Me, Andrew, Melanie and Kevin checking out our jungle backyardFriday, September 25, 2009
In the United States, Canada and many other places in the world are found pine trees. On these luscious evergreen trees one can find little brown pricklies called pine cones, which are typically not edible unless you are a squirrel or chipmunk. However, here in Peru there is a lack of pine trees and therefore no pinecones. But the good news is that in this far away land, one can find abundant Aguaje. This odd fruit highly resembles a pinecone in its appearance - it has the same shape and color. This fruit is definitely not my favorite due to its lack in flavor. This fruit consists of a large seed with a little bit of flavorless yellow paste. Very odd. If Pluto were still a planet, I would say that this fruit was from Pluto.
This past Saturday night I experienced my first Peruvian Social. These Socials are very common down here in the Southern Hemisphere. These events usually last for about 3 hours and are full of laughs, fun, and exercise all centered around completely pointless games fueled by equally pointless music. If any of you have ever taken part in a South American social you will know what I am talking about, if you haven’t you just need to experience one. They are quite unique and can only best be described at crazy confusion and lots of running around in circles.
As September presses on my team and I are nearing the end of our campaign here at Km 8. To end with a big shebang, we are doing a two week long evangelistic series of nightly meetings. Each meeting is about 2 hours long and full of singing and talking about different bible topics. My main task is to keep the kids occupied during the adult meetings. We do fun songs, tell a Bible story, learn and memory verse and then let the kids color a picture relating to the Bible story. Each kid gets two crayons to color with and may exchange their crayons in the crayon bag for different colors. It is a fun task to color with about 50 kids who are all jabbering in Castellano, wanting this obscure color or that. I only know the basic - colors in Castellano- red, green, blue, black…and it is oh so confusing with 50 kids requesting weird little shades of light rays. Needless to say the meetings are going well. The funniest part about the meetings and any meeting or church service down here in Peru is that it is not unusual to sing the same song three or four times during one program. In one song service we might 9 songs, but only have 3 or 4 different songs. Yet everyone seems to love this odd repetition. It doesn’t seem to matter that we sing one song, then another, only to return to the first song again, and then maybe again. With doing these meeting nightly I have many songs stuck in my head and am constantly humming them.
Welp, thanks for tuning into the Mindy sometimes-weekly-news-flash. Things are busy here with teaching my classes in the homes and for the community, planning classes, cooking meals, cleaning, eating Papaya, doing a evangelistic series, drinking water to keep from melting in the heat, learning Castellano and much more. Life is great as a Peruvian!
You know you are Peruvian when…
Your skin is darker than that of those who live here.
You prefer to ride in the back of a truck because it has more air-conditioning (the wind).
You prefer to use a hole in the ground for a bathroom, rather than use a toilet.
Your sleeping schedule resembles that of the sun rising and setting.
You get sad if you do not eat lentils and rice every single day.
However, you know you are not Peruvian when you see a parade in town, but everyone (including the parade participants) is more focused on the group of white people (me and my friends) as that is walking down the sidewalk.
This past Saturday night I experienced my first Peruvian Social. These Socials are very common down here in the Southern Hemisphere. These events usually last for about 3 hours and are full of laughs, fun, and exercise all centered around completely pointless games fueled by equally pointless music. If any of you have ever taken part in a South American social you will know what I am talking about, if you haven’t you just need to experience one. They are quite unique and can only best be described at crazy confusion and lots of running around in circles.
As September presses on my team and I are nearing the end of our campaign here at Km 8. To end with a big shebang, we are doing a two week long evangelistic series of nightly meetings. Each meeting is about 2 hours long and full of singing and talking about different bible topics. My main task is to keep the kids occupied during the adult meetings. We do fun songs, tell a Bible story, learn and memory verse and then let the kids color a picture relating to the Bible story. Each kid gets two crayons to color with and may exchange their crayons in the crayon bag for different colors. It is a fun task to color with about 50 kids who are all jabbering in Castellano, wanting this obscure color or that. I only know the basic - colors in Castellano- red, green, blue, black…and it is oh so confusing with 50 kids requesting weird little shades of light rays. Needless to say the meetings are going well. The funniest part about the meetings and any meeting or church service down here in Peru is that it is not unusual to sing the same song three or four times during one program. In one song service we might 9 songs, but only have 3 or 4 different songs. Yet everyone seems to love this odd repetition. It doesn’t seem to matter that we sing one song, then another, only to return to the first song again, and then maybe again. With doing these meeting nightly I have many songs stuck in my head and am constantly humming them.
Welp, thanks for tuning into the Mindy sometimes-weekly-news-flash. Things are busy here with teaching my classes in the homes and for the community, planning classes, cooking meals, cleaning, eating Papaya, doing a evangelistic series, drinking water to keep from melting in the heat, learning Castellano and much more. Life is great as a Peruvian!
You know you are Peruvian when…
Your skin is darker than that of those who live here.
You prefer to ride in the back of a truck because it has more air-conditioning (the wind).
You prefer to use a hole in the ground for a bathroom, rather than use a toilet.
Your sleeping schedule resembles that of the sun rising and setting.
You get sad if you do not eat lentils and rice every single day.
However, you know you are not Peruvian when you see a parade in town, but everyone (including the parade participants) is more focused on the group of white people (me and my friends) as that is walking down the sidewalk.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
One of the newest, biggest, greatest changes to my past few days was the arrival of 3 friendly people from They are ere for about a week to host an eye clinic for all my new Peruvian buddies. I was fortunate enough to assist with this new element of my Peruvian life in the midst of visiting all my families and teaching all my classes. The mission of this clinic was simple – just to fit people with glasses. When ever I had free time I found myself rushing over to the refracting area to help out. With this job I would start out by greeting the people with a harty-cheerful Buenas Dias! Then would explain to them that I needed to look at their eyes with a spiffy little flashlight. After this quick observation I would explain if tey had cataracts or pterygium and what this meant. Then the fun part began. People could choose between either glasses for reading or glasses for distance. Depending on their desires I would hold up prescription refraction lenses to their faces until we discovered the perfect prescription for them. The joy of it was that people got so excited at the first bit of improvement. Then their joy would increase ten fold as I increased the magnification in 50 sector increments. In no time at all we would find the perfect refraction and they would receive their new glasses. I was instantly rewarded with beaming faces. It was amazing to see people come in tired, groggy (not quite sure if this is the right spelling for this word, but it rhymes with froggy, so it should be spelled similar, eh?) then see people walking away with overpowering smiles. For the first time in a long while they could see once again. They best part was that a great percentage wanted glasses so they could read their Bibles. In all we were able to give 857 people glasses. The funniest part of clinic was when I accidentally switched up some words when talking to one lady. Instead of asking if she wanted lentes (glasses) for reading I said lentejas (lentils). After a quick look of confusion, a little laugh and a quick refraction we got this lady her spiffy reading lentils. What could be better?Great experience of my week volume 2 was a quick snipet of my life during rainey season. The other day it poured all night and all day, which is great, I love rain. However, the tricky part is that our little bucket shower area is completely exposed to the heavens. We have to roof, meaning when it is raining (pouring in all actuality) there is no possible way to keep a towel dry. But alas I wanted my cold refreshing shower, so I donned my swimsuit and fearlessly entered the land of pelting raindrops. In spite of the cold I quite enjoyed myself as I showered in the rain with collected free rain water. When finished I slipped across the muddy clay to the wonderfulness of a dry towel. (So, Uncle John Schreven I have a fun task for you. Next time it rains collect about a liter and a half of rain water, then put on some colorful swimshorts, go outside early in the morning with your little soap bottle and take a shower. Aunt Kim, this is where your job comes in… you get the fun taking a picture to show to me at some point in the future).
Highlight #3. We are entering Papaya and mango season. How could life not be grand? Some of the papayas are Basketball sized and oh so wonderfully delicious. If chocolate were a fruit it just might be a giant ripe papaya.
Smile breaking activity #4 was a grand jungle adventure trek excursion journey quest ma-bober. The nurse squad was fortunate enough to return to Km 38 the other night. A few of us took this great opportunity to trek into the back 40. To me it was the most wonderful thing ever to be out and active again, to be clomping along a little jungle trail. Sadly we didn’t see any monkeys, but I heard birds and was attacked by an evil thorny bush. But after a quick battle with a machete the little bush quickly lost his life. And we rudely left its corpse to wilt in the jungle heat. With only a few battle scars and some bug bites to match I would call this trek a successful venture.
New Activity #5. We put on our first church service on Sabbath. We had a fairly good attendance – around 100 in all. My task was to lead out with Sabbath school for about 50 kids. It was difficult work, but people enjoyed it and are excited for next weeks service. To make it a perfect Sabbath our little crew splurged on haystacks. (We thankfully found little corn chip like things down here after an arduous search) We had great fun introducing this Adventist American food oddity to our Peruvian team members.
As far as my pictures go, I decided it would be a good neck excercise for all of you to twist your head sideways as you observe first hand a bit my life here. Hehehehe....or maybe I am just trying to help the masouse (people who rub backs...not sure how to spell this word) industry. Have fun!
Highlight #3. We are entering Papaya and mango season. How could life not be grand? Some of the papayas are Basketball sized and oh so wonderfully delicious. If chocolate were a fruit it just might be a giant ripe papaya.
Smile breaking activity #4 was a grand jungle adventure trek excursion journey quest ma-bober. The nurse squad was fortunate enough to return to Km 38 the other night. A few of us took this great opportunity to trek into the back 40. To me it was the most wonderful thing ever to be out and active again, to be clomping along a little jungle trail. Sadly we didn’t see any monkeys, but I heard birds and was attacked by an evil thorny bush. But after a quick battle with a machete the little bush quickly lost his life. And we rudely left its corpse to wilt in the jungle heat. With only a few battle scars and some bug bites to match I would call this trek a successful venture.
New Activity #5. We put on our first church service on Sabbath. We had a fairly good attendance – around 100 in all. My task was to lead out with Sabbath school for about 50 kids. It was difficult work, but people enjoyed it and are excited for next weeks service. To make it a perfect Sabbath our little crew splurged on haystacks. (We thankfully found little corn chip like things down here after an arduous search) We had great fun introducing this Adventist American food oddity to our Peruvian team members.
As far as my pictures go, I decided it would be a good neck excercise for all of you to twist your head sideways as you observe first hand a bit my life here. Hehehehe....or maybe I am just trying to help the masouse (people who rub backs...not sure how to spell this word) industry. Have fun!
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
The activity of my days has slowed down a bit. My daily rountine is to traverse across Neuvo Amazonia stopping at different peoples houses to visit with them and teach them about nutrition and hygiene. I have a pretty good are ato cover so I tend to walk at a pretty fast pace. Everyone down here thinks I am so funny for walking fast with big strides.
I feel as if I am pretty acoustombed to Peruvian life. Where we are living right now at km 8 there is no running wáter. This means that we have to buy all of our wáter for cooking, drinking, showering, washing clothes, etc. It seems like such a silly thing to spend money on, but it is definietly a necissity. I was overjoyed the other day when it started raining super hard. I quickly grabbed all the buckets and contianers that we had and set them all out to collect free wáter. Another great thing about life down here is that giant papayas can be bought for the equivalent of 30 US cents. Papaya season is about 2 weeks away and I am oh so excited. Another reason I think I am becoming Peruvian is that the other night our group decided to taste a bit of American cultura and eat supper at a Pizzaria. We delightfully enjoyed our pizza until the bill game and we realized that each slice of pizza came out to about $1 US. Normally this would not be considered a ridiculous Price, but for here that is super duper expensive. That is almost a whole days worth of food (and I had 3 slices - no food for 3 whole days…aaahhh). One other funny thing that has been happening to me over the past few days is running into random tables in the dark. You see, where we are living now there is no electicity. The sun goes down soon after 6 leaving lots of time to wander through darkness and run into things. Me, being to cheap to use my flashlight batteries and preferring the adventure of exploring in the darkness, have found myself colliding into random tables and chairs that were not there earlier. My legs have random bruises to remind me of my clumsiness. Funny how my I am still just as clumsy even here in a different hemisphere.
I feel as if I am pretty acoustombed to Peruvian life. Where we are living right now at km 8 there is no running wáter. This means that we have to buy all of our wáter for cooking, drinking, showering, washing clothes, etc. It seems like such a silly thing to spend money on, but it is definietly a necissity. I was overjoyed the other day when it started raining super hard. I quickly grabbed all the buckets and contianers that we had and set them all out to collect free wáter. Another great thing about life down here is that giant papayas can be bought for the equivalent of 30 US cents. Papaya season is about 2 weeks away and I am oh so excited. Another reason I think I am becoming Peruvian is that the other night our group decided to taste a bit of American cultura and eat supper at a Pizzaria. We delightfully enjoyed our pizza until the bill game and we realized that each slice of pizza came out to about $1 US. Normally this would not be considered a ridiculous Price, but for here that is super duper expensive. That is almost a whole days worth of food (and I had 3 slices - no food for 3 whole days…aaahhh). One other funny thing that has been happening to me over the past few days is running into random tables in the dark. You see, where we are living now there is no electicity. The sun goes down soon after 6 leaving lots of time to wander through darkness and run into things. Me, being to cheap to use my flashlight batteries and preferring the adventure of exploring in the darkness, have found myself colliding into random tables and chairs that were not there earlier. My legs have random bruises to remind me of my clumsiness. Funny how my I am still just as clumsy even here in a different hemisphere.
Only in Peru...
-Allow at least 3 times as much time as it should take to get anywhere or do anything.
-Speak Castellano and not Spanish (Spanish is spoken in Spain)
-Eat fruit that resmebles forg eggs, cacoons and other typically non-edible ítems
-Lick your plate after every meal to coserve wáter when doing dishes
-Burn all your garbage in a hole behind your house
-Find glowey bugs (fireflies) that turn off when you try to catch them. (In all my quests of catching glowey bugs I have never suceded. I will think that I have one only to find that he magically has dissappeared) However the battle is not yeto ver between me and the glowey bugs
-Find lemons the size of something that could only have been grown in Texas.
-East rice all the time
-Cook rice with a plastic bag in the pot (this actually makes the rice a lot more delicious, I will teach anyone that desires to know the secret to cooking rice in the Peruvian fashion)
-Tie a trailer to the bumper of the truck because there is no hitch
-Find people with typewriters on street corners to type letters for the general public
- Do you find a family of 5 squishing onto a motorbike to go to school each day
-Speak Castellano and not Spanish (Spanish is spoken in Spain)
-Eat fruit that resmebles forg eggs, cacoons and other typically non-edible ítems
-Lick your plate after every meal to coserve wáter when doing dishes
-Burn all your garbage in a hole behind your house
-Find glowey bugs (fireflies) that turn off when you try to catch them. (In all my quests of catching glowey bugs I have never suceded. I will think that I have one only to find that he magically has dissappeared) However the battle is not yeto ver between me and the glowey bugs
-Find lemons the size of something that could only have been grown in Texas.
-East rice all the time
-Cook rice with a plastic bag in the pot (this actually makes the rice a lot more delicious, I will teach anyone that desires to know the secret to cooking rice in the Peruvian fashion)
-Tie a trailer to the bumper of the truck because there is no hitch
-Find people with typewriters on street corners to type letters for the general public
- Do you find a family of 5 squishing onto a motorbike to go to school each day
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