Monday, January 27, 2014

Tunas and Terabytes

The rains have been hitting us pretty hard and steady all week. Reminiscent of the downpours when we first came to Peru in 1998, it can sometimes be hard to think and or talk over the din of some of these heavy downpours. When we came to Peru, the news ran one story of disaster after the next. While not that severe, we see many reports of flooding and landslides. Some have compromised highways and just yesterday, we saw where a railroad had been destroyed by a river undercutting the tracks in Huancavelica. Hard to build anything and have it last in one of the steepest terrain’s in the world, the heavy rains exacerbate the problem and crews scramble to keep up. Well, “scramble,” may be a little generous.

They do work on this situation and we see many road crews out and manual labor is king. We drove past a crew with guys busting big rocks into small rocks using an array of jury rigged sledgehammers, with no eye or foot protection that we could tell. They break big rocks into little rocks to put them in the gabion baskets, big wire-mesh, cubic cages that they set in place to shore up the hillside before it all comes down. This is an effective technique that our engineers used to build bridges from Tintaya to highway. When we first came to Tintaya, we had to ford six good sized rivers to get to the city from our mining camp. These were often impassable and we could not get out for weeks at a time.

The upside of torrential rains is that everything is becoming so green and lush that the hillsides look like Scotland, well, a really steep Scotland.

We had a lovely dinner and movie at the mission home Monday night. We enjoyed visiting with President and Sister Harbertson and swapping missionary stories and adventures. We laughed and marveled at our experiences here in Peru, what a great time this is.

We were able to attend the Cusco Zone Conference on Tuesday with all the young missionaries that are serving in this area. It’s always a treat to feel so welcome and loved by the elders and sisters. We share advice, encouragement and lots of laughs together. There is always a wonderful spirit at these meetings.

There is a new director of the archives, Umberto Apaza Quispe. He visited us on Wednesday to learn more about what we are doing and how Family Search works. He was very interested in the image taking process and the churches interest in genealogy. We were invited to the archive meeting on Thursday afternoon at the University where we presented the Archives with our first full hard disk of our approved and passed images. A full Terabyte, several thousand images, it was pretty exciting.
Julie’s brother and family are coming to visit in March. We’re excited about that and visited a funky bed and breakfast to see if it was livable. The house is built around a big tree and has parts of the tree in some of the rooms. It really is a kind of tree house in the old part of Cusco. It will be an adventure for sure!

A different aspect of the rains and our proximity to the rainforest is that we get to choose from an unimaginable wealth of fruit. Right now, the mangoes and tuna are on. Now, one might be tempted to seek a tuna sandwich, in which case, he/she might be disappointed. The tuna are cactus fruit/ prickly pear and they are juicy and tasty. This is one of the things we love about life here and one of the things we miss about it when we are gone. One of Rich’s favorite soda pops is made from the guarana fruit, famous in Brazil.

On a fruity note, Julie hit upon an idea of such deliciousness that it pretty much defies description. Maracuya is a very sour passion fruit, about as strong a flavor as a lime. They sell them in heaps, most of the year. She decided that it would make a great cheese cake to add its juice instead of lemon to the cream cheese and then make a thick sauce of maracuya to pour over the cheese cake. Pretty sure this has to be bad for you because it is positively decadent.

Things are getting back to normal after the holidays. Rich is back in his Quechua classes and Julie back on track with her Spanish lessons.

We had a great Sunday in Izcuchaca with about 35 in attendance. Julie taught primary and she’s teaching them songs for the 2014 Primary Program. The children love to sing and “Do as I’m Doing” in English, is always the first request. It’s lots of fun. Rich taught Priesthood and had a great time. We are so grateful to be serving a mission together. It is challenging and difficult at times but mostly it is a grand spiritual adventure. We love the people we serve and work with, we love being together and we love serving the Lord.
 
Photos From Before Our Mission-Upper Reaches of the Apurimac Gorge

Photo2 From Before Our Mission-Upper Reaches of the Apurimac Gorge

Photo3 From Before Our Mission-Upper Reaches of the Apurimac Gorge (One of the switchback segments of the road in and out of the canyon)

Photo4 From Before Our Mission-Upper Reaches of the Apurimac Gorge


A beggar in the pharmacy

A lady on her way to work, all business, this one...

Presenting our Terabyte of photos

Llamas on their lunch break

Llamas on their lunch break 2 (we just liked both photos)

The reason that Peruvian surgeons excel in hernia surgery

The  Tree Hotel 1

The  Tree Hotel 2

Lady selling tea

A lady not selling anything... Warm Sunday afternoon

Tunas for sale

Izcuchaca on Sunday afternoon, in the car waiting to go home

Fresh Tunas

Huge and delicious Curahuasi mangoes



Sunday, January 19, 2014

Raging Rivers and Mango Mounds

Rich has had a sore foot for the last week or so. We have no idea why or what happened but he was out of commission for a few days. He is feeling much better now but taking our usual morning walk has been out of the question. We had some difficult books to work with this week but managed nearly 4,000 new images with 1200 images that we had to retake.  If we get 4 images that aren’t perfect the auditors in SLC sent it back and we “get” to re-do the whole book. We were feeling pretty sure of ourselves and we took the images too fast, so there was some blur on the pages. We have been much more cautious since and decided that we’re not trying to break any “Family Search Record” for number of photos taken in a week!

The branch in Curahuasi changed their meeting time from 8am to 9am Sunday morning so we were able to leave our apartment at 6am and get to Curahuasi on time. It was nice that we didn’t have to go Saturday afternoon and pack a bunch of stuff to spend the night. It makes for a long day but when you have baby chicks chirping in a box on the way it makes it worth the trip. There was a confirmation of a young lady today in church; wisely she put her parrot outside on a tree during her confirmation and for sacrament meeting. He was one happy bird, squawking and screeching all morning; he obviously loves to come to church! Our deaf friend Julian always brings his dog Chico with him to church. Chico loves to greet everyone and then quietly lies under the benches until he hears a “disturbance in the force” and then he’s up and ready to defend the “chapel” from any intruders.  Curahuasi is always an adventure.

Mango season is in full swing here and Curahuasi has huge mounds of enormous mangos on every corner. They go for the whopping price of …sorry to make you mango lovers jealous… $0.30 each! They are delectable. We each eat one or two every day.

On our way to Cuarahuasi, we cross the Apurimac River, the longest tributary to the Amazon. We have been told that the Amazon has eighteen tributaries that are each larger than the volume of the Mississippi River. Mighty indeed, where it empties into the Atlantic, it forces fresh water out into the ocean for fifty miles and depending on where you draw the line, the mouth  is around 350 miles across.
 
All of the rain in the Altiplano, where we are has charged the rivers on their way East.  Impressive at low levels, the Apurimac is raging like Assyria right at the top of its banks. We’re hoping it won’t go over and block the way to Curahuasi, although landslides are just as threatening during the rainy season. We shall see. Because of the rain the countryside is beautiful and green. The cornfields are
 
Our apologies for the number of dog pictures but they abound, are absolutely everywhere and often, out of control.
 
 

Garbage Patrol/Where’s Waldo? Can you count  how many dogs are rummaging for treats in the dumpsters???


Green fields near Cusco


Corn fields near Cusco (for Isaac our Son-in-law)


Women with an alpaca, hustling for photos.


Gratuitous dog #1

 


Gratuitous dog #2


Gratuitous bat-eared dog #3

 


Chico, enjoying a well-earned rest from his vigilance.



Church Parrot

 
Elder Muñoz with the church parrot
 

 


“The Great Escape,” Cuyes (Guinea Pigs) slipping out of the construction site.

Fried foods section of the Central Market, Cooked Cuyes prominent



Apurimac, upstream from our crossing
 
 
 

Hail storm outside of our apartment  on Sunday

Monday, January 13, 2014

Fireside under the Andean Sky-Rambling and Roaming

Cusco Breakfast Market near grade school

Traditional garb in the new Cusco Mall

Random dogs in Cusco

Breakfast Trout, Chuño, and potatoes Soup in Espinar

Hatun Mama, Angela Tunqui, Luis' mom with her grandaughters and  Luis' wife

Julie with the Hatun Mama, The matriarch of Tarucuyo

Tarucuyo Missionary Night #1

Tarucuyo Missionary Night #2

Tarucuyo Missionary Night #3
Our Reflections from our seats on one of the many busses this weekend...

Tarucuyo Missionary Night #4

 
We had a pretty mundane week though we thought we would have a visit with friends from the States. Sadly, the visit was interrupted by Peruvian bacteria, we suppose. They got sick in the jungle and we never actually met up.
 
On the weekend, the  mundane ended! We had decided to visit Espinar. While we traveled to Puno we received the very sad news that a friend of ours, Valderiano Laucata, a fine and humble man, from Espinar had died suddenly. He was only forty eight and has a son on a mission in La Paz Bolivia. It is nearly impossible to get to a funeral in Peru because the lack of morgues results in a law that, if the dead are not embalmed, they have to be buried within 24 hours. This rarely happens but it is usually close, for obvious reasons. Few people get embalmed here.
 
These are very close friends for whom we had been witnesses at their temple marriage. We went to see Damiana and the boys, Ever and Nestor who are at home. No one, who lives in a house, in the United States lives in the humble circumstances that are this family’s lot. We decided to go up on Friday and spend all day Saturday and see some other people as well while there. Also, we have wanted to visit a family group of the church that meets in the village of Tarucuyo, outside of Machu Puente. We contacted the bishop and stake president to tell them that we would be visiting Tarucuyo and to invite them along. Tarucuyo is fully a half hour from Espinar; this after everyone told us that it was fifteen minutes, no mas, from town.
 
These noche misionales (missionary nights) began when we lived in Peru the first time and the tiny group in Espinar held them and invited friends to learn about the church. We sometimes had upwards of one hundred people show up. We played games, had a spiritual message and some sort of refreshments. They call these Open Houses in the states and hold them every three months or so. In Espinar, we held them on Friday nights and now it Tarucuyo they do them on Saturday nights. They were/are a blast!
 
When we got out there, we discovered that the word had gotten out that we were going and about thirty people from Espinar went along, in a rented combi (a twelve person van) and two personal cars, all full to capacity. In terms of the van, they stuff in about seventeen to twenty people … We took an hour getting out there since the rivers have swollen; it is the rainy season now. We got into this little village at about dusk and they decided it would be more like a fireside if we went out behind the house they use for a chapel, built a bonfire, mostly dried dung and some wood and we sat around in a circle, sang songs, had a couple of messages, both Julie and Rich spoke, all under the Southern Cross.
 
We had an unusually clear night, for this time of year, the stars overhead, familiar after years in Tintaya were brilliant. The chill breeze, the smell of the fire and the warmth of our friends made for a remarkable evening. When it got too cold to sit outside any longer, we went back into the chapel. We had crackers and hot chicha (purple corn pudding) and just visited. We drove home in relative silence full of reflection. We got back to our hotel, exactly twelve hours after we had left it. We were pooped but pretty fulfilled…
 
On Sunday, we met with the bishopric and the Laucatas to discuss how to take care of Edgar’s mission. To his credit, the bishop suggested that he would call upon the ward to take care of it. He felt that if everyone put in a portion, it could all be handled. We felt humbled to see the strength and humility in that ward.
 
We began our trek home after church. Many people have asked if the bus passengers include chickens or pigs, ala Hollywood and we have always said, “No.” However, when we got onto our bus from Espinar to Sicuani, we were met by a crowing cock! We both looked at each other and started to laugh! The rooster was pretty raucous but finally settled down after we got out of town.
 
We had just started our trip when a young fellow stood up with a head-mounted microphone that ran to a speaker on his chest and he regaled us with the curative merits of marvelous Asian herbal remedies. We learned that our consumption of meat and fried foods were destroying our livers by cirrhosis and kidneys but that the ginseng, and some nasty tasting Asian mushrooms would clean it all out. He told how the Chinese are all skinny and that they smoke up to fifty cigarettes each day but that they clean out their systems by drinking these fantastic Asain herbs and so on, and so forth, ad nauseum.
 
When we changed busses in Sicuani to finish the trip to Cusco, a different fellow launched out of his seat and put on a head-mounted microphone that ran to a speaker on his belt. This time we frantically sought out our iPods and earphones to not be subjected to another rant. We got in  late and tired.


Sunday, January 5, 2014

New Years On Lake Titikaka

Christmas Eve with our  neighbors and our mission president and  his wife

Nativities around Peru, the lower one contains the  Aircraft Carrier that was somehow omitted from the accounts in the Gospels
 

Left to Right Maria Quispe with Josemaria Sotec, Richard Sotec with William (Yesenia's baby), Lisbeth Sotec, Julie Sotec

Maria Quispe with us

Yard Denizen in the  Arequipa hotel

Maria Pacheco our dear friend from Tintaya

Juana Aparcana's baptism.
 
Juana with her niece Juanita

 

Her Nephew Justin

Julia, Juana's younger sister


 



Mix of traditional and modern, Arequipa style.

Juanita and Justin at their first movie

Juliaca music stand and mud puddle

Huge Juliaca mud puddle

More mud, very glad to be above it in a travel bus!

Our Ride to Puno, waiting for luggage

Local Puno artist Cecilia Rodriguez' painting in out hotel El Mosoq Inn in Puno

Cecilia Rodriguez' painting #2

The Puno cathedral

Especially creepy mobile Christmas Toy...


 

Puno chicken and sausage market
 
A very patient pooch
 
For New Year’s there are mountains of yellow underwear everywhere. From skivvies to undershirts to long johns, everyone is buying new yellow underwear for good luck and prosperity in the coming year.  There are also stands selling yellow flowers and premade flower arrangements, again for good luck in the New Year. We saw heaps of grapes for sell because eating 12 grapes at each stroke marking midnight will bring luck and prosperity too. For Abundance and Plenty, many eat a spoon of lentils - or any other grain – at midnight or put some grains in the corners of the house, in bags and pockets. Little bags filled with various grains were for sale on every corner. We could feel the excitement in the air and of course at midnight the fireworks went on forever!
New Year's Eve purchases
Yellow flowers and grapes for New Years in Puno

Yellow Underwear ad in Puno
Nothing but grapes, New Years in Puno
Yellow undies for New Years

Random dog for Pauline


The Puno version of traditional and modern

The Puno version of traditional and modern #2

Modest movie popcorn in Puno



New Years day on the Uros Islands

New Years day our welcome to the Uros Islands

Teresa, selling us a tapestry

Travel between islands on totora reed boats (papyrus)

Rower

Julie in front of the a totora reed house

Rich in front of the a totora reed house

New Years day, our hike up to the top of Taquile Island 13,000 feet high

A little boy tormenting a sheep

Weaver/vendors on Taquile

Weaver/vendors on Taquile #2

Taquile leadership on their way to mass

Leader's wives on their way to mass

 
Ladies outside of the church

Taquile Island dignitaries mass

From Taquile looking across to Bolivia

Weaver/vendor #2

Taquile girl

On our  way down

Lake Titikaka

Puno from Lake Titikaka