Josh Renaud

You asked for photos, you're getting photos

I just got back 50 digital images on CD. Oh yeah, baby... 500 megs of photographic beauty. Here are a few for your viewing pleasure.

I'm on the roof of a building near the Basílica Menor de San Lorenzo.

Five Iron Frenzy fans, here it is, "milk in a bag." Only it's not from Canada, it's from Bolivia. P.S. Tony the Tiger says "Grrrrrriquisima!" on this box of Zucaritas.

Jessi, the younger of two daughters of Yoli's sister Lucy.

A protest near the Plaza.

I'm standing around in one of Santa Cruz's many large markets.

This is what my mom's prized tree from Texas could have grown up to be if we still lived in Texas' warm climate.

Yoli stands under a tree for shade while we wait for a bus to take us back to Santa Cruz from Hogar Nacer.

Uncle Adonai's parrot eats some fruit from my hand.

Four bichon-type dogs, wet after Uncle Adonai gave them each baths.

Traffic in Bolivia is not for the faint of heart.

A full, satisfying day

Today was a day of blessings. It started early. We had a full morning planned: going to the bank to change dollars to Bs... then going to the photo store to check on the cost of scanning film to a PhotoCD... then going to the plaza and visiting a museum.

Well, things at the photo store turned out great. We knew they could do PhotoCDs. Basically they either scan prints or use a negative scanner to scan the negatives. The guy told me a few days ago that he generally leaves the images raw, so color correction will be up to me. He told me it would cost 50. The confusion was afterward... Yoli thought he meant dollars and I thought he meant Bs. $50 US would be rape, and 50 Bs would be a good deal. Well, we went back to the store today hoping and praying for the best.

It turns out I was right. He meant 50 Bs. So I dropped off two rolls of film that I had taken (yes, Mom, I've used half of my film halfway through the trip. Pretty good, eh?) as well as a stack of photos I brought from Hogar Nacer. All of it will be scanned in at 400 DPI and saved to a CD. This will save me a load of work. I'll be able to post some photos from my trip (since they'll already be on the computer) and it will help me begin to design the Hogar Nacer website much more quickly.

Since we didn't get to eat it the other day, we went back to the restaurant that sold "helado leche" (milk ice cream) and "helado canela" (cinnamon ice cream). We wanted the helado canela, but we were surprised that it wasn't an ice cream at all. It was more like an "icee" or "slurpee." It was a cup of iced cinnamon juice. It tasted very good, and they make it the same way they'd make ice cream: by turning a metal canister in a bucket of ice.

We went to two different museums around the plaza. One seemed to be an art museum that had some very distinctive and eye-catching paintings on exhibit. Yoli told me that in the back of this museum they taught all sorts of fine art classes. When she was young, she took classes there, and really loved the place. I enjoyed visiting it. We also went to a history museum that was somewhat new. It was interesting as well, but didn't have as much to offer as the art museum. We went through several rooms all dedicated to showing different aspects of life for Indians, from pre-Spanish times to the present.

We bought some bread from the market, and stopped at a little bakery to try some Santa Cruz specialties. I had a rice cake with cheese in it, and Yoli had something similar made with corn. They both also had a little yucca in them. They tasted good, and we had them with tea, which hit the spot.

Later we bought bread to bring back to the guest kitchen and a bar of soap (2 Bs) for my shower.

At work, I got quite a bit finished. The website is coming along well. I also talked with Rusty and I think we've found a solution to get all the digital photos he hason his computer onto mine. Then I can use some of them for the seminary website.

I can't fully explain some of the things that happened in the evening, but they were all good. We went to Yoli's house to visit the family. On the bus ride there, we met a friend of Yoli's that she knew from church. He was a nice young guy and I got to practice a little Spanish with him as we rode toward her house.

We had dinner at a small restaurant-in-a-house in Yoli's neighborhood, kind of like the other one we've been to twice. It was nice cheap food, and pretty good. I had a beef milanesa with rice. Then we walked a few blocks to Yoli's house.

Unfortunately, Jessi (Yoli's niece) had a swollen eye. She probably got sand or something in it. She visited the doctor today and he gave her some drops to put in it. She was playing the pouty preschooler to a T, so she wasn't much fun. Her little baby brother (nicknamed Papicho) was still going full-steam, though, toddling his way around his mom Lucy's room. We also saw Leya, who asked me a few questions that I actually understood and was able to answer. I also understood clearly a story told by Yoli's dad. I had told him how I had some trouble understanding the guy on the bus because of all the noise. Her dad explained that 40 years ago he worked at a place that sold salteñas (a food like empanadas) with a Japanese guy who didn't speak any Spanish. I usually have a lot of trouble understanding Yoli's parents when they speak, but this particular anecdote came through loud and clear.

Yoli and I spent some time looking through wedding magazines she'd saved and she also showed me ideas for wedding souvenirs that she had made for friends' weddings. It was supposed to be a semi-private conversation, but the once-quiet house seemed to come to life, and we were joined by different members of the family. Yoli's mom suggested we just talk in English, which we did. :)

Tidbits about life here

I forgot to post one of my entries from last week when I visited the Santa Cruz Zoo. If you'd like to read about it, click here.

Anyway, I'm no longer "wrestling" with the electric shower. Instead, we've settled into a strange sort of daily dance.

Here's what I've learned: the secret is to keep the water pressure right. When I first turn on the water, if the pressure is too high, the cap on the shower head will pop off. That's no good. So I keep the pressure low to start off. Then I switch on the heater. I can tell by the electric hum the florescent lights make (and by the water temperature) if the heater is on. When the hum grows much louder, it means the heater for whatever reason has stopped heating. I'll have a few seconds of hot water left to turn the knob slightly and increase the water pressure. Doing this causes the heater to come back to life. This cat-and-mouse game continues throughout the shower until I'm done. It sounds silly, but once I figured it out, I was thankful I could maintain hot water throughout the shower.

When I wake up in the morning, I often hear the sounds of a military group a few blocks away. I'm not sure if they're singing or just shouting something in unison. Since my windows are always open (it gets hot otherwise), I can hear a lot of other things. There are lots of vendors-on-bikes who drive around. They let people know they are coming with special horns. For instance, the "milk man" has a cow "moo" sound effect. All the milk men use the same one. It sounds like a real cow, but it's not. There are vendors who sell a kind of food (I forget what it is) and their sound effect is a distinctive cell-phone ringtone. But it's not from a cell phone. There are others, but I can't remember them all. You can hear lots of birds, and sometimes at night you hear parties (which always have loud music). When it rains near Yoli's house, where many of the roads are unpaved, you will often hear frogs (or toads, I'm not sure) croaking.

Wednesday was a good day with ups and downs. For breakfast yesterday Yoli brought two cups of a cinnamon jello substance that she said was made from nerves (yes, THOSE nerves). It's supposed to make you stronger, I think she said. Well, it tasted good, and I had the last of our Fruit Loops to top things off.

We spent the morning at El Jordán again. Today was Yoli's day to teach her typing class. I made excellent use of my time there and completed a first draft of one of the two fliers I'm making for El Jordán. We ate lunch at Corina's apartment with Kelly, but Corina and Kitty (the lady who made lunch for us last time) were not there. They were "in jail" as Yoli says, which means they were ministering at the city jail.

At work, I made a little progress on the website, but also discovered I had shot myself in the foot without knowing it.

I'll try to explain this as simply as I can. Basically, I do most of the work on the HTML files in a text editor called BBedit. BBedit is a very powerful tool, and one of it's best features is a multi-file search-and-replace. It lets me go through hundreds of files (if I want) and replace every instance of some piece of text with another. For a webpage in Spanish, this is important since the language has many special characters (like á, é, í, ó, ú, ñ, ¿, ¡, etc). These characters have to be replaced with a special HTML code (for example, í which creates í).

The problem for me is that I had mistakenly told BBedit to search through EVERY file in my Seminary web directory. I should have restricted it to only text files. So, it also went through my graphics files.. the logos, maps, etc. They were corrupted. But I didn't know it at the time. I saw something was wrong today when I tried to load the pages in a web browser. At first I thought it was a problem with OS X, but I tried other graphics in my other directories, and they worked fine. So then I thought it was a problem with Fireworks, my main web graphics program. But that wasn't it, either. Then I finally realized what happened.

To make a long story short, I fixed some of the graphics, but couldn't repair them all. So I'll have to redo many of them. But it wasn't a huge loss. I'm pleased that I was able to even figure out what I did wrong.

That evening we went to the home of Louise (the GMU secretary) and Chris (a teacher at the seminary). They bought Bolivian pizza (we stuck to fairly recognizable toppings) and tought us how to play a card game called Hand and Foot, which requires a special deck of cards (they all said "Rook" so maybe that's the brand, like "Uno"). I didn't win, but I had one good round. Yoli had several good rounds and was in contention, but ultimately she lost, too.

All in all it was a good day.

I never turn down a free meal

Tuesday was "Eat For Free Day" for me. For breakfast, I ate again with Arnold and Greta Wry, who have basically told me that any time I want to eat breakfast with them is fine. Then for lunch, Yoli and I were supposed to eat with Glennie and Marilyn Wry, but Marilyn was sick, so someone else cooked. And for dinner, Yoli took me to see her friend Gina and her husband for dinner.

But much more happened throughout the day.

After breakfast, I had been asked to help Louie (the GMU secretary) with a computer problem she was having. The "computer guy" label seems to have been firmly attached to me, so anytime someone asks for help, I have to give them a disclaimer. I tell them that my expertise is with Macs (and it is) and that my PC diagnostic abilities aren't near as good. But on this occasion, I was able to find the problem (a rogue PDF utility) and uninstall it for Louise.

Yoli arrived and brought a friend with her. It was a guy she knew from her time at the seminary. He was from Argentina, but had recently married a Bolivian girl. He was a funny guy, and encouraged us not to wait too long to get married. I heartily agree with him.

After that, Yoli and I went to the center of the city: the plaza. Our plan was to visit a museum inside of the city's cathedral (I believe it's the Templo de San Larenzo, but I might not have that right). On our way, we went to pick up a photo enlargement Yoli is planning to give to her sister. Since we were already at the photo place, I talked with a manager about PhotoCDs. He said he did put photos on CDs, by scanning the negatives or the photos (whichever I provided) and could give me the files in any format I desired. The cost would be 50 Bs per roll of 36 exposures. I intend to come back on Thursday and drop off two rolls of my own film, plus a stack of photos for Hogar Nacer and get them made into 2 CDs.

We visited several other photo places to see if anyone else did PhotoCDs, but couldn't actually find any. We were told of one store that did, but we were unable to visit it this time. I think we'll just go to the first place we visited, since Yoli likes that place and it has a good reputation.

We wanted to eat some cinnamon ice cream at a special place close to the plaza, but when we got there they had just started making it (by hand, the old-fashioned way). We decided to try and come back after visiting the museum.

The cathedral is really quite beautiful, very South American to my eyes. I'd seen it before (the last time we were in the plaza), and it's prominently featured on most Santa Cruz postcards I've seen so far. Inside it was very nice. There were many people there praying, lighting candles, and being quiet.

The museum was off in one wing of the cathedral and had a very impressive array of gold and silver objects.. chalices, altar coverings, etc. For those art lovers out there, these objects were great examples of the mestizo barroco (baroque). Basically, it's the European Baroque style with heavy Indian influences. Thus, what is usually depicted as a pelican in European Catholic art is depicted as a turkey-like bird in the mestizo barroco. The angels have very Indian-like faces. It was very interesting. Much of this stuff dated from the 1700s, and I believe we saw a few items from the 1500 and 1600s. It was a reminder that Latin American culture is older and deeper than North American culture (not including the American Indians, of course). The museum had other stuff as well, lots of different clothing, like one of the robes the Pope wore when he came to Santa Cruz. There were also many paintings. We didn't have time to see everything, but it was interesting to look at. We also got some help understanding some of the symbols (like the eye of God within a triangle) from a lady who worked there and tried her best to speak in slow Spanish so I could understand.

But, as has happened before (especially during my experiences in Jerusalem), in my heart I was saddened by the materialism of it all. Maybe that's not quite the right way to put it. But when I look at scripture and the way Jesus lived, and what we learn about how the church is supposed to function, it makes me wonder what better uses the church's money could have been put to. God doesn't care if you take communion in a gold cup or a paper cup. There's more than just that, though. I think the Catholic church has developed a vast, elaborate system of rituals and rules that are completely unscriptural. The elaborate objects are an extension of the rituals. Well, I don't want to get too carried away with this thought process, but my visit to the museum was a mixture of being impressed and intruiged by the different objects on display, and being somewhat repulsed by the ritualism and materialism behind them.

At work we accomplished a lot. Glennie has asked me several times to look for songs from a guy named Jerry Douglas. But I keep forgetting to do it. So at lunch today, he reminded me again, and I told him it'd be the first thing I did when I went to work. But it wasn't, because I forgot again. As we were getting ready to finish up, Yoli reminded me of what I'd said, so I quickly went to work seeing what I could find. I used LimeWire (a Gnutella client) to find a song, and I'll download it today for him. Glennie says he wants to demonstrate for his students some "real" acoustic guitar work. I guess I'll hear for myself what he means when I download a song.

Dinner with Gina and her husband was pretty fun. The meal was very good, though the meat was a bit tough (or as her husband said, it was cooked in the "Bolivian way"). Gina is a white North American, and her husband is Bolivian. It was interesting to see their kids and how they all relate to each other. English is the primary language at home, which surprised me, since they are living in Bolivia. But Yoli reminded me later that the kids had been homeschooled by their mother, and her primary language is English. They also go to school at the Christian Learning Center, which is a school run by a lot of people connected to GMU. Classes there are in English, as well. We ended up helping the family fix a few simple things on their computer (wow, twice in one day).

It had begun raining while we were at Gina's, but thankfully it let up when it was time for us to leave. But after got off the bus and began making our way back toward Paragua Ave., it began raining again. So we both waited under cover for Yoli's bus (#27) to come, and then I waited for the rain to die down a little more.

I forgot to mention that Tuesday morning around 5 am, there had been a HUGE storm. It really cooled things off when I woke up, but the storm blew away, and the sun heated everything back up like yesterday. We'll see if Wednesday is any cooler.

Oh yeah, I did laundry today, as well. This is my second time doing it... My clothes last about a week or so, and then I need to do two loads (colored and white).

Trouble accessing this site?

I know some people have had a little trouble accessing this website at times. For reasons I don't yet understand, it appears that just using the link http://www.joshrenaud.addr.com/ is sometimes not enough. Appending index.html to the end of that address seems to work every time I try it.

If you've been having trouble, then try bookmarking this link: http://www.joshrenaud.addr.com/index.html.

HEAT WAVE!

There wasn't much new Monday, except for the heat. It got very hot today!

Monday morning, Yoli and I went back to El Jordán to do some work. She spent much of her time translating a prayer newsletter for Corina, while I brought my laptop and did some work for the El Jordán brochures I was asked to do.

I didn't get as much done as I had hoped because I forgot to bring my notebook with the notes I took when I talked with Corina last week. Still, I revised the text of her old brochure and then emailed photos from their office computer to my email address so I could download them later in the afternoon at the Seminary.

For lunch we ate at Corina's apartment, which is on the second floor of El Jordán, along with Kelly (the volunteer we ate with last week) and Kitty. I'm not positive, but I believe Kitty cooks and cleans at El Jordán and for Corina. I think she is also involved in the ministry aspect, too, but I'm not clear on that. It was a somewhat awkward lunch for me personally, since I was the lone male and also since much of the conversation was in Spanish.

Boy was it hot, though. Going to El Jordán there are basically two choice if you take the bus, and both involve lots of walking. We took the option where the walking is from the seminary to the bus stop. The bus then drops you off almost right in front of El Jordán. It was hot, so we stayed on the sidewalk and tried to find shade, which is unbelievably cool. Later in the evening someone told me they thought it got up to about 95 F, which is pretty darn hot, especially when you consider there are few air conditioners.

Thankfully one of those few is in the office where I work in the afternoons, so my 4 hours of work were a little more comfortable, though I was still sweating a lot. Yoli and I worked together and actually got quite a bit done for the web page. I've decided to stop monkeying with the design for now and focus on content. I want to have as much ready to go by Feb. 12 as possible. If I spend too much time tweaking the design up front, I may run out of time at the end to get the important pages. So, I'll get the content finished first, and then come back to making the site look really nice.

For dinner, we made the last of our frozen hamburgers, which, for the second time in a row, I undercooked somewhat. Yoli made some french fries, or, as she prefers to call them, "Bolivian fries," since we're in Bolivia not France. I cooked some broccoli. The broccoli led to a weird situation. I decided to soakthe broccoli with this chemical that is supposed to make it safe to eat. It's a purple powder that you mix with water and immerse vegetables in for 5-10 minutes. As I was preparing to do this, Glennie Wry (the seminary's administrator) walked by and asked what I was doing. I told him what I was doing and that I planned to cook the broccoli and he corrected me, telling me that I only needed to soak the broccoli if I planned to eat it raw. Boiling the broccoli would have the same effect as the chemical. I didn't know that, but the way he said it embarrassed me. Yoli could tell I wasn't too keen about it, and she thought something she said had contributed to the embarrassment. Later we cleared everything up. I wasn't mad at her, or really mad at all. I just felt stupid. But she pointed out that I actually was doing the right thing, because I didn't boil the broccoli. Instead, I cooked it the way I like to at home, where I use only a little water and sort of steam the broccoli for a few minutes. The broccoli doesn't turn to mush, it retains its crispness, but it tastes cooked, not raw. Since I didn't boil the broccoli, it's good that I bathed it in the chemical. Well, that made me feel good after all.

Monday night was the GMU prayer meeting. This time the vice president of GMU was there. I had met him earlier in the afternoon at the seminary. During the devotional time, he used verses from the first two chapters of Nehemiah to illustrate changes the GMU leadership is planning to make to the organization. Since I'm new to all this, I didn't understand everything, but it boiled down to this: GMU has lost 25% of its missionary force over the last decade, so something has to change. A board of directors has decided they need to re-focus on their original purpose: planting churches. He mentioned that there had been a lot of unresolved interpersonal issues among some missionaries and that there had also been personnel problems that needed resolution. While I couldn't relate to everything he said (since I'm not part of GMU or a missionary), what he said about the interpersonal relationships was helpful. He said that he didn't believe God would bless a ministry where there are unresolved resentments between people. And I think that's true, too. It's a good reminder that I need to examine myself from time to time and make sure there's nothing between me and anyone else that could hinder my usefulness to God.

Quick note: GMU is the Gospel Missionary Union, which sends missionaries all over the world. Their headquarters is in Kansas City. They founded and sponsor the Seminary where I work, and their Bolivian HQ just happens to be within the same compound, literally right next to my guest quarters.

Too much sitting numbs my bum

On Sunday we had made plans to visit Yoli's uncle Adonai again, since he told us that weekends are the best time to come by. We had some breakfast and then spent time together talking about Ecclesiastes chapter 3, which is what our friends in the Bible study in St. Louis studied Saturday.

We had a nice time at Uncle Adonai's. He is married to a woman named Miriam, but they have no children. Instead he has 3 parrots, 2 cats, and 4 dogs. The dogs all look like they could be bichon frises (the same breed as my dog Jed). In Bolivia, though, dogs are pretty much allowed to run where they wish. Adonai keeps his dogs within his property, so they don't come into contact with other dogs except from behind the gate. But they still run freely on bare ground, and get pretty dirty.

But the dogs are so cute. They are the right size for bichons, little bitty things, unlike Jed who is unusually large for the breed. They all clearly had different personalities. Adonai was going to bathe them, and the dogs figured this out. The oldest one, called Gordita because she is fat), hid immediately. But she was found eventually and got washed. When they were all washed, Adonai tied them to a stake in the yard so they wouldn't get into dirt while they dried off. They were all shivering, which I wondered about, since it wasn't cold outside. Yoli reminded me that they probably had a cold bath.

Adonai is a jokester and he has many jokes to tell for any given occasion. His jokes are usually the story kind. He's a voracious reader, and likes to learn about new inventions. As we talked during lunch (a very late lunch), I discovered that he knew a lot about the modern history of Israel and its wars, a subject that has fascinated me for a long time.

It was interesting to see his grilling setup. There was a brick enclosure, and then several levels of metal grating. One was for the coals, and another for the meat. The meat rack could be raised and lowered with a chain.

Miriam is an accountant and I didn't get to talk with her as much because she had a friend from college over to visit and they spent much of their time together. But she did make some good food for us. She made some sort of corn salad that tasted better than I expected... It was fresh corn cut from the cob, not out of a can. The grilled meat was good, too, excellent flavor. Like the other night at Yoli's house, it had too much fat for me, but the meat was much more tender.

At 4:00, we realized we had stayed too long at Adonai's house (2 hours too long!) and needed to leave to get to Yoli's house. Her dad had complained earlier this week that I hadn't been to the house since Sunday. So we wanted to make sure we came and spent some time there.

We planned to watch the Ben-Hur DVD I got Yoli for her birthday last year with Eliza and Boris. I brought my computer to hook up to their TV. The movie was good, but extremely long. My rear end went numb twice during the movie. Thank goodness for the intermission which required us to eject the DVD and flip it over (yes, a double-sided DVD).

Lucy's kids began making a lot of noise later in the movie. Her brother-in-law Alcides joked and said "Bye, Lucy" anticipating that Lucy would have to take the kids and leave. But Lucy keenly pointed out that his own baby would soon be at noise-making age and then it would be she who could say "Bye, Alcides!" during movies.

All in all it was a fun day, but now the weekend is over, so it will be time to get back to work.

Kilometro 52

I took my first trip outside the city of Santa Cruz on Saturday. We travelled about 50 kilometers to Casa Hogar Nacer, a boys home to rehabilitate street kids.

The place was absolutely beautiful. There were mountains in the distance, and green everywhere. To get there we took a bus out of the city and we passed through many small towns, picking up and dropping off passengers along the way. Like in Santa Cruz, any time we made an extended stop, different vendors would swarm to the bus shouting the name of whatever they were trying to sell, whether it was peanuts, soda, or salteñas.

It was strange to see the mix of rich and poor in this more rural area. There would be stick-and-mud adobe houses and then you'd see a mansion, perhaps a retirement home for someone wealthy. There was lots of livestock to be seen from the road, too.

The drive itself wasn't too bad, though after the main highway ended and it became a two-lane highway, it wasn't quite as fun. Every town had speed bumps to keep the buses from zooming through and killing people.

When we finally arrived at our stop, we took some pictures, and then began walking down a flooded, muddy road. We passed a Baptist camp, which was right next to Hogar Nacer.

As we came to Hogar Nacer, I noticed long lines of trees of a kind I recognized. They are the same kind of tree that my mom brought with us when we moved from Texas to St. Louis, but I can't remember the name. All I remember is that they don't do well in cold weather, so every winter we'd have to heave the tree and its pot inside the house, and then in spring, take it back outside. Well, these trees were far, far bigger than my mom's. They were extremely tall and thick, and I could stand under one. It was quite amazing.

Hogar Nacer itself was a beautiful place with lots of trees, flower gardens, and nice brick buildings. We were quickly ushered under a thatched wooden pavilion to meet Miguel Zucchetti, a Peruvian missionary who runs this camp (as well as two others). He was a really, really friendly man, and I found his Spanish more understandable than many other people I've met so far.

I came with Yoli to this place because they wanted my help designing a brochure and a website. I'm not sure how much I'll be able to do, but I want to help, because it's clear they are making a huge impact in the lives of these children.

At Hogar Nacer, the children have responsibilities. When they first arrive, they are adopted into the "society" of the camp and learn the system. Then they begin the difficult process of disintoxification, as they leave drugs. Hogar Nacer uses sports, physical activity, and work to help the children's bodies and minds. The kids begin to recuperate and change. As this happens, they are given responsibilities like caring for animals, helping to plant gardens, cleaning the dorms, building new buildings, etc. The kids also become aware of the changes happening in their lives. Finally, when the children feel secure and have developed spiritual and personal maturity, they move to Camp Hogar Nacer Ciudad, a house in the city of Santa Cruz where they are re-integrated with society and learn a profession or skill they can use to earn a living.

It's amazing to think that all the buildings, all the gardens, most of the food grown and cooked here, everything was done by these kids over the past 4-5 years. We ate lunch with them, and tentatively the boys at our table began to ask questions of me and Yoli, though mostly me. As I've come to expect from kids, there were some surprisingly deep questions. Some of them wanted to ask about how I felt when the U.S. was attacked on Sept. 11, and if there was a war in our country. But there were also silly questions and statements like "You're so tall, you could make a basket just standing on the ground and reaching up!" There was one especially sweet 9-year-old Quechua kid who kept asking me questions (addressing me as "hermano" or brother) and wanted to know if I'd play basketball with him. Unfortunately we couldn't play any sports, but we'll probably come back in a week or two and possibly stay the night.

We stayed to talk with Miguel and learn more about Hogar Nacer and iron out details of the publications he wanted. But we soon realized we had stayed too long and needed to leave so we could get to Yoli's house for a brief visit with her family, and then go to a 6:00 dinner at Rusty Penney's house.

So we had about an hours' worth more of driving and at least we came to Yoli's house. We took bathroom breaks and cleaned up as best we could, then said quick goodbyes and apologized for not being able to spend more time there.

Finding Rusty's house turned out to be a chore. We stayed on a bus til we got in the general vicinity of his neighborhood, but Yoli wasn't really sure of where we were going. But her instincts were good and we did make it there eventually, after lots and lots and lots of walking. Suffice it to say that I felt travelled out when the day was over.

We had a nice time at Rusty's with his family, another missionary family, and a young guy named Dave. Rusty's wife made soft tacos, so the private joke between Yoli and I was that we did eat tacos in Bolivia. Back home, there are quite a few people who kept thinking that all of South America eats the same food the Mexicans do, which is completely wrong. They don't eat tacos here generally, unless you're an American missionary family from Texas. So, to everyone who asked if I would eat tacos while I was here: yes, I did.

The turtles are in heat: my visit to the Zoo

Friday was another one of those turnabout days. When Yoli was in the States, I took her to the St. Louis Zoo. So Friday she took me to the Santa Cruz Zoo. I noticed the zoos had one thing in common immediately: the same 3-D, block-letter column spelling the word ZOO from the top down.

I wasn't sure what to expect from this Zoo, but it turned out to be fairly nice. Most of the animals were South American, so there were many I hadn't seen before and a few that I had. I enjoyed seeing the birds most. They had a lot of different parrots (all sorts of colors) as well as toucans and even turkey-type birds.

We spent a lot of time in the giant birdcage, which is much like the one in St. Louis. As soon as we went in, I saw a worker sweeping the floor. He was wearing a Maryville University shirt, so I tried to ask him in Spanish if he knew the university. He smiled and nodded but didn't really say anything. I tried to say I was from St. Louis, but not much more reaction. Yoli stepped in and explained what I was getting at, and the man had a laugh. It was clear to everyone he hadn't been to St. Louis. A few minutes later Yoli told me he didn't say anything because his mouth was full of coca leaves he was chewing, and that his whole mouth was green.

We saw many other creatures while we were there... alpacas (like llamas), all kinds of cats (ocelots, tigers, etc), spider monkeys, snakes, iguanas, and many that I can't remember the names of. There were a lot of strange creatures I'd never seen before, like the one that looked like a fox only with tall legs like a horse and dark, mane-like hair on its neck.

This zoo also had an area with a lot of playground equipment for kids, and there were several food vendors around. It was in decent shape overall, but some parts were a little neglected, especially toward the back.

Also interesting were the two giant turtle pens. There were a ton of turtles in these two pens, and it seemed most of them had one thing on the mind: reproduction. It was hard not to laugh every time we walked past it. Fortunately we found one non-entangled turtle near the fence and it gave us a chance to pet it and take photos.

Before we went to the zoo, I ate breakfast with Arnold and Greta Wry. They were very nice and the food was good. I had an orange, a nice bowl of granola, and two pieces of toast. Most Bolivians only eat a piece of bread for breakfast, if anything. The big meal is lunch. Since we went to the market yesterday, we now have some cereal again here, so I can resume having a somewhat larger breakfast.

Conversation with the Wrys was good, we talked about conservative churches and about the challenges facing rural churches in Bolivia, where there are few qualified pastors. There's a big need, and for those missionaries who are serving, there's so much work. We also had a short devotional time together, after which Greta asked for my help with some problems she was having in Outlook Express on her PC. I resisted the urge to recommend she dump her PC for a Mac (where even Microsoft's own programs work better and have more features).

During work Friday Yoli and I took a break to participate in the seminary's afternoon chapel service. There are two sessions of school every day: morning and evening. My understanding is that there is a chapel service for each of those sessions once a week. But I could be wrong. Anyway, Friday Rusty Penney (the rector) was talking about the seminary's doctrinal statement and its importance. Every year all the staff of the seminary sign it to show their agreement with it. Yoli hadn't signed it yet, so she was invited to the front to sign it. I couldn't fully participate in much of the service, since all the songs were Spanish and they didn't use hymnals or overhead projectors to show the words. But Rusty is a Texan, and his Spanish was more understandable to my American ears.

This evening we went back to that "restaurant" at that family's house near the seminary for their chicken milanesa. It wasn't quite the same (or as good) as the one Yoli did while she was here in the US, but I liked it more than what I ate the previous night we came. Afterward, we went back to the seminary hoping to watch the games at their Social Night. But instead they were doing a chapel-like service, which we stayed for. Then they went to eat at about 9 p.m. Yoli wasn't feeling good and looked tired, so we decided to call it a night and she went home.

A trip to the market

Thursday was an interesting day. First, the weather has been unusually mild the whole time I've been here. There were a few hot days, but overall I have to say the weather has been great. Today was especially mild, and it sprinkled a few times.

Thursday morning, Yoli and I had breakfast together and then I dried off the clothes I hadn't finished yesterday. After that we were ready for our main activity of the morning: going to the market.

The market was within the first circle (primer anillo). Before we got there, we stopped at a bank to exchange US dollars for bolivianos (Bs). We both traded in $20 (total $40) for about 300 Bs.

The market was very interesting to go through. Some parts of it reminded me of the market in Jerusalem, but I think it was more like the one in Tel Aviv, which was outdoor and had more food. This market had everything, and the food prices were pretty low. Blue seemed to be the color scheme for tarps and sellers' clothes. Everywhere you went, there was somebody with something to show you. We pretty much limited ourselves to a list of things we needed that we made the night before. Most of it was food to restock the little guest kitchen next to my room at the seminary. We got broccoli, carrots, green beans, potatoes, two boxes of cereal, two packages of bon-bons, oil, dish detergent, Herbal Essence shampoo, a bunch of juice mix powder packets, and two soup packets.

The market was interesting because there were so many people. Of course, we took caution to protect ourselves from potential thieves, but we had no problems. This market didn't smell like the one we walked past on Wednesday, which was really putrid. But I'm sure that certain parts of it would have flunked my mom's sanitation inspection. Yoli took great delight in showing me the people who were selling chickens. The chickens were dead and cut open, and some of them still had eggs inside of them. We've both agreed that if mom comes here, the market will be off-limits to her. She'd probably lose her mind.

We stuffed all our groceries into my backpack, her purse, and two plastic bags. It wasn't a problem carrying them around on the street, but it made getting in and out of the bus a real adventure.

After the market, we went to the supermarket to purchase a few other items we didn't find like sandwich meat (fresh sliced), butter, and cinnamon powder. I did all the shopping in the supermarket while Yoli waited outside with our stuff from the market. I was able to speak with a few workers inside in Spanish as I got my items. The butcher and I were getting along well until he asked me something that I didn't understand. After repeating it several times, he finally used his knife to indicate a spot on the chicken lunch meat roll. I finally understood he was asking how much I wanted him to cut off and slice.

We also went to a photo developing store to retrieve some photos Yoli had dropped off. After that we went to the post office to buy postcards for me. Not at the post office, mind you, but from one of the many street vendors selling postcards on the sidewalk up and down the street from the post office. I found some I liked and paid for them, and took great delight in catching the vendor's not giving me enough change. Handling Bolivian money all day made me feel like I had accomplished something new.

While we were there within the first circle, we began hearing loud bangs. It wasn't anything new at first, I've heard firecrackers go off in different parts of the city several times since I got here. But these kept going and going. Then we heard chants and realized there was some sort of protest march happening in the Plaza 24 de Septiembre. In my book on Bolivia, I had read that there were frequently protests in a similar plaza in the city La Paz, so this was like the book coming to life. It sounded like they were residents of a particular neighborhood in the city who were protesting appropriation of their land. But we couldn't make it all out and we had to get back for lunch.

For lunch we had leftover soup and crackers. After that I had a short siesta then went to work for 4 hours. I made some good progress on the website, finishing a transcription of a brochure, fixing some code, and working with Yoli to determine how and where we would get all the content we needed from.

Yoli wrote some notes for me to give to two professors who could supply information we could use on the website. We dropped those notes off and then went back to the guest kitchen to make dinner.

Before dinner we stopped off at Arnold Wry's house (which is within the seminary/GMU compound) to ask about breakfast. He had invited me to eat breakfast with he and his wife sometime. So I'll be doing that tomorrow. He is a professor at the seminary, and his brother Glennie is as well. Glennie has additional administrative responsibilities there and is a big-time choleric. But he's been nice to me, and I haven't had any problems with him. I haven't talked as much with Arnold, so breakfast will be a nice chance to learn more about him.

My plan for dinner was to make grilled chicken-and-cheese sandwiches with french fries and broccoli. Overall it worked out, but the sandiwches didn't melt as much as I wanted. The stove didn't let me turn the temp down far enough like our stove at home. But it still turned out nice. The homemade french fries were good, too. Yoli cut them to just the right size.

Looking back, something I noticed Thursday was that I saw more beggars Thursday than I think I have any other day. In particular there was a woman begging right next to me as I was paying for my postcards. I decided not to give anything to her because I wasn't sure what was smart. In the U.S. when I was working in St. Louis City, my policy was generally to give when asked, since that's what Jesus commanded us to do. But I don't know if that's the best thing in every situation. I asked Yoli what her advice was, and she said that she prefers to find the poor who are trying to sell something. Then you are rewarding them for trying to be more self-sufficient. I don't know that there's a one-size-fits-all answer to this particular problem, but one thing is clear from scripture: we should help those in need.

A story about El Jordán (no, not Michael)

On Wednesday we visited El Jordán, which is a place street kids can go to when they want to turn their lives around. At El Jordán, there are people the kids can talk to. They also can come to learn something practical, like typing or macrame (a type of knitting or sewing), that they can use to earn money. There is also a dentist's facility and a nice library. I spent time searching for Waldo in a "¿Dondé esta Wally?" book.

A few days before, while walking within the first circle (primer anillo) of Santa Cruz, we passed a few street kids. One of them called Yoli by name and we went back to talk with him. His name was Angel and he recognized Yoli from either El Jordán or a boys' home (I forget which). He wanted to contact Corina Clements, who runs El Jordán, so Yoli gave him her phone number. Hopefully he will get in touch with her.

I spent some time talking with Corina since she wants me to help them with two brochures. One of the brochures is for "Jericho" -- the name they've given to an expansion project. The facilities at El Jordán are very nice, but they've outgrown the space. Corina and the others have raised funds to purchase the house and property next door, but they need money to pay for demolition and construction of a new facility that will connect to El Jordán. So I will try to design a brochure that tells about this need, something she can distribute to churches and people who express interest in it. El Jordán has a webpage here if you'd like to learn more about what they do.

We ate lunch in Corina's apartment with Kelly, a girl from Canada (many of the missionaries here are from Canada) who is working at El Jordán for 5 months. She had previously spent a semester (or part of a semester?) in Guatemala through school. We reheated some leftovers... some kind of pasta casserole that tasted good, and fresh green beans. I had a lot of green beans because I haven't been eating many vegetables in recent days, since they aren't always safe.

In the afternoon we worked and then had an early dinner (6:30pm). It was very nice. Then Yoli left a little later and I did some laundry. But I didn't get it all done soon enough... so I had to take my wet white clothes and hang them up in my room to air dry. In the future I will do the laundry in the morning so I don't have to worry about being locked out. :)

About money...

To answer my dad's question about currency and exchange rates.... Here the currency is the Boliviano (the "b", pronounced "bee"). There are 7.52 Bs to 1 US dollar.

We did a lot of shopping today (Thursday) in the market and I tried to compare with the U.S., but the problem is that I don't remember exact US prices for most stuff. We did see a pair of nice-looking binoculars for $33.

Food is fairly cheap, though my favorite US cereals (the ones with fruits and crunchies, etc) are expensive since most people here don't eat cereal.

A ride on any bus on its route across the city costs 1.50Bs, so it's pretty cheap to get around. You just have to endure sometimes very bumpy roads, breakneck daredevil driving, and sometimes crowded interiors.

Bureaucracy gives us a headache instead of fixing a knee

A few days ago, Yoli hurt her knee somehow when standing up to leave a restaurant. We're not sure exactly what happened, but it swelled the next day and she couldn't bend it much. Her family tried several different creams, but I'm not sure they did a lot to help.

So, yesterday we went to the Caja, which is a big health center for all workers who have national insurance. Yoli had made the appropriate insurance arrangements the day before and had secured an appointment. When we got there early in the morning, it was already packed with people.

The amount of bureaucracy was amazing. Every form had to be stamped by like three different people, it was truly crazy. Yoli was seen first by a general doctor who prescribed some medicine to reduce the swelling. She was then directed to go to a traumatologist. So after jumping through a few more bureaucratic hoops, we made our way to the traumatologist. But the nurse/secretary there told Yoli she couldn't see him for at least 9 days. Yoli tried to show her the note she had from the general doctor, marked "urgent", but she wouldn't look at it.

So, we decided to fill the prescription and come back in the afternoon when there would be a different nurse. The pharmacy was at the corner of two hallways (making an L-shape), and the lines were confusing. There were 3 or 4 lines, we're not really sure how many there were. at one point, our line appeared to have halted, so Yoli told me to wait in the line labelled "cronicos." I ended up getting to the window first, so she handed me the prescription, whichI gave to the lady in the pharmacy. It was funny when she returned with the medicine and then gave me instructions on how to take it, which I only partially understood.

After that, we decided to visit Yoli's uncle Adonai who lived nearby. He had a nice store and house (most people's business and house are the same building) and we were having an interesting chat, but we were frequently interrupted as customers came in asking him to make photocopies. After hearing about Yoli's knee, he advised her to visit a woman nearby who "fixed" people's ailments.

I was skeptical, to say the least. But Yoli wanted to go, so we did. We followed Adonai's hand-drawn map to get to her street. Then we asked a man who was welding some wall fixtures where the woman was, and he directed us. Outside her house, we told some children who we were looking for, and they went inside to fetch her.

The woman didn't look qualified at all to my eyes. But she took Yoli in the back, and what she did has apparently helped Yoli. Yoli explained that she put oil on her knee and felt it. She could tell the problem, and pushed whatever was out of place back into place while pulling her leg back. Yoli didn't cry or scream, and said it felt better. From what we learned, this woman is well-known, and you can even get X-ray technicians to take pictures for you if you tell them they are for her.

We visited a supermarket to restock a few items. We ended up getting milk, some juice drink mix, and frozen hamburgers.

(SIDE NOTE: I should mention that the very first morning Yoli came to eat breakfast with me, she brought milk. It was milk in a bag, which I had only heard of in Five Iron Frenzy's parody song "Oh, Canada." The song pokes lots of fun at Canadians, and includes the following lines: "They've got trees and mooses and sled dogs / lots of lumber and lumberjacks and logs / they all think that it's kind of a drag / you have to go there to get milk in a bag.")

We had lunch, followed by siesta (nap), and then work for 4 hours. I made a lot of progress on the website, thankfully. After work we went to a little restaurant run out of a home. You have to understand that throughout the city, any given street will include a bunch of businesses and houses. And in many cases, a family runs a business out of its home. At Yoli's house, for instance, her mom has a store in a small structure in their front yard. It's also her kitchen, with a stove and refrigerator inside. Anyway, the food at this place was cheap and Yoli said she ate there often. They always serve chicken (pollo) and hamburgers (hamburguesas) and one extra item. Yoli explained to me that the extra item that evening was one of the things she had cooked for me in the States. But I misunderstood which one she meant, and got excited. I was thinking she meant chicken milanesa, but that's not what it was. It was rice with some chicken and beef, along with an egg, salad, and baked yucca (like potatoes). Unfortunately, the chicken in the rice included a lot of bones and stuff I didn't want to eat. And I couldn't eat the salad because one never eats vegetables if you don't know they've been washed in safe water. My appetite didn't last through the whole meal, so Yoli ate the extra food. I felt kind of bad about that, but I didn't get sick or anything, so it worked out okay.

Later we walked to a park and found a nice bench for some quiet time together. I've really enjoyed being able to spend so much time with her. Almost immediately when I arrived here it was like I had been with her all along these past 6 months. The time apart vanished. Now I remember what made me fall in love with her, how beautiful she is, and how wise she is. I'm glad that I'm here!

P.S. -- My mom requested that I post photos of Yoli here. I don't have any new ones developed yet, but many old ones are available on my other website. Click here to see them.

P.P.S. -- Apparently my final column was published in the North County Journal today. Click here to read it!

It's not easy being green

Today I'm getting over my first (and hopefully last) bout of Montezuma's Revenge. We're not exactly sure what caused it. Theories range from some salteñas I ate on Sunday night to my drinking of tap water at the seminario (which I mistakenly believed was filtered).

Regardless, I'm feeling better. This was something I knew would happen eventually. From now on, I'll be boiling all my water at the seminario and storing it in water bottles. That should help.

Speaking of Sunday, that was an interesting day. I spent the first half of the day with Yoli at church. The church is small compared to Grace, about 100 or 150 people, but it's right next to her house. The service began with congregational wroship and then after that the different age groups split into their own classes. I helped Yoli lead a preschool class. When she was in the U.S. she had worked with me in children's ministry at Grace, so it was fun to have the tables turned and see how she did things. We played several little games and Yoli used flannels to teach about Jesus and the feeding of the 5000. When all the kids and adults came together again in the church, each group recited the verse they had learned.

Later that day we went to Eliza (Yoli's sister) and Boris' to watch "Spiderman." I had bought the DVD for Yoli for Christmas. I brought my PowerBook and connected it to their TV and that's how we played the DVD. It worked great.

On Monday I felt pretty sick all day, which didn't make for a great day. Still, I got to have dinner with Russell Penney (the rector of the seminario) and his family. We had some interesting discussion. Then after that we went to a prayer meeting at GMU. All the missionaries in Santa Cruz who are sponsored by GMU were there, as well as a few people from the seminary. It was a good time of sharing and praying. We also had a special time of praying for a Bolivian missionary family that is moving to Potosi to prepare the way for a program of pastoral training. Pastors are badly needed in that part of Bolivia.

Work on the website is coming along well. Once I have something a little more final, I may post a link here so you can look at the progress.

it's nice to hear from you all through email and through the comments on this site. Take care!

Good weather and the Lord of the Rings... who could ask for anything more?

Well, I'm still behind with my entries. This entry was originally written Saturday.

Saturday was Registration for the seminario. There were many students who came to get registered for classes. They come from all over South America, and some of them are Indians. Originally I was supposed to help calculate the total cost for students' books as they came through the line. But it turned out that they didn't need me to do that, so I stayed in the office with Yoli and the other secretary, Noemi (not Yoli's sister). I ended up working on the website. I did some basic layout things and also visited many other seminario websites for ideas. I also am thinking about revising the seminario's logo using Adobe Illustrator. We'll see how that goes.

In the hallway there on the third floor, the line of students seemed endless. But Yoli was very patient and did all of her tasks on the computer with ease. We ate a little food around 11 or 12. I forget the name, but they were like empanadas. They were baked, not fried, and the food inside was more liquidy than with an empanada. Yoli and Noemi were impressed that I could eat it all so quickly and without making a mess all over my clothes.

I also had a chance to talk a little more with Rusty about the website. Sometime probably late next week we'll sit down and really hash out ideas. In the mean time I am roughing things out and guessing what they will like, to give us something to work from.

In the afternoon, Yoli and I went to the center of Santa Cruz. Our plans were to walk around the Plaza de Septiembre 28 and later to see "El Señor del Anillo: Los Dos Torres" at the cine.

Santa Cruz was founded in the 1500s. I doubt many of the buildings there now date from that time, but still many of the houses and buildings at the heart of the city are beautiful Spanish colonial style. It was very busy with lots of people walking around. the Plaza itself was very beautiful with lots of trees of different kinds. I had read about the sloths that live in these trees, and Yoli told me that she usually saw them whenever she would come, but on this day we didn't spot any.

We went into a little mall and as we went through it level by level, we discovered the top floor was for people to gaze out at the plaza. The view from up there was magnificent, and it was a delightful surprise discovering the place. You could see all around and I got a better sense for the tall buildings in Santa Cruz.

Seeing the Lord of the Rings again was nice. This time it was subtitled in Spanish. When the cast spoke in Elvish, I had to try to read the Spanish subtitles. But even when they were speaking in English, I tried to read the subtitles to help improve my Spanish.. I even managed to catch one mistake where the subtitle said "Sauron" but it should have been "Saruman." Many of the names and places were changed in the subtitles... For instance, Frodo Baggins became Frodo Bolsón, which I presume they created from "bolsa" which means bag.

After the movie, Yoli and I walked through the city to her favorite fried chicken place. It was good food... 1/8 of a chicken, french fries, pickled vegetables, rice, and fried plantains.

Tomorrow morning I'll be helping Yoli with her sunday school class. It should be very interesting. She also believes her pastor will want to introduce me to the congregation (it's a small church). We'll see how that goes.

The Club, Bolivia-style

Day two of my Bolivian experience ran the gamut. This entry was written Friday night, but I couldn't post it until Saturday (today).

I woke up early Friday morning and prepared to take a shower. Thankfully the guest shower has hot water. It doesn't use a hot water heater like in the U.S. Instead it is an electric shower head that heats the water as it flows through the head. I was a little scared of the thing, truth be told. I envisioned being electrocuted or something. Actually, it worked well. The problem was that the water pressure was too high and caused the bottom of the head to pop off. I had to screw it on several times before I got it tight enough to stay.

After the shower experience, it dawned on me that being in Bolivia is in many ways similar to taking a vacation at The Club. My great-grandparents owned a small house near Clearwater Lake that the family called The Club. When my dad moved back to St. Louis we would go there for vacation about one a year. It didn't have too many amenities, and the shower was definitely not great. It was in a dark, musty, cellar-like "downstairs." There were always spiders or other bugs crawling around and the tile was gross. To get to it you had to walk outside down earthen steps covered with smooth gravel and stones and held in place by railroad ties. Well, here I have no air conditioning and there are bugs all over. The doorpost of the guest kitchen apparently serves as the front door to an underground ant world, and they roam all over the place.

Talking about ants reminds me of another place that Bolivia makes me think of: Bullard, Texas. In Bullard we had fire ants. I don't think the ants here are fire ants, but still, ants and I don't get along too well.

Anyway, back to the events of the day. This morning Yoli and I had planned to eat breakfast together and then go clean something for the seminario before lunch. But Yoli didn't arrive on time. This is quite unusual for her, since she is very punctual. I was at a loss, and didn't know what to do. So I ate some peanut butter crackers, thinking she might still arrive with the food. I spent 15 minutes looking around for her and asking people if they had seen her, but nobody had.

Finally I found her as she arrived at the seminario. She was limping, and explained that she had done something to her knee the previous day. She limped all day and her knee was somewhat swollen. So we just took it slow. She brought baked apples with grapes, something her mom had prepared the previous night but that I couldn't stay for because I had to get to the bus before the buses stopped running. They were good.

It turns out that we weren't going to be cleaning anything, but PRUNING. Between the girls and guys' dorms is a walkway with two large trees in the middle. Some of the older professors call it "la avenida del camotes" which means Avenue of Sweet Potatoes. A girl and guy in a relationship are said to be camotes. Anyway, after pruning the trees so that I could walk under them without ducking (I'm one of the tallest people here), we had to dig up bricks from an old garden that was being converted for another use.

After all the work Yoli and I ate lunch. We stayed at the seminario so she didn't have to walk much. We made a chicken-flavored rice soup from a package and then we each took brief naps before preparing to go to work. In Bolivia, the work day runs 8am-noon, is interrupted by lunch (the main meal of the day) and resumes at 2 p.m. It's over at 6.

I spent a good chunk of time in the office trying to figure out why Fireworks MX was displaying most of my fonts with "jaggies" instead of smoothly. I realized that I had forgotten to install Adobe Type Manager when I installed the OS last week. We also spent a long time trying to figure out the password to the seminario's internet access so we could set it up on my laptop. The actual password wasn't recorded anywhere, and the only thing Yoli knew was a clue she had been told by a former boss. We had trouble calling the ISP, but we emailed them, and eventually the called back and helped us out. Let this be a lesson those of you in the workplace--always keep good records of how to access your account so those who come after you can have a smooth transition.

I met Russell Penney ("Don Russell" to everyone at the seminario. His nickname is "Rusty" which is quite funny) today. He is the rector of the seminario and the man who last June invited me to come here. When Yoli and I were in the office, Rusty came by and we talked about the setup of the site. I think it will be a larger site than I originally envisioned. It will be interesting to see it come together.

In the evening Yoli and I went to eat dinner with her sister Noemi and her husband Alcides. Noemi and Alcides were married in July. Yoli and I were padrinos (godparents) and purchased their rings for the wedding. On Thursday night (the night before) Alcides showed me his ring (which Yoli picked out when she came back to Bolivia in July). It was very nice, and strange... Because at the time I accepted the idea of being a padrino, I didn't know Noemi or Alcides. And now, here they are.

Anyway, Noemi prepared dinner for us. It was very simple, and I can't remember the name of the food. It was a sort of cake made up of yucca and meat. Yucca is a tuber that is a lot like a potato, but much bigger. She mashed it up in a a tree trunk that had been hollowed out by fire (I forgot the name of this thing, also) and then mixed it with a little beef and cooked it. I'm not sure if it was baked or fried. We also had hot chocolate, which was strange for me, but in Bolivia they drink it all year, regardless of the season.

Alcides and Noemi showed us three of their most precious wedding gifts. The first was silver-plated tea service set. I explained to them that my dad sells the machines that electroplate items like that (I also told this to Don Hector (yoli's dad) on Monday). The second item was a poem his mother had written and given to him after the wedding. His mother was from the "campo" (countryside) and had little education. So it touched him that she could write such a poem. the third item they didn't actually show to us, but he explained it was a piece of lingerie for Noemi given by a lady. Apparently they opened it at just the right time on their wedding night, and it was a perfect gift because they had forgotten to buy it themselves before the wedding.

A side note about last night (Thursday): We went back to Yoli's house for dinner. Yoli lives with her parents, youngest sister Sara, and her sister Lucy's family (husband and three kids). Noemi and Alcides live in a house almost next door. It's amazing how families stay close like this.. it is totally the opposite in the U.S. So on Thursday there were like 14 of us eating dinner on their front patio. The inside wasn't big enough. They cooked everything outside. Their stove uses a propane tank, and is therefore portable. The sink they used was outside. in front of the house is Yoli's mom's small store (Doña Lucila). Every neighborhood has small stores like these. No such thing as single-use zoning here, and I think it's better that way.

Again Alcides rode with me on the bus home and we had a lot of conversation. I'm finding it easier to express things in Spanish, even though I mangle most of the words (using the wrong gender or verb tenses frequently). It's still very hard to understand what people are saying unless they speak slowly.

At some point I will have to travel home on the bus by myself. I don't think it will be too hard once I can remember where to stop so that I can yell "pare" and get the driver to stop.

In Santa Cruz, people are out and about late into the night, especially on Friday. It reminds me of all the people outside at night in St. Louis city, except there are even more. Adults, kids, dogs, everyone is outside. Some are having fiestas, some are entertaining guests, some are drunk, whatever. Tonight we saw a birthday serenade on the ride home.. It's a tradition Yoli has told me about before where a group of people go to the home of the birthday person at night and sing a song to them from outside the house. This particular serenade was being performed by a group with instruments. It was very loud, but funny.

On Saturday I will be helping Yoli with student registration, probably serving as a tabulator for book prices. I think we will be going to see "The Two Towers" that afternoon. Yes, yes, I know, it will be my fifth time. But she wants to see it, and who am I to deny her that pleasure? :)

Safe and sound

Here I am at the Seminario Teologico Hebron, and already it's been a long day!

I arrived at Santa Cruz's Viru Viru airport at 6 am (Bolivia time). My journey began at 10 am (CST) the previous day. There were a few curveballs during my connections (one flight was switched to a different plane and delayed almost 2 hours) but everything worked out okay and now I'm here.

I know one thing for sure: my Spanish definitely needs work. I had plenty of opportunity to listen to others converse in Spanish during the flight from Miami to Santa Cruz. Thankfully most of the in-flight announcements were in both English and Spanish, but the attendants all spoke in Spanish.

Anyway, after making it through customs, I met Yoli and Corina who had come to pick me up and take me to the Seminario. I noticed the differences between St. Louis and Santa Cruz immediately.... My brother Jon, who is practicing for his driver's test, would not do well here. I'm not even sure I would! The driving is defintely crazy for someone who is not used to it.

My accomodations at the Seminario are pretty nice. It's hot here, and there isn't much air conditioning, but that's fine with me. It's a nice change from cold and snow.

Yoli and I shared breakfast together (cereal--xxx, or "Frosted Flakes") and then met several people at the Seminario. Later we went to meet her family. They were all very nice, and we had an interesting time communicating. Yoli's brother-in-law Alcides tried very hard to get me to speak in Spanish and to speak himself with careful, slow sentences.

I got to see all of the Zegarra house. In many ways it was similar to what I expected to find, a far cry from our air-conditioned, Ranch-style home in Hazelwood. But it was different in other ways. I liked it though, and after a while I felt at home.

We spent some time performing a family ritual involving a tea called "mate" (mah-TAY). It's a dark tea that reminded me of something my friend John likes to make. They would fill up a mug of it and give it to someone to sip. All the while everyone is eating buttered bread and talking. The mug is finished then refilled and given to someone else and so it continues as the conversation goes on.

All of Yoli's sisters are very beautiful and the three who are married seem to have good husbands. All the nieces were a trip, too. One of them was very shy when I arrived, but eventually she came out of her shell and even sang a song.

We ate lunch at a small restaurant with Yoli's sister Eliza, her husband Boris, and their daughter Melanie. We had nice conversation and the food was good. It was some sort of sliced beef tenderloin stuffed with a sausage or something, and cooked in Coca-Cola. Good stuff.

Anyway, that's enough for now. Here it is 2:47 (4:47 CST) p.m. I will nap wile Yoli works and then tonight I think we will eat with her family. Tomorrow I am scheduled to help clean something up at the Seminario and then we will work on the website and such in the afternoon.

Love to you all. Adios!

Making lists, checking 'em twice

Today and tomorrow will probably be very busy as I make all my last-minute arrangements for the trip.

I'm using a technique I learned during my time at the Management Seminar for Newspaper Editors a few years back. Basically I'm making an agenda, or list of things that need to be done. When I make myself do it, using an agenda is quite helpful.

I'm also making another list, this one is more of an inventory. I'm writing down everything that I'm packing to take with me. That way if my luggage is lost or stolen, I can report exactly what I need to have replaced.

More email woes

My trusty old email address of the past 3 years finally bit the dust. Since I'm no longer a student at UMSL, I left my part-time job at the Public Policy Research Center there. Unfortunately, that meant the end of a good run for "kirkman@umsl.edu."

If you've had trouble reaching me in the past few days, that's probably why. If you need to get my NEW email address, just post a Comment here and I'll send it to you.

I feel like Gollum

In "The Two Towers" he moans and screams "It burns, it burns us!" because of the Elf-made rope that Samwise uses to tie him up.

Well, my arms they are a-burnin' and a-stingin' from my immunization shots. But that's okay... At least I'll be protected and healthy on my trip. And thankfully I got in and out of the health clinic quickly.

Quick enough, in fact, that I was able to get to UMSL in time to take my second (and final) exit exam. With that out of the way, I should officially graduate this Sunday. Wow, how about that. I made it out in 4.5 years. Not bad!

Captain, we've got power!

Praise God! The replacement part for my PowerBook's power supply arrived today, just one day after it was ordered. I picked it up this afternoon and the PB is now running great. The battery is fully charged again, and I've been spending time getting everything installed and ready.

I almost ran into trouble with OS X. The PB wouldn't boot from the OS X installer CD, and I was getting scared that the RAM in the computer might not be up to snuff. But it turns out the CD itself was just a little too dirty. So after cleaning it off, everything installed perfectly. Whew, crisis averted.

So why am I going to Bolivia, anyway?

I guess I haven't written here about WHY exactly I'm going to Bolivia. Well, put simply, there are two reasons: my girlfriend Yoli and volunteer work.

Let me first tell you about the volunteer work. I was invited to come to Santa Cruz and help the Seminario Teológico de Hebron with their website. They will be taking care of my housing while I'm there and I will design their website. I also expect to help other missionaries and Christian workers in Santa Cruz, like Corina Clements, who runs El Jordán, which helps street kids.

This is the reason I purchased a PowerBook, so that I can bring all my web and print design tools with me.

I'm also going to visit my girlfriend Yoli Zegarra. I've known her for almost 3 years. We met through my Petra website. She first wrote to me asking for permission to translate some of the articles I had written on my site into Spanish. She wanted to develop her own Spanish Petra website.

Yoli was in the U.S. for a year, from Aug. 2001 to July 2002. She lived in St. Louis for 3 or 4 months with a host family and worked at Plowsharing Crafts in the Delmar Loop.

I love her very much and it's been 6 months since I last saw her, so this is an exciting opportunity for us.

The PowerBook has landed!

My Pismo PowerBook arrived yesterday, and I am very pleased with it. It's a better machine than what I'm currently using, and has everything I wanted when I started looking for one: dvd, cd-rw, zip drive, lots of ram, etc.

There's only one problem: The power supply isn't working right. But I took it to the Apple Store today, and they're going to replace it for free. I just have to wait a couple days for the replacement to arrive. That'll be hard, since I am really itching to use this computer. But I can live with it, since it's free. :)

The inescapability of exams

Today I'm taking one of two required "exit exams" so that I can graduate from UMSL.

I've fulfilled all my academic requirements for my communication degree. But unless I take these tests, I can't graduate. The ridiculous thing is that these tests mean nothing. If I get all the answers wrong on the test, I still graduate. I am only required to *take* them.

Anyway, I keep thinking of this as my "second-to-last test ever," but my heart knows better... tests are inescapable. I'm sure I'll have to take more of them at some point down the road.

The trip draws nearer...

Justin's wedding this weekend and an online chat with Yoli this morning have really got me excited about this trip. This morning I corresponded with Yoli's friend Maria Esther and her fiancee Mark about their recent trip to Bolivia. Mark was able to give me a very helpful perspective.

Also, today I got one step closer to owning a PowerBook. The guy I've been negotiating with shipped it off today, and it should arrive before Friday. We're doing the transaction COD, so I'll pay for it when it is delivered. This machine should be great: 1gig of ram, 500MHz G3, CD-RW and ZIP drives... Much better than what I'm using right now.

So, to prepare, I went out and bought a new Logitech mouse and Fireworks MX. After buying Fireworks, I believe all my software is now legit (MX replaced a kracked copy of FW4 I had been using), and I'm proud of that.

Totally unrelated: I returned two pairs of XL long johns (thermal underwear) today. I bought a L pair last year, and they're great, but not long enough. Unfortunately, the XLs proved to be much too large. I need a LT (large tall), but the store didn't have any. Oh well... In Bolivia I won't need them.

My brother ties the knot

Last Friday I travelled with my family to St. James, MO for my younger brother Justin's wedding. The weekend went well overall. I got to see many of my relatives that I haven't seen in years. Most importantly, I think Justin and his bride Becca will be very happy.

Justin, my youngest brother Jon, my parents, and I all went to the wedding rehearsal to learn how everything was supposed to go. Immediately after that we went to the rehearsal dinner. Everyone member of the wedding party was there. This was the part of the wedding that my parents were in charge of (and had to pay for). It was very nice, and the food was good. I spent most of my time talking with Justin's best man, Jon Fuchs, and his girlfriend, Rebecca. As my uncle Jerry pointed out repeatedly over the rest of the weekend, it was quite a weird coincidence.

Later Friday night we went to Becca's aunt's house for a party. I talked with Becca's brothers, who are all very nice. I was able to spend a little more time with some of my uncles as well. There were many people from Becca's family there (since the wedding was in their town), but I didn't meet most of them. I probably should have spent more time meeting new people. Oh well.

On wedding day (Saturday), Justin, Jon, and I all had to arrive 2 hours early to change into our tuxedos with the other groomsmen and ushers. The funny thing is that they put us into the church's toddler preschool room. The toilet in the bathroom was tiny. Two of the guys tried to use it and had difficulty standing up when they were finished. It was very funny. But we were bored most of the time, because there wasn't anything to do. Justin was quite anxious, understandably, but he seemed to do well.

Before the wedding began, I saw a copy of the program (which I designed) and it looked good. The church sanctuary was decorated very beautifully in a "winter" theme.

The ceremony itself was nice. The bride, groom, groomsmen, and bridesmaids were all standing on the stage, and the pastor was on the floor below us, near the steps to the stage. This was an unusual arrangement, but I liked it. Usually the pastor faces the audience and the wedding party's backs are turned. Justin and Becca's pastor had travelled from Kirksville (where they both live) to preside over the wedding and I thought he did a good job.

The downside to being in the wedding party is all the standing and waiting. After the ceremony was over, we had to stand at the end of the receiving line and greet all the members of the audience as they left the sancutary. That took forever, and obviously I didn't know half the people. Then after that we had to take lots of posed photos witht he wedding photographer. Justin and Becca had it the worst, since they were in every photo.

But the advantage is that the wedding party eats first at the reception, since we are at the head table with the bride and groom. And that was nice. We left the church and came to the reception as soon as the pictures involving the parents and the groomsmen were done. While we waited for the bride and groom to show up, I got to talk with many of my relatives, including some of my great-aunts and great-uncles that I don't often see. It was nice to talk with them and hear their stories, especially from my Uncle Merl, who was my Grandpa Renaud's brother. My Grandpa Renaud was a character... the most choleric Choleric in history. But he died about 7 years aog, so we can only relive stories about him from the past.

Justin and Becca showed up and things were nice. The food was okay, not near as good as at the rehearsal dinner, but not bad. There was lots of dancing, cake eating, and mingling, etc. It was fun, but like all weddings, the reception lasted a long time. I was very tired, mostly from standing for so long.

Justin and Becca eventually left and everyone threw rice as they went to their car. They went to a hotel in town for the night, and their plan was to go to Branson, Missouri in the morning for their honeymoon. My family and all my relatives went back to our own hotel and spent several more hours in a big conference room eating and drinking (I had a coke, no alcohol) and talking.

All in all it was a good time. We got to see Justin and Becca again Sunday morning, since they had something Jonathan needed, and my dad had their marriage certificate. They seemed pretty happy!