Armadillo cuisine

On alert

The clever but dangerous hat smuggler awaits his connection

Farewell dinner at the Harbertson's

Nothing says Mother's Day like a bullfight

Bits

Jungle poodle

Caiman for lunch

Armadillo fixings

On the fuego

Yummy tender yuca

K'ala kunka chicken, literally, the naked neck chicken

And there  you have it salty fried armadillo

Puerto fish market

Motorcycle repair

Mother's Day lunch with the Poulsens

Mother's Day lunch with the Poulsens

Some not so impressed by the baby saíno

Baby saíno

The Mighty Madre de Dios River

Puerto fruit market

It was pretty luxurious to not have to go into the archives this week. However, we certainly kept plenty busy with other assignments and undertakings. Rich went to his Quechua class and we attended our district meeting Monday night and had a productive time with the missionaries. 

Tuesday we went for our early morning walk and then the Poulsen’s came and took some things we aren’t bringing home. We’re getting things cleaned out and pared down to fit in our suitcases. Julie made rolls for our last dinner together as a mission presidency. We enjoyed a delicious dinner at the mission home with the Harbertson’s, Reáteguis and Quique Rubio.  The rolls were a big hit. Julie made extras and gave the recipe to the Reáteguis and Quique who can’t find anything like them here in Peru. We had a wonderful evening together and we will certainly miss them all. Thank goodness for Facebook, at least we won’t feel quite so far away.

After our walk Wednesday morning we took Julie’s old computer to Quique whose office is in the Inti Raymi building. He is a computer whiz and cleaned, erased everything off and reformatted it so that we could give it a good friend who needs it.  Rich finished packing for his trip to Puerto Maldonado with Pres. Reategui and left for the airport. 

Julie stayed home and started packing etc. Thursday Marvid and Yahir came for their english class and brought Julie three red roses for Mother’s Day. Marvid also recited a poem for her. They are such sweet children and we do love their families. Julie has three more classes with them, seems impossible. 

The best news… We heard back from the auditors in Salt Lake City and we have NO retakes! We have really and truly finished the FamilySearch project here in Cusco. We’re so happy and the indexing is happening quickly. We have heard about people finding their ancestors from the photos we have taken. It’s an awesome feeling. 

Rich had to travel to Puerto Maldonado for mission business. He loves going there. Still there are a number of challenges no matter how we go there. Puerto is between the Madre de Dios and Tambopata rivers. These are massive things. The bridge across the Madre de Dios takes ten minutes to walk across. The size of the Amazon tributaries is amazing and that is just a flaccid word. There are eighteen tributaries that are bigger than the Mississippi River. Anyway, this was his first time to walk across the bridge and have a look see. Parrots and big black vultures called gallinazos flew by once morning really started to break. The sun rising over the jungle is nothing short of spectacular and there are colors there that only bugs can see.

 Rich does not suffer with the heat as much as some but he is not a huge fan of the  humidity. Still, we always stay in the Cabaña Quinta where the air conditioning always works pretty well. Except,… This trip, upon arrival he and Segundo, his traveling buddy learned that the place was full and we did not get our reservations in time to have air conditioning, we didn’t even suspect that there were such rooms. The temperature did not get much over 100° Fahrenheit though the humidity (90-100%) made up for it. In three days Rich took at least seven showers and still, everything felt pretty sticky. The nights sort of cool down in the sense of sleeping in a sauna that was turned off for five hours through the night. It felt a little like a scene from The Year of Living Dangerously, no, a lot…

On Thursday, Rich had  some free time and one of the members, Cipriano, offered to take him out to his farm. Driving east from Puerto for three hours gets you to the Brazilian border. He only went about an hour out that way. The farm is impressive. He has 200 hectares and it is positively beautiful. He cultivates 30 hectares of hybrid papaya that they were harvesting when we got there. He plans to plant 2500 cacao trees and has a big hill where he has planted hundreds of mahogany trees. It is a pretty going concern.

They stopped to check out the hired hands who were happy to get the fertilizer Cipriano took to them. While they waited, Cipriano’s wife, decided to cook up some lunch/snack/experiment… she pulled out a water bucket full of butchered… armadillo parts. They had killed this thing in their yard and she fried it up. Rich who has eaten and enjoyed many things that others label strange, did not speak very highly of the armadillo. They cooked up a bit of yuca that pretty much saved the day. Rich’s approximation of the nature of the armadillo fell somewhere among the possible flavors/textures that might be expected from a dog, a raccoon or a cat. The meat was a mix of gristly, greasy and tough. She cooked it with enough salt to jerk a small deer and it tasted a bit like some worn out slippers, just guessing here as well. 

Later, they went to a fish hatchery/restaurant… Only in the jungle. Yet, there the culinary extravagance continued but this time with a tropical fish called Paco, that was pretty delicious. When they were about to leave a little Saíno (Peccary) wandered up. They are a wild pig-like critter that gets about as big as a medium sized dog. This one was about two and a half months old and cuddly as a puppy, dying for some one to rub it’s bristly little neck and for a finger to suckle. It was adorable.

Back in town, Rich had time for another shower and then spent the rest of the afternoon running around to talk with some members and had meetings at the church. One of the amazing things about Puerto is that there are fruit juices that no one who has not been there has ever heard of. There is one that is called copoazu and is a tart cousin of cacao, but there are tons of others. You get refrescos every time you turn up and they are all to die for! Mostly, you get chicken to eat, but the juices make up for the rest.

On Friday, Rich came home. No serious problems with the change back to altitude. It was a delight to be back to the cool and dry climate. Naturally, Pres. Reátigui and he did not get it all done, people did not show up for appointments etc. He will need to go back one more time and then it will bye bye Puerto. We love the people there. They are always very good to us. The trip was productive and a pretty grand adventure!

Saturday we met the Poulsen’s for lunch at Uchu’s, for a Mother’s Day get together. We totally indulged ourselves with a chocolate dessert consisting of a large dark chocolate truffle, chocolate mousse and a dark chocolate cake filled with runny gooey chocolate. It was fun to eat! The men bought some dying flowers from a darling little girl and we divided them up between us. It’s absolutely amazing what water will do. Julie’s flowers are standing straight up and opening, they’re lovely!

We attended both wards sacrament meetings today to say goodbye to friends. We will be in Urubamba for a district conference next week, then to Juli for one last Sunday and our last Sunday we’re planning to go to Pitumarca to say farewell to the members there. These next few weeks are going to be crazy!

We love the gospel, our testimonies have grown and been strengthened, we are grateful for all we have learned and experienced here.