So, last week was really cool!  We visited children in 2 different hospitals in the city.  Two people from the gringo team dressed up as clowns and gave out balloons.  Our Peruvian friend Liby that leads one of New Hope´s kid programs sang songs and had us do motions to them.  Then we colored and read books.  It´s one of my favorite things from this summer – I could really identify with the children and their families.  And their hospitals definitely aren´t as nice as Children´s Healthcare of Atlanta!  I was able to speak to one mom for a while and tell her all about the project.  She was really interested and said she was a lawyer and would love to help with whatever she could.  So, I got Jose and Danelle to talk to her – hopefully she gets involved!  Her son had been in the hospital for 10 days with fluid in his lungs…he should be out by now!

On Thursday, we visited a senior citizens club (that´s the best thing I can think to call it).  They performed for us!  It was so much fun.  80 year old women sang and danced (all dressed up in costumes) and recited poems for us.  Then we played a few competitive rounds of BINGO – they were serious about winning that sweet bread!  At the end, we danced with all the old folks!   Friday we went to a women´s jail and did crafts, played volleyball, and just talked with them.  That was cool – a few of them gave their testimonies about how they became Christians in jail.

This weekend Emily, the American missionary family, and I had a little break and went to a town called Cajamarca, in the mountains.  It was an 8 hour bus ride, but definitely worth it.  The town was really cute and we went on a tour of a national park called Cumbe Mayo, which is all these rock formations way up in the mountains.  Its gorgeous!  We also saw the new Batman movie, but it was kind of hard to follow in Spanish.

We have 1 more group and 11 more days before we leave.  It´s gone by so fast!  I can´t believe it!!!

The past 2 days we had a retreat with a group of Peruvian college kids from the city.  It was some of the most fun I´ve had in a while – we got to laugh a lot!  It´s the first time in about a month that  I´ve been able to hang out with a big group of kids my age – I didn´t realize how much I missed college folk!  haha.  Emily and I ended up having to do a lot of translating, which was definitely entertaining for all involved.  We played lots of silly games, one where I busted it on a concrete slab and have a few bruises to show for it.  We also made things that resembled smores, went for a ride in a leaky boat that almost sank a few hundred times.  Good times.

Tomorrow we´re going to church and there are going to be several baptisms, and I think that some of the kids from the retreat will be getting baptized.  I´m really excited about this week because it´s a change of pace.  We´ll be spending most of our time in the city, going to a hospital, women´s jail, etc.  Then, Saturday we are going to the mountains for a little break with the missionary family.  Woot!

We made it!  July 7th – I can’t believe it!

The other intern, Emily, sent an e-mail update to her friends and family, so to save time, I thought I’d just steal some words from her!:

“It has been a busy time for me and Joy. When the groups come, we spend the whole day in the barrio. We usually leave around 8:00am and usually don’t get home until about 6:00pm. Since I last wrote, we have had three more groups come from the United States. The groups stay for about a week and each one has worked in a different barrio.

The first group was from Parkway Christian Church in Surprise, AZ. This church worked in barrio Alto Trujillo 6a where they built a swing set and helped to pour cement for a sports court. They also hosted a women’s tea and a barbecue for all of the people who help Nueva Esperanza in that barrio. With this group I basically helped with translating, making sure everyone had the tools they needed, and then just chatting with the group and the people in the barrio.

The next group was made up of El Centro Church in El Centro, CA and Pomerado Christian Church in San Diego, CA. This group worked in the barrio called Los Libertadores (the liberators) in Alto Trujillo. This group was also focused on doing construction in the barrio. They helped to put up a swing set and a really nifty jungle gym as well as helped to build a wall. I also helped to toss/pass about 1, 000 bricks along a line of people from a ditch to the other side. I was sore for days, but I’m getting my brick-tossing technique down pat!

The group that is here now is from Chandler Christian Church in Chandler, AZ. They are working in the barrio called Milagros (Miracles). Yesterday was their first day in the barrio and we mostly worked with kids. We had some activities and crafts for the kids and then some games and activities for the families. It was a fun day and a neat way to get to know the people in the barrio.”

Today we are having fun hanging out with the Bukta girls!  We helped them with their school work, went out to lunch, and now we’re just having fun until the group gets here tonight for a full out Peruvian dinner!  Papa rellena (a potato filled with meat and fried), tequenos,  arroz con leche, and some other yummy stuff.  It’s always fun!  Each group does this one night while there here.  The business side of Nueva Esperanza also comes to sell scarfs, ponchos, purses, etc made by the women in the barrios.  All the money goes straight to the women who made them.  They are eventually going to import them to the US.  It’s a really cool project.

So things are going well!  Can’t believe we have been here over a month already!  Hope everyone is having a great summer!

It´s been a while!  The computer I normally use has been out of service the past week or 2, and I have no time to go to an internet cafe or anything, so I´ve been MIA for a bit.  But Mom, there´s no need to worry – I´m fine!

New Hope works in 7 different barrios around the city, and each barrio has one or more sister church in the states that helps support it.  Right now we have 2 groups here together.  They are from 2 sister churchs in California that support the same barrio, Las Libertadores (I think that´s what it´s called). One of the churches is in a border town and most of the people are some part Mexican, almost all of them are completely bilingual!  I´m so jealous!  haha.  But, it´s really great to have a team that can really communicate with the people here and get to know them on a deeper level than most gringos. 

It´s also been awesome to have some sunny days finally!  I think so far we´ve had about 4 1/2 sunny days within the month I´ve been here.  It´s intense, but it definitely boosts my mood!  As does chocolate…they have this awesome chocolate bar called Sublime (pronounced Soo-blee-may) that I eat a lot. 

I can´t believe we´re over the half-way mark now!  I had a rough day or 2, but cleared it pretty well.  It´s all down hill from here, I think.  I´m getting more comfortable with things every day, and someone even commented on how I just seem to know things and just dive-in to whatever is happening.  That was a surprise to me because I had been feeling really incompetent and confused for a while there! 

Haha…I started writing in Spanish and then realized my audience! 

So, 2 more work days with our first group of gringos.  It´s been good…definitely tiring!  The past few days Emily and I have left our house around 8 am and regrasamos anytime between 8 and 10 pm.  Needless to say, we´re tired!  But it´s been good.

All the men have been doing manly construction…moving bricks, building bathrooms and houses.  Mostly moving bricks.  Us women help with that when kids aren´t surrounding us.  But usually we have over 100 kids doing crafts and playing games.  It´s pretty much been all the same the past few days…in the mornings I help with games and crafts and such…then we eat lunch…help a little with construction…then play volleyball or dodgeball until time to go.

My favorite was yesterday…we played with bubbles and I got to hang out with some pretty cool chicas.  We played volleyball, telephone (in Spanish!), and they taught me a new game called ¨Ula ula.¨ 

My Spanish is so-so when I´m hanging out with the gringos…but tonight at dinner we talked for a while with the family we´re staying with and I understood a lot!  It was fun.  When we´re with gringos, I´m supposed to be somewhat of a ¨translator,¨ which is pretty funny sometimes.  I usually know enough to figure out what really matters…and if not I call the bilingual missionary kids over.

So, things are going well!  I´m really glad I´m here!  I´m trying to add some new photos, so take a look!

My last relaxed day before teams get here…so I figured I should make an entry!

My Spanish is improving a little everyday.  At dinner the other night I understood the majority of the conversation, even jokes, and made a couple of jokes myself!  It´s amazing how those little things can be so encouraging! 

Every time I begin to get super frustrated with the language barrier, God sends a little something to keep me going.  Like yesterday, for example.  It was our last day of Spanish class, which I must admit, I was ready for.  I was beyond frustrated with it and ready to be done.  But the last day was good and I was sad to see my teacher go.  We had to ask people on the street what time it was, buy some candy from a street vender, listen to songs and pick out words, etc.  And then…

Yesterday afternoon we went to the local univeristy and played volleyball and hung out.  I think my team lost the majority of the games, but it was fun.  Afterwards, Emily and I hung out with a few of the guys from our organization´s college group.  I helped them with their English homework, which I loved!  We walked around town for a bit, too.  I love those guys, which makes me a bit sad that the groups are coming because I won´t get to see them much at all anymore.

But, I am excited to get started with our work in the barrios!  Our first team of gringos gets here tomorrow.  We´ll go meet them at the airport, take them to their hotel, and let them rest a bit before we get started.  After that, it will be go-go-go.  7 am to 5 pm everyday in the barrios!  I don´t know exactly what to expect as far as the teams go, but I´m excited to find out!

Thanks so much for reading & for all your support!

Another cloudy day in the ¨land of the Incas.¨  I highly doubt Trujillo now bears any resemblance to what it was when the Incas were partying it up.  I bet it was prettier without all these buildings and taxis everywhere.

Last night was fun.  Emily & I went to the mall with our new friends, Karin and Rosa.  We bought some board games for their college group, saw What Happens In Vegas at the movie theater (which was actually better than I expected) with some loud Spaniards sitting behind us who compared Lima to Vegas, met up with Milton and had some McFlurries from McDonalds, then walked around the streets of Trujillo.  It was definitely nice to walk around, since we never really get to because we can´t go anywhere by ourselves.  We can´t even leave this fortress we live in just to walk up & down the street, because apparently we live in the worst part of town.  It was also fun to teach Karin English slang and try to understand Milton´s long, drawn-out stories in Spanish.

I´m really glad that tomorrow is our last day of Spanish class!  Our teacher kind of speaks English, but she usually doesn´t understand what I´m asking her.  It´s starting to get really frustrating…and I´m tired of her giving us homework on my summer vacation!  haha.  Tomorrow we have an exam and we have to talk to someone in Spanish on the phone.  Should be fun!  Today after Spanish class, we got a break!  We came home and had lunch (which included brains & rice pudding), studied Spanish on the roof, did our laundry & hung our clothes to dry on the roof, watched a couple fight on the street, laid in bed, I did my homework, and now here I am.  Woooo.

 

Now, to answer Nicki´s questions…

What kind of food do you eat… most important question. Do they have ice cream?   Let´s see…at our house for breakfast we have ¨drinkable yogurt¨ with cereal, bread, and hot tea.  For lunch we either have soup, meat, potatos, & corn, or beans or something like that.  With bread.  Always bread.  And the guy we live with puts mayonaise on EVERYTHING…luckily we don´t have to.  There´s always dessert at lunch…chocolate cake, jello, and rice pudding is what we´ve had so far.  For dinner we either have a piece of bread or a sandwich…lunch is the big meal…and I do mean BIG.  Dinner is just kind of whatever.

And yes, they have ice cream.  It´s not quite as creamy as what I´m used to, but still good.  They even have McFlurries!  I´ve had 2 so far…everyone here loves McDonald´s.  haha.

Do they like Indiana Jones?  Yes, they do.

Is the missionary family nice?  Yeah!  They´re cool.  The dad is really funny & sarcastic.  The mom is nice and likes to talk to us.  They like movies a lot.  They have 2 girls who are 12 and 8, and they call us their sisters!  They are hilarious and we have lots of fun together.  The girls are pretty much fluent in Spanish – they could probably teach us more than our Spanish teacher!  I love them! 

Do people stare at your blonde hair?  Yeah, kinda.  My Spanish teacher calls it ¨cabello gringo.¨ We definitely stand out in a crowd with our light skin and hair.  But it´s not too bad.
It’s hot as Dante’s millionith circle of hell up here in Ga.  I´m sorry to hear that.  It´s a tad bit cold & windy here today.

 

Oh yeah, don´t forget to look at my pictures (to the right).  It takes me forever to upload them!

Little by little…

So, you take Spanish every year since 9th grade & you´d think you could hold a decent conversation with someone, right?  Wrong.  I´d like to blame it on public education, rather than myself…but I´m guessing both are to blame.  The worst is when people try to talk to you, ask you how long you´ve studied Spanish, and then you say 6 years.  One guy who knows some English said, ¨¿Seis años??  What´s wrong with this??¨  haha.  Or when the little girl got so tired of trying to talk to me that she ran off.  Yeah, good boost for my confidence!  haha.

But it´s getting a little better cada día.  I understood a lot more at dinner tonight.  And I find myself not remembering what language people speak to me, just that I understood whatever it was they said!  (when I actually do understand, that it)  haha.  And I randomly think things in Spanish…so I think those are all good signs.  But sometimes I just want to scream if I hear another Spanish word…so, it´s a love-hate relationship…haha.

We have 3 or 4 more days of Spanish lessons with the lovely Sandra, so hopefully by the time American teams (aka ¨los gringos!¨) get here I should be able to converse!  haha.  Our first team comes next Friday.

Our bags got here!  YAY!!!!  An answer to pray!  Just when I had resigned to never seeing my bag again…viola!  Gracias a Dios!  (Thanks be to God!)

Hope your summer is going well!  My winter is great down here…a little cloudy, but perfect temperatures!

So, I´ve been in Trujillo, Peru since Sunday.  We made it here safely, miraculously!  Time-wise they´re only an hour behind, so that has been helpful in getting acclimated.  The loss of our luggage, however, has not!  haha.  As of yesterday the airline had no idea where the bags were, except that they aren´t in Peru.  They`re working on finding them, but it seems they´re having some trouble.  We´re okay with out them, we packed the necessities in our carry-ons and whatever else we need we should be able to buy, but it would be nice to get our luggage soon.  The one thing I need that I might not be able to buy here is tennis shoes – apparently my feet are too big for Peru…haha.

We´re living in a very nice house with a Chilean missionary family.  We eat 3 meals a day, lunch being the biggest (VERY big…I am always beyond full, muy llena!).  The parents come home from work for lunch every day…and they have a cook & a cleaning lady.  My mom would love that!

We started Spanish classes yesterday.  A lady named Sandra comes to the American missionary´s house.  Today we walked around the supermarket learning words and then read Little Red Riding Hood in Spanish.  Tomorrow she said we´re going to the park.  In the afternoons we´ll be hanging out with some college kids who want to speak English.  So, that should be fun!

We went to a barrio (poor neighborhood) yesterday.  Once American teams get here, we´ll spend most of our time in the barrios.  It is so sad – most people live in huts with dirt floors, no bathrooms or running water.  There was a 15 yr old girl there who had just had a 5 month old baby.  The program I´m working with is going to get her in school, so that will be good…but it´s just so sad.

Sorry, it´s hard to write a lot…but I´ll try to keep you updated as much as I can.  PLease pray that we get our bags, for our language learning, and all the people we´re meeting, that we can communicate well with them!

Now, if you were here, I´d say ¨Chow¨ & give you a kiss on the cheek, Peruvian style. 

After lots of flights and delays and running through terminals…we made it! 

That´s about all I got right now…haha.