Flooding

Our trip to the Beni was really a great and sad experience. It was unbelievable the conditions the people are living in that have houses under water. They are given a tarp and then it's up to them to construct some sort of living quarters. There were tent camps for miles and miles. The smell in the camps is unforgettable it's so bad. We saw dikes up all over the city of sand trying to protect some neighborhoods. We saw streets that were underwater up to your shoulders. The water is very polluted and contaminated and there were people bathing in it. The news said a major problem is there are not bathrooms so people are using the water as bathrooms. We had a meeting with some pastors to discuss what the mission is going to do. We decided to do similarly to what we did last year as a mission and that is providing food twice a month to a group (a large group) and also talking to the people about God and evangelizing. They make up bags that are about 20 kilos of rice, oil, sugar, flour, beans, coffee, powdered milk etc They also help all the people from the churches in the area that are hurting. They waters are not going to go down until June or July so it's not a short term displacement from their homes. At this rate the people in this area live in their homes about 2 thirds of the year and the rest they live under a tarp in the middle of thousands. Our mission is raising money so we can support as many families as possible. This trip we brought enough food for 100 families for a couple of weeks. Also we brought tarps and water boots. The pastors have a heart to help the people long term as well by giving them seeds and helping them to plant so they will have food longer term.

I have some pictures but Grant has our camera in Peru right now. He is helping a pastor and his family to rebuild a house they lost in the earthquake. I'll post those later.

Talita Cumi Birthday Celebration

We had a great opportunity to sponsor two children from Talita Cumi for their birthday celebration. Every two months a family hosts a birthday party where all the kids with birthdays in those two months gets to attend and celebrate. The hosts ask people to sponsor a child which means buying them a gift and spending the night with them at the party. We sponsered two-Juan de Dios and Carla Patricia. We had a cookout and cake and opened presents. It was so much fun to watch the kids--they were soo excited the entire evening. With over thirty children the orphanage needs help making each child's birthday special and they have found a great system for doing just that. Vanessa, the hostess, lighting the candles with all the birthday children watching.

Juan anticipating a big slice of cake.

The group bowed their heads and prayed before eating the cake thanking Jesus for His blessings.

Juan ran and gave Grant and I a hug before he opened his presents :)

For Carla we bought a shirt and a bracelet and some nail polish. She modeled the shirt for everyone later.

We bought Juan de Dios a backpack which he needed to start school again and a outfit and a box car. He was thrilled. The next week every time Grant went to work he would bring out his backpack to show Grant.Here is Grant, Carla Patricia, Juan de Dios and I (and Juan's balloons :) This is Sally my prayer partner at the school. She had sponsor a child as well. She is the grandmother of two students at the school and is here to take care of them. She is also the school nurse. Grant and Gustavo played a lot of checkers. The rules varied depending on if Gustavo liked the move or not :)

Brazilian Adventure

Over Christmas break we had the opportunity to visit Grant's family Tim, Denice and Timmy in Brazil. We had a rough start to the trip--we were traveling with Gary and Diane. The plane on the way there was 10 people overbooked. So Gary and Diane were put on standby and they moved Grant and I to first class. Gary and Diane did not make it on the plane so we barely made it but we got on the plane minutes before it left the gate.

Gary and Diane arrived the next morning to Sao Paulo. We rented a car and took a road trip along the coast. It was so beautiful drive through the little beach towns and see the ocean and islands. Our final destination was Paraty a quaint old town where we could rent a boat and snorkel. We had a lot of adventures along the way. We lost our keys in the ocean, hotwired our car, couldn't find any vacancies but that made the trip all the more memorable. We were pleasantly surprised when on the way home we were given first class seats again :) That was a nice way to end a trip.
Grant and Timmie went out on boogie boards for hours. We later learned one reason they were gone for so long was they walked the wrong way on the beach when they came out and got a little turned around.

Tim showing off his physique :)

Gary showing us his muscles to the amusement of his wife.

Lunch beachside one day. We needed a table so a boogie board was drudged up and we feasted on peanut butter and jelly. Random moments in the car. Walkie Talkies were a great source of entertainment between cars. We played the game of starting a song and then the other car finish the line. They also helped when we got separated from each other.
One of the many beautiful views as we drove.
We pulled beside the road to enjoy the view. The highway was right along side the coast for most of our trip so we had a lot of stops like this one. We ate a lot of pizza in Brazil. Everywhere I looked there were pizzarias. We really liked the spinach pizza they served.

Here was our boat for the day. We made it to Parati and first thing in the morning went to the port and asked around until we found a good price to rent a boat for the day with snorkel equipment. We were on the water over 5 hours and got to snorkel at three locations. The view was great the captain was friendly and we had a sunny sunny day. Our brave captain.
Grant and I on the lower deck. Denice, Me and Diane enjoying the view from the top.
Grant found a starfish and brought it up to show us in the boat. We later watched it flip itself over on the bottom of the ocean.
The guys loved jumping off the top deck of the boat into the water over and over again.
The view riding on the top deck of the boat. We passed many islands some were populated other only had one large mansion.
Here is the view as we returned to the harbor.
At the end of our day here is the crew minus me. Our captain was a great sport and the boat was great.
One of the streets in Parati...it was extremely picturesque. We walked around the streets at night and looked at all the shops. Grant and I at the bay in Parati after our snorkeling day on the boat. This was called Slippery Rock and it was long natural slide you could go down and end in a deep enough not to hurt. This dare devil was crazy he got a running start and surfed down the rock on his feet. At the end he surfed straight out into the air and far enough passed the rest of the rock and landed in the water below. You never knew what path you would go for sure it was definately a thrill. This is me screaming at the top of my lungs as I started to pick up too much speed for my liking. Here is Grant going down one of several times he slid down. The beach had huge boulders scattered along it....really reminded me of a beach I visisted in Portugal. Gorgeous. This was the gorgeous beach where the car keys ended up in the ocean. They were in Tim's pocket and the waves were very strong and we lost them. So we talked to the bartender who called a locksmith. Fortunately we left one door unlocked so we could get into the car just not drive it 4 hours back to Sao Paulo. Between my Spanish and Tim's Portuguese we drove the locksmith back to his house and he got the tools to hot wire our car...no I'm not joking :) He made me watch him hot wire it and told me how to put the car back together in Portuguese. We were just thrilled to be able to continue our trip. Tim, Denice, Gary, Diane, Me and Grant in front of Tim's house on our last day :( We had a wonderful trip but it was too short.

Kuhns' Christmas Visit

On December 27th Gary and Diane came to visit! My parents were in Santa Cruz for three more days so we went to the fabulous Camino Real Hotel for three nights. We had a wonderful time with both our parents here. The first day together, Friday, we went back to the Butterfly Farm and swam and had a wonderful time. On Saturday we went to the zoo and then swam at the hotel in the afternoon. That night we went Brasargent for dinner. This place is a Churrasco place where they bring every kind of meat and then some to your table. Everyone was brave and tried the bull hump and udder. We had such a good time laughing and trying everything. We tried a dessert that tasted like marshmellow Peeps you get at Easter time. Weird as that sounds we loved it and everyone ate some.

We dropped my parents at the airport on Sunday morning and made it to church. After church we went back to the hotel to check out and swam one last time. We went Casa del Camba for a late lunch. We tried all the traditional Santa Cruz dishes like Majidito and Sopa de Mani. After lunch Gary, Diane and Grant played miniature golf. The course was so rough and they lost a ball or two in a few of the tunnels. That night we got to show them our house for the first time.

We went to the orphanage and introduced them to everybody there. Unfortunately Diane and Gary both got pretty sick from something they ate or drank. We had to make a run to the pharmacy and they took a lot of little pink pills the entire time they were here :( Tuesday we tried to go to Los Espejillos but it had rained and we couldn't get through the road. Wednesday and Thursday we went to Samaipata and visited all our favorites like Lago Volcan (Volcano Lake) and El Fuerte. On Friday we came back and went to Los Espejillos, which is it's own entry earlier in the blog :) It was the craziest day I've had to date in Bolivia. We shopped all day on Saturday and Sunday we grabbed a flight to Sao Paulo to visit family. Here is my Mom and Diane and Gary on the morning we had to take my parents to the airport.

This Christmas tree was sitting on real grass that was brought into the hotel. They watered the grass regulary while we were there.

We did have one big hitch in our visit...Gary and Diane tried to get money out of the ATM. It said it was processing and then no money came out. They checked online and the money came out! So they were out money and it was a huge fiasco but fortunately it was eventually cleared up. At Volcano Lake we ate a picnic lunch by the lake. Grant and Gary walked to the other side of the lake while Diane and I enjoyed the scenery.

Mr. and Mrs. Kuhns

Proud parents with their oldest :) Grant on the balcony at La Vispera where we stayed in Samaipata. The stars from this place were amazing--the best view I've had of the stars in my life.

Fender Bender

So it's been our goal not to get in an accident while here :) Pretty much anyone's goal I guess but traffic is a lot different in Bolivia and it's never a good idea to be a foreigner and be in an accident. On Friday we were rear ended while coming home from school together in our big truck. There was a bus on the side of the road that was stopped and so the vehicle in front of us stopped fast and changed lanes so we put on our brakes and the Jeep behind us did not. He did not hit us too hard and since our truck is a monster there was no damage on our part. The Jeep had a few scrapes and bumps. So we get out and immediately draw a large crowd of bystanders. One of the bystanders gets very involved and starts saying it was our fault. In Bolivia the person who does the rear ending is always at fault. Some of our friends were also driving home from school and stopped which was very nice for us. One of our friends is Bolivian and he said you aren't at fault just leave. But we didn't want any trouble so we talked and finally the guy said give me 50 Bolivianos or we'll have to get the cops and the insurance all to come out. 50 bolivianos is the equivilant of 6 dollars. So our options were pay 6 bucks or wait and go through a 2-3 hour ordeal with cops and insurance. We decided just to pay him after we wrote a paper saying he was at fault which he signed. As we were paying him another vehicle stopped and a man came up and said --You know they are taking advantage because you are gringos? That afternoon I was very aware that I was a foreigner.