February 2003 Archives

Yes, folks, here you go... 29 fabulous photos from the latter half of my trip. They turned out GREAT! I hope you enjoy them.

Well, I've been back in the U.S. for a day now, and I'm still somewhat in culture shock. It's not really severe or anything, but it's just strange to here in the land of television and very sweet candy.

My trip home was bittersweet. It's always tough to say goodbye, but maybe Yoli and I are getting to be old hats at this. This time is different--we have very real things to look forward to, and very real work to do during our time apart. It was also hard for me to say goodbye to Bolivia, to the seminary and the mission and the people in those places, to her family, to her friends.

We did so much more than I ever dreamed we would. I came there to learn about Yoli's culture and her family; I ended up joining them by getting engaged. I came here to design a website for the seminary; I also designed two brochures and started a website for other ministries. I came, planning to stay for four weeks; I stayed five.

I got into St. Louis at about noon on Thursday. I was tired and sore and scraggly-looking. But my mom was pleased to see me, and it was good to be back.

My departure began on Wednesday. Yoli and I spent the day finishing the last details of the website, then burning CDs for everyone I had done projects for--the seminary, El Jord�n, and Casa Hogar Nacer. I made sure I burned a special CD for Glennie that included the lone Jerry Douglas song I found for him.

The Hebron website is now online.... The Spanish site is at http://www.sthebron.org/ and the English site is at http://www.sthebron.org/english/

One note: since we just bought the domain yesterday, it may not have propagated everywhere yet. If you are unable to see it when you click on the links, just wait a day and try it again.

Monday was a tough day at the Seminary. They've been facing an incredibly tight budget and now they have a personnel problem as well.

It was frustrating for me, because I wanted to purchase web hosting and get the site online before the day was over. But Rusty, the rector of the seminary, was busy most of the day and couldn't come until late in the afternoon.

On the lighter side, Louise took a photo of Yoli and I with her digital camera, so enjoy!

Well, now we're down to the wire. Two and a half days left before I return to the U.S.

This weekend was pretty nice. I got to spend a lot of time with Yoli's family, and the two of us got some important things taken care of.

On Saturday we went to have our pictures taken. It's a requirement with this fiance� visa application. The funny thing (to me) is that here in Bolivia all photos for official documents are very strict.

On Wednesday we were invited to eat lunch with Glennie and Marilyn Wry. They are my neighbors, physically. Their house is on the ground floor of a 3-story student housing building which is right next the the guest quarters where I live.

Upon arriving for lunch from El Jordán, Marilyn called to let me know that my dad had called Becky Turner. Apparently someone in my family saw a news report on CNN about flooding in Santa Cruz -- so bad that the water had carried people away. They were afraid for me.

Well, rest assured that I haven't been swept away anywhere (unless you're talking about love...).

The six months before seeing Josh were very hard, especially the first 3 months after I returned to Bolivia.

In the aftermath of getting engaged and having the opportunity to remain here for another week, I've been somewhat busy. So I'll just fill today's entry with a few anecdotes you'll probably enjoy.

First, let's talk about sandals. On Saturday, Yoli took me to the Feria, a giant place filled with different vendors selling all sorts of things. It's mostly nonperishable stuff like clothes, furniture, etc. I was hoping to find a pair of sandals.

Saturday night Yoli and I cooked pizza and then we got engaged.

We've been planning this for a while, and I must admit to you now that I left all the details related to our engagement out of my entries for the past two weeks so it would be a surprise.

It didn't happen exactly as we originally envisioned, but it still went well. She said yes and she's wearing the ring, and that's the main thing. :)

Call me Josh Renaud, rain-bringer.

Yes, there's been an unusually high amount of rain in Santa Cruz since I arrived in January. And on Wednesday it was really rainy. It has also been very windy. I can't complain about rain, since it eases the pain of the high temperatures that are the bane of my existence.

Sorry, I just had to get those rhymes off my chest.

I forgot to write about my adventures Saturday and I didn't write about Tuesday, either, so I'll share some anecdotes from those days, as well as Wednesday.

On Saturday, Yoli took me to see Santa Cruz's relatively new Botanical Garden. The original one was located near the river and was destroyed be a flood in the early 1980s. She hadn't been to the new one, and was looking forward to seeing it.

Well, neither of us thought to bring bug spray.

On Monday I grappled with a PC and came away from the battle victorious.

The problem computer belonged to Rusty. Our goal was to get digital photos he had on his home computer onto my computer. The easiest way to do that, I thought, would be to hook up a CD burner to his computer and burn a CD.

But in a typical illustration of why PCs are inferior to Macs, his home computer had trouble understanding "plug-n-play." Rusty had trouble getting the drivers for the CD burner installed by himself, so in the morning Yoli and I went over to give it a try.

Sunday was by far the most beautiful day I've had since I've been here.

It started with a shower -- a rain shower, mind you. Well, perhaps it would be better described as a torrent. As I sleep with my windows open (to let cool air in), it woke me up around 5 am. It wasn't the rain the woke me up, really. It was the roar of a cascading waterfall. The rain was coming so hard that the gutter over the roof perpendicular to my building had temporarily failed, and all the water was flowing off of it, down into a brick-border garden below. I was hopeful that the rain would last a while and bring a cool day with it, but then I remembered that this was the day we were going to Samaipata, and we needed good conditions to get there.