Ant eater and Welcome back Warren

Sunday April 21 - Tuesday April 23, 2013

Once again, I procrastinated and did not blog for these 3 days. So I am not able to provide a detailed description of what all happened. Sorry to disappoint. But I shall give the main points.

Sunday:

Because Eric and I were the only ones going to town today, we were able to take the moto in! How cool is that? It was even more exciting for Eric because he drove on the way into town and it was his first time driving the moto here in Bolivia on the main roads. Having the moto also allowed us to stay in town longer than usual because we had a ride bike for free.

We also met this tour guide a few weeks ago who lives above Juliano's restaurant. He saw Eric and I eating and asked us if we were interested in a tour. We bagan talking and told him that we wanted to go look for internet. But he offered for us to come on up because he has WiFi. When we got up there, he had a pretty cool little office set up. So Eric and I set up our stations and got online for a couple hours. Best part was, it was free! And he said that since we are only going to be here for a couple more weeks, we could use it anytime we want.

Monday:

Today Juan and I changed the oil in the truck and looked over other things that could be repaired. We also worked a lot on drying/cleaning the rice that we had harvested. Then for work program, we had several kids working on filling in the holes where electrical wire was laid.

Armando voluntarily came over to help me with the rice even though work program was over. He saw that I was alone working and just wanted to help. Then, after awhile, he said "Teacher. Who is you favorite kid?" I told him that I didn't have a favorite because all of them were my favorites (wow, I sound like a mother). Then he asked who I trusted. I told him that I trusted a couple of the boys including him, but not some of the others. Then he asked one final question. He asked "Teacher, at this moment, right now, who is the most helpful?" That's when he finally got the answer he was looking for. I told him that at this moment, I would have to say him. Then he got a big smile and gave me a hug.

Tuesday:

Today I spent awhile in town getting more money out of the bank to fix the truck and taking it to the shop. This was also Juan and Emmy's day off, so I had to catch a taxi back to Familia Feliz. Before I left to go to town though, I stopped by Missy's house and her kids started yelling and pulling me into the backyard to see something. Apparently there was an anteater in the tree behind their house! It got there ealier in the day and the dogs started to attack it before Missy's kids intervened.

Wednesday April 24, 2013

Hm, what happened today. I feel like most of today I was confused at what was happening. First thing I did was to go with Juan, Samuel, and Gerry to go and pick up wood to build a bridge in Familia Feliz and at the entrance.

Now you listen hear mister!

The reason for the bridge at the entrance is because the people who have been paving the road have also been installing very deep and large drainage ditches on the sides of the road. However, in doing so, they have effectively blocked Familia Feliz in. We can no longer leave, or come back with the truck. We originally had a deal with the workers in which they told us that they would build a bridge or something so that we oculd get across. But just today, they decided to back out on that deal.

When we go to the wood place, the guy wasn't there. So we ended up just sitting there waiting for a long time until we decided to just take the wood and pay him later. Then, when we got back to Familia Feliz, we sat there waiting again. This time until Juan could talk with the workers.

Later this afternoon, Samuel and I tried to use the lawnmower because it was supposedly fixed. But while we were trying to start it up, it just kept shooting out white smoke all over the place and randomly shutting off. We could not figure it out. So we called the smartest guy in the world over, Juan. He spent awhile trying to figure out what was wrong and decided the we needed to let it run for 30 minutes before we used it again.

After that, it was no problem. Then, Later that afternoon during the work program, I mowed the lawn in front of the school. It is actually a soccer field that I think the kids use every single day. I was pretty excited and was doing a pretty good job right up until the belt broke. Then is was back to square one with the lawnmower not working.

However, the good news was that it broke down right when Eric and Juan were pulling out to go to town. They waited for me to put the mower back and grab my stuff so that I could go too. I personally didn't have anything to do, but because the work program was over, I decided to go ahead and go. I mean come on, who passes on a free day to town?

The highlight of the day came this evening. That anteater that I mentioned before was now in Missy's house. Her son Edgar apparently caught it and brought it into his room. Eric saw it and got super excited and came over to get me. We then spent a long time playing with the little furball. Ant-eaters are apparently pretty dangerous and aggressive. But fortunately, the dogs had gotten to it first and wounded it. It was still pretty fiesty though.

Thursday April 25, 2013

This morning, Eric and I got a little treat. We got to go to town! Samuel came back and Eric asked him if he would cover for him while Eric and I went to run a few errands in town. The main reason we needed to go was to pick up the rest of the new school desks that Eric had ordered.

While in town, we did several things. We shopped for food, took some things to get cleaned, picked up desks, and got online. However, the desks took the longest. It was not a simple pick them up and go. Apparently, the carpenter did not make the desks the way that he promised he would. So while I moved all the desks outside and loaded them onto the truck, Eric made a deal with the guy that if any of the desks broke, he would fix them for free. After we finished with our errands, Eric and I were able to get a little free WiFi internet. We ended up just sitting in the truck outside of Narguila's on our computers using the internet. Because it was not our day off, we only sat there for about an hour or 2 before heading back.

We had strategically planned our return trip to brig us back right at lunchtime. Genius right? After lunch, we had the days normal relax time (for maybe an hour), then it was time for the work program. For work today, Eric and I helped unload the desks, clean the classrooms, and dried/cleaned rice.

Later this afternoon though, we did the usual afternoon activity. Soccer. We all played for a long long time and I played shoeless to boot (pun intended). All

For dinner, Eric and I treated ourselves to a little something special. We had a bag of mashed potatoes (designed to feed a family of 8) that we decided to make along with some mushroom gravy that had been sent to us awhile back. Wowie. It was all too good. We enjoyed every last bite while relaxing to a movie in our room. After each of us ate enough for 4 people, we were full. It was a good night.

Friday April 26, 2013

TGIF! This week has been a little bit of a slower week. But I think thats normal as things are starting to wind down before our departure. Thinking back, the time has absolutely flown by. But thinking forward, it is going very slow.

Today was yet another bread making day. And today, we actually had enough flour purchased to do so. I only had to round up a few other ingredients from a couple of other houses. While baking bread, I had the time to wash all of my dirty clothes. This kept me pretty much constantly busy. Also, on top of that, Emmy also sent over 7 trays of items that she wanted me to bake for her as well. Other than that, bread making days are pretty uneventful.

Some exciting news, Warren got back today! He has been got for about 2 weeks maybe? But it is sure nice to have him back here. He had planned to go to La Paz to figure out passport issues, then he wanted to go to other sites to visit. However, he got pretty sick in La Paz and was not able to continue traveling around.

This evening started out very relaxing. Eric and I were sitting around welcoming the Sabbath and some rest. I asked Eric "arn't Sabbath's so much more relaxing when we don't have to worry about giving the sermon or teaching Sabbath School?" Not more than a few minutes later, there was a knock on our door. It was Warren. As it turns out, he was on the schedule for the Adult Sabbath School AND the Sermon. So instead of doing both, Eric and I were just put in charge of doing the sermon. Uh oh.

Eric and I immediately began to try and figure out what we were going to do. We decided that it would just be best for us to do a couple of childrens stories and give a message about it. But then came the cherry on top; I remembered that 30 church members from up the road are planning to visit tomorrow for church. Oh boy. They are not going to want to hear a little kids story for a sermon and are expecting a well put together sermon.

Later this evening, Eric had to go and talk with Missy for a bit. While there, Missy voluntarily offered to do the sermon instead of us. Crazy blessing! We just went from being very relaxed, to very stressed, to very relaxed again. I don't know if I can handle this kind of emotional roller coaster much longer!

Saturday April 27, 2013

Well, so much for a relaxing Sabbath. We had a very good Sabbath with good weather. It was just simply a very busy sabbath.

As I said before, Eric and I were able to squeeze ourselves out of doing a sermon for the day. That was a major help to us for sure. However for some reason, I was completely drained today. I had to use every bit of strength I had to stay awake in church. All the while knowing that I had a full day ahead of me.

After church, we had a potluck lunch with all the visitors from the other church. then right afterwards it was time to head out for the outreach program where we walk along the road, then go to peoples homes and sing for them and give them bread. This is always super fun to do, but again, Eric and I have been running on reserve power all day long.

The outreach went great and we went to several homes. Everyone greeted us with open arms and was ready to listen. We sang songs, read some scripture, and then prayed for them. Great Sabbath afternoon.

As soon as we got back to Familia Feliz, it was time for rounda where we did even more singing. Then shortly thereafter, it was time for the Saturday night social. This was really fun and all the kids seemed to really enjoy it. We played some tag games, some jumping games, and some listening games. It was funny, even though these were all kids games, I still broke a sweat! It was probably because I had two cute "leeches" the whole time. I had 2 kids holding onto me no matter what I did or where I went because they wanted to do good like me.

After the games, it was the time I had been waiting for all day! Relaxing time in my room! Sweet.

You stay civilized.....Planet Earth!!!!



 

Crazy Jungle Trip!!!



thinking back, this was a bad idea...



Sporting my new skills

Our fearless guide Judah

Sunday April 14, 2013

SUPER FUN DAY!!!! Since I stayed at FF last night, I had to wake up at 4:45 and make my way to town as soon as possible to make sure I had some time to upload my last blog with some pictures, and to make sure that I didn't miss our trip. So I met Eric at the hotel where he had slept and had about 1.5 hours of internet time.

Now the time had come, everything online was taken care of, snacks had been purchased, and it was time to roll out. When it was time, we loaded up into a red Land Rover with our group. We had 10 people cramed in there so it was pretty uncomfortable and then we had to drive 3 hours with our new found "friends."

The group that we were placed in, was 7 young Isreali's who were all friends. Our group was going to prove to be the only downside to our whole weekend. They were loud, obnoxious, rude, inappropriate, smoke, drank, cursed, and were doing drugs throughout the whole trip. They seemed to like Eric and I pretty well, but they had short fuses with the guides and were not patient at all.

The rudeness of the others in our group turned out to be bittersweet. After seeing how the Isreali's acted, the guides and other workers began to like us better and give us special treatment. For example, after our long drive, they brought us to this restaurant that was included with the excursion price. Everyone got 1 plate of surprisingly good food. But sure enough, the Isreali's were not satisfied. Then they began to ask the waitress for more food and said what they had already cooked and provided wasn't enough. But they waitress said no and there wasn't anymore. Then she told Eric and I that there was a little more rice and corn if we wanted. Then she brought Eric and I (who were sitting at the same table), a big plate of rice and another plate of corn. When the Isreali's saw that, they said that they wanted more too, but the lady just looked at them and said she doesn't have anymore food again. Eric and I thought it was so funny and had to surpress our laughter while the Isreali's got irratated.

After we ate, we had another 15 minute drive to a national park where we met our guide. When we pulled up, there were several boats, guides, and tourists. Thats when we met Judah, our guide. Thats when we all loaded up into the boat and took off down the river.

This river isn't a typical river. It is more marshland. It was a massive expanse of marshland with a network of rivers going through it. It could not have been any more beautiful! The weather was absolutely perfect too. The past 3 days had been very rainy and gross. But today was beautiful and sunny which only enhanced our experience.



Easy there killer...

Going on our 2 hour boatride, we had a nice little breeze that felt amazing on a warm day. The boat was a simple boat that was long and narrow with a little motor bolted to the back. While on the boat, we stopped a couple times to see turtles, birds, pink dolphins, and a tree-full of monkeys! We we got to the monkeys, he drove the boat right up to the tree and as soon as he pulled out a banana, the monkeys all began to jump on the boat from the tree. There must have been 30 monkeys there. Non of which were afraid to be around humans.

It didn't take long to notice that Judah liked Eric and I more than the Isreali's. For awhile, they were rocking the boat and being loud. They were not enjoying or appreciating whenever Judah pointed out animals like Eric and I did. They also didn't speak much spanish which didn't help their case.

After our boatride, we drove up to an extremely cliche and very awesome swampshack place. It is totally secluded and looked more like a bunch of boards randomly thrown together with hammocks hanging in one area and about a 10-12 foot aligator right below the planks where we walk. It was so cool to see. This was to be our homebase for 2 days. The hammocks however is where Eric and I were going to spend most of time at while there.

We just arrived, and we have already seen some of the greatest thing nature has to offer. We have seen aligators, monkeys, crazy looking birds, turtles, pink dolphins, owls, and boom boom potato yucca's! Nature is good.



Our fish drawl carriage

After we chose beds and set our stuff up, they gave us some popcorn and water as a snack, and then we headed out again. Now, they took us to a beautiful place to watch the sunset. This part was one of the weaker parts of the trip because that location was set up as more of a drinking spot. It was a beautiful sunset and we really enjoyed it, but the beauty was a little tarnished by the loud music and all the "gringo" tourists that were there drinking.

Following the social came a little more fun. Aligator hunting! I have only been aligator hunting once in Brazil and it wasn't very successful. But at least I knew how to do it. This proved to be very advantageous. Because the only aligator we caught, I spotted deep in some brush. Even the guide didn't see it at first (and he saw everything) so I was pretty proud of myself. He then drove the boat over and snatched it up and let us play with it. Then he showed Eric and I that we could put it in our mouths like we were eating it! What do you think?




This guy slept right under us

After hunting for a bit, we headed back to the lodge to eat dinner and relax. After dinner is when the bongs, alcohol, and drugs came out. I literally watched these guys rolling marajuana and smoking out of a bong that was made out of a gatorade bottle. While they all did this, Eric and I went to the opposite end of the place, grabbed some hammocks and listened to the birds, frongs, and fish. Completely relaxed.

I also want to point out how impressed I was with the food. Every meal we had, they gave us a food for vegetarians and it was always very good. They even made a special kosher meal for one of the guys in our group for every meal. This was a big relief for Eric and I because we thought we were gunna be scrambling to find non meat food.


Because we were very tired, and the Isreali's were up to nothing good, Eric and I actually went to bed at 8:45. We thought the plan was to wake up early to see the sunrise and head back so we wanted a good nights sleep. The beds were actually more comfortable than the one I have been sleeping on at Familia Feliz.

Monday April 15, 2013



One of the beautiful views on our boatride

This morning, I didn't set an alarm. That alone in itself means that I am on vacation! Reguardless, we still woke up around 8 or 8:30. Eric and I assumed that breakfast wasn't quite ready yet so we went directly to our favorite spot, the hammocks. While there, we watched monkeys crawl on the rooftops, pink dolphins swimming, birds diving into the water catching fish in their mouths, and birds that could swim and dove under the water for 10 seconds at a time. All this over the perfectly still water with the sun shining on it. Not a bad morning. Then came the call for our delicious breakfast.

Thinking we were going to start heading back after breakfast, Eric and I were surprised when we talked to our guide and he said we were about to go hunting for anaconda's. WHAT?!?!? How cool is that? I have already held and played with monkeys, had an aligator in my mouth, and now I get to hunt anaconda's? Sweet. He came to Eric and I first before anyone else knew and let us choose our boots first. Then once everyone had their boots, we headed to the anaconda field.

We were probably in the field for no more than 30 minutes before the Isreali girls started to complain. They said that they were girls, not boys and they should not be walking in the mud. Wow. By now, I think our guide was fed up with them because they have not been listening to him and have been putting us way behind schedule. Knowing that Eric and I wanted to keep hunting, he sent us up with another group while he took the others back.



Reminds me of my family

I felt so bad for our guide for having to deal with these guys. But Eric and I headed up to the other group to keep searching. Unfortunately, we were not able to find any. We walked in muddy marsh for about 2 hours, but because of all the rain recently, it was too wet.

After we got back to the base, Judah (our guide) tied a piece of raw meat to the end of a stick to feed to aligator. He was teasing it and the aligator was jumping up trying to snatch it. It was quite the show. Afterwards, Eric and I relaxed in the hammocks for a little bit longer until we had lunch and left. But yet again, the Isreali's weren't listening to Judah and kept on being super slow. So we packed all of our stuff and put in the boat and told Judah to yell for us when the slow pokes were ready. He really appreciated us and told us no problem.

Because we didn't stop too many times on the way back to see all the birds, turtles, and monkeys, we were able to get back in a little over an hour. But that ride is so incredibly comfortable. Especially because of the great weather we had yet again.

Our crazy crew

When we got back, the Land Rover was waiting there for us as it was when we left. We loaded up and were off back to Rurre. The trip would have gone pretty good except for awhile, we literally had to stop every 30 minutes (we actually timed it) to stop and let the girls go to the bathroom. It is probably because of all the drinking they did last night and this morning. The driver buddied up with Eric and I because he knew we wern't the problem and it was just as annoying to us too. However, a little later, part of the axel broke on the truck which added about an hour onto our journey. Unable to fix the broken part, our driver decided to just keep going but to go really slow. Fortunately by that time, we were only about 20 minutes away.



Hooter!

As soon as we got back, we were greeted by Pepe (no, not pee pee, Pe Pe) the boss, with a bottle of ice cold Coke for all of us. That was extremely refreshing for all of us. Then we all took a couple pictures then headed our separate ways. Eric and I caught some dinner at Juliano's, had a little internet, and then luckily caught a ride back in the Familia Feliz truck. But before we headed back, we had to stop and pick up a General Electric refrigerator/freezer for Missy!!! How cool is that? Now that we have electricity, she can have a refrigerator here. Not only that, but she said that she would let Eric and I put some stuff in there if we want.

Our miniature vacation has been amazing. We had such a great time and it was actually really cheap especially considering vegetarian food, lodging, animals, a guide, and beautiful scenery. Now we are back to the land of children and work. This is also a momentous day in that as of today, we have exactly 1 month left here at Familia Feliz. This too is a bittersweet occassion.

One other thing to note, on the way back to Rurre, Eric and I saw a Cabyvara (I think thats how it's spelled). A Cabyvara which is the world biggest rodent. They are actually quite tough to find and very ugly. But we happened to drive by at a lucky time.

Tuesday April 16, 2013



Yet another great view from the boat

Today was yet another great day. It was Juan and Emmy's day off which is normally a little more stressful because Eric and I have to take care of the kids. However, after breakfast and before I started working, Jerry came over and asked me if I wanted to cross over to San Buena with him so he could see the lady's house where we are thinking about building. He wanted to assess the situation to see the land and also if it is even possible to lug all the wood up that mountain trail.

I was a little hesitant because on Juan and Emmy's day off, I am responsible for lunch because Eric has class. But Jerry assured me that it was going to be a quick trip because he wanted to get back. That, and we were taking the motor bike. Meaning we can get into town fast, do our thing, and get back fast. So I agreed.

As soon as we got into town, started to not feel so good. Every step I took brought me closer and closer to puking. But I wasn't there yet. I really wanted to get it out too because once you puke, normally you are good to keep goin and get on with your life. Fortunately, I was about to exert myself some more and that might help facilitate it.

We took some moto taxi's down the main road until we got to the turn off to walk up to her house. Then Jerry and I started our long walk up. It didn't take him long to realize that it will be a nearly impossible job with just a few guys. It would literally take us a week of hard labor just to move the wood up there. Good news is, shortly after we made it to the top, I was able to clear all the junk out of my stomach.



I´m watching you....

The other good news is that the mom was up there as well. Normally she works so I'm not sure why she was there. This was good because we wanted to ask her if she was planning on sending her kids back to Familia Feliz to go to school. But she has no intentional of doing that. So we now have non of her kids at Familia Feliz. Then Jerry asked her about getting guys to help carry wood (which was her only responsibility to build the house) and she said that she doesn't want to go to her friends or local churches and ask. This puts us in a major predicament on what to do about the house.

As we were leaving, Jerry was telling me more of what she said because I missed most of the conversation due to my puking situation. Then, all of a sudden, we saw this snake in the middle of the path and it scurried away really fast. It's crazy because on our entire excursion this past weekend, we didn't see a single snake. Then when we were not looking for one, we come across one.

As soon as we crossed back over, I went online for about 15 min to send a couple emails. Then right
before we left, Jerry and I stopped by the mail place just to see if I had a package. And what do you know! I did! SCORE!!!! It was from a good friend of mine in Roanoke, Tim Hogan. The package had very....interesting things inside. It had tons of water flavorings which was great. But it also had some very interesting items like one of the extendable pointers that teachers used to use in the old days. They can sometimes be used as a form of punishment for kids. It is always so great to get a package!

But on the way back to Familia Feliz, the highlight of the day came. I have really been wanting to learn how to drive a motor bike especially before I leave Bolivia. Well, Jerry knew I wanted to, so shortly after we got out of Rurre, he just started to slow down and came to a random stop on the side of the road. I asked him what he was doing, then he asked me if I wanted to learn how to drive! I was so excited.

I slid forward, and he hopped on in the back and I took off. I had already learned what all the buttons and petals did. Now it was just putting them to work. Then, surprisingly enough, I nailed it first try. No problems. No spinouts or wheelies. Just a simple, smooth takeaway. Then I shifted all the way up, then all the way down a couple times just to practice. It's actually quite easy and beings how I have been driving stick shift all my life really helped me a lot. It is a very similar concept to a manual car.

I had an amazing time driving it! I even had to go off road a couple of times because the government hasn't paved the whole road yet. Jerry said that I was doing really good and that i've got it down. So mom and dad, next Christmas, just write down a dirtbike. That would be great. ;-)

Then once we got back to Familia Feliz, Jerry told me to drive all the way over to my house because he knew that I would want to show Eric. I laughed and told him that he already knew me too well. As soon as I pulled up, all the kids ran out and wanted a ride. So I did 2 laps around the field and took a couple of kids. Driving that bike has been a big highlight in my Bolivia adventure.



Midnight snack

For the work program, we all worked on clearing a massive tree that fell in our backyard a few days ago. It destroyed our clothesline and could have easily killed someone if they were standing there at the wrong time. But fortunately no one was hurt and we were able to chainsaw it, then clear it all up today.

Wednesday April 17, 2013

First thing I started on this morning was taking down then fence around Warren's house. He is actually not here because he is dealing with Visa issues, but he had told me that he was wanting to take it down. I just wasn't sure how much. So for today, my goal was just the fence in his front yard.

After I finished rolling up the wire and taking down the posts, I decided to shovel a little bit. Thank-goodness we are done with the making the hole part. Now that we are done connecting the electricity, it is a simple filling in issue. I figured it would be a lot easier. however, the sun has baked all the dirt we had removed and it was just as hard as removing it in the first place.



A swampy paradise

I mostly wanted to just fill in the trenches that were going across the road making it difficult for the trucks and moto bikes to cross. It was tough, but because I wasn't going to do a ton of it, I could handle it. Hopefully now the road is back to normal. I may have to make a few adjustments though.

This afternoon was actually quite exciting. Because a big tree fell and almost hit our house in a storm last week, Juan wanted to cut down a couple others. Looking around our house, he saw at least 4 more that posed a threat to our humble aboad. That means we spent all afternoon cutting down trees.

Now when I say trees, I mean trees. These boogers are extremely tall and have a rather good thickness as well. The first tree we pulled down we started with a wrench that had a rope attached. The we began a series of launches to get it looped around a top part of the tree. Then after it was secured, we rounded up the boys and all of us began to pull while Juan cut. We were pulling in a side direction to make sure the tree didn't fall on the house. It worked quite well.

The last two were not only huge, but a lot clser to the house and leaning more directly towards it. For these 2, after we looped a rope, we attached it to the truck. Yet again, growing up on stick shift paid off because I needed to drive the truck while Juan cut. Not going to lie, I felt a little pressure. If I messed up, our entire house could get destroyed! The first one we got down with no problems. Well, it did destroy the soccer goal. The second came very close to doing some damage. However, the bulk of the tree missed the house. After it was down, we simply needed to reattach the rope to a different spot on the tree while I dragged it off of the house.



When did Ryan get here?

It was quite the fun experience. It was also a big help that the kids worked very hard all day. I think they were a little more motivated because this was exciting work. The other reason it was nice that they worked so hard was because after the trees fell, they had TONS of ants all over them. But they didn't slow the kids down. Just Eric and I.

Thursday April 18, 2013

Sorry folk. I don't remember too much from this day. I forgot to blog about it. All I remember is that in the afternoon, we all went to work on filling in the ditch that is running all over campus. But I was unable to do too much because I was starting to feel very weak and a little sick.

Friday April 19, 2013



Livin large

I really don't have too much to blog about for today. I felt pretty poopy for most of the day. Fortunately, it's not as bad as it has been before. But all last night and this morning I had some serious chills and my head has been throbbing all day along with some other sickness related symptoms.

Armando has continued becoming a lot closer to me and impressing me. Today he wanted to talk with me and have me put my arm around him. He told me that he was going to pray to Jesus and ask Him to make me better. At lunch, before I came out of the room, he asked Eric if I was going to go on the outreach program tomorrow singing for the neighbors. He told Eric that if I didn't go and still felt sick, that he wanted to stay back with me while everyone else went. I wasn't even there when he said that. Eric told me about it later. Anyway, I have started to take a special liking to him.

Saturday April 20, 2013

Sabbath! Got an extra hour of sleep this morning! Super duper! Well, this morning I was the teacher for the early teen class. Surprisingly, I don't mind this too much because I don't have to put nearly as much work into the kids class as I do with the adult class. Class went really well and the kids did really well with their memory verse and study questions.

After church, we were able to rest up for a couple hours before we headed out to do the outreach program. Unfortunately, we were not able to bake bread for this week because of the lack of flour on campus. But God did give us a beautiful day for a walk on the road.



Marco and Polo

This week we had 2 good size groups go out. 1 group of boys and 1 group of girls. Eric and I were in charge of our 12 boys. We only ended up going to 3 houses, but we were able to sing for them, pray for them, and read them a bible verse. They all seemed like they liked it and the kids had a really fun time doing it. The only downside to the day that I can think of was that while we were walking, I got a big blister and it popped on the bottom of my toe which made it a lot more painful to walk. Other than that, great day.
You stay civilized......Planet Earth!!!!

Busy Busy Week

Sunday April 7, 2013

This guy was bigger than my extended hand

Our day off today started off pretty bitter, but had a sweet moment at the end. The little truck was in town getting more work done but was ready to pick up. So we all took the big truck and and Warren said that Eric and I could just bring back the little truck whenever we were ready to come back which these days is around 10 or 11 pm. But normally, we have to pay a moto taxi guy 20 B's each for this. So this was going to be a big savings!



From last week

While on the big truck going into town with everyone, I had my first, and probably biggest let down of the day. I had forgotten my laptop charger. And for those of you who are not sure, pretty much the only reason Eric and I come to town is for Internet. Thats why we pay for a hotel that has wifi and just sit there all day long. So needless to say, only having half a charge on my battery and no charger was pretty maddening. Fortunately, I had my iPhone and Eric had his computer. So I simply had to do everything from my phone for the day.

Next irritating thing, I needed to withdrawl another $250 to pay for the truck in order to pick it up. But once again, the bank was out of money. This was a big problem. The bight side was that Eric had just gotten a large chunk of money from his account and said he could cover the cost and I could pay him back when the bank had money.

Next bad thing, after the big truck left, Eric and I took a moto taxi and went to the mechanic. But, when we got there, we found out that they are apparently closed on Sunday's. This was immediately aggravating because now Eric and I had to both pay for 2 moto taxi rides, and then a ride all the way back to Familia Feliz. And needless to say, money is not in abundant supply for us. But oh well, things happen. We've adapted to the culture of everything changing and things not happening as they are planned.

Not everything was bad today however. I mean, even the worst day in town is still a good day. We were able to purchase our flights back to La Paz to begin our trip home. We now have a set date to leave Rurrenabaque. I have to say though, it was a little bittersweet purchasing that ticket. I will definately miss this place a ton, but I am also ready to be back home. Furthermore, Eric and I got to eat at Juliano's! Woohoo!

But later in the night is when the "cherry on the cake" came. Beings how the truck wasn't ready, Eric and I needed to called our 2 motorcycle taxi friends (Carlos and Fernando) that we met a few weeks, and ask for them to take us back. Carlos is my guy and he is so much fun to talk to. I am only 1 month older than him, my girlfriend is only 2 months onlder than his girlfriend, his favorite Bolivian soccer team is the Strongest along with me. We were just having a great conversation.

Then he asked me why I am taking a year off from school to work in Bolivia. I told him that it's because the kids here in Bolivia need a lot of help and I really enjoy it. I told him that at Familia Feliz, we teach the kids their school classes, but above all, we show them Jesus love and how to show others his love too. I kept going and told him that the world is a bad place and that there isn't too much time left. I told him that nothing in this world is important. Not our jobs, not our hobbies, not our money, just if we have a relationship with Jesus. He was very receptive to what I was saying and agreed.

He told me that he believes in Jesus and goes to church on Sundays. So I told him that on Saturday, he should come to Familia Feliz for church. He actually seemed a lot more interested than I thought. He was asking what time we started and kinds of services we do. So hopefully I will see him Saturday. But who knows, he may have just been humoring me.

Monday April 8, 2013

Beings how I forgot to blog about this day, my memory of details is pretty fuzzy. So I will have to give highlights for today.

The plan for today was to go and pick up all the wood that we had ordered for the lady's house. Everything is cut and ready to go. So the plan was to head out around 10 and go pick it all up. So, until then I decided to wash my clothes (or at least have of them). After hanging up all my clothes, it was just about time to go, so Gerry, Mike, Samuel, Warren, and I headed out to pick up all the wood. Got there, and there was no problem. Warren had already paid the guy and everything was squared away.

Then for pretty much the rest of the day I worked on electrical stuff with Mike and Samuel. One interesting thing about that was I had to climb a tree and cut some branches down with a machete. But one of the branches that I needed to wack, had an ants' nest hanging on it. Meaning, not only are they all clustered in the nest, but they are also all over the tree! With each wack, I got covered with these biting ants. The infiltrated my hair, my beard, my chest hair, and my shoes. Not a good day to be a hairy man.

After all of our electrical work, Samuel and I headed off to a staff meeting at 4. We are planning on having one major staff meeting for 2 hours every Monday and 1 small one every night. It was hard to believe that we needed 2 hours, but we were able to fill it easily. But I'm not complaining, because again, I am loving the new found communication that we are having here on campus.

Tuesday April 9, 2013

This morning Warren came to my door and informed me of something pretty major that happened last night. Apparently, the only 2 girls left here at Familia Feliz that belong to the lady that we are building a house for, escaped. The packed up all their clothes, stuck a ladder out their window, climber down, and left sometime between 1 am and 5 am. Other than their safety, the biggest issue with this is part of the agreement we had with the lady in building her house.

We had agreed that we would try and help build her a house if she would let us help take care of her children. Simply because the father has ditched them, and she works all day long. This leaves all her children, including babies, home alone with no house in the hot sun. Then, shortly after we told her that we found the money to build her a house, she took Bismarck and John Alex back. Now, the day after we pick up all the wood for their house, the other 2 girls disappear.

The plan for today was to go into town cross over to San Buena (where we are building the house) and inform them of our start date so that they could round up about 10 people to help us carry wood up the hill. However, now, we needed to track down the mom and see if she had anything to do with the girls disappearance, see if they were ok, and see if she was planning on sending them back.

On the way into town, Gerry, Juan, one of Missy's kids and myself were in the back of the truck. Then, without any warning, I got a terrible pain just to the left of my right shin. Out of an immediate reaction, I reached down and swatted out my leg. I was able to kill it. I huge yellow and black hornet/wasp thing. And let me remind you, everything terrible is twice as big in Bolivia as any in the states.

Even though I was able to kill it, I still gave it another smash simply out of vengence. That little booger hurt a lot! For probably 2 or 3 minutes, I just had a shooting pain in my lower leg. It was not a fun experience. But fortunately it felt fine afterward.



What my dinner consisted of

In town, my first objective was to look for the lady. So naturally, I went to her 2 main posts that she stands at all day. But she wasn't at either location. This left me with only one thing to do. Abandone that mission and move on to the next. My next mission was to purchase a big long list of electrical things for Mike from 4 different tool shops. After that, it pretty much concluded my day in town and I headed back in a taxi because today was Juan and Emmy's day off leaving Eric at the house alone with the boys.

Wednesday April 10, 2013

Today was a full day of work. In our staff meeting on Monday, we decided that we wanted to take one more full day and work in the rice choco. There is so much rice that we were unable to harvest due to time and lack of manpower. Since so much time has gone by, the rice is becoming unharvestable. So we cancled classes for this morning and took all the kids out for one last rice hoorah.

We divided all the kids up into different teams with each volunteer. Fortunately, Eric gave me first pick of which 3 kids I wanted. This was a relief because I was able to pick who I believed were good workers; Armando, Edgar, and Juan Carlos. After the dividing took place, I was awarded one more child, Emiliana, because a couple of the volunteers had to stay back to work on the electricity.

I thought I had the dream team. Thee guys and a very nice girl. Well, I ended up being half right. Armando and Edgar worked really hard all day long and were real champs about it, however, Emiliana and Juan Carlos worked well for about 30 minutes before they became pretty worthless.

This was pretty frustrating as we all had a quota to meet. As soon as each team hit 2 bags, they were done for the day. This was hopefully to get the kids motivated to work hard and fast. For my group, it only worked for 3 of us. Fortunately however, we were able to fill up our 2 bags in about 3.5 hours (granted, I think our bags were a little bit smaller than some of the other groups).

I had no problems the entire day until we had about an hour left, thats when my foot began to hurt pretty bad. I didn't think much of it, and it wasn't bad enough to stop me from finishing our bags. But after we finished and went back to the house, I looked at my right ankle and it was swollen up pretty bad. I'm really not exactly sure what happened because I don't recall rolling it or anything. My best guess is that it is something from the big wasp that stung me yesterday going into town. But I would think that I would have had a reaction sooner.

After a much needed rest, Mike asked me if I would keep digging this afternoon. I wasn't sure if I could even do it because my ankle was getting a bit bigger and it was getting a little harder to walk. But, you know me, I said yes. So this afternoon I spent a couple hours digging.

While doing this, Armando came over and asked if I needed help and if he could dig with me. I was really surprised because I had told him that since he worked so hard this morning, he was exempt from working in the afternoon unlike Emiliana and Juan Carlos. He was super excited when I told him. But now, he was voluntarily asking if he could work with me. Just him and I. So that was pretty cool and made me pretty happy.

Thursday April 11, 2013

Dia de Ninos! Today is a national holiday called the kids day. It is a day where all classes are cancled and games and competitions are played in the morning. So last night, A few of us guys got together and set the schedule for today and even stayed up late filling close to 1,500 water balloons! We had everything on our schedule. We had sack races, water balloon fight, relay races, water balloon tosses, tug of war, soccer (of course), and several other games.

I think today was a big hit. We had about 70+ kids in attendance and they all seemed to have a blast! At times, it was very hard to keep them organized and behaving, but overall, they were quite well behaved. It seemed as though that some of them couldn't focus on anything other than the water balloons that we had stored in the kitchen.

After several short events that led kids to trip and fall and hop and scream, it was time to bring out the balloons for several balloon related activities. These games had them locked in the zone.....the zone of attack! All anyone wanted to do was grab balloons and start pelting each other like rampid beasts! But we had to struggle to keep the beasts locked up for a few more minutes until we had war....

Then, the much awaited time had come.....WAR! This was the much anticipated activity of the entire day. The kids could barely contain their excitment. But it was now time to unlock all of the beasts (including myself) and start going crazy! When we started, it looked like a bomb of kids just exploded to different areas of the field to buckets filled with balloons. Then, about 3 minutes later, all the balloons were gone, and everyone was completely soaked.

After we had all the kids take part in cleaning up all the shrapnel of balloons, it was time to eat. The ladies had been working tirelessly all morning making majalito, and tamarindo juice. They made so much of it and gave everyone huge portions and yet still had enough left over for dinner later this evening. I didn't last too long eating in the big house because by this time, I was completely exhausted. I needed to go rest up for awhile.

But just when I thought I would have a few minutes break, Mike showed up at my door and was ready to work on electrical work. I told him to give me a few minutes break and that I would be out soon. It is actually getting to be crunch time for the electrical work because Mike leaves this Sunday meaning that all the electrical work needs to be done before then. So that is what really drove me out of my seat to go on and help out.

That was pretty much the end of the day. However, I wanted to write a little something about one of the students; Armando. When I first got here and was a teacher, Armando was in my class and just drove me up the wall. He was one of my most difficult students who never wanted to learn, listen, or obey. Easily one of my biggest challenges.

But over the past 2 weeks of so, he has really grown on me a lot. He has been extremely helpful to me and honest about everything. He helps me remember some rules of the house or does what chores for the day when I forget. He has also taken a pretty obvious liking to me because he is always looking to hang out with me and talk with me. I actually really enjoy talking with him as opposed to some of the other kids because I can actually hold an intelligent conversation with him which I can't do with many of the others. He is definately more mature than most of the other kids.

Also, one last thing to note, my ankle is still very swollen. Good news is that it doesn't hurt too bad anymore though. It is almost for sure that it is from the wasp/swordfish sting that I incurred 2 days ago. So hopefully it dies down here soon, or else I'm gunna be flying back to the States with one less leg than I came with! Just kidding family.

Friday April 12, 2013

The plan for today was to make bread again for the outreach program. Then, while I wait for the bread to rise, I would do some electrical work. However, because it rained so hard 2 days ago, Familia Feliz has no water yet again. This makes life so much more difficult because we can't cook, we can't clean, and we can't bathe. So that pretty much ruined my baking plans.

So I decided to help with electrical because today was Mike's last working day here, and I knew he needed all the help he could get. He had me work on taking down all the high wires now that our cable was going to be underground. While doing this, I ran into a problem. There was a electrical post that was made out of a tree trunk and had wires secured way up top and it needed to come down. However, we only had one ladder and the post wasn't sturdy enough to lean the ladder up against. So I boosted my levels of testonsterone until it was surging through my body, and I used my bare hands to rip down this 6 inch thick wooden post! I do have to admit, it wasn't as impressive as it sounds because the post had started to rot. But it DID sound pretty good, so thats how I blogged about it.

For the next 2 hours or so, I continued helping Mike and Sam get all the new wiring up and put up new posts, and connect the houses. But when Juan and Gerry found out that I wasn't baking bread because there was no water, they told me that there was a big tank of saved water that I could use. I didn't know about that at all until they told me. So before it got too late, I immediately went to start bread.

The whole bread making process went completely smooth and without incidence until later on in the afternoon, and that's when Jorge showed up. By this time, Gerry, Jenny, Eric, Samuel, and I were all at the oven talking and hanging out. Then mischievious Jorge walks up with what looks like a really big potato with stems and leaves coming off of it. Non of us had any idea what it was and was asking him if it was a potato or a fruit or what. Then, while Gerry got close to look at it, Jorge accidentally (i think) dropped it. As soon as it hit the floor, it busted open and a ton of wasps exploded out of their, what once was home. All of us took off running in all different directions. Fortunately, no one got stung and all was ok.

Later this evening we had vespers. Normally, the service is just singing a few songs, someone talks for a few minutes, then we shake hands. But beings how Eric and I were in charge this week, we wanted to do something a little more memorable for the kids. So we decided to do a skit!

Eric and I got together one evening and typed up a script that we could get a rough idea of what we were going to say from. Then we typed up a part for a narrarator and asked Samuel if he would read it. Right before we went out to go to vespers, Eric and I put our hair in pony tails and borrowed a couple of dolls from baby Emily. This was because our skit was about two little girls that were best friends, got into a fight, then made up. When we actually performed the skit, the kids seemed to really love it. They were laughing and totally into it. This was a nice change from their normal boredom.

Then in the eveing, Eric and I went over to Missy's house just to hang out. She actually turned her upstairs into a really cozy living room/hangout spot. Once Eric and I got there, we just went upstairs and talked with Missy and a few of her kids. Then right before we went back, she invited us to stay there for dinner! Eric and I will NEVER turn down food again after being here in Bolivia. Especially dinners because our typical dinners at night are a piece of bread and flavored water (which we had already eaten). Readily accepting her invitation, we walked out and found that she had made 14 packs of Ramaan Noodles! Jackpot! And that was the close to a busy, but good day.

Saturday April 13, 2013

Happy Sabbath! As usual, I was able to set my alarm all the way back to 8:30. However, as usual, my body woke me up before me alarm went off. I guess my body is becoming accustomed to waking up that early. I ended up waking up at 7:30 and then just laying there for awhile until the last second I needed to get dressed and get to church.

I was very excited today because Eric was going to be giving the adult Sabbath School class and I was very anxious to hear it. However, as everyone was dividing up for their classes, Juan came up to me and asked if I could help him with his class because his throat was hurting and he had been sick. I said that I had no problem helping him even though I had no idea how I could help him.

Then just before we walked over, Niquisha (one of the 2 new girls that have been here for a while) walked up and told me that she was sorry and that she didn't have any quarterly or lesson for me and that I needed to come up with a memory verse for them. The realization that I was going to be leading the Sabbath School started creeping into my mind. But I wasn't sure yet.

Once we got to our class, Juan apologized to the class, and said that I was going to be teaching today. Then he smiled at me and sat down. Oh boy. Well, I decided that I was going to tell the story of Jonah. Somehow or another, I was able to get through the whole story with my spanish and select a memory verse for them to learn. I also had to come up with 3 different questions to ask them about the story to make sure they were listening. Then once we got back to the church with everyone, I asked them the questions in front of everyone.

Normally, this would be an extremely stressful time for me. However, I actually had a really fun time with it! I was able to tell the story how I wanted to and do some fun acting to go along with it to keep the kids interest. The kids also seemed to really enjoy it and have a fun time. Next week I am on the schedule again for a different kids class. So hopefully that one will go well too. However, I will have a quarterly for that one.

The downside to this Sabbath was that I didn't see Carlos. But I can't say that he just "didn't show up" because it has been raining the entire day. It would have been a terrible drive on a bike to get here and back. We have found that when it rains, Bolivians stay home. Maybe we will see him next week, but who knows.

Because it rained, we had to cancle to outreach program for this week. But this afternoon was still actually a lot of fun. Juan LOVES to hear me play the violin and is completely fascinated by it. So he asks me like everyday to play for him. And this afternoon I told him I would, so I brought out my violin and played a couple hymms that I remembered. Then, they wanted me to play some spanish hymms that I didn't know at all. The only times I had heard them was at church or vespers. I had never seen the music to them before, but fortunately I was able to pick them up in 2 or 3 minutes and play for them. They all got such a kick out of it. So much so, that they wanted me to keep playing for the family worship which I did. I had a good time with it and I think the kids really enjoyed it too.

Tonight, Juan, Emmy, and Eric went in with all the volunteers to play vollyball (I volunteered to stay back, so I wasn't ditched). This left me with most of the kids for the evening. The first thing I did was go in my room and bring out tons of balloons and stickers that they could play with. They had so much fun blowing them up and letting them go and decorating them with stickers. Then, it was movie time!

But now, I have to get to sleep because I have to wake up at 4:45 am so I can go on a jungle tour! Super excited!

You Stay Civilized.......Planet Earth!!!!









 

Town

Sunday April 31, 2013

    Today Eric and I had a little extra fun planned. This morning, Eric and I brought all 5 of of our boys into town to go to the pool! Since the other boys get to go home, we firgured it was the least we could do to make sure that these 5 had some sort of fun for vacation.

    Loading up the truck, it looked as though we were going to be pretty packed once again. Not only, did we have a lot of people going into town, but we were bringing 4 dogs as well. The plan was to either sell them or just give them away to lower the population of animals on campus. Anyway, 3 of them were large puppies that were extremely cute. So naturally Eric and I each wanted to hold one on the drive in. This was working out all good and well until we were about 5 min. outside if town. Thats when it happened. My puppy calmly opened his mouth, and shot dog vomit EVERYWHERE! It was all over the boys beside me, all down my arms and legs, and all over the floor of the truck. It wouldn't have been so bad except for the fact that since we were in the back of the truck, the wind took all of it and dispersed it all over.

    This was so gross! As all of it was starting to bake onto my skin in the sun, Eric being the great friend he is gave me a nice little reminder. "Hey dude, you know that since they are puppies, and all their vomit was white, it was probably all breastmilk." GROSS!!! So now, I have dried dog breastmilk that has been partially digested, all over my arms and leg. No biggie. Fortunately, today was a town day and we were taking the kids to the pool so I could shower.

    Getting to the pool, before we brought all the kids in, we went and spoke with the owner to see if they were open and to see if we could bring our kids in. He was a little reluctant and then gave us a very stern warning/lecture about our boys. Apparently our boys have been here several times in the past, and every single time, they have pee'd in the pool and the owner has to clean it all out. He told us that this was the boys' very last chance. If a single one of them pee'd in the pool, we were never allowed back.

    Relaying this back to them, the boys understood and were ready for some swimming! It is actually an extremely nice swimming pool. It looks just like a resort and even has a loose tucan that walks around the pool guarding it. For the first couple of minutes, Eric and I sat in some lawnchairs watching the boys as they swam. We felt like such parents. But then parent time was over and it was time to be a kid again, so we jumped in and started throwing the kids all over the place.

    After the pool, I had some things that I needed to do online right at 2:30. So while Eric took the boys with Juan and Emmy to a soccer field, I went online. But as soon as my meeting started, the power in the entire city went out! Blah. When the power came back on a little later, my meeting was already over.

    Good news was, today something very special happened. I got to skype my grandmother and my aunt and uncle! She has been reading my blogs and we have talked on the phone a couple of times, but never face to face. After a couple of failed attempts, we finally got it to work. As soon as my grandmother saw me and the jungle that is growing on my face, she couldn't believe it was me. So after a DNA test, fingerprint scan, and the use of voice recognition software, she finally believed me that I indeed was her grandson. The 4 of us had a really good talk and as usual, my family is extremely supportive of me.

Monday April 1, 2013

    Today I got a little bonus. I got to go to town again! The main reason was to take the truck in so they could fix a couple more things on it. We had to move our appointment to today due to the vacation of the students. Originally, they said that it would take 3 days. However, after we dropped it off, they said that it would be ready tomorrow at 5 which was great news.

    But as usual, it was not a simple drop the truck off and go. Other volunteers came in as well which always means a full day trip. When everyone split to run their errands, I went to the bank to withdrawl the last $250 of the donation money for the truck. However, after I put my card in, put my pin # in, selected withdrawl, and put in the amount, the machine flashed the word processing just before it shut off on me. I had the fear of death instantly for a few seconds until the machine turned back on, and gave me my card back. However, I was still a little worried because I recieved no reciept and no money even after the machine said it was processing. I thought maybe the machine took the money out of my account and didn't give me the cash.

    Fearing the worst, I went into the bank to talk with someone. As I walked in, I came into contact with a soldier holding a shotgun who asked what I needed. So I told him the story and he sent me upstairs. Once I got there, a lady behind a desk asked me why I was there and so I then told her the story as well. She proceeded to tell me that there was nothing that they could do and that the bank was out of money.

    Having no luck at the bank, I ran to get internet to see if money had actually been withdrawl from my bank account. And sure enough, $250 was withdrawn. Great. I then signed onto skype hoping my mom was on and could talk to me. Thank-goodness she was. So now, my mom and I went through the whole "push a bunch of numbers, listen to elevator music, and get transfered from person to person" routine. In the end, they said that we needed to wait 24 hours because sometimes the issue resolves itself. If when we came back tomorrow, there was still a problem, then an international claims dipute would have to be filed. Wow. So exciting. Good news is, that the person we spoke with had actually heard about many occassions where an international bank runs out of money. For me, thats the hardest part to understand, how a BANK can run out of money. Oh well.

    For the rest of the time in town, I simply sat in Ron's restaurant (Paititi) checking things online and talking to friends and family.
Tuesday March 2, 2013

    What do you know?!?! I get to come to town again today! But not until the afternoon. This morning we had a big staff meeting to discuss outreach programs, inreach programs, work programs, the website, the pathfinder camporee and various other things. That meeting went until 12:30. So it was quite the doosy. The bigger problem was, it was Juan and Emmy's day off so Eric and I needed to cook lunch. Fortunately, I was able to beg one of the girls to cook for us as well.

    After lunch, Gerry, Samuel, and I headed off to the chainsaw guy who we ordered all the framing for the house from. But he wasn't there and we didn't see our wood sitting out front which generally means that it's not done. So we went back to Familia Feliz empty handed.

    Back in the motherland of Familia Feliz, other volunteers loaded up in the truck and we were off yet again to town. The truck should be ready in the afternoon and I needed to check my bank statement to see if the charge went through.

    But before I did anything, Missy needed me to send a big bag of things to her sister Joy in La Paz who is about to go back to Canada for awhile. That process was a lot easier but longer than I expected. I ended up talking to the guy behind the counter about my time here in Bolivia and how I have been working at Familia Feliz. It's amazing that majority of the time, when I tell people that I work for Familia Feliz, they immediately get nicer and more open to helping. So appartenly FF. has a good reputation.

    After that, I went directly to internet to check my bank statement. With fingers crossed, I opened my bank statment and sure enough, it had gone through. I wanted to get on skype with my mom, but she wasn't online so I had to send her an email saying that we needed to open up an international dispute claim.

    The rest of the day in town was claimed by internet, and running errands for Familia Feliz, including the building project across the river. Just as an update for that house, all the wood has been ordered and should be ready at the beginning of next week. We have a lot of the material needed to build, and we have spoken with the family and told them that they will need to get helpers to carry the wood up the mountain.

Wednesday March 3, 2013

    Now I know what you're thinking, what do I do in town today right? Well, surprisingly enough, I broke the trend and I stayed on campus today. I did some pretty interesting work today but unfortunately it is not a lot to tell.

    Today we dragged several bags of rice outside from the store room to spread it all out on tarps to dry in the sun. This is all the rice that we harvested from the choco over the past couple of weeks. So we have quite a bit to do. After the rice site in the hot sun for about 4 hours, we have to somehow get all of the dirt and leaves out of the grains before we can take it to the mill. Most of the time, when people do this, they just pick up a bucket full of rice, hold it up high, and pour it slowly and the wind will take the junk out. But no no no, thats that efficient. So we decided to give the wind a little help and brought our fan out there. This actually worked really great! As we pour the rice in front of the fan, it blew all the junk away.

    After we cleaned several bags of the rice, we had to put them back into bags and seal them in order to take them to the mill. Eric and I ended up working until about 7:40 pm just because of how slow the process is.

    A lot of people have asked me about Jenette and how she is doing. So I figured it would be a good time to give an update on her. Just looking at her, she looks a lot better. One of the big things that is contributing to that is the 2 new volunteers that are living up there with her. They are dressing her nice and doing her hair and bathing her so she smells good. They are doing a great job at making her look and smell completely normal.

    As far as how she moves, she is now able to not only crawl, but she can support her own body weight while standing. She still cannot stand up by herself, but once we get her up, as long as she has something to hold onto for balance, she can stand there for a couple of minutes. The way she crawls is not the typical crawl on the knees and hands. No, Jenette has her own unique way. She kind of sits on the ground with one knee in the air, and when she wants to move, she uses her arms to push herself up, then uses her feet to push her forward. It is pretty interesting to watch.

    But overall, we are seeing really good improvement. She has a long way to go though. But all of the volunteers are doing a good job with her and we keep trying to encourage muscle development and walking.

    One other thing to note, is that the rest of the boys got back late in the evening from their break. This was good because classes started first thing in the morning.

Thursday April 4, 2013

    This morning I had several things that I wanted to start doing, however as soon as I had finished my breakfast, Mike showed up wanting some help with the electrical work. But that was fine with me because as always, I'm always up to continue learning new things.

    Today he wanted to wire Missy's house and install switches, lights, and outlets. Mike is very intelligent when it comes to electricity, especially when it comes to the physics aspect. He is very patient and does his very best to try and explain things very clearly to me so that I learn it very good. And something must have stuck, because today, I wired the bathroom and installed a lightswitch by myself! Boo yea!

    This afternoon for the work program, Eric and I took all of our boys plus a couple others out in front of Familia Feliz to machete. The entrance to Familia Feliz has become incredibly overgrown to the point that it's become hard to see our sign from the road. The grass and weeds look more like trees than schrubs.

    Even though it was difficult to keep the boys on task, we were able to get a fair amount done. The only bad news is that I got a blister almost immediately on my left hand. Just when I thought I had gotten all the "gringo-ness" out of my body, this happens. Well, I still just over a month to get the sissy out of me.

    To close out the day, I found out terrifying news.... I was on the schedule to give the adult Sabbath School this week! And let me remind you, here, giving the adult Sabbath School class is way more of a sermon than the actual sermon is because of all the kids. This immediately got me a little flustered. I had no idea what to talk about and how to prepare for it.

Friday April 5, 2013

    Today I had 2 main tasks on my plate. The first was to start preparing for Sabbath School, and the second was to bake bread for our outreach program tomorrow after church. Both of which are all day processes.

    Here's the deal with the bread. Eric has been put in charge of evangelism on Sabbath afternoons. So one idea that came up was baking a bunch of bread and then taking the boys out on the road, then going house to house singing songs and giving out bread.

    It has actually been quite awhile since I have made bread, but I was ready for it. No Problem. Since Eric had class in the morning, I spent the morning making the bread by myself and mixing everything up. Then in the afternoon, he helped me divide them and bake em' up.

    While waiting for the bread to rise, I was able to sneak in some Sabbath School preparation. Fortunately, Mike has a quarterly that is in English. That turned out to be a massive help to me. It atleast gave me a template to go off of. However, it is still pretty much a sermon because no one else has the quarterly here.

    When Eric and I were finishing baking the bread, we were just doing our usual talking and making plans for next year when we are housemates at Southern. Talking about the things we're gunna put in our apartment, how much fun we're gunna have, the double dates we're gunna go on, the whole 9 yards. Just good guy bonding time.

    One thing to note on the day, further confirming my new found closeness with nature. Tonight, for dinner Emmy made some lemonade for us. But shortlt before I drank mine, I found 2 dead ants, a floating mosquito, and a fluttering/swimming moth in my cup. Hm, that's interesting. Oh well, all I needed to do was push them to the side of my cup and get them out real quick. Good as new.

Saturday April 6, 2013

    So today was the big day. The little time that I had to prepare for my sabbath school sermon was up. So after everyone sang for awhile, we divided into our classes. Fortunately, i was able to snag Samuel to translate at the last second.

    After I was finished, I didn’t feel like it went TOO well. I thought it actually went pretty bad. But Eric and a few others told me differently. But I dunno, I think they could be lying. And as always, when I started talking, I was completely dry, but afterwards, I was completely soaked. When Missy walked in and saw me, she was blown away at how much I sweated.

    After sabbath school was over, I was able to sigh a breath of relief. The hard part was over. Now all I had to do was the opening prayer for the divine service. But RIGHT before we walked upfront during the prayer song, I was told that I needed to do the welcom (in Spanish) and I was also responsible for the closing song. Are you kidding me?!?!? I don’t even know a single song in spanish. Wouldn’t have mattered if I did anyway because they assigned me a song to sing....never heard of it. So I recruited one of the boys to help me.

    Then right after the closing song, Juan nudged me and told me to have the closing prayer in spanish. Then I said no, you do it. But he nudged me again and said no no go ahead. To which again I said, no Juan, you pray. So he finally stepped up and prayed. Phew. So stressful.

    But after church is when things started going uphill. Right after church, Jerry and his wife Jenny invited us over to their house for lunch along with a couple of other volunteers.

    You know those girls that you can just tell that they are good cooks, thats Jenny. And I sure was right. She cooked us an amazing meal. But that wasn’t even the best part. After we ate, we all lounged around their house socializing and listening to Sabbath music. It reminded me so much of home. Where everyone gets together, eats a lot of food, the spends time together all with music playing softly in the background. Wowie.

    After we ate, it was time for our social outreach program where we take the boys out to sing songs and hand out bread to several of our non adventist neighbors. But we came into a problem. Juan wanted to go, and needed to because he knew all the songs and where people lived. But he didn’t want to leave Emmy at home alone with all the little ones and trouble makers who were not allowed to go. So I stayed back to watch the rest of the boys with Emmy.

    I was a little bummed at first, but it actually turned out to be pretty fun. Shortly after everyone else left, I pulled out my violin and started playing a bunch of songs while the rest of the boys sang along. They were fascinated by the violin and hearing one being played. I also brought out my computer and showed them tons of pictures from the States of my Family, Europe, Africa, and even scuba diving pictures. They were totally into it and wanted to watch all of my movie clips that I had. After the pictures, I ended up spending a lot of time with Armando and talking with him.

    Later in the evening, Eric had been planning to do a bonfire and roasting some bread dough. So we had a big night with all the kids roasted bread dough and drinking hot chocolate. I don’t know if they have ever had a social like that before or not. But they all seemed to love it.

You Stay Civilized.....Planet Earth!!!!