We are still in a time of transition and although we have a newsletter written up with our coming plans we are still not quite ready to send it out. In the mean time this is what's keeping us busy:
The beginning of the school year: First grade and preschool.
Attending church with our local church family.
Drawing up potential floor plans for our temporary home (3 rooms, about 615 square feet) in the village.
We're not sure exactly what the inside looks like and the bathroom doesn't exist currently.
The building we'll be living in.
Getting reacquainted with Biscuit!
Spending time with Nathan's brother and family (food is always a good reason to hang out).
Sickness, yup, a few weeks of rest. . .and sickness hits. . .we're thankful for the time we had without it!
Meetings, phone calls and emailing with our leadership and local church ministry team.
Sharing with some local college-age men and women about missions.
Getting used to shopping in the local market and stores again.
And running miscellaneous errands.
We've hit a few hiccups in our planning but continue to move forward. Please pray for unity amongst those involved in decision making and supporting these transitions and wisdom as we make decisions.
After a fun-filled and altogether too-crazy summer in Montana, it's time to put our collective nose back to the grindstone. This afternoon we leave Bozeman and will arrive in Bolivia on Tuesday, Lord willing.
I put up some more photos of our summer fun in our online photo album. Here are some of the highlights:
Swimming with cousins:
Denver zoo:
Massive sandwiches from Pickle Barrel:
Awesome scenery:
More fun with cousins:
Fun with gubs:
New books:
VBS:
Fourth of July with cousins:
Fishing (and more awesome MT scenery):
Father-daughter camping with friends:
Feeding ducks:
While we have enjoyed being back in the States, it has been far from restful. We've been running like crazy to see people and visit churches. That said, it has been refreshing to be in our home culture again. Our last Sunday here in our home church was particularly enjoyable.
During our four weeks back in the US, we've spent time in Denver, Billings, Bozeman, and Cody. Now we're heading over to Dillon to see Kaylee's mom. We're having fun, but it's CRAZY! :)
As of tonight, we've been in the US for two weeks! At times it seems so long and at others so short, but 1/6 of our time has passed and it has been a whirlwind. We've spent time with lots of family in 3 different cities and seen lots of friends at church. This week, we're in Bozeman doing VBS at our home church.
Please continue to pray for our girls as the strain of continuous activity and (especially) meeting new people is taking its toll. Addi, the most introverted of the 3, stayed home from VBS this morning with Kaylee, which was good for both of them. Lydia went again today and says she enjoys it, but is unusually clingy and gets pretty nervous if I'm not right next to her. Anne is handling it the best and is genuinely enjoying VBS, but the strain is coming out in other areas, especially in her pride and unwillingness to take correction (she gets that from me).
Kaylee and I are soaking it up. Although it is difficult for us at times too, it is SO wonderful to be spending time in a place we know so well, with good friends, speaking English! Kaylee had a very productive day yesterday buying homeschool material, getting a routine medical checkup, making phone calls, and shopping. I've been enjoying the food and had a great time shooting through a case of clay pigeons (click for video)with my dad, brother-in-law, and nephews while camping on Friday.
I'll try to get some photos up here soon, but for now you can see a couple on Kaylee's personal Missionary Wife blog.
Our life is never dull, that's a fact. Here's what's going on around our house:
No more classes! Kaylee finished her formal Spanish study at the end of April, officially closing the latest chapter in our long road to tribal ministry! Anne finished her year of Kindergarten the following day. Kaylee has a few words and photos at her personal blog: Life of a Missionary Wife.
Packing! For the last two weeks, we have been slowly sorting and packing our things to get ready to store them for our trip to the US in June. We're still sorting out the details of how that's all going to work out, but it is coming together. In the meantime, our house is a shambles:
Planning! We have a full itinerary for our summer in Bozeman and are trying to work out the details of our move to Urubichá when we return. It is coming along slowly, mostly due to the wide variety of options and opinions that we have to work with! Please pray that God would give us wisdom as we inch forward.
I had the opportunity to give a presentation at our church here about our plans a couple weeks ago:
Civil Unrest! Please pray for Bolivia right now as the government and workers' unions are having difficulty resolving an issue regarding salary and retirement pensions. There have been blockades on and off over the last few weeks (including one where miners blew up a bridge west of here), but this week they have started blocking non-stop and things continue to escalate. Please pray for safety for those involved and that the situation would be resolved peacefully. If it does not resolve soon, it may affect our travel plans.
This is a local news photo of one of the blockades between us and the city. Blockading at night is very uncommon, a sure sign of escalation.
During the past couple of days I have taken the time to read 1st and 2nd Thessalonians. I am so impressed by their reputation. They were obviously a group of believers growing in their faith and with a great love for their brothers and sisters in Christ. What a testimony!
As I was reading I came across two verses that really struck me as great verses for missionaries. In 1st Thessalonians 2:8 Paul says,
We loved you so much that we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well, because you had become so dear to us. (NIV, 1984)
Whoa! All I can say is that I pray that we have this same love for the people with whom we share the gospel. To not only desire to share the gospel but to have such a desire to share their lives with them; what an amazing impact Paul must have had in the lives of these people.
The second verse that really stood out to me was 2nd Thessalonians 3:1,
. . .pray for us that the message of the Lord may spread rapidly and be honored. . . (NIV, 1984)
I know that this is the desire of all involved in ministry, that the word of God and the truth would spread rapidly. So often it takes so many years to get just a young, struggling church going but our desire is to see so much more. Thankfully we can rest in God's will and trust that He knows best. May the prayer of our hearts be that we honor Him and His word as we live among these people.
Kaylee already posted about her thoughts and feeling regarding our trip to Urubichá, but we decided that we should also write about the trip itself, as it was very stressful (especially returning!).
We set out from Cochabamba on the 15th of February, headed for Santa Cruz. It was an uneventful trip and we felt quite comfortable on the road, since we had been over the same 300 miles just five weeks earlier.
On the morning of the 17th, Kaylee and I said goodbye to our girls and my parents and got on the road to Urubichá. The first 185 miles to Ascención de Guarayos is on one of Bolivia's major highways and is paved pretty well all the way. Then you turn off the main road and go another 25 miles on dirt.
I recently purchased a GoPro camera and have had a lot of fun filming our latest driving adventures (more about that in this post, including the video of me getting the Patrol very stuck in a big mud hole). Take a drive-through look at the town that is going to be our shopping headquarters and the first part of the drive to our future home:
There is a gas station in Ascención, but it didn't have any gasoline! We had filled up in San Ramón, 150km back, but thanks to a wonky gas gauge, I thought we had less than a quarter tank left. By the time we actually got out to Urubichá, it was reading empty. According to our coworkers and the people in the village, the fuel truck would come on Tuesday (the day we planned to leave), but there would be a huge line of cars waiting and not all would get gas. So we purchased 50 liters from a friend, enough to get us back to San Ramón.
Here's a video of Urubichá, taken as we left town:
The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful, other than never being sure about how much fuel we had and a couple of problems due to my international driver's license.
Uneventful, that is, until we reached Villa Tunari and were on the last leg of our trip home to Cochabamba. We got about halfway up the very steep climb out of the lowlands and ran into a huge line of trucks, buses, and cars. We weren't sure what was going on, so we decided to stay wait and see what happened.
During rainy season, that particular road is fraught with landslides and unstable areas. When there is a problem, the truck traffic starts to get backed up and the little cars and even the coaches start to pass them, often packing up 3 lanes wide! Even after the roadway is passable again, it takes forever to get the traffic mess untangled!
We waited for 2 hours and, since it was already 4pm, decided to turn around and find a place to spend the night in Villa Tunari. The idea of spending the night on a mountain, in the car, with 3 little girls and limited food and water did not appeal to us. This is what happened when we turned around:
Thankfully, I was able to get through to my brother on the cell and find out where they have stayed in the past. We ended up in a very nice bungalow-style hotel with a great pool, a good restaurant, and nice rooms with AC.
The next day we tried again in the morning. This time, we took a chance and followed some other cars up the wrong lane as far as we could. We didn't even get to the same spot as the day before! Kaylee asked a trucker how long he'd been there and he replied, "Since 3am!" A police officer was coming through the traffic on his motorcycle, informing everyone what was going on and it didn't look promising, so we turned back, checked back into the hotel, and enjoyed another afternoon in the pool!
On Sunday morning, I went down to the roadside restaurants near the
hotel and talked to several truckers about how the road was. They all
said that the problem was fixed for the time being and traffic was
slowly making its way through. Sure enough, we made it home, with no trouble!
We didn't know until later, but when we turned around on the second day, we were 14km (8.7 miles) from the actual problem!! That's a lot of trucks! This is what the situation looked like (click photo to enlarge):
