Sunday June 5, 2011

Saturday was a long and fulfilling day. We started our day by going to the market downtown which is an experience in itself. It's a large building covering about a block that houses 150 (más o menos) small stalls selling everything you could want except maybe Doritoes... Yarnell's ice cream...packaged meat...it's all fresh and hanging to be bought... including organ meats, cows feet, chicken feet, sheep feet, duck feet, pigs feet (I have pictures of all if you don't believe me) along with cow heads, sheep heads, chicken heads, duck heads, pig heads...well, you get the picture without me showing you, I think. We split into teams of 5 and each team bought staple food for 2 families each to last 2-4 weeks. None of the vendors speak English, so it was a challenge for some to negotiate a deal. In the afternoon, we came back to Villa Milagro and separated the food and then made some of the deliveries to the families that had been selected by the VM staff and Monte Sion Church as being the neediest. It's always an emotional experience to go into their homes, such as they are and actually see how they live and feel their gratitude for what we bring. We all wished we could have given more.
Saturday evening, we went to the orphanage and played with the children, then had a weiner and marshmallow roast. Several ladies bonded with the llama but couldn't get too close for fear of getting spit on. The children are shy at first but quickly respond to all the attention. Most ate 2-3 hotdogs and one little boy ate 5 on our last count.
This morning (Sunday), we had church here at Villa Milagro with Bro. Mike Shy delivering a wonderful message on knowing God. Today is a very important election day in Peru, the presidental run-off. In Peru, you must travel back to your home town to vote, or pay a high fine and it is illegal to conduct any kind of meeting such as a church service. Therefore, they did not have church at Monte Sion where we usually go, plus Pastor Elmer is from the coast and had to travel home to vote. We have been busy packing and getting ready to go to a village called Chancay that we have been to before, about 3 hours away. We'll be leaving sometime after lunch and will probably not be back in contact until Tuesday evening. Everyone is well, almost...one of our dentist is a little under the weather after playing soccer with the kids at the orphanage last night...altitude, altitude, altitude! He's says he's feeling OK now. Please continue to pray for us as we travel and hold clinic in Chancay!