Let's Put A New Coat of Paint On This Lonesome Old Town/Rats of Nimh Rescue

New Coat of Paint  indeed!

Happy Birthday to Rich

Happy Birthday to Rich

Happy Valentines Day to Julie

Moving to the Lee of the Stone

Moving to the Lee of the Stone

Moving to the Lee of the Stone

Moving to the Lee of the Stone

Moving to the Lee of the Stone, stove mover

Moving to the Lee of the Stone, stove mover

Moving to the Lee of the Stone

The cringer

Only Rich loves this mangy dog

Gene pool

Watermelon boy

Watermelon boy

Good Sister

Nemesio peddling Mallow plants

Prickly pear vendor

Alfalfa vendor

Shoes

Avenida Ejercito on Saturday Morning

Saturday Protest

Rich traveled to Ayaviri on Sunday to attend meetings there. He did this to get some information for the president in order to make some decisions about this branch. It was a long day for him; he left at 4am and returned about 8pm.  Julie stayed behind, attended church in Cusco and finished what packing she could for our move Monday.  

Julie covered piano lessons at the church for Sister Rhoades Monday morning, While Rich finished the last bit of packing. It has been raining more and seems to hit every afternoon about two. We had coordinated for an earlier pick up to keep our belongings dry. Rich called Lalo, our move coordinator and asked, could we move it up?

While Rich packed, Lalo dropped by with more boxes for the move. Rich promptly left the house without his keys and had to borrow from the kindly neighbor, (not named Auntie Shrew), in order to take a key to the chapel where Julie taught to get her keys so he could get back into the apartment and finish packing before the moving truck arrived to take us to the lee of the stone. While this went on, Rich became obsessed with the thunderheads building up from the Amazon and began to pester Lalo who kept pushing the hour back… It seemed that Murphy’s Law had serious potential to get us!

The truck and two men showed up about 1 pm to load things up and drive 5 minutes down the road to unload everything. At about half way unloaded, we felt the first pats of rain drops and began a more harried unloading. Just while the last box came in, the heavens opened and a downpour commenced. We were blessed, and all of our stuff was dry.

Moving is such a pain. We were exhausted and compared to home, we had nothing to move! Our new apartment is about 2 years old and is right across the street from the Ttio Chapel. When we’re in town church will be close. Our apartment is on the second floor, down a walkway, off the main road so it is much quieter.  Six sister missionaries live above us, but they are quiet so far. Of course, they have not had a transfer when the number can increase to more than twenty in that apartment… Of course, there are the usual barking dogs and there is a parrot that lives behind us who likes to squawk when he is put outside. But, overall it’s a pretty calm spot.

This Tuesday, we’re supposed to be getting cupboards put in the kitchen. We’ll take some pictures when it’s all put together. We’re pretty happy that we have propane heated hot water in both showers, so we can actually take longer than a 3 minute shower.

On Wednesday, Rich went back to work and Julie worked Thursday and Friday while Rich took care of some of his many responsibilities pertaining to his calling in the mission presidency and waited for the landlord to make some additional adjustments in the apartment. It is great to be back in our routine and we’re enjoying seeing another part of Cusco as we walk to and from work each day.

We have a young friend named Vicki who was visiting the other day and expressed her complete conviction about things she had read in the “newspaper.” Apparently, according to her information, there is an Embassy in Lima for Aliens (extra-terrestrial type aliens that they call Omni’s.) Who knew? Also there are “some Peruvians who have signed up for a trip to Mars so that they can buy land that is for sale there.” “But the tickets are one way only.” Most “newspapers” here are the tabloid variety. We had a good chuckle over this new information.

Rich learned from his Quechua teacher who is also a biologist that cankers are caused by “warm food.”  Not warm in the sense of spiciness or temperature but foods that make your stomach “hot.” It sounds a bit like a balance thing but we have never figured it out. Anyway, if you have more than three cankers at a time, it isn’t from a “hot stomach” but it’s another problem, maybe a virus??? We are still trying to figure out which foods make your stomach “hot” and of course no one has given us a definitive answer.  Some candidate foods include chocolate, deep fried foods etc.

On Saturday we had lunch in a new “picanteria” that is up near the ruins of Sacsayhuaman. We had a wonderful view of Cusco below us and the food was delicious. We were above the Plaza de Armas and there was a staircase nearby so we decided to walk down the stairs to the Plaza. It was fun, but because there were hundreds, many hundreds of stairs, by the time we hit the bottom, our legs were pretty shaky. Julie’s front thigh muscles are still feeling the effects of our adventure. 

We attended the Cusco Stake Conference this Sunday and enjoyed a great meeting. The talks were wonderful and there was a sweet spirit there.  We always run in to people who knew us when we lived here before.  This time we met Wilson who was in Primary when we lived in Espinar, and his brother Abram who was in Young Men’s. They are grown up now and it was fun to reminisce with them.  Next week we travel to Sicuani for their Stake Conference. We have lots of friends there, so we’re looking forward to it. 

After meetings, Rich had more meetings with the mission presidency. In recent days, both secretaries and now, the first counselor have been transferred or obligated to move for work! He came away with a lot more to do than in prior meetings. Previously, he had been charged with the membership audits and now he just has audits… This all happens as we plan for a district president’s seminar at the end of March! Good grief!