Updates

I've been wanting to write a blog post for awhile now but every time I have sat down to do it the internet seems to crap out on me. This last Friday was the kids Father's day presentation at the school. It was great, they did a bunch of little skits and songs with their fellow classmates. It was going smoothly until all the power went out. Everything went pitch black except for our emergency lights that came on, and of course all the kids starting doing the whole screaming because its dark thing. So when the lights went out I brought the little kids that were from the orphanage but not old enough to be in the school back to the house with a house mom so we wouldn't have to deal with them with no lights. Then walked back to the school just in time for the power to come back on and the kids to finish their Father's day presentation. I got a couple gifts from the kids, a couple of picture frames with a picture of them and I in it all decorated.

About 2 weeks ago there was a team from Colorado here. They came and painted all the outside walls of the orphanage. It was something that has been needed for a long time now. All there work looks great. Before they go here our workers painted the swing set and we hired a local to paint some murals on the outside of the orphanage gate. Everything looks so much more alive now with all the new paint it really helps a lot with the atmosphere.

I only have 6 days left here now. I return to the states Wednesday the 30th at around 6:30 pm. Everyday the past week I've had the same two thoughts in my head, "I wish this last week would just hurry up and get over so I can be home" and "I wish this last week would never end because I'm dreading leaving all the kids."

Below are a couple pictures of the new paint jobs.

One of the paintings Steve and I painted in the kids rooms

Outside gate painted by local Peruvian

Mural by Colorado team

Swing set painted by Carlos Augusto

Mural by the Colorado team

Updates

I've been wanting to write a blog post for awhile now but every time I have sat down to do it the internet seems to crap out on me. This last Friday was the kids Father's day presentation at the school. It was great, they did a bunch of little skits and songs with their fellow classmates. It was going smoothly until all the power went out. Everything went pitch black except for our emergency lights that came on, and of course all the kids starting doing the whole screaming because its dark thing. So when the lights went out I brought the little kids that were from the orphanage but not old enough to be in the school back to the house with a house mom so we wouldn't have to deal with them with no lights. Then walked back to the school just in time for the power to come back on and the kids to finish their Father's day presentation. I got a couple gifts from the kids, a couple of picture frames with a picture of them and I in it all decorated.

About 2 weeks ago there was a team from Colorado here. They came and painted all the outside walls of the orphanage. It was something that has been needed for a long time now. All there work looks great. Before they go here our workers painted the swing set and we hired a local to paint some murals on the outside of the orphanage gate. Everything looks so much more alive now with all the new paint it really helps a lot with the atmosphere.

I only have 6 days left here now. I return to the states Wednesday the 30th at around 6:30 pm. Everyday the past week I've had the same two thoughts in my head, "I wish this last week would just hurry up and get over so I can be home" and "I wish this last week would never end because I'm dreading leaving all the kids."

Below are a couple pictures of the new paint jobs.

One of the paintings Steve and I painted in the kids rooms

Outside gate painted by local Peruvian

Mural by Colorado team

Swing set painted by Carlos Augusto

Mural by the Colorado team

Some Fun Stuff

The last week has been a little busy for me and I enjoyed that. Las Thursday there was a medical mission team that was giving a free clinical in Chenpen that we decided to take advantage of. We heard about it through pastor Tito whom helped organize the team. So Thursday morning I loaded up half of the kids in the van and we traveled to Chenpen. They gave check-ups to everyone of the kids and prescribed medicine if needed. They even pulled some teeth. Friday I took the rest of the kids, mainly the older ones...and Danilo. Danilo actually behaved very well, until getting back to the house. I guess he saved up all his energy for the whole afternoon and then let it out in about 20 mins. Somewhere in those 20 minutes he pee'd on another kid from the top of the slide.

Saturday I went surfing in the morning and Steve took the kids to soccer practice. However the soccer practice was cancelled he brought them to the beach to watch me surf and play in the ocean for a bit, it was a little cold for them. Unfortunately the waves weren't good so I didn't get to put on a surf demo for the kids.

Monday was a big March day. The kids had been practicing last week for the Flag Day ceremony. That was my third year in a row attending that, thinking about that kind of blew my mind. After the March we took a couple of pictures the kids needed for Father's day. Below are a couple of the Father's day pictures the kids are going to use for their school project.

Just bought my plane ticket from Trujillo to Lima, so now all my traveling preperations are finished (besides getting from Pacasmayo to Trujillo), and I'm already starting to get that bittersweet feeling with exactly 3 weeks left to go here.

Pulling Teeth

Father's day Pictures

Last weekend decided to take a trip with ALL the kids from the orphanage. We left Friday morning because the kids were still on their week long vacation. We went out to the house mother Gina's house. She lives about 20 minutes outside of town on a farm that is in a river valley. It took me two trips in the van to get everyone there and that was still a stretch. We fit about 20 people in the van with clothes and food each trip.

When we all got to Gina's house we started off Friday with a trip to the river. It was about a 10 minute walk from her house and was a great place to swim. The older kids had fun swimming against the current and goofing off on their own. While the other volunteers and I took the little kids out and swam with them. The current was too strong for the little kids to play in it alone. We took some fruit out there and had a snack, then after about two hours we returned to the house and got ready for lunch. We had come pan fried pork which was excellent. After lunch we went to a different stream which was more of an irrigation ditch but was just as fun for the kids to swim in. The little kids could play by themselves in that one because it had some shallow parts that did not have much of a current. After the second swimming time we came back and ate dinner which was a turkey from Gina's house that she killed and cleaned for us to eat.

After dinner we went to Rosa's house when it started getting dark. Rosa is a lady who goes to the church and has a son in the school. She likes to be very involved with the kids. We all slept in her living room after watching all three Home Alone movies. All the kids were piled on mattresses and I was sleeping on top of a couple blankets on the floor (not the most comfortable thing). Throughout the night one little kids kept waking up and crying thus waking everyone else up. I think we all got about 3-5 hours of sleep that night.

Saturday we went back to Gina's house and did some more swimming in the morning. Then we did my favorite part of the weekend which was return back to Rosa's house for lunch. For lunch Rosa and her uncle prepared pork, chicken and beef by cooking it under ground surrounded by hot rocks they heated up in a brick oven with firewood. It was by far the best meal I have eaten in Peru. It tasted a lot like BBQ and was super tender. After lunch we lounged around for a little while then went and played some soccer. We headed back to the orphanage around 4:00 in the afternoon. Overall it was an excellent weekend, I had a blast and I know the kids had even more fun.

Packing up the van.

Looking out from the back of Gina's house, beautiful farm country.

Swimming in the big river

Swimming in the irrigation canal

Smashed together on some mattresses watching Home Alone movies