-)

Our dental team has had the privilege to hold 2 more mini clinics in 2 different places in the last couple weeks. The first clinic was in Bena Jema where we held clinic in the SDA church. We were there for three days and saw quite a number of patients, though the numbers weren't as high as our previous clinic. During these clinics Brent and I were training in Willem, who is going to be taking over dental after we leave. The second clinic we had was at km. 13 San Juan. We were there for 2 days and saw a good number of patients. It was quite fun to play with the kids and get to know the community a bit. I was able to spend some time talking with the Shipibo women and learn a little more about how they live. One of the ladies actually walks around Pucallpa selling her necklaces, purses, bracelets, and other little "touristy" items around the square. So I run into her every once in a while and talk. These clinics have been quite nice for me, at chance to pull some more teeth, get to know a new community, and talk to others about Jesus.

In less than a week, four of us will be flying up to Iquitos to see the Amazon River and see some "real" jungle. There is another Adventist non-profit up there (People of Peru Projects) and so will be getting to know that team for a few days. Then its down to Lima and a day of surfing and sandboarding before heading home. I am quite excited for the upcoming adventures and travels, but really I'm quite sad about leaving this place. This week is the week of "lasts." Last time eating my favorite meal at the vegetarian restaurant, last time eating fries, last night in my apartment, last time buying at the market, etc. the list could go on forever and then I get quite sentimental and it's no good!:-) I think the thing I'm going to miss most are the people, especially the people I have been working, eating, living, sweating, laughing with. Each and every one of them are amazing and unique. We have all had a great time and experienced many different things that will forever bond us together, that nobody else will completely understand. God definitely had a hand in putting this team together and I have been blessed beyond belief this year with such awesome friends aka my brothers and sisters. I will miss them all terribly. Almost all of us are returning to the States either to continue schooling (Brent, Tara, Kaitlin, David, and me), finding that perfect job (Kristin), or getting married (congrats Emily!!). but it will never be exactly the same. Dr. Mathews, Willem, and Jenni are all still here in Peru and are planning on staying a while. But I must end this now because I will start to cry...:-) besides I have much to do before I leave! argh...until next time Blessings

our team pictures

2008-03-12T20:03:00.000-07:00

some pictures from the past weeks

2008-03-12T19:46:00.001-07:00

Baby Hector Update

2008-03-12T19:27:00.000-07:00

So much has happened in the last month with this little bundle of joy. Emotional and mental ups and downs, it’s hard to summarize them all. In the month-span that we have been privileged to take care of this little guy, much has happened and so I will try to summarize it because I don’t have much time. As I write, Hector is laying on my lap, crying for attention and for his bottle of milk. I’m still working on the multi-tasking concept, which I think is pretty much impossible when trying to take care of a needy little 4month old boy, named Hector!

After spending about 9 days in the hospital, little Hector was discharged and sent to km. 38. Over the next week, he quickly developed many mommies and daddies, all taking care of the little guy. But by the weekend, he was have difficulty breathing and Jenni and Anita took him back to the hospital. He was diagnosed with pneumonia and began rigorious anti-biotic and breathing treatments. Despite difficulties and frustration with being in the hospital yet again for a few days, and with hospital staff trying the patience of Anita and Jenni, Hector was again released, with the promise by Jenni to take good care of him outside of the hospital. So with IV’s hanging up around the room and a crazy 24-hr schedule of medication to give the little guy, Hector became the center of attention. Anita and Jenni faithfully took care of the little guy, many times staying up all night because of the crazy medicine schedule and little Hector not wanting to sleep either.

Every few nights, I stayed up with Hector, allowing Anita and Jenni some much needed and deserved sleep. Over the next week or so, Hector improved, though one was fearful of gaining too much hope knowing that he, just like any other little baby, could become sick with a fever in a very short time. Throughout this second bout of illness, he lost weight. Drinking milk become quite difficult because he was having such a hard time breathing and drinking at the same time. Often he would go into coughing spasms and throwing up much of the milk he just consumed.

Despite all the anti-biotics, vitamins, breathing treatments, minerals, and milk little Hector was being given, he still wasn’t getting better. Nobody could understand why. These medications were top quality, yet the baby wasn’t improving. Why? Back to the laboratories for more testing. Over the next few days, Jenni faithfully took Hector to various places for tests. On Friday morning the results came. Providing answers, yet leaving so many unanswerable questions. Why does this have to happen to such a small, innocent little boy? It’s NOT fair!! Hector. So tiny. Cute. Precious. Lovable. Innocent. Yet, he test HIV positive. Why? I don’t understand.

Hector´s mother has also been diagnosed with HIV, which at this point have already become full blown AIDS. Dad has also tested positive for HIV. They have two older sons (one from the mother´s previous relationship) and neither one has tested positive. Praise the Lord!! Please keep this little family in your prayers. This news has been devastating to say the least. We have been praying for a miracle for little baby Hector. Despite all the nights he keeps us up, you can help for love and adore the little guy. He is just so special to each of us. I don´t know how long he has to live: days, weeks, months, or even years. What I do know is that this little baby deserves the best chance at life as any other baby. Each and every moment I spend holding him, listening to his little coos, watching the little smile crease his face, or even caring for him (even at 3am), I treasure, because I just don´t know how much more time he has, and I want little Hector to know that he is loved!! God can and is doing amazing things in this little boy´s life, please pray for little Hector!

House Hunting part 2

2008-03-12T19:22:00.000-07:00

Well, the search is over. At least I think so. We have moved into a new room. After walking up and down street after street in Pucallpa, Jenni and I finally decided on the original place we first looked at. A 4th floor room, with an amazing roof-top view of the city, though you have to walk out onto the veranda area to actually see the viewJ, it’s quite the place, not to mention some quality stair-climbing exercise! Throughout this whole time of searching for a place, I felt God opening and closing doors to various rooms. Some just didn’t have the right location, or the room was really small, or there was no chance at having internet. Needless to say, I feel God has led us to this room, high above almost all of the city. Walking onto the veranda, we are able to receive internet signal. The location is perfect. Being just across the street from our former room, we are just as close to everything, even closer to the french fry place!J We have our own private bathroom, which is great, not to mention cleaner!! Of course, after living here not that long, actually the very first night, we discovered that the ceiling leaks and the water randomly turns off and on. Well the ceiling has since been fixed (thank goodness). However we are still trying to figure out the water situation. Apparently we are under city water, which tuns off supposedly between 1 and 6pm each day. Thats fine with me. If its consistent, i can plan and be prepared. However, the water thing has been anything but consistent. One time it was off for 48hours with no sign of life anywhere. Water is pretty important and so to have its supply source be very unpredictable, makes it a frustrating situation. We hope to have this resolved in the very near future! After organizing and finally settling on Thursday, I have been able to make use of the desk that was already here and finally get some quality work completed. It’s exciting because our little room is finally looking like home and becoming comfortable, despite it’s little quirks. the picture is of our old room. new pictures of new room coming sometime soon...

House Hunting Part 1

2008-02-11T11:11:00.000-08:00

Considering the recent events leading us to feel unsafe and not secure in our present home, Jenni and I made the unanimous decision to move out. However, finding a new home has quickly presented us a challenge. Where do you find a room/apartment that is decently priced, close to the center of town, is safe, comfortable, and maybe, just maybe have a wireless internet signal? For over three months, our little hostel room has served us quite splendidly. Being within two blocks of the taxi stop to Campo Verde aka Home, only one block from the post office, vegetarian restaurant, french fry place, market, being right on the plaza (which is an easy orientation point when lost), not to mention the quite dependable free wireless internet that the Pronegocious warehouse has unknowingly provided us. God has blessed tremedously. However, we feel it is time to move out.

So, Saturday night and Sunday we spent apartment shopping. Well, it has been fruitful in many ways, finding some nice places and some not-so-nice places. From a dungeon/prison cell at about S/.120 (a little under $40 a month) to a fully furnished two bedroom, kitchen, and living room with outside garden, with air conditioning, water, and light included for a mere $350 per month (that’s about S/.1000 aka out-of-my-price-range-but-lovely-to-look-at), we searched Pucallpa. Sunday afternoon we went around town in a motokar with a “real-estate agent.” Actually, he was a guy that is developing some new homes/apartments and wanted to show us. Well, quite fun, mostly cause we got a free ride around town, but also because we got to become a part of Carnival.

Carnival is a Peruvian holiday that lasts the entire month of February. Hearing stories about past experiences during the month of February, made me dread the coming of February, but now it’s here and it isn’t even half as bad as I had heard. Let me explain. I don’t know too much about it, except that for the whole month it is a huge water fight between guys and girls. Guys throw water on girls and vice-versa. Fun right? Well, the problem and grossness comes in when people decide to throw water that isn’t really water, more like sewage and other nasty stuff. That’s not fun. However, this year a law was passed that states no dirty water can be used and if caught, the device used to throw will be confiscated (however, if it’s an arm used to throw the dirty stuff, I’m not sure how that works) and if it becomes a public annoyance, then the person is arrested. Amazing. So walking and driving around town on Sunday was quite fun and refreshing. I was hot and tired, and some Peruvian guys must have seen this and decided I would be a perfect target for their water balloons. I was actually quite grateful and felt refreshed after. Driving around town with our “real estate agent,” we were able to see quite a number of young people in little groups, waiting for the perfect person to chuck a water balloon at. A few times, I just smiled real nicely at some of the little kids and I think they must have gotten scared cause they didn’t throw any at me or Jenni. Haha:-) We also witnessed someone getting arrested for throwing apparently dirty water at passer-bys. So the law is enforced around here, which is good to know.

Since school is out for almost all the kids, they are definitely taking advantage of Carnival month. Little groups of kids gather on street corners waiting for people to pass by before throwing water balloons at them. And of course, white girls walking by always has a special draw to the Peruvian guys for some reason and so they seem especially eager to get us wet. I think it’s hilarious, not to mention it feels great to cool off. I think our team should pick a street corner next Sunday and join in on the fun!

Praise God, despite the hard times

2008-02-11T11:09:00.000-08:00

"Praise God from whom all blessings flow..." When trials and discouraging times fall upon us, it's only natural and easy to look at the situation and feel broken down, betrayed, or depressed. But recently I have been trying to look beyond the negatives in a particular situation and see how God has blessed in the situation, despite the obvious discouraging aspects. Last Friday afternoon, my camera and Brent's laptop were stolen from Jenni's and my hostel room in Pucallpa. When Jenni and I discovered this fact, I felt betrayed and pretty much was in denial. I couldn't believe that someone would take these things. It just doesn't happen to me. I hear/read about it, but not actually to me personally. But, after searching our entire room, which didn't take too long, we realized someone had come into our room and taken these two items.

As the realization set in that I would most likely 99.9% never seen my camera or Brent's laptop (which had all of Jenni's administration documents) again (unless God worked a huge miracle), I searched for the blessings that I could find in this situation. Well, first off, I didn't have any pictures really on my camera (except a few of the baby, which weren't that great anyway), I happened to not have my 4G memory card in the camera case at the time, and I even found one of my extra camera batteries in one of my other bags that I had been meaning to put in my camera bag but kept on forgetting (for which I am now thankful for forgetting). As I searched through the room to see if anything else had been stolen, I realized how many other valuable things were in the room, yet weren't taken. My passport, which was really close to the camera bag and laptop, multiple hard drives, printer, PC desktop, clothes, my laptop, and other things. The room wasn’t trashed or messed up at all. The door wasn’t broken down or anything, a very clean steal. This experience wasn’t violent, nobody got hurt or anything. Just someone decided they wanted some of our stuff and took it.

Through this whole experience, I have realized so much to be thankful for. A camera and laptop. Yes, very important and quite useful, but in the whole scheme of life, they are only things. Replaceable. It’s so easy to place a lot of value on things of this world, thinking that if we didn’t have this or that, we wouldn’t survive. This year I have learned a lot about the essentials I absolutely need to survive. And really, it’s not a lot. With this modern world the way it is, we are constantly bombarded with new gadgets, nicer clothes, better this, faster that, things we “need,” at least according to the advertising world, to survive. But I challenge each of us, myself included to not place our hearts and desires on things of this world, things that we “need.” Instead, let’s focus our eyes to the treasure God has laid in store for us in heaven. In Matthew 6:19-21, Jesus promises, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Little Baby Hector

2008-02-11T09:53:00.000-08:00

We have been blessed to be able to help this little baby boy Hector Daniel. He was born to a mother who, because of some health conditions, was unable to nurse and take proper care of him. So Hector’s aunt tried to take care of him, feeding him rice water and other stuff that doesn’t carry really any nutrients a baby so desperately needs. So after 3 1/2 months, this baby was barely alive, skin was turning gray and he pretty much not an ounce of fat on him. His stomach was sunken in and you could see his ribs quite well. After hearing about the condition of this baby, Jenni offered to take the baby to the hospital for care. Sunday, the family brought him over and Jenni and I took him to the hospital late Sunday evening. All the nurses and doctors were shocked and in horror at the little baby in Jenni’s arms. 3 months?? Are you serious?
The doctor who helped us in emergency was Dr. Mendoza, a friend of Jenni’s from years ago. He had been the doctor in charge of Pancho, a baby helped last year. Ever so kind and helpful, he saw to it that baby Hector and both Jenni and I were taken care of. The health-care system in Peru is quite different than that in the States. First, I am learning a new definition of sterile. I’m pretty sure they have never heard of gloves here in Peru, or at least in the hospitals. Everything is done with the bare hands, including drawing blood, sticking needles, and other such “clean” activities. Secondly, all medications, syringes, and other such items must be purchased by the patient (or family) before any sort of treatment can be done. After the doctor’s rounds each morning, involved a trip to the pharmacy on the hospital premises to purchase the day’s supply of medicines and syringes. There is insurance and so if bought at the hospital pharmacy, there is a discount, but if bought outside, no such luck. So, if you happen to have an emergency, I hope you brought a family member to go buy your IV set up and medications, otherwise, you’ll have to wait until someone can purchase the stuff. And hopefully during that time, you won’t bleed to death.

Back to the baby. Hector has improved 100% over the last few days. Each day, he has a marked improvement in energy and movement. Sunday night, I was running around town buying medications for the baby. Finally after everything, we were admitted to the hospital. The baby laid on the bed and Jenni and I looked at him and looked at each other and were like, NOW WHAT?? Since, it was after 11pm, we both decided to spend the night in the hospital bed with the baby. Quite cozy. Well, since neither of us have experience being moms to a 3 month old, the first night was quite the experience. Needless to say, we didn’t sleep the first night. The baby kept us both awake the entire night. He really liked the whole idea of sleeping maybe 15 minutes, followed up with a cry of hunger until we fed him some PediaSure milk through a syringe because he didn’t know how to suck on a nipple. This was his first time getting some nutritious food and he was hungry. By the next morning, we realized this taking-care-of-baby-thing was gonna be a handful. And to add to that, all the moms in the pediatric ward thought the sight of two white gringas taking care of a 3 month-old Peruvian baby as the craziest sight ever. Needless to say, over the next few days, we had quite the steady stream of visitors, all wondering how in the world we ended up with this baby and why we weren’t nursing the poor little guy. Well, those explanations were always fun!! So, over the next few days, I truly felt like a mom, spending day and night with the baby. My whole life seemed to revolve around the baby, nothing else. My days and nights were spent rocking the baby, feeding him, and sometimes being able to watch him sleep. Sleep. For the first few days, Hector didn’t know what that word mean’t, therefore, he didn’t practice it. Up until Thursday night, he didn’t sleep more than 30minutes straight. Day or night. Meaning, Jenni or I didn’t sleep more than 20 minutes straight. So after a while, we got into a system of watching him. Switching off nights taking care of him. Finally on Thursday night, realizing the baby wasn’t going to be released anytime soon, we called up our backup moms from km.38 to help out, especially for nights. So now, little baby Hector has many mommies.

Hector has improved soo incredibly much over the last days. When I first saw him, he just laid motionless, with no energy or color in his skin. Now, his eyes are wide open, very curious to the world around him. He especially is fixated with a painting of Pinocchio on the wall. He has color in his skin again. His tummy is full and looks like it’s about to pop each time he is fed. He loves scratching his head behind his ears and just tries to kick and move, though he is still unable to move his head. He is able to sleep for hours now, which is amazing and makes nights so much easier to deal with. Pretty much, he’s doing amazing! Praise God!! Little Hector has been released from the hospital today and so is being taken back to km. 38 for a little more strengthening before heading back to his family. I have had such a great time with this little bundle of joy, now realizing how much of a responsibility and sacrifice it is to have a baby. Please continue to pray for little Hector as he is soon to return to his family, where it will be harder to receive the nutritious milk he needs.

January Clinic

2008-01-29T15:38:00.000-08:00

Our latest campaign saw us quite close to home, which in fact was quite lovely indeed. Sleeping in my own bed for more than two nights in a row, eating at the house with everyone and just taking a break from hostel/city living was very much appreciated on my part.

Clinic this time took place in 3 different places. Sunday through Tuesday we were at Dos de Diciembre, about 5km. down the road from our house. The first three days saw little patients. The pace was slow and the lines short. The biggest excitement was a runaway bull charging through our clinic away, scaring everyone as we heard screams and loud stomping of the bull as it neared the schoolhouse where we were holding clinic. Thankfully we were able to get everyone safely inside the building and watch as someone on the back of a truck tried to lasso the bull. Cf course, it didn't work and the bull ran away. Quite fun. The people of Dos de Diciembre were quite nice and with the clinic being a slower pace, I was able to sit and chat with some of the people hanging around. That's when you really get to know the people and see the needs. One of the ladies asked me if I had any children. Well, I said no, but then she started talking about how there were so many orphaned children in this village or children with parents, but the parents are unable to support the child. no money for food or clothes. The lady then proceeds to point to a boy standing just in front of us, who I guess is a child of parents who can't afford to take care of him. He is smiling broadly and joking with one of his friends. As I looked at him, trying to imagine life without parents, a life without ever having enough food to eat or having clean, hole-less clothes, it made me really sad. At that moment, I so wanted to just adopt that boy and all the other homeless kids in Peru and take care of them. Of course, right now for me that would be impossible, but....

Wednesday found us quite busy in Santa Catalina. With only one day in this village, the people made the most of it. With leftover donated glasses from the Gordon Hospital group clinic back in August/September, David and Kristin were quickly trained and were able to pass out prescription glasses to those in need. Definitely a popular place to be. The optical team were quite busy the entire day…and clinic for that matter. Dental was pretty crazy too.

With each clinic, I get better, more confident and efficient pulling teeth. Some patients take less than 10 minutes, while others I have poured sweat and worked on for over an hour. Those are the patients that test my patience and trust in God. Each time I honestly feel like giving up and letting someone else try, right on the brink of giving up, the tooth pops out! While working on each patient’s mouth, I am praying to God for a steady hand, clear head, and patience. I could not be able to pull these teeth without God’s help. Some patients are nearly impossible to numb, which makes it all the more difficult to pull the tooth. So I pray for patience, a firm steady grip, and the knowledge to know how to get the tooth out quickly and smoothly without too much discomfort.

Driving farther in for clinic on Thursday and Friday, we were able to help people in the larger village of Nueva Tunuya. These two days were quite busy for us in dental and so I didn’t have much time to take pictures and get to know the people as well, but those I did meet were so kind and helpful! Many of the kids enjoyed just hanging around and watch dental. They were all so cute and sweet!!:-) Friday was a crazy long day with seemingly extra-long/hard patients. After lunch I worked on this elderly man’s teeth for what seemed like forever. He wasn’t getting numb and I was getting frustrated, because he seemed to be wincing in pain with the slightest touch, though ALL of the kids I had worked on earlier that day had been tough as steel!! Grrr…finally I was able to get the teeth out he needed and finished up. I was still feeling a little grumpy as I took my last patient for the day and clinic. She was only six yrs. old and the cutest little thing ever. Actually she and her twin sister came in at the same time and Brent took one and I took the other. Sooo adorable. Both of the girls just needed a little help getting some rotten baby teeth out, so with just a couple gentle tugs, I got her tooth out. All done. Less than 10 minutes!! I like finishing the clinic week with a good patient like that. But what really made my day was when her and her sister both thanked us for helping them and shook our hands. Not only was it the most precious thing ever, but it just really made me realize yet again how much a simple thank you and smile can make someone’s day!!

On a really sad note, our team found out on the Monday after clinic week that one of the leaders of the village of Nueva Tunuya and his family had been shot and machetted to death over the weekend. Apparently he had made an agreement with the government to inform them of the location of his village’s cocaine fields. The town found out and took revenge, killing him, his wife, his brother, and his children. It really hit home, knowing that we had seen these people and helped them in medical, dental, and/or optical on Thursday or Friday. Life is soo short! I pray that in the short time we were in Nueva Tunuya for clinic, we were able to show Christ to these people and be a blessing!! I hope and pray I will see these precious children of God in heaven one day!

January clinic and other random pictures

2008-01-22T12:18:00.000-08:00

What is A.M.O.R. Projects?

2008-01-10T05:58:00.000-08:00

Here is the video of A.M.O.R. Projects that is being sent to the missions, conferences, and unions of Peru. It's kind of a promo thing for A.M.O.R. Projects. If you are interested in receiving a copy to show at church, schools, or another event, please let me know. God bless!

clips from Peru

2008-01-08T20:34:00.000-08:00

Here is a video of random clips from life in Peru, mostly from life at km. 38. All the clips are pretty much unedited, cause I was running out of time when I made it, so it's kinda longer, but it's still fun to look at. sooo...tada

pics from the trip

2008-01-07T19:11:00.001-08:00

Bus rides, uncooked eggs, people watching, and sunburns

2008-01-07T18:22:00.000-08:00

Christmas vacation. What comes to mind? Probably not hiking, sunburns, traveling around in buses for hours and hours, or even eating pizza for Christmas dinner. Well, what’s traditional anyway? When living in Peru, it’s all about living the nontraditional life. Considering we traveled around southern Peru for two weeks, which means tons of adventures, there is not time to relive all of them right now, I will mention some of the highlights.

So we left Saturday night on a 20hr. bus ride over the Andes to Lima. I have never spent so many hours in a bus before and with it pretty much impossible to get any sort of quality sleep, the hours dragged by. But we eventually got to Lima and were able to stretch the legs and wander around the city with our huge, badly-packed backpacks. Using buses as our main source of transportation between major cities was not only cheaper but much more adventuresome than flying. Of course, the big drawback for busing is that it takes forever to get anywhere. So…many a night was spent driving from one city to another, usually with not many hours of successful sleep. Arriving at the bus station around 5 or 6am, many a time we were greeted by a handful of desperate off-season hostel owners, begging for our business. It was great! Usually we wouldn’t know where we would be staying in the next city, soo these people answered our prayers with amazing hostels for unbeatable prices that could be bargained down even more!! So for less than $3 a night, we were able to enjoy free breakfasts, hot water, our own beds, luggage storage, not to mention meeting some really nice people and just having a place to crash after traveling around town all day. It was such a blessing!!

For living in Pucallpa for about 5 months and not seeing hardly any foreigners except those from within our group, arriving in the Lima airport and traveling to the different touristy cities and places was actually quite a culture shock. I hadn’t seen so many English-speaking people, it felt really weird to talk to these people in English. So many of the restaurants catered to the tourists, and so much of the time we would ask for a menú (which is the cheaper food a restaurant serves, costing usually about $.90-2.00). Many of the restaurants didn’t have menus, or the cheapest plates they would have would be like S./10-15 or about $3.50-5.00. Quite expensive for us from Pucallpa where it’s quite easy to find places to eat cheap and safely! And when we did find a place to eat, we complicated matters by asking for vegetarian food. Much of the time the only option was eggs, rice, soup, and salad. So by the end of the trip, we all hated eggs, mostly cause Peruvians don’t know how to properly them and so much of the meals consisted of almost raw “sunny-side-up” eggs. Nasty. So finding food was always a stressful time, because we would be hungry but unable to find places that would serve decent food at a reasonable price. On Christmas Day, however, we splurged and went to a tourist restaurant and ordered clay-oven baked pizza, for about S./12 (about $4.00) per person with a pitcher of lemonade to share. AMAZING!! We felt so giddy and weird spending so much money on one meal, but hey, it’s Christmas right?!

Our travels took us to Arequipa, which is quite a beautiful city. I highly recommend it! From there we traveled to Cusco, Puno, which took us to the floating islands and Isla Taquile of Lake Titicaca, then on to Copacabana, Bolivia where we renewed our visas and spent a beautiful night on Isla del Sol!! Quite an amazing two weeks. Definitely the highlight was hiking to Machu Picchu, just outside of Cusco. The three of us girls, Tara, Kaitlin, and I had ever really backpacked before, but thankfully Brent, is not only an expert backpacker, but also very patient and helpful to us newbies!!J The first day of our quest for Machu Picchu found us riding a supposedly 5hr. bus to Santa Maria. It turned into more like an 8hr. ride as our bus as to navigate through mud slides, some of which came a little too close to the edge of the cliff for my liking, but our guardian angels were with us, and we safely arrived in Santa Maria. The trail we were to take to Machu Picchu started in Santa Maria, with us spending a day hiking for about 7hrs. to Santa Teresa where we would spend the night. The 2nd day of hiking had us hike from Santa Teresa to Aguas Calientes. The third day hikng from Aguas Calientes to Machu Picchu and spending the day checking out the place.

Well, we got to Santa Maria safely. But we didn’t really know how to get to Santa Teresa. Of course, there is the road, which cars take, but we wanted the trail, and of course we didn’t know where that was. So after some searching and asking around, we finally figured out the general direction to take. So early the next morning we set out, knowing that a few other guided groups were to be on the trail as well, so if we didn’t know which direction to take, we could just follow one of the groups. The trail was absolutely amazing! Incredibly beautiful. As we slowly ascended higher and higher along the narrow path, the view would just get better and better. Hiking the trail wasn’t easy and we had to stop often, but it was totally all worth it. In the late afternoon we came to the part of the trail where we had to cross over the river by a simply constructed cable car. Quite a thrilling experience. After hiking a few hours, we stopped at some hot springs just outside of Santa Teresa to relax with the other groups of hikers for a bit. This whole hiking experience was different because there were quite a number of places/towns to stop at along the way, so we didn’t have to carry any food! Many of the locals have taken advantage of having the trail run practically through their front yards and have set up water/Gatorade/snack stands along the way. Day two of hiking was much easier, though my back was still sore from the day-before’s activities. We hiked through almost every kind of terrain possible, or at least it seemed like it. So fun sloshing through creeks, climbing over rocks, descending steps, and climbing seemingly straight up a mountain, crossing rivers by cable cars, walking on railroad tracks, mud, so much variety, it never got boring! After hiking along the railroad tracks, we finally made it to Aguas Calientes, the town at the base of Machu Picchu.

We got up early the next morning to climb the last little bit and enjoy the sunrise on Machu Picchu. Well, when we finally arrived at the top, the fog was so thick we couldn’t see anything. So we decided to hike around and find the classic machu picchu photo op. Place. Well, apparently we were overachievers and instead climbed Machu Picchu mountain. With the fog so thick, and after climbing for over 1 1/2hrs. with no luck, we finally stopped to rest and have Sabbath worship. As we sung, the clouds parted and Machu Picchu unveiled itself in all it’s glory over 1000ft. below us! It truly was beautiful. As the four of us surveyed the scene below us, we could see much of the trail that we had hiked, except from way up on the mountain top. As the clouds continued to burn off, we could see for miles and it was so amazingly beautiful. This place was just breathtaking, I can’t even imagine what heaven will be like!! Well, we decided to actually go explore the lost city, and so made a much quicker decent down to the ruins. Brent practically ran up Waynapicchu (probably to escape from us slow-pokes..haha:-)) as us girls decided to rest and take in the whole scene. We spent the day checking out the place and unknowingly picking up quite a bit of sun rays apparently, cause when we got back down to Aguas Calientes, we discovered we got quite toasted:-). Well, Machu Picchu was quite beautiful, though I think I enjoyed the hike (as hard as it was) and the view from Machu Picchu mountain better.

Sunday was spent trying to get back to Cusco, which consisted of riding the train partway, then riding a stuffed minibus (21 people, 2 babies, and the cutest little puppy ever, plus all the luggage) for 3hrs and catching an overnight bus back to Cusco. Quite the trip back, but definitely cheaper than $46!! The four of us then caught a bus to Puno where we spent Christmas Day visiting the floating islands and Isla Traquile on Lake Titicaca. Riding the bus across the border into Bolivia to renew visas was uneventful, except being from the U.S. always requires more money to be paid and a few extra documents, but soon we were on our way to the border town of Copacabana, Bolivia. We quickly found out that the town is like Hippy-capital. So many foreigners, I hardly saw a Bolivian the whole time. I liked Bolivia, mostly cause the exchange rate is even better than Peru!! But Lake Titicaca truly is more beautiful on the Bolivian side. We took a boat out to Isla del Sol and camped out on the island. Soo beautiful. With snow-capped Andes mountains painting the backdrop, we slept under the stars and watched an amazing sunset and sunrise on the lake. Soo cool!

We then headed back over the border with no trouble, and so I’m now able to live in Peru for another 90 days legally:-). So we then spent the evening in Puno making quite a few purchases at the local alpaca markets. We then headed to Cusco then back to Arequipa to catch our plane back to Lima. So we arrived safely back in Pucallpa early Monday morning. and that was 2 weeks! Now I need a vacation to recover!!

For many many pictures from the trip visit (click "Christmas in Peru" on the left side): http://s48.photobucket.com/albums/f214/lkclark/

Merry Christmas

2007-12-14T13:37:00.000-08:00

Happy Sabbath (well almost)

I'm leaving on my great Christmas adventure tomorrow night. Going to be exploring the southern part of Peru for about two weeks. We are hoping to see Machu Picchu, Lake Titicaca, Cusco, and Arequipa and of course everything else in between. It's gonna be a different Christmas away from family and all, but it will definitely be adventuresome and memorable!! Well, I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and a happy new year!!

By the way, I'm feeling tons better. Turns out I had worms in my tummy. So I took some albendazol and am feeling amazing! Didn't even see any worms come out. Actually, kind of disappointed. I was kind of hoping for a worm or too. more exciting that way. Well, Kaitlin got one, practically coming out her nose. gross!! Well, that's all for now. Thank you so much for all the prayers and support. God bless and have a merry merry Christmas!!

Clinic, sick times and rabblings

2007-12-03T17:15:00.000-08:00

Well, it’s Sabbath as I write this blog and I’m hanging out in my hammock typing away. I really love my hammock, quite comfortable in fact. I’m gonna have to figure out some way to hang one up back home in States, though not really sure how it’s gonna work. This whole day has been spent chilling in my hammock, sleeping, reading, and now typing. Well, that’s not normally how I spend Sabbaths around here by any means, but the thing is I’m sick, vomiting and diarrhea to be exact. God has been good to me and kept me from getting sick until now, which is amazing considering Tara, Kristin, and Emily have been sick off and on the whole time down here so far. So I feel really blessed about that. But being sick is no fun! Not having energy to really do anything and no appetite to eat is kinda annoying. But I am soo incredibly thankful because we just finished clinic yesterday and I didn’t get sick till this morning. God kept my sickness away until the perfect time, a Sabbath. I have been able to spend this special day reading and talking to God, actually relaxing and resting, for which I am so very thankful for, despite the frequent trips to the bathroom!:-) I just finished some broth and crackers, so I’m hoping I’m getting over my nausea at least! Most days are so crazy busy around here, even Sabbaths, visiting different churches and helping out with church activities that I really appreciate the quite Sabbaths every once in a while to spend some one-on-one time with God.

Yet another clinic week has come and past. Wow! time flies. This clinic took place in a small town just outside of Pucallpa, Luz Divina. What a fun time we all had! Another crazy clinic. We left early Sunday morning around 6:30am and drove to the site with our over-stuffed truck, at one point carrying 13 people, meds, and our stuff for the week. Don’t worry, we drove slow!;-) A torrential downpour didn’t detour about 150 patients from coming to the clinic for medical and dental care on Sunday. Sunday is usually a slower day as we must set up for clinic and figure out logistics. The beginning of the week was steadily busy and continued to pick up as the week went on for Brent, Manuel, and I in dental. By the end of the week, Brent and I (Manuel had left for km38 already to watch over the place) pulled about 64 teeth on Friday, which is quite a number of teeth I must say. Needless to say we were all quite tired, but thankful for a good clinic week, by Friday evening. With each clinic, I’m gaining more confidence, efficiency, and experience in my skills with pulling teeth, it’s exciting. The mornings were usually quite crazy in dental, with patients been seen all morning, but by afternoon I was actually kind of bored because everyone decided to come in the morning! This gave me some good time to take pictures and video, though which was quite nice. One of the highlights of clinic without a doubt though was the arrival of two dental chairs on Friday!! Wow! The coolest thing ever! Brent and I had been working all week and previous clinics with patients sitting in small wooden chairs, like you would use in elementary school. Needless to say, not the most comfortable things to sit in for the patient, making the “visit to the dentist” that much more nerve wracking! And bending over at weird angles to see inside people’s teeth, after a while takes a toll on your back, so without a doubt, when we saw those new, cushioned, adjustable, real dental chairs arrive Friday morning, Brent and I (not to mention our backs as well) were quite excited!! They are amazing! I didn’t get half as many patient complaints of pain after these chairs arrived! So, I am forever thankful for these new chairs! Thanks Dr. Filman, you’re awesome!!

Well, another highlight of the week, which I think is one of the most amazing things God has given us, the miracle of life. Not only one, but two births occurred during our week-long clinic. I was privileged to be able to witness one of them on Wednesday evening. The other happened Friday afternoon as we were finishing up clinic. This was my first time to see a birth in person, much less inside a home, so needless to say, it was quite exciting for me! Jenni, Doctor, and all us girls were able to help out and witness the birth of an adorable baby girl. Seeing this lady give birth was just so cool. To just think that this baby started from a microscopic sperm and egg and to develop into a fat, healthy, crying baby, is just so amazing to me! The baby girl was named Jenni, fitting because it just so happened to be our Jenni’s birthday on Wednesday as well. How precious! Well, Jenni got quite a surprise on Friday afternoon when the second baby landed in her lap, literally. We had gotten word that a lady was about ready to give birth, so Jenni, Kristin, and Emily went to check on the lady and see how far along she was. When the girls arrived, the pregnant mother (she already had four kids) was still walking around, so it at least appeared to be still a ways off. Not so. The girls were there for maybe 5 minutes when the lady was like, “it’s coming.” Suddenly, the head crowned and Jenni ducked down just in time to catch the baby as it came out. Quite the surprise! Well, Kristin and Emily come running back to the clinic to grab everything needed for the mother and already-born baby. I stayed back this time because there were quite a number of dental patients waiting to be seen still. But I hear the baby girl, also named Jenni, was quite adorable and precious!

Time is going by so fast and we are all trying to convince ourselves that Christmas is actually coming quite soon, despite the 80-90 degree weather strongly discouraging us from that fact. Only a couple weeks more and off we will be on a new adventure exploring southern Peru. Kristin is flying home for the holidays, but the rest of us are all eventually making our way south to visit Machu Picchu, Lake Titicaca, Arequipa, Cuzco, and Bolivia in order to renew our visas. So, Christmas will be different this year, though I actually might have a white Christmas for once because we’ll be spending much of our time in the higher parts of Peru. Work is piling up as we near the end of the year with deadlines for projects and so the next couple weeks (as the last few weeks have been crazy as well, hence no blog updates for like a month) will be crazy. God is blessing incredibly in this project, and I have been blessed so incredibly much. I am having such an amazing time here in Peru and I wouldn’t trade this time for anything! Satan is trying his hardest to discourage and distract the team and project, but with prayers and support, each difficulty and obstacle can be overcomed and used to increase faith in our Awesome Savior, Jesus Christ. Thank you so much for the packages, words of encouragement, and prayers, I really appreciate it soo very much. Please continue to keep each of us and AMOR Projects in your prayers!! God bless

Thanksgiving Day

2007-12-03T17:07:00.000-08:00

yummy pumpkin pie

Kristin is REALLY excited about the big dinner!

All us ladies excited about all the delicious food we made!!

This year I had the privilege of experiencing Thanksgiving with my friends-turned-family and despite being in a country where veggie-turkey slices, cranberry sauce, stuffing, and pumpkin pie are not easy to find (impossible actually), the holiday was quite delicious, memorable and fun! Kaitlin’s family and Tara’s dad and step-mom were visiting for the week and so we were able to have quite a large get-together, minus the real turkey of course:-). My mom sent down pumpkin pie fixings and other delicious thanksgiving additions, and so I was able to make pumpkin pie, which turned out quite delicious I must say. All of us ladies spent the morning and afternoon cooking lots of food. When we were actually able to sit down and eat, it was all quite delicious. Even our Peruvian friends living with us were able to enjoy our special day of thanks with us!

Student Missionary Recruit Video (short/quick version)

2007-11-01T12:37:00.000-07:00

2007-10-31T16:54:00.000-07:00

riding a pekepeke...
Future home of the Masisea SDA Church
Kaitlin really likes to color!!:-)
Kaitlin coloring with kids at Masisea for SS
pretty much the cutest couple ever
Check out them roots
Fun Sabbath afternoon ride...
The back view of our house..isn't it cute??
The boys like to cook breakfast:-)
The guys harvested over 250 pineapples from our field. yummy
A beautiful rainbow after a downpour

Donate to Emancipate

2007-10-31T06:50:00.000-07:00

A.M.O.R. Projects’ “Donate to Emancipate” Fundraising Campaign

The Current Situation
Could somebody please free us? We are stuck in a hostel room, which we have affectionately named, “The Cage.” Spending almost all sleeping and waking hours in the same 8’x12’ room, you can see the appropriateness of the name. The problem is we can’t leave, at least not now because we have responsibilities and tasks to complete, but it sure would be nice. You see, we are trapped by the necessity of electricity, but unable to leave because we lack electricity back home at km. 38 where the rest of our family lives. Emancipate us!

Machete. Machete grass. Machete vines. I wish I had my lawn mower from home because I am feeling like one. Machete some more. I wish we had a tractor. Ouch! Got stung by a wasp. Again. Now out to the chacra to machete trees. Of course, once we cut them down we have to haul them…on our backs. We don’t have a chain. Could they be any heavier? Oh yeah, we could use a cart, which we pull by hand. I wish we had a tractor. Machete some more. If we had a tractor, we could bushog the back acres, mow the lawn, haul logs for the carpentry shop, and pull the chicken poop in a cart, all in a day’s work, not a month’s. Emancipate me!

Emancipate. What does it really mean? Freedom. Independence. Liberty from something or someone. Absence of obligation. Over the centuries, the word has been used by various religious, political, or minority groups to represent their desire for freedom from a particular cause. What if ‘emancipate’ was used to describe those who are poverty stricken, those with physical illness, or those who are struggling spiritually, but want to change and break free from the bondage of life they are currently under?

The Plan
A.M.O.R. Projects has a plan to emancipate the people in the Amazon Basin of Peru. Poverty, lack of education, health problems, and unemployment plague the jungle villagers. A.M.O.R. Projects’ purpose is to found a surgical-medical clinic and trade school to serve the villagers’ need for health care, health education and trade development. Through the clinic, health issues can be addressed and treated. With the trade school, useful skills such as carpentry, mechanics, bakery, dairy, and fish farming can be taught. The people can then use their newly learned skills to make a living, thus reducing poverty and unemployment.

In order to continue moving towards building the clinic and trade school, we have two big needs: electricity and a tractor. Electricity is vital for the development of industries, on-site administration work, use of quality power tools, project site security, and much more. Right now our volunteer team enjoys a simple lifestyle of candlelit evenings, but electricity is very important for project advancement. Below is a breakdown of the costs for electricity:
$10,450-poles, hardward, equipment, and wires
$9,000-transformer & meter
$1,700- equipment installation
$3, 850- wiring buildings/other expenses
$25,000USD
This is a lot of money to raise, but God is good and anything can happen with His leading. We are setting a goal to raise this money for electricity by Christmas Day! With God’s help and yours, we can reach this goal!!

A tractor is essential for the development and maintance of our 249 acres of land. Hauling logs, cultivating, upkeep of dirt roads/driveways, and pulling out stumps are just some of the many jobs around the property that would be made a lot easier if there was a tractor. Below is a breakdown of the costs for a tractor:
$28,500-John Deere 5403 tractor
$5,000-attachments (bushog, boxblade, cart, etc.)
$1,500-transport from Lima to Pucallpa
$35,000USD
A huge project, yes, but definitely possible. Goal is to raise the money by New Year’s Day 2008!

You can help
Each and every donation, small or large is very much appreciated. To help with electricity or tractor, there are two ways to donate (all donations are tax-deductible):

1. Send donation by mail (please make checks payable to A.M.O.R. Projects and mark electricity or tractor) to the following address:
A.M.O.R. Projects
P.O. Box 212
Loma Linda, CA 92354
2. Online donations possible mid-November at: touchofloveperu.org

Thank you so much for your prayers and support. Please share this with a friend, family member, or someone else who has the same vision of helping others. We are so excited to see how God will lead in this fundraising campaign. Please continue to pray for God’s guidance as we work towards emancipating the people of Peru!

In His Service,

The A.M.O.R. Projects Team
(Dr. Richard Mathews, Jenni Goodwin, Laura Clark, Kaitlin Elloway, Kristin Goodin, Emily Moore, Brent Sherwin, David Skau, and Tara Weeks)

a little trip to the post office

2007-10-29T20:07:00.000-07:00

I just got back from the weekly trip to the post office. Visits to the post office are always exciting for each of us, wondering who got something (and in Tara's case, how many boxes did she get this time:-)??)? Thanks everyone for the steady stream of letters and packages. There always seems to be something in the box for me whenever I visit the post office, which just makes my day!! Thank you soo much:-)

The deal with packages is that when one arrives at the post office, the workers somehow decide whether it should be sent to customs or not. I really don't understand how they make that decision, but I'm pretty sure it's random. I have gotten all of my packages, except for one, stuck in customs. The thing with customs is that if your package is stuck in customs, you can only pick it up on Mondays and Thursdays between 10am-12p. Not too much time to pick from and much of the time, the lines for the customs official are quite long, so being there at or before 10am is optimal. The fait of your package and it’s contents lies in the hands of the customs official. There is one guy who works there that is really nice. He barely opens the box, takes a couple things out, looks at them with a quizzical look on his face as to what most of the stuff in the box is, then puts them back. I find it quite amusing to watch the different expressions on various customs officials’ faces as each item is examined. Then there is the other customs official. He is a lot more picky, wanting my original passport to look at, examining each of my documents with a careful eye. Not only that, but he has a little helper, who opens the boxes and tells him each and every item in the package. He carefully examines everything. Sometimes I have to try explain in my broken Spanish what something is. They are usually satisfied and quite amused by my explanations. This second official also the one that told me last time I visited, that in order to pick up packages for other people, I not only needed a signed letter explaining why the other person couldn’t make it, but also it needed to be notarized.

So today I go to the post office, with a signed paper to pick up Kaitlin’s package, but without it notarized, because it’s expense, quite a hassle, and I was already running late. I found out I also had a couple packages to pick up, which was super exciting!! My camera lens came!! Quick tangent, my camera lens broke a couple months ago, so Kaitlin has been kind enough to let me use her camera. Well, my family decided to send down a old cheap lens to hold me over until someone was coming down who could bring a nicer one. Knowing that the package should be coming soon, I was praying hard that the customs guy wouldn’t charge me for the cheap lens because if they think an item holds any great amount of worth (at least in their eyes), they can charge you. Well, I walk into the room where the customs guy is and low and behold it was the tough, stern, picky guy who looks through the whole package. “Great!” I said to myself, “how am I gonna explain this camera lens to this guy?” Well, I sent another quick prayer to God, and walked calmly into the room. He went through my first package. No problem. Food. Second package. The camera lens was right there, plain as day. I had mentally prepared a little speech about the lens not being worth that much, but the guy didn’t even really listen. He simply put it back in the case and continued on to the next item. I was amazed!! God is so awesome! I was so estatic I didn’t have to pay anything!!

Well, I was able to both of my packages with no problem. Now for Kaitlin’s package. I prayed again, knowing this was gonna be pretty much impossible. As I started to ask about getting my friend’s package (for which I didn’t have a notarized paper), the guy was already shaking his head, NO!! This was the same guy on Thursday who specifically told me I needed to get a notarized, signed paper before I try to get someone else’s box for them next time. Well, here I am facing the same guy a couple days later with a non-notarized paper. No wonder he’s saying no!! I pleaded with him, saying Kaitlin works all day long teaching at the school and doesn’t have time to come in. Besides, I told him, the box is very important because it has a dictionary for her to use at school. Therefore very very important. As I tried to explain this to the man, I could see he was softening up, hinting at the slight possibility of being able to get the package. Then he asked why couldn’t she come in on Saturday. Well, I then explained that as Adventists we don’t come visit the post office on Sabbath, because it is our day of rest. So, somehow, I know it was all God, he gave me Kaitlin’s package!! I couldn’t help but shed a tear as I watched the official fill out the customs form, knowing that God totally softened this man’s heart, just for me I was so shocked! God totally answered my prayers right in front of my eyes! It was soo cool!

I couldn’t help but smile at everyone I passed as I walked down the street proudly carrying my packages, knowing I just witnessed a miracle. It may not seem like such a huge answer to prayer, but to me, it’s the coolest to see God caring for the little things in our day-to-day lives.

“Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father.” –Matthew 10:29

I'm a Hostage

2007-10-18T11:52:00.000-07:00

Right now, I'm feeling a little claustrophobic. I haven't left the small hostel room for about 2 days, except to visit the bathroom down the hall. I look out the window and can only see rooftops and gray skies, but I can hear shouting and police sirens. There is a demonstration march in progress. I walk down the hall and look out another window, which has a view over the main plaza. I watch the people march by, shouting words I don't understand and blowing whistles so loud it hurts my ears. It's a strike.

Pucallpa and surrounding regions are on strike for 48hours for various political reasons. Jenni and I are staying in a hostel, staring at our computers all day, trying to work, without going insane. While on strike, the city shuts down. Shops are closed, taxis don't drive their routes. Everything is closed down. People still walk around and a few motocars and motos drive around, but Jenni and I have stayed inside the hostel the whole time because we aren't sure how safe it is to be outside during this time. We had been in Pucallpa for a couple days already, but when we found out about the strike (the afternoon before it was to start), we drove back to km 38 gathered up some food and headed back to the city. Because this strike is only for 48hours, it is not deemed really dangerous to be in the city. However, if it was a full-blown strike, we would definitely be back at km. 38. There is a good chance that a big strike will hit our region in a few weeks, and if that is the case, Jenni and I wanted to get as much done now as we could. So here we are, staring at the same four walls for the past couple days, finishing up the last of our food from the house. It's kinda fun actually!

Please keep this whole situation in your prayers, as an exteneded strike would create many challenges for our team and the progress of A.M.O.R. Projects!!!

2007-10-15T13:25:00.000-07:00

that's where we camped for the week!

2007-10-15T13:04:00.000-07:00

that's the dental team: Me, David, and Brent

that's me...

2007-10-15T07:35:00.000-07:00

the line forming outside the clinic

our team

The evening evangelistic meetings

Our adorable little cook ladies

such tiny fingers...

2007-10-15T07:16:00.000-07:00

You don't see this everyday...

2007-10-14T22:18:00.000-07:00

Check out those papayas!!

Celebrating Brent's birthday with hats and brownies

That's what happens to your feet when you work in the jungle all day...or don't

Cuidad Constitucion Campaign: Medical Clinic

2007-10-14T22:17:00.000-07:00

Well, our second campaign of the year is already underway. We just got back from a week of clinic at Constitucion. I was really touched by the overwhelming kindness and generousity shown to our team in this town. It was such a blessing!! Arriving early Sunday morning, still groggy and sore from an overnight 8hr. truck ride, we were greeted with open arms from the Adventist church members. We were quickly taken to one lady’s house for breakfast, which was absolutely delicious, then to the church for another breakfast provided by the church. The whole week I was completely taken aback by how warm and inviting everyone was, it was really amazing!! They were the sweetest people ever, always so concerned with caring for our every need and making sure we had plenty of food! Wowzers! Ok, so the food was pretty much amazing!! Lots of food too! I definitely got my fill of yuca! Every meal had either platano or yuca with it. Good thing I like them!!

So this town is about 7hrs by truck. It is only accessible by 4-wheel drive and traveling on the road at night could be quite dangerous. Around 12:30am Saturday night-early Sunday morning, 11 of us all piled into two pick-up trucks with all our stuff and medical supplies for the clinic. Tara, Kaitlin, and I crammed into the extended cab of a pick up truck, along with two Bible workers and the hired driver. For the next few hours, we kinda slept, kinda watched the road, kinda slept a little more.

This was the most layed back clinic ever. No rush or line of people at 6 o’clock in the morning, most didn’t start arriving until 9 or so. Dental was much busier this clinic, which is great because it gave Brent and me lots more practice. Thankfully, Manuel was there to handle the hard cases and help teach David about extracting teeth. Each day we pulled between 50-70 teeth. I’ll highlight some of our more memorable patients:
- 9yr-old boy came in to have his teeth pulled, except he didn’t didn’t want to. He was pretty much forced by his mother. He cried, kicked and screamed the whole time. Manuel, who has seen thousands of patients, said this was his hardest patient ever! I felt so bad for the kid, but it was really hard explaining to the poor boy that he wouldn’t be in so much pain anymore if we were just able to get a couple of the teeth out. With me holding the boy’s hands down, Manuel was able to inject some anesthesia into the kid’s mouth. Between the kicking and screaming (despite being numb), Manuel was able to expertly extract the boy’s tooth. By this time, 45 minutes had passed and there was no way to get the second tooth out, so that was it for the day. The boy and his mother came back on Friday and we tried to get the other tooth out, but we didn’t get too far. Spent 30 minutes trying to calm the poor boy down, but he was just too much to handle a second time.
- I had a young patient who came in with a tooth quite far into the hard palate. I had never seen something like that before, but with God’s help and guidance, it turned out to be quite easy to get out and the boy felt much better afterwards. I saved the tooth! J
- I worked on a patient’s tooth for about an hour, trying to get the roots out. I finally asked Dr. Mathews to come help (Manuel was gone for the afternnon). He spent a good amount of time on it as well. I felt bad for the girl. I’m pretty sure her jaw was quite sore for a while after that experience, but thankfully we got it out and she was ok!!

So, we have this cute little monkey, Frankie, as our pet. However the same affection for him is not shared by all of our team members. Case in point: On Wednesday of clinic, about mid-morning Kailtin noticed that the monkey was unusually tired, slow reaction time, and loss of grib strengh, among other things. She freaks out, knowing that some of our beloved team members (mostly Manuel and Dr. Mathews) have a strong dislike for the little thing, she asks around, trying to figure out if anyone had done anything to the monkey. Of course, it didn’t really help the situation knowing that the monkey had been tethered to a table leg in the pharmacy area, and the possibility of him finding a random pill or liquid on the ground could be pretty good, considering the little creature loves to eat almost everything (at least it seems like it).
Well, as time passes it quickly becomes apparant that the monkey is acting quite drunk and cannot for the life of him walk, much less in a straight line! It’s really funny, though sad/scary not knoing exactly why he is suddenly acting this way. Kaitlin is still probing Manuel and Dr. Mathews trying to find out if either one of them did it, but of course they’re not going to admit anything (at least not right away). With pressue building against the guild-ridden face of Dr. Mathews (Manuel had been busy with dental the whole morning so he couldn’t have done anything), the pieces to the mystery puzzle of what happened to Frankie slowly are put together.

Despite Dr. Mathews proclaiming his innocence, he is in deed quite guilty. Somehow, in the course of the morning, he found the time to sneak over to pharmacy, pop a Diazepam (Valium) pill from the container and try to feed it to the monkey. The monkey for some reason wasn’t too excited about eating the pill straight so…the doctor calculates the “correct” dosage a monkey should receive of the stuff, dilutes it in Amoxicilian/water solution, puts it into a little water bottle cap and gives it to the monkey. Of course, being that this monkey is willing to try anything and with his love for sweet things, quickly downs the whole solution! Somehow, Dr. Mathews is able to do this whole operation without anyone seeing him. Crazy!
So for the next 36hrs. The monkey came in and out of conscienceness, sleeping lots and not being able to do anything else. Though whenever a platano was shoved in his mouth, he would suddenly come alive and eat like mad! Finally after acting drunk and just completely out of it for over a day, the monkey finally came out of his hazy state, much to the relief of everyone, including doctor!!

An outline of a campaign

2007-10-14T22:16:00.000-07:00

During the time us student missionaries are down here in Peru, A.M.O.R. Projects has divided up the time into about 5-6 major campaigns. A major campaign lasts for six weeks, the first week being the medical clinic and the last five weeks being a public health program called Familias Saludables aka Healthy Families. Throughout the entire six weeks is the evangelistic meetings, with a children’s program each night before the main program. Communities of around 1000-3000 residents are usually good places for the campaigns.

The medical clinics consist of seeing patients for 5-6 days with medical and dental needs, performing basic/simple surgeries when needed. The Familias Saludables program is run by our two lovely nurses, Kristin and Emily. They live in the community for five weeks working with about 20-30 families to educate them about ways to improve basic hygiene/sanitation, nutrition, home environment, and help with family planning (financial, goals, etc.). In the evenings the girls run the children’s program which consist of lots of singing, a Bible story, and a craft or coloring (which the kids LOVE). Peruvian Bible workers run the evangelistic meetings in the evenings, but have Bible studies with contacts and make home visitations during the day.

2007-09-28T06:47:00.000-07:00

raindrops

Domingo studying with a contact

Kristin, Emily, and me

2007-09-28T06:38:00.000-07:00

Me, Tara, and Kaitlin after church

The boys after a long day in the jungle

One of the Bible workers, Domingo, and me before leaving for visitations

Suzy Homemaker

2007-09-28T06:35:00.000-07:00

Well, the last couple weeks have consisted of me staying at the land almost the whole time and just working on the computer. When I run out of battery life (no electricity at our house), usually cooking meals, shopping at the market for food, doing laundry, random stuff usually takes up the rest of the day. Either I go into town and I am able to charge my computer or sometimes if it has been sunny enough outside, I am able to charge my computer at the house by our solar-powered charger. Since Tara and Kaitlin are both gone every morning teaching English and music at various local schools in the area. David and Brent spend their days, at least recently, cutting down trees and clearing the jungle. After even just a few hours of working, they come back covered in soot and dirt from burning and carrying wood. Quite a sight! Their pearly white smiles really shine through!J So that leaves me to hold the fort down! It gets really quiet at times, such a change from eight people all talking at once!!

This last Friday I was Miss Suzy Homemaker! Haha…David, Brent, and Manuel left in the morning for Masisea (former campaign site that we are doing some follow-up work at) for the weekend. Jenni had been town the last few days and who knows really when she’ll be back! Tara and Kaitlin had left for the day on a field trip to the zoo with one of their classes. So that leaves me!! Mauro and Edwin (two of the Peruvian workers) were outside working and since they speak pretty much no English and I speak very very little spanish, it made for a pretty quiet day. Cleaning house, making lunch, washing clothes pretty much took up Friday. I got stung by a wasp in the morning, which was a new experience for me, but it was all good. Thankfully it wasn’t a lot of African Killer bees, of which we have hives close to the house. Bad idea! I really had a lot of fun though on Friday cause it totally reminded me of Fridays back home: listening to music while cooking and cleaning, making it quite fun preparing for Sabbath. Yesterday, was a really great Sabbath! First off, it was absolutely beautiful outside! The last few days had been quite overcast with smoke, so not so pretty. Sabbath was crystal clear blue skies with white fluffy clouds high in the sky. Of course, it also means it’s gonna be hot, but that’s ok every once in while. I was able to play the piano for church, which was fun, but since the piano is out of tune and some of the keys don’t work, it was interesting. It has been such a blessing to hear these people sing. Some of them don’t have the greatest singing abilities, but that doesn’t seem to stop them from singing. It is so great to come to church and hear everyone singing their hearts praising God! I had a lot of fun playing the piano, mostly because they are all so forgiving with all my sight-reading mistakes, not to mention that Spanish songs are written differently from English, at least it seems like it. In the afternoon, the church had choir practice and so I played the piano for that as well. I am so blessed every time I go to visit the church because they are all so thankful and blessed by all of us SM’s singing/playing talents or attempts as they may be. It really is amazing!!

2007-09-16T09:01:00.000-07:00

more pictures....

2007-09-16T08:58:00.000-07:00

more pictures...

2007-09-16T08:52:00.000-07:00

2007-09-13T07:07:00.000-07:00

2007-09-13T06:50:00.000-07:00

Inahuaya

2007-09-13T06:28:00.000-07:00

So in a previous blog I mentioned we were going to Iparia for a mini-clinic. Well, plans change and we didn’t end up going to Iparia. Instead, the night before we were to leave for this mini-clinic plans fell through and Jenni was frantically calling around, trying to find a place for us to go. We had already bought medicines and were all packed and ready to go, we just didn’t have a place to go. On top of that, there was a medical team of 14 people en-route from Gordon Adventist Hospital in Dalton, Georgia who were still planning on having a clinic. Thankfully, with God’s help we were able to find a place. Inahuaya is a river village about halfway between Iquitos and Pucallpa, meaninging a 24hr ride on a boat launch.
Throughout this whole clinic experience, the word flexible took on a whole new meaning. Changing clinic destinations less than 24hrs before departure, changing boat launches, differing arrival/departure times, things just not working the way you planned them are all different ways our faith and flexibility were tested last week. The trip to get to the clinic itself was such an experience. Spending 24hrs on a boat was a new experience for me and it was really fun! We all bought hammocks and lounged in those pretty much the whole boat trip, though some of the time we held a little clinic for those on board. What was really awesome about this medical team, was not only doctors and nurses were coming, but also people trained in optical, eye-glass fitting. During clinics, this was the hot place to be. The lines for optical were always the longest!! I was able to learn how to test people’s vision and find glasses that fit them! Being able to help give someone the ability to see things again is so cool. The look on the person’s face when they are able to see again is amazing!!
When we finally arrived in Inahuaya around 2:30am Friday morning, we were pretty exhausted. Clinic started around 8:30am that morning, leaving little time for sleep. Each day of clinic was to be spent in a different neighboring town. The term “neighboring” is used loosely to refer to any town within 2hrs of traveling. Some days the trip to the clinic location took 20minutes by motocar, other days it took 30minutes by pekepeke and 1-1.5hrs by walking/riding a horse cart/motocar, not leaving took much time for actual clinic. AMOR and Gordon groups were divided into two different groups, each going to different locations for the day and returning to stay in Inahuaya for the night.
Because of there being two groups, our dental team was split as well. Manuel went with one group and Brent and I went with the other. I was excited yet kind of nervous being on our own without some experience teeth-puller watching over your shoulder. Yet, I was calm, knowing God would be guiding the hands in each procedure. The first day was really discouraging for us. We didn’t have the right tools to pull properly and each tooth we had to ask Dr. Mathews for help on, which was frustrating a little for him as well. However, the next 3 days of clinic went much better!! We got the right tools and with God’s help were able to pull quite a number of teeth. In between patients, I was able to hang out with the kids and get to know them, though with my limited spanish, it proved to be quite difficultJ

After the clinic, the Gordon group left for the States and the rest of us went to some hot springs about 25km from Cantamana. They were so amazing! I had never been to hot springs before and to be in a stream of hot water was a totally new experience for me. We slept by the hot springs in a large hut. It was so relaxing to fall asleep in your hammock listening to the water rush over the rocks nearby! The next morning, we hiked out to the main road and started walking back to Cantamana. Since it had rained the night before the roads were too muddy for the motocars to come and pick us up, so we hiked. Dr. Mathews had borrowed a motorcycle for the trip and was going to shuttle us back to Cantamana, so we wouldn’t have to walk all the way, but the motorcycle broke down. So the guys tried to push the bike through the mud for quite a ways, but 25km is a really long way to push a motorcycle, so the bike was left. And we walked. And walked…and walked. We hadn’t exactly planned on hiking this far, so hiking in the mud and on an empty stomach early in the morning was a tiring experience. Yet, it was such a blessing because nobody complained at all. Despite our backs hurting, having no breakfast, and just being discouraged that the bike wasn’t working, everyone was laughing and making the best of the situation. The hot springs were literally in the middle of the jungle and by walking out, I was able to spend more time enjoying the scenery and take some pictures! The early morning sun shone brightly on the green grass and the clear blue sky above was absolutely beautiful!!

Franky Asuito Gordito aka MonkMonk

2007-09-13T06:13:00.000-07:00

I can now say I’ve had a monkey for a pet! Last week, during clinic, someone sold Jenni a monkey and so now we have a monkey to play with. Actually, our duties consist mostly of cleaning up after him and changing his diaper. Yep, we made diapers out of old socks. The need for the monkey to be wearing a diaper at all times quickly became apparent after going through multiple changes of clothes in one day. So we made diapers…The monkey is quite small, about the size of a small kitten. His hands are so cute! Tiny little fingernails too! He loves to cuddle and cling to everyone! He’s so lovable, yet some of the SM’s aren’t so in love with him. Some not so affectionate names, such as Monster, Terror, and Pooper are quite common with the monkey-haters. Kristin and David have even been plotting different ways to give the monkey as food to Cheva, our beloved, yet dumb rotweiler who has shown quite a bit of interest in eating the monkey on a number of occasions. Cheva has already killed one of the baby sheep and is looking to expand her tastes with monkey meat. So, it’s an on-going battle everyday to save the little monkey!

2007-09-12T22:33:00.000-07:00

a little creature, a vampire bat to be exact that we found in our house. Some of the girls had seen and even felt some sort of bat-like create flying around the last couple days. I had not seen it, crazy though enough I hadn't put up my mosquito net yet because we had just gotten back from a clinic and hadn't yet made the time!!

Food

2007-09-12T22:31:00.000-07:00

So I love food! All of us SM’s love food. So much so that I’m pretty sure it’s our favorite topic. We talk about food we are craving all the time: before meals, while we are eating, when we’re going somewhere, when we are washing dishes, so yeah all the time! The food here pretty much consists of rice, pasta, potatoes, beans, eggs, and platano (that is, at least for the non-meat eaters). Whenever we go out to eat, rice and some form of beans or potatoes or eggs are served, with fried platano as a side. Usually soup is served, but since it has chunks of beef or chicken floating in it, I usually ask for a salad instead. Ok, so the salads are soo delicious. Lots of fresh, crisp vegetables. Mmmm…..cabbage, tomatoes, cucumbers, lots of avocado (yumm), carrots, etc. The salads are soo good-and without any salad dressing except lemon juice and salt!! I am so thankful that we are able to have fresh vegetables that taste great and are inexpensive! The fruit is really good too, though right now there isn’t any really in season except for platano (which I’m pretty sure doesn’t ever go out of season). Pineapple and mango season is coming up really soon, like next month, so I can’t waith for those fruits!! I’m learning to like papaya. I’ve found that the more yellowish looking variety tastes pretty good. We can also get mandarins and oranges, which are quite tasty but also full of seeds! We also have fruit salads, though not as often as vegetable.

Peruvian food has a strong Chinese influence. Soy sauce is used quite frequently in dishes. In Pucallpa, there are quite a number of Chinese restaurants. Some of them are quite touristy and more expensive, but others are quite economical. Lunch today was called Arroz Chaufa, pretty much Chinese fried rice. It’ definitely a favorite dish among us SM’s and Peruvian workers. There is also a pasta dish that is very similar to Chinese Chow Mein. It’s really good!! We found this one restaurant that serves this pasta dish and also the Arroz Chaufa for really cheap. I have never seen so much pasta piled onto one plate in my life---all for 3.50 soles or just over $1!! It was huge. I’ll have to post a picture sometime!!

I’m so excited to share all this amazing food when I get back to the states! So much great food, I’m really happy that I’m not tired of beans and rice yet. It’s kind of hard to cause there are many different ways to cook rice and since I’m hungry I’m not gonna complain!

Breakfast usually consists of fruit, bread, hot chocolate/roma type drink called Ecco, and hot cereal. Now, Peruvian hot cereal is quite thin. Normally it’s the drink and suplimented by rice and beans and fried platano. Sometimes we’ll have a sweet rice porridge type thing and so thats good. Eggs are really cheap and so sometimes, like this morning, we’ll make eggs and potatoes.

Lunch is the biggest meal of the day and is usually salad, rice and beans, and some form of potato or fried platano or boiled yuca. Yuca is a really starchy version of potato. It’s solid stuff. At first I thought it was pretty gross, but it’s growing on me and it’s quite good now!

Dinner is usually pretty small with popcorn, tea/Ecco, bread and fruit.

Birthdays, Fire fighting, and storms

2007-08-28T15:22:00.000-07:00

So, Sunday was my 20th birthday, which was spent shopping for food for this campaign! It definitely was a different way to spend it, but that's ok, cause we all went to ice cream Saturday night and I totally ate too much ice cream!! It was amazing though!! Well, sunday was a really long day, but it definitely got exciting when we got home. Turns out, Manuel had started a fire on our property and it had gotten really close to our house. So to come home and see smoke and tree logs still smoldering about 20ft from the house was less than comforting. It also seemed like the whole community around Km 38 had wanted have fires as well, so there was quite a glow on the horizon as we drove home that night. Thankfully, God provided a tremedous downpour about 30 minutes after we got home to put out any possible fires, which I was very happy for!!

The storms down here are quite amazing. Sunday night's storm was soo incrediably loud that I couldn't even sleep. The rain was pounding on the tin roof so loud, I couldn't even hear myself talk! Yesterday, we had a crazy wind storm. We were eating lunch and suddenly the wind picked up and started blowing so incrediably hard. The tin was rattling really loud, so much so I was afraid it was going to rip off, which wouldn't have been too fun. Cheva, our beloved, but dumb rotweiler dog, was barking at the roof as it rattled and tried jumping up to it. It was soo funny! Cheva is afraid of thunder and now I guess tin roofs!

Iparia

2007-08-28T15:12:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm sitting in a hostel using the free wireless internet that we found while staying here the last couple days. It's been pretty cool! I'm waiting to hear whether or not we are leaving for Iparia tonight for our next campaign or if we'll be leaving in the morning. Lack of communication with some important people has caused this delay and so, by the looks of it, we'll be leaving sometime tomorrow morning.

I'm actually really excited about this trip. We are leaving by boat for a 16hr. ride down the Ucayali River to Iparia where we will be holding clinic for 4 days. All of us SM's are quite excited about using our newly purchased hammocks on the boat! A medical team from Georgia is joining us for this trip, which will be awesome. We will be working among the Shipibo Indians, providing medical and dental care. The dentist who was with us for the last campaign is now gone and so Brent and I are basically on our own! Kinda scary! We have a Peruvian worker who is a crazy teeth-pulling machine, but the language barrier creates some problems in learning how to pull teeth!

2007-08-25T20:43:00.000-07:00

2007-08-25T20:25:00.000-07:00

1st Campaign

2007-08-25T19:47:00.001-07:00

Woah! What a week! It's been such a crazy long, stressful, tiring week, but wow it's been really great at the same time!! Our first medical/dental campaign started on Sunday morning, around 9am. We left our house about 6:30am and drove to the site, which actually wasn't too far from our house. So we did 5 1/2 days of clinic, from about 8:30 to 5:30 or whenever all the patients were seen for the day.

Learning teeth extractions hands-on style is totally new thing for me! We saw around 50 patients each day. Extracting teeth takes lots of patience and time, though at times it's just easier and less painful to yank the tooth out and get it done and over with. Manuel, a Peruvian who is an expert tooth-yanker, helped out and showed Brent and me some techniques. He's a maniac!! crazy. I definitely wouldn't want to get my tooth pulled by him! :-)

Days were really busy and long. Nights were short and frequently interrupted by roosters crowing, dogs barking, and people talking. We slept in the house we were using as a clinic and so people would start lining up early in the morning (like 1am on Friday morning!!) in order to get a ticket, because only 70 were passed out in the morning and 70 more in the afternoon. Otherwise, we would be treating patients 24/7! By the second day though I was so tired, I pretty much slept though everything, so I got pretty good sleep.

The previous weekend right before the clinic started, some of us had traveled again to Masisea to visit the church members on Sabbath. So I had had no time to catch up on the sleep before leaving for the clinic. It was just one thing after another. But God is awesome and gave us all the strength and patience to deal with each situation and patient in a kind and Christ-like manner, despite the lack of sleep. God really blessed and we were able to help lots of people, though at the same time, there were still so many people that need help. At times, I feel we are only helping the current toothache or health problem, but not teaching a lifestyle change that could help to prevent further problems in the future. That's where Emily and Kristin come in. Starting today, they will be living in the community for about 6 weeks trying to help instruct and educate the locals about how live a healthier lifestyle, which I think is a great idea!! I'm really excited to see how this new concept will work out! Please keep this campaign in your prayers as Satan is really trying to discourage the Bible workers and the campaign!

Earthquake

2007-08-17T07:02:00.000-07:00

Just a quick note to say that we are all safe from the earthquake. All of us had just sat down to eat dinner and were in the middle of prayer when a weird rolling sensation started. I thought I was just really ditzy and about to faint, but everyone felt it, so. Then we found out more about what had happened. We are all hoping to be able to go sometime and help with the relief effort but it´s hard to say when. God is good!!

2007-08-14T16:19:00.000-07:00

Masisea

2007-08-14T16:18:00.001-07:00

This last weekend was one huge adventure after another! This summer Ansley and Carly spent about six weeks in a small river town about 6hrs south of Pucallpa. Peruvian Bible workers had also been holding an evangelistic series there and by the end of the series, started a small body of church members. So this last weekend, the head Bible worker, Domingo, and Jenni, our on-side director, decided to visit Masisea for do some follow up. So all of us SM’s, five girls and one guy decided to tag along and see for ourselves what Masisea was like. In the short time we had been with Ansley and Carly, I had heard quite a number of stories and experiences, so I wanted to see for myself what Masisea was like.

We left Friday morning around 10:30 from the port in Pucallpa and traveled up river (actually south) to Masisea. The port of Pucallpa is the most dirty, disgusting, place I have ever seen in my life. The river is pretty low right now, because it is dry season and so in order to get to the boat, you have to walk through mud and muck, which seems to stick to your shoes and anything else it comes in contact with. Not only that, but the mud has so much trash, banana skins, paper, sewer, you name it, I’m sure it was there. There really is so much pollution in that area, it’s just really sad. The boat itself isn’t much better. It’s crowded with lots of people, carrying their produce, soda cans, and whatever else they can sell, with them to the next port. The boat is just a larger version of a peke peke, very old-fashioned by American standards. Platano, papaya, and other items are placed on top to be sold in other villages along the river. The stench of the whole area is really what got me. Everything smelled rotten and disgusting. No sanitation whatsoever. The trash from the shoreline of the river would get in the river and contaminate the river as well. Seeing people going to the bathroom in the river was a commen occurrence. The boat ride lasted for about 5hrs. These are the times you hope for no diahhrea, because there aren’t too many options for going to the bathroom except just using the river as the boat rides along and everyone watches you! Also, the boats aren’t the most comfortable things to sit in especially when your seat is made of wood. The whole experience was new for me, and despite it all, it was quite fun, though it was really sad for me to see how so many people live, even in the 21st century.

After arriving at our stop, we had about a 30minute motorcar ride to Masisea itself. While we were riding, we passed soo many papaya trees! I had never seen so many before. No wonder papaya was a very common gift to give visitors!! The church is made up of very new members and nobody really knows how to run things, so us SM’s helped out with the Friday evening worship and also church on Sabbath. Brent preached on Sabbath for church and us girls sang special music and told children story. Friday afternoon before the evening vespers, we were able to play some soccer with the local children. We all had so much fun and I think they were quite excited to be playing with some white kids from the United States. All the kids down in Peru are amazing soccer players; all soo naturally talented, it’s crazy! We were supposed to leave on Sabbath afternoon and head back to Pucallpa, but it decided to rain and man did it rain!! We all huddled in our tin house that we were sleeping in for the night and listened to the rain pour down. Whenever it rains, the boats don’t run and so we were stuck in Masisea until the next boat was scheduled to come, around 4am Sunday. So we were able to spend a few more hours in Masisea, though most were spent watching and listening the rain come down. Boy, was I glad I brought my raincoat. That was a lifesaver for sure!

The hostal where we were staying for Friday (and eventually Saturday night) was right by the center of town, across the street from the plaza. And since no Peruvian home has sound-proof walls, we got to hear lots of different sounds Friday night. A bar/party was right behind the hostal, so I got to fall asleep to techno music. Also Peruvians like to have chickens and so that means there needs to be at least one rooster around as well, and since these particular roosters can’t tell time, they decide to do their cakadoodledoing at all hours of the night. I think the rooster at the hostal also had problems of some time because his cakadoodledoing sounded like he was dying each time Through Ansley and Carly, I had also heard of rats and other questionable creatures scurring around at night and wreaking havoc. I had a hard time sleeping because I would always wake up to little noises that sounded like rats could be in the room. I’m not a big fan of rats at all and so needless to say, none of us got much sleep, though when I think about it now, the whole situation was quite amusing!!

After the Sabbath sundown program, we played games with the local children for a little while, which was really fun! We had quite a number of children playing, but we had lots of spectators watching as well, observing our attempts at duck-duck-goose and other fun kid games. The children really looked like they were having fun and it was so great to see the smiles on their faces and be able to bring a spark to their life even if it was only for a little bit.

Being gone from the States for only a couple of weeks and all of us are already craving American food! BBQ chips, nachos, ice cream, chocolate, and pizza, just to name a few. It is quite a hot topic of conversation! Saturday we all got horrible cravings for junk food and so we hunted down a Peruvian style Seven-Eleven/gas station and stocked up on the Peruvian versions of junk food. I will have to get used to their brands of chips and other junk-like foods, but it’s possible. With the knowledge we would be having to leave around 4am to catch our boat back we headed off to bed early.

In order to get to the port, we had to get two motos, but by 4am we only had one, so Kaitlin, Kristin, Marjie, and I piled into one of the motos and followed Domingo (the Bible worker) and Brent who were both on Domingo´s motorcycle to the port. Since it had rained so hard the roads were very muddy and slow to navigate. Not too long into our drive, Brent had to switch over to our moto because he was too heavy and the motorcycle was fishtailing all over the place. So Marji went on the cycle. So the four of us left headed off into the darkness of the Papaya tree jungle. Our moto stopped at one of the villages close to the port. Since none of us really knew Spanish and it was still quite dark outside, it was definitely a sketchy situation. Luckily in a few minutes the rest of our group showed up, but by then we had to run to the port, which we found out was about 1 mile farther down the road. So in the early morning dark with only our headlamps to guide us, we speed walked to the port. Thankfully the boat was waiting for us and we were able to catch up on our sleep. This boat was much smaller, and the seats were long narrow boards, needless to say, we were all very excited to get off the boat and go home and get some sleep.

2007-08-14T16:13:00.000-07:00

2007-08-14T16:06:00.000-07:00

Huge prayer requests

2007-08-14T16:05:00.000-07:00

I have a huge prayer request for this week. Actually a couple. First, we are having our first campaign starting on August 19, which will last for a week. Then two of our nurses will stay in the village for six weeks living with the people and trying to teach and educate the villagers about nutrition, hygiene, home improvement, etc. This is the first campaign so it’s going to be kind of crazy! This week, there is a dentist visiting who will be training Brent and I about administering anesthesia and pulling teeth. Please pray that the campaign will be a success and God will guide our hands and minds to treat the patients and villagers in the best way!

I have another huge prayer request. There is a good possibility that in the area where I’m living there will be a strike starting on August 20. This basically means that all life stops in Peru. No transportation anywhere, food bought or sold, no stores open, so pretty much nobody does anything. I don’t know all the politics involved with the strike or why it’s all happening, but the strike would not be a good thing for us. There was a strike at the end of June that lasted for about 10 days. Many of the Peruvians hadn’t prepared for the strike and they starved. It wasn’t a good situation for many of the Peruvians. The people who could afford to stock up were fine, but most Peruvians can’t afford to buy lots of rice ahead of time.

If there is a strike, we are not able to go anywhere or do anything. It is safest to stay at km 38 and hang out, waiting for the strike to end, which could possibly last for 30 days or so. The sad thing is if there is a strike, we will have to cancel the medical campaign and possibly the health campaign that the nurses would be doing. A lot of work has already been put into this campaign. Dentists and other volunteers are traveling down here to help out during this campaign and it would really be sad if it didn’t work out. So please pray for this situation, as we don’t really know for sure what is happening!! We are going to be stocking up on rice and beans and other basic essentials to be prepared in case the strike happens. It would definitely be a memorable adventure. So if you don’t hear from me for a while, it’s because of the strike. God knows what we can all handle and He will work out everything for the best!!

visit to the zoo

2007-08-08T09:58:00.000-07:00

We visited the zoo and saw lots of pretty animals. We also became quite an attraction to the Peruvian visitors!!

A sunset at Km 38 (our home)

2007-08-08T09:56:00.000-07:00

The past and current Southern SM´s in Peru

2007-08-08T09:49:00.000-07:00

Past are Carly and Ansley
Current are Emily, Kristin, Tara, Kaitlin, and Me

There is a guy too, but...definitely lots of girls!!

the first breakfast in Peru

2007-08-08T09:47:00.000-07:00

2007-08-08T09:37:00.000-07:00

Mingling Cultures

2007-08-08T09:36:00.000-07:00

Mingling Cultures

We have been so blessed to having some Adventist Peruvian workers living and working on the project with us. So while eating meals, there are always Spanish lessons. They are quite amused by our horrible attempts at learning their language. We are all learning, but it’s definitely going to take a while!! It has been really cool to see how everyone has been included in conversation, despite an obvious language barrier between most of us. Saturday night, we played some games and were able to convince the Peruvian workers to play with us despite having no translator and all us SM’s knowing little Spanish. Amazingly enough, we were all able to use the little Spanish we knew and hand motions to describe the games. The whole evening was quite hilarious and I can honestly say I haven’t laughed that hard in a while!!

A Novelty

2007-08-08T09:35:00.000-07:00

I absolutely love Peru! The Peruvians are amazing people. Just soo friendly and nice! Walking down the street in Pucallpa with four other American girls is quite a sight and the Peruvian men make sure we know it’s a wonderful sight for them to behold. The constant cat calls, whistles, and stares makes it all but impossible to blend in. We had an experience the other day which was quite amusing.

On Sunday, the group of us, which now consists of a guy as well, Brent from Andrews, took a trip to the Pucallpa Zoo. It was really great to see some of the beautiful animals that the Amazon has to offer, yet it was quite sad to see so many of them in really small cages. Many of the animals looked quite sad and scared, walking back and forth quite swiftly in kind of a nervous manner. The spotted jaguars had the most beautiful green eyes and I just wanted to cuddle up and pet them (though, at least on earth that wouldn’t be such a grand idea). The black panther also had some beautifully peersingly yellow eyes against his velvety black coat of fur. They are such beautiful creatures!! The monkeys were definitely the main attraction. Watching the spider monkeys crawl up and around the walls and ropes was so entertaining. While watching the monkeys “fly” around, the girl who had come along with us “gringos” to translate and show us around the area, told us that some of the local Peruvian girls at the zoo wanted to take a picture with all of us. Needless to say, we were all quite taken aback and amused by this idea. But not knowing what else to say, we went along and posed for quite a few pictures, as more and more Peruvians wanted to have their picture taken with us. None of us had taken a shower that morning because we had all been in a rush. With the humidity and walking around everywhere, we definitely didn’t look our best. So being the celebrities at a zoo was quite hilarious to us. Afterwards, we decided we should start charging money for each picture!! For the rest of the time there, we had quite an entourage of Peruvians, mostly children, following us and attempting to converse, though it was quite slow.

While, still at the zoo, we were interviewed on some TV show for Pucallpa about what we thought of the park and Pucallpa, so maybe I’ll be able to get a copy and post it! So the trip to the zoo was quite memorable for us!

Too many wonderful surprises

2007-08-08T09:34:00.000-07:00

Upon arriving at Km 38, which is the main site for construction and living for those involved with the project, I was really surprised as to how nice the house was we were to be living in for the next 10 months. The previous SM’s had been living in tents, taking bucket showers, using a hole in the ground as a bathroom, basically camping for a whole year. With this knowledge, I had planned to be living be rough for a while, at least a couple months until there was running water to have a shower. The five of us girls (all from Southern) were taken aback by how large the house was. The house consists of five bedrooms, each with two beds, and a kitchen. There is also a main eating/social area in the middle. The roof is made of tin (which is going to make those downpours of rain extra loud) and the floor is made of cement. The walls are all made of wood, hand chopped and cut from the jungle. Lots of sweat and hard work was put into our wonderful new place we call home! After getting a tour of the area, getting a run-down of the bucket shower process and checking out the bathroom situation, I quickly realize that taking a shower will take longer than normal and it might just be safer to not go to the bathroom at night because coming face to face with some creature staring at you in the middle of the night is not my idea of a good time, especially when you are half-asleep.

But God is amazing!! Less than 24 hours into our stay we are surprised with our first miracle. The Peruvian workers have been working hard laying water pipes and building the shower, but we had been told it would be at least another couple weeks or so. Somehow the men completed the shower by mid-morning. Some of the girls had already experienced a bucket shower earlier, but I was privileged to be the second person to take a “real” shower. It was a super amazing surprise! Then, by mid afternoon they have the toilet installed and we are able to use the bathroom in style, without after to squat over a maggot infested hole and having to walk though questionable territory (especially at odd hours of the night). Granted we had to pour water ourselves because the flush wasn’t working, but that’s not a big deal. I just couldn’t believe how amazing it was to be upgraded to a real shower and bathroom so quickly upon our arrival! So spoiled!!

By Friday, the Peruvian workers had set up a sink outside the house with running water and also a sink in the bathroom! And Friday afternoon, there was even running water in the kitchen sink. I just couldn’t believe how spoiled, but incredibly blessed we all were to be able to live pretty comfortably (minus the mosquitoes). God has blessed so much already!!

2007-08-03T12:35:00.000-07:00

Well, I’m here safely in Peru, to be exact km 38 at the main house. The trip over went super smoothly and nobody lost luggage or anything. God really was with me throughout the whole flight over. I was stressed out because one of my suitcases was overweight and my carry-on was absolutely huge, but thankfully I had no problems on any of the flights. On our flight over to Pucallpa, the five of us girls had tons of luggage and totally went over the limits, but the airline didn’t even charge us, which is amazing!! God really watched over all of us.

My flight left at about 6am from Sacramento, CA and I flew to Houston, TX. I was able to catch up on some sleep, which I was very thankful. After getting to Houston, I met up with Kaitlin, who is another SM who will be teaching English. The layover in Houston was about 3 1/2 hrs. We then boarded the plane to Lima. The flight was about 6hrs, which seemed liked a long time for me. Since I don’t know hardly any Spanish (I can understand more than I speak) I had my first experience on this Peru trip with communicating with people who don’t know English. I sat next to a cute older lady who didn’t know any English and since I don’t really know Spanish, it was kind of awkward at first. Thankfully, the lady on the other side of me could translate, so I was given my first unofficial lesson in Spanish!

The flight over to Pucallpa was beautiful! We were able to see the Andes mountains, though there wasn’t much snow on the peaks. On the jungle side of the mountains, everything was soo green. So much water everywhere. The rivers slowly meander through the trees, it´s quite amazing!

Peru is a really beautiful place, though the cities I’ve been to so far have been quite dirty. I have had so much fun riding around Lima and Pucallpa just observing the people and their way of life.

Last night I was able to look up at the stars and see millions...We are right below the Milky Way and it is just breathtakingly beautiful. The sky is soo clear and I can just see forever!! I´m going to try to take a picture, but we´ll see.

I´m here!!

2007-08-01T15:52:00.000-07:00

Just a quick note to say I´m here in Peru, safely. The trip over went so smooth, God really answered my prayers and even exceed my expectations!! well, gotta run!

Here I am Lord, send me

2007-07-29T23:12:00.000-07:00

I'm getting really excited about leaving!! I feel the butterflies in my stomach and it is making it hard for me to sleep. The butterflies are not only of excitment, but also nerviousness, a little scaredness, and just a little apprehension of the unknown! I leave in about 36hrs to begin my biggest adventure to face me in my young life! Actually I have already started the adventure a few months ago when I decided to commit to a year of student mission work. I had no idea all the paperwork, purchasing of supplies, and all the little details that go into a trip like this would take so much time and energy to complete. Yet, here I am on the verge of leaving for Peru and have so much energy and excitment I can't contain myself. I'm still having a hard time grasping the whole concept of actually being away from the people I love and the environment I feel at home in and replacing it with a year of uncertainity as to what is exactly going to happen to me. But in the end, I realize what a great opportunity I have to learn to rely completely on God for everything. There are going to be many times that patience and my faithfulness to God will be tested, but by God's grace I will conquer all obstacles and return a stronger servant of the Lord.