It's been a few weeks since I've posted anything, I know. For the most part, this last month has been pretty routine. But there are a few things that have happened that I can share about now! You may have seen them on the blogs of some of my other teammates, but I'm going to tell you anyway just in case you haven't been checking!
Greg left a few days after my last post, but before he went he took us to a restaurant he knew. It's right on the ocean outside the bay where we go swimming, so the waves are huge (at least twice my height from what I could see)! It's called "The Jump of the Monk" because this guy dresses up like a monk every day and dives from the cliff into the ocean below, then climbs back up the cliff and runs around asking for money! We didn't get to see him, but just walking so close to the water was really exciting. We had dessert since it was a little late for supper, but the real fun happened when we left. Not many taxis come by the restaurant so our waiter offered to have us driven into the city so we could get a taxi. We agreed, and we all (waiter included) piled into a van to head up to the city again. Our first hint of trouble was when our driver came out of the restaurant, got into the front seat, and accidentally turned on the windshield wipers. She couldn't figure out how to turn them off, so Greg reached over to help her! Then she patiently tried to figure out how to put the van in reverse. We started to get a little more worried at this point. But after a few false starts, we were off and running! That is, until we had driven for a minute and reached the hill back up into Lima. That's when we ran out of gas, on a steep grade, in the dark. I told the waiter that it was OK, but he told me he was about ready to cry! The driver didn't know what to do, but Greg thought he'd have a try at getting us going so they switched places. Somehow, the fuel indicator was below empty but the engine started back up and Greg drove us safely up into the city to a gas station where the van could be filled up and we could catch a more reliable form of transportation! We bid our faithful waiter and the driver goodbye and got into 2 taxis to return home. I was in the second taxi, and we had a pretty fun ride back because we caught up with the first taxi along the freeway! Our driver, once he found out that we knew the occupants of the other taxi, stuck right beside them along the road so we got some fun pictures and videos of us racing side by side along the road. It was a pretty crazy night overall!
Most of the month then proceeded routinely until last weekend. On Friday the 18th our team joined up with members of the church leadership team and some other people from the church and English classes. We all visited a hospital in a less fortunate part of Lima a fair distance from home. We were guests in the pediatric ward, where we brightened the days of some of the children being treated in the hospital. We sang songs, told bible stories, played games and handed out prizes! We told the story of David and Goliath, and apparently I was a hit as Goliath. Unfortunately I missed the kids' smiles because I was playing dead at the time. In all, it went quite well. We are going to make some improvements and bring our materials along on our trip to Trujillo and Piura for kids programs.
The next day we went to the concert of Jesus Adrian Romero. It was a very nice concert, although it took a little longer than we'd hoped for the singing to begin! We arrived at the stadium to wait in line at 5:30, got into the stadium by 6:30, and some guys started talking about 7:00. Unfortunately their speech was quite involved and the actual concert didn't begin until almost 9:00. The music was pretty great, although I couldn't understand a whole lot. We ended up heading home at about 10:30, and it was quite a bit colder than I thought it would be! That Sunday our team also performed our drime in church, and we received an enthusiastic response! We will be performing it many more times while on our trip.
The real highlight of the month came unexpectedly on Monday the 21st. We went hiking for the day on the outskirts of Lima, and I wasn't sure what to expect since all we'd seen of Peru was desert and city. We went to a waterfall in the foothills of the Andes, and I have never seen a place like it! It was very beautiful, and we had a great day hiking and taking pictures among so many new sights.
Here is the waterfall from the bottom, where it looks the most spectacular!
Here are a bunch of us standing at the top of the waterfall. From left to right you see: me, Lisa, Martin, Laura, Roxy, Lidia, and Sarah. On the stairs behind us, you can see Breanne, Maria, and Arturo.
At one point, Otto and I climbed farther up the valley than the rest, and we discovered a few interesting sights. Among them was this huge and fun-looking cactus!
We also stumbled into a farmer's field in the middle of what I would consider to be a barely accessible valley. Here was one of his pumpkins (it's still a little green, I think *wink*)! I have no idea he would get them down from there, but I guess they must have been able to figure something out!
Here is the whole group together! From left to right you see: Arturo, Martin, Lidia, Laura, Breanne, Sarah, Lisa, Roxy, Maria, myself, German, and Abel. Laura is holding a makeshift kite she was making with Arturo.It was really great to get to see a part of Peru that wasn't in the big city or in the desert! We had a great day, and it completely justified the 5 hours we spent on the bus traveling there and back.
The next big thing for us is going to be our trip up to Trujillo and Piura! We leave this Wednesday in the afternoon to arrive in Trujillo in the evening. We will be gone until at least the 18th of May, and I'm not sure how much I'll be able to communicate in that time. So if I'm not answering emails, you'll know why!
I hope you all have a great few weeks while I'm gone, and I'll try to update the blog with the details of our trip when I get back. Talk to you again in a few weeks!
