Josh Renaud

PICTURES!

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

El Jardín Botanico

We thought it would be cute to take a photo with me in one of the trees.... that is until I got on the tree and discovered the huge black ants crawling all over it.

Look at the beautiful girl!

Here we are after deciding to leave the botanical garden because of all the mosquitos. You might be able to make out the name ("jardín botanico") in giant letters behind us.

Two birthdays

Yoli's niece Jessi watches her decorate a birthday cake. We were going to celebrate the birthdays of Eliza and Noemi, two of Yoli's sisters. As you might imagine, "¡Feliz Cumpleaños a Eliza y Noemi!" was a tight fit on the cake.

Here's Yoli with some of her sisters and nieces sitting on the front porch. Orion, the dog, decided to join the fun, too.

Here's almost the whole family. Front row: Jessi and Leya, Eliza and her daughter Melanie, Noemi, and Doña Lucila holding Papicho. Row 2: Lucy (mother of Jessi, Leya, and Papicho), Don Hector, Sara, Boris (Eliza's husband), Alcides (Noemi's husband) holding his daughter Abigail (my godchild), and Yoli.

Samaipata

The drive to Samaipata was absolutely stunning. Here, I'm posing with Yoli on the side of the highway to Samaipata. The mountain behind us is not carved, it's an entirely natural formation. It's hard to tell from the photo, but we are actually on the edge of a cliff overlooking a long valley. We aren't as close to the red mountain as it seems.

The camera is now pointing just a little below and to the right of the red mountain. You can see the river and a little farm.

We turned off the highway to Samaipata to go visit ruins on top of another mountain. We ate lunch high up on the mountain, just below where the ruins were located. As you can see from the mountains behind me, the view was spectacular.

This is a photo of the main part of the ruins, taken from a viewing platform. They no longer allow visitors to actually climb on the ruins. This fortress served as a religious center, with a place for sacrifices and a burial area. There are animal representations carved into the rock, too.

There were lots of houses, public buildings and other structures like this farther down the mountain.

After exploring the ruins, we came to the actual town of Samaipata. We stopped and took a coffee break, and then decided to try to visit the local museum (which we got free admission to by purchasing tickets to see the ruins). But when we got there, they told us they were closing in 15 minutes, so we had to go through it at hyperspeed. I took this photo of a little side street after we left the museum and began driving back to the highway.

This is on the way back to Santa Cruz. Some rich person has an amazing pad situated on its little mountain between two larger mountains.

Las Cabañas

Here's Juan with his wife Lucy, Yoli, and Alcides. We all went to Las Cabañas, a place with lots of little restaurants and other activities near the river. After eating, we decided to go see the river (the Pirai) and take a photo before going home.

Rain, rain, rain

I'm standing in the middle of Canal Cotoca, which is an avenue with a giant canal in the middle. Normally this and other canals have little water in them. But this particular Saturday we had huge downpours, and the canals filled up quick.

Someone ahead of us conveniently set up stepping stones here on the way to the Feria. The Feria is the place where I bought my 30B ($4) sandles.

Coming home from the Feria, we had a very crowded bus that was also too small to allow me to stand up straight. I had this problem often, so we decided to take a photo.

Getting engaged

Yoli's mom (Doña Lucila) had roasted some peanuts in order to make peanut soup for lunch, and she let me and Jessi eat some of them. Man, they were GOOOOOOD!

Here's Doña Lucila holding Abigail. She was waiting for some torts to finish cooking, while Yoli and I were making pizzas for dinner for everyone.

I'm drinking some mate, which I loved. Mate is brewed sort of the opposite way from how we do it. The leaves and other stuff are poured into the cup, with sugar. Then the hot water is poured into it. You sip through the straw, which has a filter at the bottom so you only get the liquid.

Well, we did it. I got on my knees and proposed to Yoli, to the surprise and delight of the rest of the family. We were both smiling pretty big the rest of the night.

Different stuff

The Sunday after Yoli and I were engaged, we went to Alcides' church. After the main service was over, there was a surprise. A musical group comprised of some brothers began playing awesome Bolivian music (with a Christian message).

Then, just when we thought it couldn't get any better, their sisters came out and played some music.

Here's Yoli cataloging some books at El Jordán. She also teaches a typing class there.

You never know what you'll see in Santa Cruz traffic.

The day after the violence in La Paz, a gang of local kids decided to take advantage of the situation and loot some businesses. I took this picture the day after that. Most of the stores were emptied of everything, but this travel agency wasn't... since travel agencies don't have anything valuable in the first place. All the kids were eventually caught.

Final days

Don Hector and I have a spirited game of ping-pong the night before I left.

This is Wednesday night, right before we left for the airport. I wanted a picture with Yoli in the "Avenida Camote."

Here we are at the airport in front of a ficas tree much like my Mom's. Not long after this, I had to board the plane and take off.

Readjusting

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 already miss many things. I miss all the people walking in the streets and neighborhoods. I miss the little stores and businesses on every block. I miss the hexagonal blocks they use in many of the roads. I miss drinking hot mate. I miss driving past the "smelly market" in a crowded bus that I'm too tall for. I miss my independence from TV and the news media. I miss the beautiful wild green mountains and the incredible scenery outside Santa Cruz. I miss ficas trees and palms. I miss the dogs on every street. I miss the way everyone builds walls around their property. I miss milk men pushing their carts down the street and playing their "moo" sound effect over and over. I miss Spanish, even though I'm not too good at it.

Already I can feel myself being sucked back in. While candy here still tastes too sweet to me (I didn't have much candy in Bolivia), I know I'll gorge myself on it if I'm not careful. And I've seen more TV in 24 hours here than I probably watched in 5 weeks in Bolivia. It's cold in St. Louis. I'm in my room in the basement (which feels familiar, since it's got a concrete floor), and I'm freezing.

And of course I miss Yoli very much. Now is our time to be separated again and to spend time preparing for marriage. We both have some reading and talking and deciding to do together. But separately, I need to finish my part of the visa application and mail it in. I need to get money by collecting on debts, selling unused computer equipment, and getting full-time work (hopefully with health benefits). I need to find a place to live that's affordable. There's much to do, and much I need to trust God for.

I learned a lot in Bolivia. I can't wait to go back, hopefully in six months or so. I hope we can go back often, and maybe we'll live there. Our plans are in God's hands.

It really was an amazing adventure.

So -- is this the end? No! At the very least, I will have new pictures to put online here by Sunday or Monday. So make sure you check back for that.

Thanks to everyone for reading the site, and thanks especially to those who posted comments here or emailed me. You made me smile every day!

The Voyage Home (yet another Trek-inspired title)

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 Jordán, 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.

For lunch, Louise and Chris took us to the Gringo Limón restaurant, which was quite fancy but utterly empty. Apparently it stays very busy on weekends, but on this day, there was almost noone. The food was good, though, and the menu was humorous. The entree names included all sorts of jokes, many of which I didn't get because they were in Spanish, but yoli was particularly amused by them. I had chicken in a picante sauce. The menu said it was for macho cambas, but it didn't turn out to be too hot.

In the afternoon we continued working, and then once I had burned all the CDs and we had called to confirm my flight with LAB, I returned to my room to pack. I was in a big hurry, but the packing went fast. It helped that I had washed and folded most of my clothes the day before.

I had spent some time in the morning writing thank you notes to the folks who had spent a lot of time with us or invited us over. I wrote a few more in the afternoon and made sure i gave them all out and shook hands with folks. I didn't really get to say goodbye to Glennie, because he left Monday evening to go to Canada for a medical check-up. I also missed Dave Turner, who was working on the antenna for the Quechua radio station the mission is setting up.

I dressed in my warmest clothes--khaki pants, a long-sleeve dress shirt, and a t-shirt underneath. I did that since I'd be returning home to cold weather, but I probably should have worn shorts and changed in the evening. I was hot all day.

Finally it was dinner time. But we didn't have dinner just then because unexpectedly some old friends of Yoli's showed up. It was very bad timing and an awkward situation, but I was introduced to them and she talked with them for a while. Finally they left and we were able to eat and finish the pot of soup we had cooked yesterday.

We only had about an hour left before Louise would come to take us to the airport. So we went for a walk to have our last real private time together. It was a nice walk, and a little sad, but I tried not to dwell on that. Before returning to the seminary we bought some bread for me to eat in the morning (when I got to Miami) and some mani con chocolate (chocholate-covered peanuts, kinda like M&Ms).

It was 30 minutes or so to drive out to the airport. The three of us talked a little, but it was also quiet for some of the time.

Once inside, we made our way through check-in and customs... I paid my $25 fee and thankfully had no problems. We went upstairs to the waiting area. Viru Viru is not a big airport. Apparently you could wait in two places... We were in one. There were no seats in the main part, but if you went into this Euro-esque coffee shop, you could sit down in stylish seats. So we did that and spent time talking and stuff. Louise took a few last pictures of Yoli and I with our cameras, and we showed her some stuff on my computer.

Then it was nearly time for me to leave, so Yoli and I had our final goodbye. I got in line and and saw her for the last time and went through the immigration area and got my passport stamped.

Then I arrived in the other waiting area, the actual gate area. There were lots of seats, and lots of people. But curiously, I realized that my gate was practically empty. I thought that was weird, since it was 20 minutes before my flight was supposed to take off. Then a woman waved at me and asked if I was going to Miami, which I was. She then hurried me over toward the gate, tore my ticket and pushed me toward the plane. It turned out they had boarded early (I have no idea why) and I was the last one on the plane.

The flight itself was fairly uneventful. I got a little sleep but not a whole lot. We had a decent airplane dinner. Around 2 or 3 am we arrived in Panama and many folks got off the plane. I was cheering silently, thinking I'd get three seats to myself and be able to lay down for the second leg of the flight. But it was not to be... A larger load of folks from Panama boarded the plane and one of them sat in my row. Oh well. At least I got a donut for breakfast.

When I got to Miami, things weren't so great. I was tired, and it was 5 am local time. I got in the wrong immigration line, and then realized it very late. So I ended up being the last person to go through the U.S. citizen's line, even though I was one of the first off the plane.

I had filled out my I-94 form truthfully, and was worried I might have my stuff inspected since I was bringing back food (coffee) and had been on a farm (Casa Hogar Nacer, but only for a day). But this didn't turn out to be the case. The lady indicated they only cared if I brought back meat, and waved me toward a special desk past the search areas. I was pleased my bags weren't going to be inspected, then discovered instead my shoes were going to be washed. Yes, they had a shoe-washing desk designed to kill the germ infestation on my shoes. I guess they weren't too worried about what I had already tracked all over the airport's carpet.

After getting my shoes back, I went to the baggage area to pick up my suitcase. It was then that I realized I would have to carry my suitcase across the airport from one end to the other to check in again before making my connection.

That was an ordeal but I made it alive. Unfortunately ahead of me in line at Delta was a Southern family (Smith, apparently) that was coming back from a hunting trip in Argentina. They took forever to get through check-in. Finally it was my turn. I got my suitcase checked, and was about to leave when the lady told me I would need my suitcase inspected.

Not too bad, right? Wrong. The gun guys were also getting inspected. Each and every rifle case was opened and dusted and scanned and probed. I clenched my fists and waited.. Finally they went through my stuff (no bombs, yay!) and I was able to leave.

Then it was the metal-detector and x-ray line. This part was always tough, since I had to remove all my computer stuff from my carry-on and put it in separate containers. I had exposed film I was concenred about, but the man at the x-ray machine said the machine wouldn't hurt it. I wasn't convinced but said nothing. Then I looked over at the wall wear the Transportation Safe Authority conveniently listed my rights... among them was the right to ask for a hand inspection of photo equipment. Always eager to exercise my rights as an American, I asked for the hand inspection of my film. But it was too late. As a different lady (some sort of boss, I gathered) explained that my film would not be hurt by the machine, my stuff went into the machine on the conveyor belt before I had time to protest more. That made me very angry, but I was too tired to fight.

Ahead of me the line wasn't moving. Then I heard some guy say behind me that we were in the "special" line, meaning the line where you get the extra heavy-duty search. Wonderful, I thought.

Finally I got through the metal detector (amazed my keys, coins, belt, watch and other accessories didn't set it off) and was led to a chair where I watched them go through my stuff. I had to remove my shoes and jacket for them to inspect. Then i hand to stand up and have this detector thing waved all over my body every time it beeped, they checked to see if something was there. It kept beeping near my upper leg, so I had to empty my pocket. But it kept beeping. So they had to feel around to make sure there was nothing there. Even more wonderful. Even though the thing kept beeping, the guy let me go. Thankfully I didn't have to go to the changing rooms nearby (i'm not kidding) and get strip searched.

I got my jacket and shoes back, and then I had to re-assemble my carry-on. I made it to the gate. I didn't have the 3 hours free to play with my computer that I thought I'd have. I was pretty ticked off about all the security rigamarole, but finally we got on the plane. I ate some food from my bag, then called my mom and told her my horror story. It was nice to hear her voice, though.

The plane ride was no good though. I developed a headache along the way. Thankfully things were better in Atlanta (no security check) and the plane ride was smooth. I even got a little sleep.

And then I arrived in St. Louis, back in the familiar confines of Lambert... I got to the baggage claim and found my mom, and she drove me back home.

It was good to be back, to see Jed, and the house and the familiar streets and places. But it was also very, very weird.

It's nice to be back, but it's obviously bittersweet. I miss Yoli and everyone in Bolivia. But I have the hope that I'll be returning to them soon, hopefully in 6 months.

The site is online

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.

Twice the rice

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!

Anyway, we did get the web hosting purchased, but the site is not online yet. I hope to have it on the web by this afternoon. It's not complete -- we still need information for two pages. But about 90% of it is finished, and I'm happy about that.

Yoli and I also printed out some of our fianceé visa application forms to bring back to the U.S. Originally I sent for the forms by postal mail, and they arrived a few weeks later in a nice package. But the problem is that they were stained last week when some of my shampoo leaked out of the bottle and through my shaving kit bag.

So I was pleased to learn that the INS makes the forms available as PDFs to download and print out from your computer. Not only that, but the PDF files themselves are truly forms. You can open them in Acrobat Reader and type values into the form fields. When you print them out, and they look very professional.

But we discovered a problem when we were working on them--most of the fields aren't nearly long enough, so you can't type much into them.

The Josh solution was to place the PDFs as graphics into an Adobe InDesign document and then put a layer of type over them. That way I could control the font kerning and font width and make more fit into the blanks than the PDF would allow.

The past few days we've been eating a lot of a rice dessert Yoli made over the weekend. It's very tasty, there's just a LOT of it. Why, you ask? Well, Yoli was using a recipe that called for 1 cup of rice to 9 cups of milk (or something like that), and that seemed to be the wrong proportion to her, so she doubled the rice. You can probably imagine what happened -- we didn't have a pot big enough to hold all the milk and rice, and by the time it was done cooking, we had way more than originally intended. Enough for 20 people, according to the recipe (and a little math).

Let's just say that we've had a lot of milk and rice to eat in recent days. Milk and rice for breakfast.... Rice and milk for dessert with lunch....

But Yoli has done a wonderful job of cooking--even those times when it became an adventure--and I don't think she's yet made anything that I haven't liked.

Winding down (and still very rainy)

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 fianceé visa application. The funny thing (to me) is that here in Bolivia all photos for official documents are very strict.

They won't let you smile, they force men to shave their beards, and other stuff like that. I told Yoli I wanted her to smile in the picture. My thinking was that she's engaged now, and it would be better that she look happy than look sullen and serious. Besides, in the States, it doesn't matter how you look in driver's license photos. And further, the forms we were filling out didn't forbid smiling.

The photographer didn't share my opinion, and even when we explained that the photo was for the U.S., not Bolivia, she still said she would probably use the photo where Yoli didn't "show any teeth."

In the months ahead, if the INS rejects our application solely because she and I smiled in the photos, then there is something seriously wrong with our government.

Anyway, Saturday night Yoli and I tried to look at the moon through her telescope, but it was too cloudy to see it for more than a few moments at a time. She also doesn't have a tripod for it, and it is very difficult to hold a telescope steady with your hands.

On Sunday we ended up going to Yoli's dad's church. I liked it in many ways... the preacher had a much clearer style and delivery, so I could understand more of what he said than other Bolivian preachers I've listened to. This was more of an upper-class church, so it had lots of ceiling fans, which was very nice.

Unfortunately for me, the church didn't use an overhead proejctor during worship. They did sing hymns from a hymnal, but the church didn't have extra hymnals. I guess everyone just buys their own. Toward the end of worship, a lady let us borrow hers, so I was able to sing along with 1 or 2 songs.

It was also a very conservative church, so the most of the women wore head coverings during the service. This is only the second time I've been in a church that practiced that.

Most of the people attending this church didn't live nearby. Many of them drove cars to get there. In the U.S., of course, that's commonplace. But here it's the complete opposite. In Santa Cruz, most churchgoers go to their local neighborhood church, since they can walk to it.

But this church still had the same customs many of the others do. They have a "greeting" song about halfway through the service, where everyone walks around and shakes hands with people while singing. They also called up the members who had birthdays and sang "Cumpleaños Feliz" to them as a congregation.

Yoli's dad attends 3 different churches, we learned, on a rotational basis. They're all the same denomination, but he knows different people in each, so he just goes to all 3 of them. This particular morning he rode his bike to come.

Yoli and I went to a pharmacy to try and get some allergy medicine for me, and then we went to Chriss, a two-story chicken restaurant we ate at several weeks ago. It's a nice place with good food, and we really enjoyed it.

We went back to her house and were taking it easy. But her mom was cooking peanut soup to eat in the afternoon. I was fairly full from lunch, but I figured I should have the soup. Later in the evening when Yoli and I were working on filling out the visa application forms we had mate and some cigarros (pastries that look like cigars).

One thing I've sort of gotten hooked on here (besides certain foods and drinks) is Star Wars: Jedi Knight II for the Mac. It really adds a new dimension to first-person shooters (like Castle Wolfenstein, Doom, and all the others that have followed) with a slew of "force powers." You get to use lots of guns, of course, but you have other weapons unique to the Star Wars universe. You have your light saber, which is defensive as well as offensive, and can be thrown at enemies or objects far away. You can use the force to run fast, as well as push, pull, and throw things. You can also heal yourself and do the Jedi 'mind trick' on enemies. I got the demo off a MacAddict disk when I came down, and I play it every few days. I've completed the demo's easiest and second-hardest levels. In the easy level, you have to fight a "Dark Jedi" at the end. He likes to jump and flip around. The graphics are really cool and with the music and sound effects, it feels like you're living the movie having a classic light saber duel. The second hardest level, though, takes things way up. First, the Dark Jedi isn't a wimp this time. He uses all his force powers to throw you around and knock you off balance. Second, there's not just one, there's two. If you don't kill the first one quick, then you have to fight them both at the same time, something that's nearly impossible. But on Sunday I beat them both and felt pretty darn good -- I said "YO soy the maestro!" in Spanish upon my victory, since the Dark Jedi usually says "Now I'M the master" if he kills you.

Well, the main thing for the rest of the trip at this point is to finish the Seminary's website. I think we've got a good shot at accomplishing that. We're going to go all-out on Monday and Tuesday to make it happen. I hope to have a web address to give you tomorrow.

Media scares

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...).

In fact, until that phone call, nobody here had heard about the flooding (that I know of). There has been consistent rain every day (especially heavy one day last week), but Yoli and others say that it hasn't been what Cruceños would consider "a lot" of rain.

Because we were curious, later in the day Yoli went to the library to check a newspaper and see if there were any stories about flooding. She couldn't find any. So, we really aren't sure if the flooding took place here. If it did, it must have been away from the city near the River Pirai. There's also a chance there was flooding in a different Santa Cruz -- Argentina has a Santa Cruz, as does California in the U.S.

About that lunch with Glennie and Marilyn: I learned something new about Glennie. He loves woodworking. Before lunch we saw him turning a lamp on a lathe. When we went inside, Marilyn showed us stools, lamps, and clocks he had made. He's really very good at it. And I think my dad would drool if he saw how big the lathe was. Glennie doesn't get a often chance to do much woodworking, though, because he is constantly kept busy at the seminary, where he is the "canciller," as well as in local churches, since he is always preaching at a different church somewhere in Bolivia.

There's another item in the media about Bolivia that may frighten some of you if you've heard about it. There were some big fights in La Paz (the capital city) between police and military. Some were killed and many were wounded.

The economic situation in Bolivia is not good. It's hard to find work, and even when you do, many times you don't get paid on time or at all. There was a transportation blockade in Cochabamba recently, because of citizens angry about the economy. The government tries to create new programs (hmmm.. sounds like the U.S. and the state of Missouri) to 'help' people, but they don't really have the money to execute those programs. The politicians hope that proposing these programs will pacify people and increase their popularity.

Well, recently the president proposed a big income tax to help pay for things. Given the already bad economic situation, you can imagine how well that went over. He quickly retracted the idea, but it got people angry.

I think what happened in La Paz (and I don't understand this very well, so I could be way off) is that the police were protesting their low wages and demanding a pay increase. The government sent in the military to break things up, and it became violent. Some citizens joined the fray, and the violence escalated. There was a lot of mob-type damage to businesses and such. The mob was calling for the resignation of the president ("Goni").

So, it's not a great situation. There have been no problems here in Santa Cruz, though. People tell me (and I've read) that violent protests and mob action usually happens in the highland cities (La Paz, Cochabamba). People in lowland cities, like Santa Cruz, tend to be much more relaxed and more worried about making sure they have their parties on the weekend.

Across Santa Cruz yesterday evening, businesses announced they'd be closed Thursday, a sort of holiday to avoid trouble. There were supposed to be protests here on Thursday in the plaza at the city's center, so we'll stay off the streets just to be safe. But it's unlikely to be anything like what happened in La Paz. All the same, keep us in prayer and also pray that God would give the leaders here wisdom and integrity to deal with the nation's problems effectively.

That's one prayer request that I think we should make for leaders everywhere, especially with the U.S. on the brink of war.

Guest entry: See what Yoli has to say!

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

Although Josh did a great job at keeping in touch through email (in fact, he did better than me), I missed spending time with him, listening to him. When I was in St. Louis, we usually met in the evenings, so I had the chance to ask him how his day was. He would tell me about what was going on in his job, and although I did not understand 100% of it, I was glad to hear him. The best part was seeing the way he said things, his face, his expressions. By email, I did not have that. I tried imagining how his voice would sound, if he was sad or happy, but it was not the same.

And I had fears... I was afraid he would forget me. I was afraid because I know he likes being busy, and because he is a friendly guy and has a good social life. I was afraid he would get enough to fill the emptiness of my presence with other things. Here, my memory of him was vivid. I had tons of pictures of him I took with my camera. I would look at them almost every day. I also had a basket where I put prayer requests, and I had some about him. I was always thinking about him, asking God to help us until we would meet again.

But now, he is here. I held him tight when I first saw him at the airport, because I didn't want to lose him. And he has been here four weeks so far. During this time I have had the chance to learn new things about him and we both have had new experiences. I like it when I wake up and I know I am going to have breakfast with him. He taught me how to make cinnamon toast, and I like it. Also, he has tried different Bolivian breakfasts and he has survived. In the mornings we either work or visit a place. Then we have lunch time, where we cook soup from a bag or have leftovers. In the afternoons we always work in my oasis-office. It is a time when I try not to disturb him because he is so immersed in his work. Then in the evenings, we either cook, or eat out, or visit a friend.

Also, we are learning how to manage disagreements. My mom thinks we disagree on silly things... like I thought Terminator 1 was better than Terminator 2, when Josh thinks the second movie was a masterpiece... O well, maybe I shouldn't even mention that incident so we won't raise the topic again. But I like it when it happens because I am reminded that we come from different homes and different cultures. And it is good we experience this and learn now when we are single.

It has been four days since he asked me to marry him. In addition to that joy, now I am going to have him for one more week than I thought. I feel like the most blessed woman of the world. There is just a hint of sadness... it is saying goodbye. I know I will miss him again, and I know the first months will be the hardests. But now he has given me a bigger hope, and our joy will be bigger next time we meet because we will become husband and wife. So here we are, ready to see what God has for our lives.

Assorted amusing anecdotes

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.

Well, let me tell you, there were a lot of people selling sandals. There seemed to be 3 different classes of sandals available... Really cheap ones, imitations of foreign shoes, and then popular Brazilian and Bolivian brands.

The Brazilian ones were the most expensive, usually about 70-80 Bs per pair. But I was most intruiged by the foreign imitations. The shoes usually had a somewhat stylish American look, and I was fooled by a few of them at first. They had the Nike and Reebok logos stitched in the right places on the shoe. The soles, though, were always conspiculously void of any logos. The real giveaway, though, is that there would often be two identical pairs of shoes next to each other, but bearing different brand names.

The problem for me was price. I wanted to spend less than 50 Bs. Most of the really good sandals, though, were more than that. The others were generally very inexpensive, but also very low quality.

After much walking and asking "¿Cuanto cuesta?" over and over, we finally found a decent pair at 30 Bs. That's about $4 to $5 in U.S. dollars. Pretty darn good, in my book.

The great thing is that I'm going to get to wear these sandals longer than I originally anticipated. You see, I get to stay in Bolivia a week longer than planned. I'll be departing NEXT Wednesday, giving me 7 extra days to try and tan my pearly white feet.

Staying Longer

My trip extension is quite a story in itself. It started when Rusty emailed me Saturday, asking me to stay a week longer. He offered to pay any penalty I incurred for changing the ticket date. But I didn't get the email until Monday morning.

Well, it seemed to me that it would be great to stay, and God had already done part of the work -- when I got to Bolivia, I was stamped with a 90-day visa instead of the normal 30-day visa. I have no idea why...I certainly didn't ask for it. But they gave it to me!

In the afternoon Yoli and I called LAB (Lloyd Aero Boliviano) and they said it would cost $50 to change the LAB tickets, but they weren't sure about my Delta connections in the States. Rusty said he'd drive me out their office so we could pay the $50 and get my new tickets. Since Yoli and I had planned to eat a brief dinner with a couple that evening, we decided to call them and reschedule for later in the week when we could spend more time with them, since I'd be staying in Bolivia longer.

Rusty and I went to the LAB office. The lady helping us said it would cost $50 to change the LAB ticket, but that if we changed our departure date, we would actually forfeit my Delta tickets. It would cost $900-1100 to buy new ones.

Well, this was bad news. Rusty couldn't cover that much, and I certainly don't have that much. The lady made us wait while she went and talked with another lady. They spent 15 minutes on the phone and on the computer.

Eventually, she came back and told us that there was some sort of rule or law that said that if you change your departure date within 3 months of purchasing the ticket, the airlines can't penalize you. So she changed all my tickets to next Wednesday at no cost -- not even the $50 they were originally going to charge. We spent a total of 3Bs on parking.

That was really amazing. God took care of the need!

Perilous Pool Pockets

You pool sharks (Yes, Tom, Brian, and everyone else.. you know who you are) would have an interesting challenge here. Yoli told me prior to coming that the pool tables had narrower pockets. It's one thing to hear and imagine it, and a completely different thing to actually play the table.

I believe it was Thursday or Friday night that Yoli and I went with her dad and her brother-in-law Juan to shoot some pool. And sure enough, the pockets were very narrow. The only other difference between this table and the ones I'm used to playing on is a line running across the table on one side (which they use for scratches).

We didn't play regular pool--and I'll display my ignorance here, because I think it's called "8-ball" but I'm not sure--but a different game that I think they made up on their own.

The idea is just to sink as many balls as you can, no matter what they are. It's a good thing they play that way, because the set of balls we were given contained at least 3 duplicates (two 11-balls, for instance). If you scratch or fail to hit a ball with the cue ball, you lose a point. If you make a shot, you score a point and get to continue shooting.

Don Hector and I were on a team, and I sank two or three balls. I had many close shots but was robbed by those infernal tiny pockets. The game took a long time but it was fun, and our team ended up winning.

ENGAGED! (No, Star Trek fans, I'm not pretending I'm Captain Jean-Luc Picard)

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. :)

Let me begin at the beginning. About 2 weeks ago or so, we went to a joyero (jeweller) recommended to us by another couple who were recently engaged. We met with him and picked out an engagement ring and two wedding rings.

I wasn't really sure what I would be expected to do in asking Yoli to marry me. I didn't know if there was a common custom, or if her dad would expect me to first ask his permission. Yoli and I talked about it, and she came up with a good idea. Our plan was to come over on Saturday and make pizza for the whole family. Then, at some point during the meal, I would get everyone's attention and ask Yoli to marry me.

Well, things never quite turn out exactly how you plan them.

The first problem was that I didn't have as much money as I thought, and so we had to overcome some financial obstacles before getting the rings.

I also got another curveball from my folks when I chatted with them Thursday morning. They both strongly suggested that I get permission from Yoli's dad. What they said made a lot of sense, and I didn't want to insult him if he expected me to do it. I was worried, though, about my ability to communicate with him. Yoli and I talked about it later in the day and decided we did need to ask permission and that I would do it that very night.

We picked up the rings Thursday afternoon. To keep the rings a surprise, Yoli wasn't allowed to look at them, but we did try them on her, to make sure they fit right. I really like the wedding rings. The engagement ring was not quite what I thought it would be, but it was still very beautiful.

My talk with Yoli's parents went well. We had planned to go to Yoli's house then go with her dad and brothers-in-law to shoot some pool. When we got there, the place was mostly empty, so I decided I probably wouldn't have a better chance to talk with him alone. I told Don Hector I needed to talk with him, and he asked if I wanted to talk with Doña Lucila as well. I told him yes. Unfortunately, Yoli's mom didn't know what it was I wanted to talk about. She thought I just wanted to chat. So she spent about 15 or 20 minutes cleaning everything in sight, I suppose preparing for an evening of talk.

Sara, Yoli's youngest sister, was also home in her bedroom (which she shares with Yoli). Yoli wasn't to happy about that, but there wasn't much she could do. Sara was going to overhear everything. Yoli's nieces (Leya and Jessi) weere also around, but eventually they obeyed orders and went to their room.

Finally I sat down with Don Hector and Doña Lucila and told them "Quiero pedirle permiso para casarse con su hija" (I want to ask permission to marry your daughter). They asked about our plans and such. I was able to explain myself pretty well. As usual, my trouble was understanding the things they were saying and asking me. But overall the conversation went well, and they both said they thought Yoli and I would be very happy together and gave me permission. Eventually Yoli joined us in the room and helped bail me out of my Spanish comprehension difficulties. We ended up not having time to shoot pool and decided we'd do it another night.

Sara, of course, relayed these events to most of her sisters, but I told Yoli not to worry. We could still surprise them with the engagement--after all, she wasn't wearing the ring yet.

The days passed quickly. I had spent time preparing some words to say for Saturday night, but I ended up tossing them out. I worked with Yoli on the specific question ("Quieres casarte conmigo?" or "Do you want to marry yourself with me?"). On Saturday I mentally composed some new lines to use that night. I wanted to thank the family for all the kindness they'd shown me and explain that I had come to Bolivia for Yoli -- to learn about her country, her family, her way of life...and to ask her an important question.

Eventually we made our way to Yoli's house. I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt, but brought some dress clothes to change into. When we arrived, we began working on the pizzas.

Yoli had made some pizza sauce a few days before hand from fresh tomatoes. I was really afraid of what it would taste like, though, because she had combined two different recipes, one of which included the word "Ketchup" in the name. My fears later proved to be completely unfounded.

Earlier in the week we had purchased the necessary ingredients -- pizza crusts (orange-colored here), mozzarella cheese (expensive compared to regular Bolivian cheese, but I insisted), and thin sliced ham. To make the pizza, first we grated the mozzarella cheese. Yoli brought extra Bolivian cheese because she didn't think we had enough mozzarella (and she was right). After we finished that, I cut the ham while she spread sauce on the first crust. Then I put on the ham and cheese, and we put it in the oven.

Our hands were a little messy and by that point, and Yoli asked if I still wanted to change clothes. I decided not to, since we had 3 more pizzas to make. So, already our plans were changing... but the biggest difference was that the family didn't all sit down to eat together. Yoli gave a dinner call and everyone came in. We prayed and then passed out 1 slice of pizza each. The pizza tasted very good, it turned out very well. Some people stayed in the main room, Yoli's dad and two nieces went in his bedroom to watch TV, and others went outside to eat.

This was a problem. We had thought everyone would be at a table, making it easy for me to interrupt their eating at some point and make the proposal. Instead, we were missing 4 people (Juan, Boris, Eliza, and Melanie) and were going to lose others at some point (Alcides, Lucy, and Sara wanted to go to church).

We didn't want to leave anyone out, but it seemed clear that we weren't going to get everyone there at the same time. So I told Yoli that she should call everyone in for the third pizza and after I cut the pizza up (using a regular knife... no pizza-cutters here), I would do my thing.

The third pizza came out, Yoli called everyone in ("Come on Alcides, please eat one more before you go...."), and I then I said in a loud voice "Su atención, por favor." I had to get Don Hector and the nieces back in the room. I thanked the family for their hospitality in my broken Spanish and said a few more things before dropping to one knee and proposing to Yoli.

It was very special for me, and my hand trembled. Yoli was close to tears, even though she had known what would happen. I pulled the ring box out of my pocket. It was a simple plastic box, not the fancy padded clamshell type we use in the States. I had wrapped the ring in Kleenex to keep it from rattling in my pocket. We had considered "borrowing" a fancier ring box that belonged to Sara (without her knowing), but I decided not to do that.

We got the ring on, and everyone was very excited. The sisters present were making those chirping noises that girls make during such moments. Alcides was there, and seemed moved emotionally. He wished me "Felicidades" as did the others. We had succeeded in surprising everyone and making a very special memory.

Looking back, it's incredible to me that this all worked out. I'm thankful to God for the beautiful, intelligent, helpful woman he put in my life. He's full of surprises -- Four years ago, I never would have guessed that I would one day come to the heart of South America and propose to a Bolivian woman in Spanish. But here I am!

If you have a moment, please pray for Yoli and I. Our hope is to be married in about six months, but our plans depend on how long it takes the INS to process our request for a fianceé visa. Of course between now and then there will be plans and preparations to make, and I will be looking for full-time work. We would both greatly appreciate your prayers.

Rainy days, muddy roads

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.

Anyway, yesterday I had breakfast again with Arnold and Greta, and then later helped Louise learn how to optimize her scanned photos for sending through email. (Begin rant: if you don't know how to do this, then you are probably one of those prolematic folks who scans in family photos and emails them to everyone. The problem is that your family will spend 2 or 3 hours waiting for one photo to download, since you failed to crop them or resize them. Rant mode off.) Then Becky Turner asked if I could look at a computer for her. It was a PC with a dying hard drive that was making an awful noise. I thought it was a sound effect from the speaker, but she told me it was the actual hard drive.

Later in the day, Yoli and I went to the bank to make some withdrawals and change currencies. Then it was off to the Hipermaxi (a large supermarket) to get supplies for our planned Pizza evening on Saturday. While at Hipermaxi, we ate hot dogs (the foot-long kind, though in this metric country I have no idea how long it actually was). Mine was topped with crispy potato gratings, which was actually pretty good.

Buying food here is quite unlike the U.S. most of the time. The cheese was got was not pre-grated. We got mozzarella, a big 500-gram hunk of it. We also bought ham (couldn't find pepperoni) and 4 pizza crusts. The pizza crusts are orange, and look a little differen than what I'm used to, so I have no idea what they will taste like. It will be an adventure.

At work I made more excellent progress on the website. Rusty has also been highly complimentary of my work, and I'm glad that he's been pleased with it.

Wednesday night we had planned to shoot some pool with Yoli's dad and brothers-in-law, but the rain nixed that idea. Instead we spent it talking with her parents. It was a very fruitful conversation.

I took the bus home alone again, since I know the route pretty well, and it saves money when Yoli's not escorting me. The ride home is always crowded. It's not crowded when I get on the bus, since Yoli's home is past the third ring. But as the bus goes through the city center, it takes on a ton of people, and by the time it comes to Calle 5 and Av. Paragua (where I get off), it's hard for me to get to the door...even when I'm sitting in the seat closest to it! But the buses are cheap and reliable and go everywhere. If only St. Louis had public transporation like this...

Attack of the Mosquitos

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.

When we arrived, the man at the ticket window told us we were the first ones to arrive and we had the whole place to ourselves. Normally they give bug spray to visitors at the gate, but they had run it. He said it was a great day to come, because there were no mosquitos.

Well, I guess "no mosquitos" meant "little swarms everywhere." We were bombarded by the mosquitos, especially around the lagoon, and spent most of our time swatting ourselves and each other, rather than enjoying the plant life.

You can't compare this garden to the one in St. Louis, because it's so new. I'm sure there were many interesting things to see, but we didn't get to see many of them. We may go back (this time with bug spray) if we have time.

That evening we went to Yoli's house to celebrate the birthdays of Noemi and Eliza. We got both of them bon-bons. It was a fun time, and most of the family was there.

On Tuesday morning, Yoli and I went to "Los Cabañas" with Lucy, Juan, and Alcides. Los Cabañas is a place near the river with lots of little restaurants. You can also rent four-wheelers and ride horses (for a moderate fee). We had several traditional Santa Cruz foods for breakfast (cuñape is one I remember). We spent a lot of time walking and talking. We also went to the river, which reminded me a little of the Black River (only muddier) because it was quite shallow.

It was my last chance to see Alcides, who left that evening to go work for 20 days out of town. Both he and Juan are really big jokers, but Alcides especially. But I really enjoyed getting to know him over the past few weeks. He's a good worker and has done all different sorts of things (including being in the army and working for the US DEA). Of all the folks I've met here, he tried the hardest to communicate with me, and of course we already had a relationship before I got here since I was a co-padriño for he and Noemi.

Tuesday night, I went to a restaurant with Yoli, her friend Dora, and Dora's fiancee Jonatan. We had interesting talk, and enjoyed the food. I was surprised and intruiged when one family came in and their child was holding a tiny pet monkey. The monkey proceeded to make noises throughout the evening. That reminds me of the time Yoli and I got on a bus and saw a woman who had brought a live chicken with her in one of her bags.

That night, I saw the movie "Signs" ("Señales in Spanish) . It was a pretty good movie, and I think it's great for later discussion of the themes. We rented the movie, but I noticed as soon as we rented it that it was actually a copy, not the original movie. The entire library of the video store was copies. I'm not sure if they do it that way to protect the originals, or if there's something more shady going on, but it was interesting.

Wednesday was a fairly typical day. We went to El Jordán, where I completed a rough draft of the second flier they wanted me to do. Then most of the rest of the day I worked on the seminary's website. I got a lot finished yesterday. I'm going to have a lot more finished when I leave then I was thinking last week.

One last anecdote from Tuesday: Yoli came prepared to make pancakes (panqueques) in the morning. I thought this sounded great. She had never made them before and brought her recipe book. I was doing other work while she made the batter, and then joined her in the kitchen when she started pouring it in the skillet. She asked what she should use to pour the batter into the skillet, and I suggested a 1-cup measuring cup. She seemed surprised but used it anyway. When she poured the batter, she didn't put very much in the skillet, so I asked her to put more. When the pancake was finished and I started eating it, I realized this wasn't the kind of pancake I was used to. It took me a few minutes before I figured out what it was. The batter was for what we call FRENCH pancakes (or crepes), not American pancakes. The pancake was good, and in fact we've created something new... thick American-style crepes. Anyway, it was a pretty funny misunderstanding that turned out well.

Josh tames a PC (for a while, at least)

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.

I installed the drivers successfully (after far too much work) but still the computer wouldn't recognize the drive. I finally realized the problem was that I had to make sure the CD burner was turned on before the computer was turned on. It shouldn't have had to be like that since the burner was USB, but it was the only way we could make the computer see the drive.

Anyway, after all that, we realized we had forgotten to bring a blank CD. So I wrote up instructions for Rusty so he could bring a blank CD and try to burn it when he came home for lunch.

After that we went to El Jordán for an hour or two. Yoli worked on their newsletter and I worked on their second brochure. We had lunch with Corina, Kitty, Kelly, and two moms with their kids. Yoli knew one of the moms. It was a great lunch (except for the onions in the pasta) but soon we had to get back to the seminary so we could go to work.

Work was progressing well, and today Rusty was able to spend more time with us, providing us with information we needed for the site. I may be able to complete the entire site before I leave, after all. We'll see.

Rusty brought a CD-RW he thought he had burned, but he wasn't sure. He thought it hadn't taken long enough. we popped the CD into 3 different computers and it was clear that it hadn't been burned. So, we decided to go back to Rusty's immediately, and try to burn it on a CD-R.

Rusty's wife and kids were surprised to see us (me for the second time) back. Well, I got to work on the PC and after about 15 minutes realized the CD burning software was not working right. Thankfully the CD burner driver included one other way for burning CD-RWs. I tried it, and it worked. Praise God. I'm very thankful for my Mac, which only requires me to plug in the drive, drag onto the CD icon the files I want to burn, and click "burn."

After work, I was in a hurry to get back to the kitchen and make some dinner because we had worked a little late and the prayer meeting was going to start in about an hour. But a student flagged me down and asked for help with a computer. I was surprised. It was the first time a student has asked me for help with anything. He introduced me to a girl who could speak some English. She said she was having a problem with disks, but she was new to computers. I'm not convinced there was a problem, actually. Yoli arrived and the more she tried to explain the problem, the less we understood. When it became clear nothing was going to get fixed immeditely, I asked her to come see us in the office tomorrow, and she agreed to do so.

Dinner was quick but nice, and Yoli and I had nice discussion. After that, she left, and I went to the prayer meeting. Arnold Wry shared about the life of Joseph, and then there were a number of praise reports and prayer requests. Rusty pointed out to everyone that I would be leaving soon, so if anyone wanted to invite me to eat, they'd better do it soon. That surprised me! But Yoli has been somewhat disappointed that more people haven't asked us out. I think it's worked out okay, though. Tuesday night we'll be going out with Dora and her boyfriend, who went with us to Samaipata on Sunday.

I got 3/4 of my laundry done. The rest had to wait until Tuesday morning. Other than that, all is well. The weather today was great because of rain and cloud cover throughout the day. Thank you God!

Winding roads, spectacular mountains, weathered ruins, and coffee

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.

We had planned to go with Corina (who has her own vehicle) and Yoli's friend Dora and her boyfriend. We were all ready to go at 8 am, but Corina didn't show up. We waited 30 minutes, then finally went to Glennie's and asked Marilyn if we could use her phone to call Corina. It turns out Corina thought we wouldn't go because of the rain and had been waiting for us to call her and tell her otherwise. Confusing as that seemed to us, we confirmed that we wanted to go, and she drove out.

She also brought with her three more folks (Kelly, Kitty, and another guy whose name escapes me). And we started the drive. Samaipata is a town in the mountains more than 100km away from Santa Cruz. The main thing we planned to do there was visit some Inca ruins on one of the mountain peaks.

You take the same highway to Samaipata that we took before when we went to Hogar Nacer. It's a beautiful drive, but for the first hour or so it was the same as I'd seen before: flat, open, green land.

But once we got to the mountains and the highway started twisting and curving, it got much more beautiful. It's rather hard for me to describe how beautiful it was. It reminded me a little bit of driving to Clearwater Lake at first, but then I quickly decided this dwarfed that.

There was so much green. Much of it was trees of course, and some of them were strange to me. But there were also piñas (pineapples to us) and cacti. To me that was the weirdest thing. Imagine a lush, green forest with a cactus every so often. I generally think of cacti as only being in the desert.

As we climbed higher, we sort of broke out of the forest and could see the mountains around us. They were awesome. We came to one particular mountain that had what looked like giant half-circle cutouts on two faces. They were natural, but it was stunning. The mountain itself was red, and as we drove along and saw more cliffs and bluffs, many of them were a deep red or sometimes even a purple color.

For part of the way there was a river within view of the highway. And we saw several expensive houses, including one situated on its own little hill with a spectacular view of the larger mountains around it. But mostly we saw adobe houses and cement houses.

There were always lots of people on the road, and donkeys, and cows. Corina drives pretty fast, much faster than I'd be able to drive on the winding roads. She's been on this road many times before. There were several places along the way where the road abruptly became gravel, because of rock slides, and then a few minutes later became road again.

The road to the ruins was an extremely winding, bumpy, red-dirt road off the highway near Samaipata. THIS was a scary road that led to the top of one of the mountains. We passed two cars coming down the mountain. Truth be told, I'm not sure how we found the room to pass anyone on that road, but we did.

Once we reached our destination, we decided to eat lunch. So Corina spread out a blanket and we all ate what we brought. From our blanket, we had an amazing view of the mountains and scenery below. We weren't quite at the top, but we were close. I'm quite confident that I got some magnificent pictures.

The ruins themselves were interesting, but you had to use your imagination. The mountain peak was all stone, and the Incas had carved the stone to make a worship area. It seems there were symbols like large snakes, but there were also sacrifice areas and grave areas. Visitors were kept off the ruins in roped-off areas, but there were large platforms at various points around the ruins where you could climb up to see everything. Unfortunately, erosion has worn away a lot of it, so it's difficult to imagine what it must have been like when it was new and there were people using it.

Off the main path were smaller paths that led us to unearthed houses and public buildings. These were easier for me to envision in my mind, since they had been buried and were better preserved. They weren't carved out of stone, but instead were built of small stones and mud.

Eventually we made our way back to the car and we drove back down to the main highway and a few more kilometers to reach Samaipata, the town. Corina had planned to take us for coffee somewhere, but there was some sort of festival going on. People were packing the main plaza, there was loud music, and some people were drunk. So instead, we drove around the extremely bumpy and cramped city roads looking for another place.

We did eventually find one. It was a gift shop and coffee shop combined. The owners were apparently German, and the inside reminded me of something American. The prices for the crafts were American, too. But still, they were beautiful and interesting to look at. There was some European techno music playing, which was strange, and when we sat down, and a techno Christmas song was on. We drank some coffee (or hot chocolate in my case) and then went out back to see the owners' collection of cacti. There was an astonishing variety, even one that was long and skinny, hanging from its pot. I could have sworn it was an animal's tail, but one touch proved it was a cactus.

Our tickets to the ruins also included a visit to a museum in Samaipata. We decided to get our money's worth and check it out. When we got there, the lady told us they were closing in 5 minutes, so we had to go fast. They had some interesting displays of pottery from the site of the Inca ruins, but I was most fascinated by the various artists' renderings of how the site looked long ago. We managed to stay in the museum more than 5 minutes and get at least a quick look at everything in the two main rooms.

Then it was time to get back on the road and head back. The drive was just as good returning as it had been coming out, only quieter. It did seem there were more dogs on the road, though. About an hour into the journey, we stopped to have coffee again and eat the rest of our food. We built a small fire and tried to boil water. I'm not sure that it ever actually boiled, but it did get pretty hot. We were by the river, and it was a nice place. As we ate there, though, rain clouds were rolling in and we could hear thunder.

When we go back on the road, we did encounter rain again, which caused the folks in front to raise the windows, which sort of stifled those of us in the back. I should mention here, that we were in cramped quarters, but I was grateful Corina drove us, since she was willing to make stops for photos, and she got us there and back much faster than a bus would have.

I tried to get a little sleep, but it was difficult since every 10-15 minutes we would come to a small town with speed bumps on the highway that we'd have to slow down for.

All in all it was a good day. I came home tired and a little sun-burned, but very thankful for a great experience.