Karaoke boda!

Yeny Matilde and Alexander's wedding photos

Acted like we where her grandparents...

Saria, Julie, Rebecca and Gloria

flower lady

Homemade jerky started last blog

Overheated fiat

Keeping Cusco GREEN

whoops

Another busy week gone. We attended the civil marriage of our friend Yeny Matilde Yauli and her new husband Alexander. It is the law in most of the world that one has to have a civil marriage before a religious marriage. Yeny and her mom were some of the first baptisms after we moved to Espinar. The wedding was lovely, our friends from Sicuani did all the decorating and the catering. The invitations said 5:30pm, we showed up about 6pm and were told that we were very early. 

Things finally got under way about 6:40pm. There were lots of speeches, dances and the bride and groom singing karaoke to each other. Then we heard that the couple would take the traditional drive around the city while we watched some videos about the couple and some other church videos about families etc. TWO HOURS later, the newlyweds finally showed up at the church again, their car battery died and they spent the whole time trying to replace it at 9pm on a Friday night. 

Fortunately for us our friend Gloria, who we knew from Espinar and her three daughters, Raquel, Rebecca and Sariah arrived and we were able to catch up with her and her children. Her husband Grimaldo had to work and was unable to come. Grimaldo was Rich’s counselor while he served as branch president in Espinar. They’re a wonderful family and it was fun visiting and passing the time with them. The caterers served pretty little hors d’oeuvres while we waited, we’re not sure what they were but they were pretty tasty.

When Matilde and Alexander finally showed up there were toasts and the drink for that was fascinating. It was a mix of Ecco (like Postum or Pero) with sugar, milk and ice all blended to s froth then Sprite added at the last minute. It was actually quite good! We were totally surprised by that one. Dinner was served at 10:30pm, chicken, pastel de fideos, (baked spaghetti layered with veggies and cheese) and a type of Waldorf salad. It was all delicious and very welcome. 

While we ate the couple came to each table for group pictures, a very big tradition with weddings here. The gifts that were brought were given to Matilde’s sisters who were her bridesmaids, who put them on a table. 

About 11:00pm they announced that the party would begin and the music was turned up to an unbearable volume, well to be fair, the volume had been unbearable the whole time… This just went from motorcycle in your ear to jet plane revving decibels.  Mercifully, their taste in music did not lean to the reggaeton or teknocumbia stuff that makes rap seem positively elegant!That’s when we said our goodbye’s and headed for home, we were beat! We are getting old and cranky!

Matilde and Alexander flew to Trujillo on Thursday to be sealed in the new LDS Temple there. Matilde served her mission in Trujillo and she was excited to get back to see friends…

Our supervisor David Tirado came from Lima to do some work in Abancay and to meet with us here in Cusco. Carlos Gonzales also came, he is the new negotiator for Family Search for this area. They and Rich had a meeting with the archive director here in Cusco and Thursday night we had a nice dinner together with David and Carlos. Just as we left the apartment big rain drops began to fall so Julie convinced Rich to run back upstairs and get the umbrellas. Thank goodness he did! We grabbed a taxi and by the time we reached the hotel to pick up David and Carlos it was an absolute flood of rain and hail. What a storm!! We managed to all pile in a taxi and ate at a good pizza place we found.  We got soaked even with the umbrellas.

When we tried to get a taxi home, all the drivers wanted S/10.00 (about $3.00) to take us home. It’s not much in the scheme of things but it normally costs S/4-5 soles. Everyone takes advantage of the rain. We walked to a bus stop and paid S/ .70/each and had a fun adventure in the process. 

Rich had a meeting on Saturday with the Stake Presidents, District Presidents and the mission presidency with Elder Costa an area authority.

We were in town again this weekend and enjoyed our Sabbath with good friends.