Into The Unknown

Thanks to all of you that have followed our lives the past 7 months. We just wanted to post a homecoming entry to say that we are extremely honored that you took the time to keep in contact with us by reading and commenting on our blog. We made it back to the US on Aug. 7th. After a couple of grueling travel days, including an 18 hour bus ride, we made it from the Bolivian border to Lima, Peru. From there we flew to Atlanta, GA where we had to pay a lot of money just to get out of the airport...a story for another time. In GA we were re-introduced to American culture (southern culture that is) by Jen's aunt and uncle...truly wonderful hosts, who wined and dined us like royalty...we even got an official tour of Rome, GA (where they live) and saw the largest university in the US (in terms of land mass) and a statue of the founder of the KKK...although locals would deny this. From Atlanta we flew to Milwaukee in time to see Jen's close friend Sarah married off and then caught a ride back to Iowa (where Jen's family lives) with other friends. While in Iowa we have spent a lot of time watching the Olympics, eating, squeezing Jen's baby niece Shelby, and yes...going to the Iowa State Fair - officially the biggest state fair in the country for those of you ignorant of such things. It is a spectacle to be sure...hard to know what is more entertaining to watch, the animals or the people. They are all about creating the biggest of everything and thus we were able to see the biggest bunny contest (the winner weighed in at 22lbs), the biggest bull ("Tiny" topped the scales at 3012lbs), and the biggest boar (1259lbs...it wasn't a pretty sight...somewhat of a freak!!). You can see a video of the pig at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDEC7LWZrpk.

Or you can check out another oddity at the fair at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKoLuuPkeog ...this even made it on CNN. Here we are behind the largest pumpkin with Jen's sister, Megan.


On Aug 26 we make the final flight "home" to WA. We are still unsure what our future holds, but we have several people that have generously opened their homes to us and have arranged some temporary work in Ellensburg until mid November. After that we are unsure what we will do. There is a slight chance that we may go back to Bolivia to work, but we still need a lot of prayer, guidance, and thought before that would happen. In the meantime we look forward to seeing many of you face to face. The past 7 months have been an amazing experience for both of us...and truly God blessed. We would encourage all of you to take a step of faith and do something similiar...you won't be disappointed by what you will discover.

Out Of Bolivia

As some of you may know, we were a little worried about what would happen when we tried to exit Bolivia given that we had overstayed our 90 day visa by 80 days!! It is a long story, but when we tried to get an extension while we were in Cochabamba they refused to give it to us, saying that we could stay up to 30 days more in the country and just pay a fine for every day over our 90 day visa. They threatened that if they "found" us in the country after the 30 days then they could deport us and give us a "special stamp" that wouldn't allow us to come back for as long as 10 years. Given the commitment we had already made to the children's homes, and our desire to travel more in Bolivia, we stretched the 30 day limit to 80 days (what is 50 days anyway!!).

When we arrived at the border we had enough money in Bolivianos to pay the fine for the 80 extra days we had stayed. They thankfully did not give us the promised "special stamp" and of course the threat of deportation becomes a rather mute point when you are standing at the border ready to leave. But unknown to us, they had raised the daily fine by almost fifty percent...it was even raised in the middle of our discussion...after a consultation with another border official who assured us that the first officer was confused. We didn't have the money in Bolivianos and thus after exchanging a rather large sum of dollars a horrible rate (only one money exchanger at the boarder who knew our situation), we were able to "escape" Bolivia.

BUT not before they had given us an "official" receipt for our payment...lest we think that they were corrupt and had pocketed part of the money. It was the perfect way to go out of Bolivia though...we wished we would have videotaped it. During this whole exchange the bus was waiting for us on the Peru side of the boarder and the bus employee with us was telling us to hurry up every 5 seconds and probably would have left us if we had delayed them much longer. We payed over 2000 Bolivianos in fines, but their receipts were pre-printed in the value of 70 Bolivianos. Thus the border official had to personally sign 32 separate receipts. As he signed the last one I about ripped them out of his hands, but he insisted that they needed to be pasted onto a sheet of paper before he could give them to us. We watched in horror as he carefully ripped off one receipt, took out a wet sponge, moistened the back of the receipt and pasted it carefully in the upper left hand corner of the page. After watching this process a second time and multiplying the time involved by 30 we (including the bus employee) did rip the receipts out of his hands and started licking and pasting as fast as we could. When we got the the bottom of the page he announced that he would have to look for another sheet of paper, we insisted (rather forcefully) that it would be OK to use the other side. After they were all officially pasted, he counted them three times to make sure he had the right amount (we helped with the math) and then stamped each one of them...reapplying ink after every four stamps and finally signing his name at the bottom of the page, taking some more time to think of what day it was...making it an official 33 signatures on one page of paper. Thus we exited Bolivia at a full run (literally) with our passports and a true Bolivian receipt clutched in our hands, ran into the Peruvian immigration office, got our stamp, and ran to the bus, apologizing profusely to all the waiting passengers. We asked another American on the bus how long they had all been waiting for us, and were relieved to find that they had only been waiting on the bus for 10 minutes. Above is a picture of us holding our visas and our "Bolivian Boarder Receipt".

Jen goes into the wild

Although we feel a bit guilty and had some conflicted emotions with our guide touching all the animals (not so environmentally friendly), it was amazing to see the animals up close. Here is a series of pictures of Jen experiencing the wild up close and personal.

Baby alligator on the night boat ride

Getting stuck in the mud...did yoga poses to get my boot out--check out my socks (threw them away)...Andrew just laughed at me while another guy from Switzerland helped me out of the mud! Andrew says he loves me and would lay down his life for me, but I have some serious doubts about this! ....She (Andrew writing now) didn't tell you about the multiple alligator and wild rodent attacks I saved her from...if it hadn't been for my courage and quick reflexes who knows what would have happened!!

I just wanted to touch the skin and before I knew it he was handing this anaconda to me...yes, that is REAL fear. I had just watched it bite our guides rubber boot and was not exactly keen on harrassing the wildlife.

This constrictor was found right by a camp we were visiting on one of our hikes; again, our guide chose me to demonstrate its strength by having it constrict my arm...felt like somebody pumping up the bloodpressure cuff a bit too tight! There's the Swiss guy who saved me from the mud while my husband took pictures!

Pampas Tour

After a night in Rurre we headed out on a tour of the ¨"Pampas"...think grasslands mixed with jungle and swamps...a rather fascinating environment, but the main attraction is the plethora of animals. We took a crazy three hour 4x4 ride crammed into a landcruiser with the other 6 people on our tour (most of whom had been on our jungle tour). At Santa Rosa we got on a boat for a beautiful 3 hour ride up river. The river was lined with crocodiles and caymans...literally every 50 yards you would see one sunbathing on the shore (see photo above) and that didn´t account for the ones that were in the water. We also saw monkeys, turtles, sloths (Jen´s personal favorite), anacondas, capyberas (Sp!...the largest rodents on earth), and an incredible variety of bird life. It was a little hot and humid to say the least, but very few bugs...a welcome relief from the jungle trip!!!

In the end, we had stayed so long that we decided to take a flight out. Then it rained and planes/buses were all delayed. This was the grass airstrip that we finally were able to exit Rurre between rain storms. Thank God!

Jungle Tour

La Paz in the valley, Mt. Illimani in the backdrop

Jungle Jen

We arrived back to La Paz from the mountain at 6pm and left the next morning at 6am for the jungle. It was a beautiful 8 hour drive down through the cloud forests, with stops for breakfast and lunch and swimming, to the jungle town of Guanay where we got on a boat with 12 other gringos, two guides, a cook, and two drivers for a two day trip down river to Rurre. Our trip was actually postponed for the night while we waited for a river blockade to end...if they don´t have a road to block, then they settle for rivers. I envisioned a big net across the river, but the guide said that they just announce their blockade and if anyone tries to go by they come zooming out on their canoes and throw rocks at you...the joys of Bolivia.

During the trip, we would ride for a few hours down river, stop for lunch, take hikes through the jungle, and swim in beautiful pools at the base of waterfalls. At night we´d camp on the beach of the river in tents provided by the company and eat wonderful food by the campfire while being entertained by some very funny guys from Amsterdam. The one drawback was the sandflies once you arrived at the beach...they would bite without feeling it and then like five minutes later, you would be scratching out of control..I think they might even be in a class above mosquitos--we were still itching 5 days later!

Leaf cutter ants

Piranha

Huayna Potosi (6088 meters - almost 20,000 feet)

Parasites couldn´t keep me down...I decided to try climbing Huayna Potosi even though I wasn´t in the best shape physically or properly acclimated. By God´s grace (truly!) I made it to the top without any problems whatsoever. It wasn´t exactly a walk in the park, but I felt that I could have even climbed another 400 meters higher (height of the nearby Illumani - you can see it in the background). It is a fairly basic climb - very few crevasses and so many people go up a day (about 60) that the path is nice compact snow and ice. I was on a rope with two Brits and our guide. I thought we would have to turn around when one of the Brits lost his cookies a full two hours from the top, but with some frequent stops (the guide even said he climbed like a girl :) he pulled through - I was quite proud of him...although he couldn´t feel a couple of his toes by the time we got down. We prayed he didn´t get frostbite...he refused to take off his socks to show us though.

Jen came with me and joined me for the first day of a little experimental ice climbing on the glacier. I had never done any sort ice climbing and was a little nervous that the whole mountain was going to be like this, but the guide assured us that there was no ice climbing involved on the actual climb. Jen stayed at the refuge while I hiked up to high camp...she passed away the time sitting by the fire, reading, and helping the cook. Below is a picture of the refuge where Jen stayed with the mountain in the background, and another of the gorgeous sky--perfect climbing weather.

Recovering in Sorata

We spent the last week in Sorata...a truly beautiful mountain town. It is located north of La Paz, Bolivia at the base of Mt. Illampu (a 21,000ft + peak)...above is a view of the mountain from the town square. We spent most days just relaxing, reading and eating. Fortunately, with some good drugs, my intestional problems seemed to have subsided. The last day before leaving we managed to hike up to a alpine lake in the shadow of Mt. Illumpu...quite stunning. We were hoping to spend a couple of nights there, but due to my slow recovery and the crazy politics of the guide services in Sorata we ended up just doing a day hike. Just a few days before we arrived the community guide association decided to raise their prices by 4 times. Thus we went with a "non sanctioned guide" for a cheaper price, but had to sneak into a taxi to get out of town, only to be "discovered" during the hike by a sanctioned guide who proceeded to chew out our guide. It was quite interesting to be in the middle of small town politics, but sad to see how the community was essentially shooting itself in the foot in regards to tourism. Below is a photo of us at the base of the mounatain - it was great hike although we were both sore after hiking down 5000 feet back to Sorata.

Tomorrow we are going to Huayna Potosi. Jen will hang out at base camp (and maybe try some ice climbing the first day), while I attempt to climb the mountain. I don`t feel that confident at the moment. My plans in terms of proper conditioning and acclimatization have been messed up because of my illness, but we will see what happens. After the mountain we come back to La Paz and immediately head out for a three day jungle/river trip, followed by a three day "Pampas" tour (think grasslands, swamps, and lots of animals). And then we try to exit the country as quick as possible. Thus you may not hear from us for a week or so...

Parasites!!!

Tomorrow I was planning to climb a 20,000 ft peak, but alas the parasites in my stomach had different plans. We are now in La Paz (largest city in Bolivia). It is a bit of a rat race here, but a necessary stop to plan mountain/jungle tours. I have been feeling sick for over a week and finally went to the lab this morning to get checked out (always fun to catch a sample of your diarrhea). With my lab results, I went to a doctor and he confirmed that I wasn´t the only one eating what I have been putting in my mouth for the past week. I am on drugs now and hopefully will be feeling better in a week or so. In the meantime we are planning to go to Sorata to recover - a beautiful little town in the heart of the Andes. Hopefully by the time we return my body will be up for the climb...if not we head to the jungle to catch a little malaria, which always mixes well with parasites. - Andrew

Potosi & Mine Tour

From Sucre we headed to Potosi...the true heart of Bolivian history. Potosi was founded in the 16th century after the discovery of silver in the nearby Cerro Rico (photo above). At one point in its history it was among the largest cities in the world (160,000), but it has experienced a number of tragic booms and busts and now is a relatively "small" city of about 150,000. We found it to be a weird, although charming, mix of a rough and tumble mining town and a picturesque Spanish colonial town. We enjoyed it so much that we ended up staying much longer than we anticipated. Potosi also claims to be one of the highest cities in the world. At 4060 meters (13,200 ft) we were practically on the summit of Mt. Rainer. It makes it a wee hard to breath at times, but you adjust fairly quickly.





While in Potosi we went on a tour of one of the mines. The mining history in Bolivia is rather dismal at best. In its "heyday" the Spanish used the indigenous people for what amounted to slave labor. They (the workers) would stay in the mines without seeing daylight for up to 4 months at a time, working 12 hour rotating shifts. They estimate that millions have died from working in the mines over the course of the past 400 + years. Most of the functioning mines today are run by mining cooperatives. Conditions are pretty much the same as they were 200 years ago. This is partly due to economics, but it is also a conscious choice by the workers themselves to not change....same age-old problem that improved technology often means less jobs. Thus many cooperatives spend little money in trying to improve the working conditions. They just introduced the electric wench in some of the mines about 8 years ago, if that gives you any idea of where they are technology wise. Our guide explained that about 50 men could take out 120 tons of ore in a week. Compare that to the open pit gold mine in Nevada where my brother used to work...they extracted 120 tons in two shovel fulls (about 5 minutes).

We were warned that the tour was not for the faint of heart. There were some pretty tight spots, but nothing that made us feel too claustrophobic. The fact that you were breathing asbestos and arsenic was of greater concern to us. In places the asbestos literally covered the walls of the tunnel. Most miners only make it 10 to 15 years before they die or "retire" from silicosis pneumonia. Above is a picture of of us sitting inside one of the shafts...the small hole to my left is what we had to crawl through to get to the next level. We also got to blow up some dynamite at the end of the tour and see one of the refining plants...even that felt like 19th century technology...with all the waste going directly into the "Rio Negro"...black river.

On the Road Again

It was a rough transition to start traveling again after being "settled" in Cochabamba for over 4 months. We started our last month of traveling by going to the beautiful city of Sucre, Bolivia. There is a strict building code in downtown Sucre and it feels very much like a Spanish colonial city...beautiful white washed building (see photo above). It is the "true" capital of Bolivia according to the constitution...something they are quite proud of. One of the guides at a musuem we visited said that Sucre is the only capital of Bolivia, but it just so happens that the president lives in La Paz, the congress meets in La Paz, and all the foriegn embassies are in La Paz. Rather confusing...as is most of the history of Bolivia.

While in Sucre we experienced our first robbery...but not from a common criminal. The Bank of Bolivia ATM (oldest bank in the country) refused to give us our money...but still deducted it from our account. In our attempt to rectify the problem we go to the bank, wait for over 40 minutes for someone to tell us that we have to go to another obscure office that is in charge of all ATM transactions. After two attempts we find the place...down an alleyway to an unmarked office in what looked like an abandoned building. Of course no one is there because it is 1:30pm...we still forget that everthing shuts down between 12;00pm and 2;30pm. We return in the afternoon and encounter a woman working way in the back of the office. At her desk are no less than five phones all with different colors of tape on the receiver (black, gold, red, etc.) and approxiametly 15 old computers and servers stacked in random corners of the room. We explain our problem and give her our debit card, which she uses to pull up all our atm withdrawls in the past few days. Under the one in question it says "hardware malfunction". She will write VISA who will contact the Bank of America, who will write her back and some how we will get our money back. We can now claim we have seen the interworkings of VISA transactions in a foriegn country. ...Compared to the 10 minute call we made to our bank today in which we were told the money would be credited to our account by tomorrow...some things are more effecient in the US!

God´s amazing grace

Apologies for not writing sooner...our last 2 weeks in Cochabamba were a bit of a whirlwind. We worked up to the last week, then attempted to go to Sucre for a 4 day trip (thinking we´d leave our stuff in our apartment since it was paid for, only taking small bags). We packed everything sometime around June 29, went to the bus station and then found there were no tickets...after wandering aimlessly for about 30 minutes, we just got on the trufi and went back home. Andrew felt defeated and I felt relieved...I wasn´t ready to leave anyway. After sleeping on it and talking it over, we decided to just stay through the 5th of July and leave with everything a week later. Sunday, at church, we knew it was exactly what we were supposed to do. We were able to make plans to meet with people for dinners to say good-bye, to plan days to visit the kids at the different homes to say good-bye, and time to clean the house and pack up without all the stress and pressure of some time constraint. It was exactly what we needed...a week in Cochabamba without work and time to just do the things we wanted before leaving. We´ve struggled with many different emotions...at one moment we want to stay here or return to work in Cochabamba as we´ve been so comfortable, while at other moments we are ready to get back to the states to see family and friends. We both felt pretty strongly that we will be back to Cochabamba in the future; thus, it didn´t feel like good-bye, but we´ll see you later. The kids were so kind, writing us cards and giving hugs and loves...the Baker girls even performed a dance for us and made us a cake on our last night. Our landlords even had us over for lunch the day before we left and we spent about 4 hours just talking and sharing about our lives. The Thompson´s fed us and took us to the bus station on July 6th and we headed for Sucre with all our bags loading us down. Can´t believe we´ll be back in the states in 30 days (less now).

Reflecting, we´ve seen how God has been in control the entire way these past 6 months. He has protected us and kept us safe in this huge city, where daily people told us about getting robbed or bothered by attempted pickpockets. He helped us to meet incredible Christians doing amazing work with children who have experienced horrific pasts. Here is one recent situation I wanted to share, that we´ve seen prove His amazing love and grace. It involved a tiny baby named Victoria. About 2 weeks ago, Victoria was brought to Jennifer´s orphanage after some folks found her in a bag down by the river that runs through the center of Cochabamba. Now if that wasn´t enough, the doctors predicted that Vic was about 4 hours old when the people heard her crying (remember temperatures here get down to about 40 at night as it is the middle of winter here)...come to find out she was in the bag with her ambilical cord and placenta still attached. Much longer and she would have been dead. Doctors said she was tiny, about 5 1/2 lbs, but doing all right and after a thorough check up, sent her on with Jennifer (this all happened around 5pm on the night we were having a family celebration for all the employees of Jennifer´s houses, as she just opened a new Casa de Amor III with the Alseth family). Thus, Victoria was brought to the party and loved on from all the tias and staff, a new member of the Casa de Amor family. Strangely though, Victoria has lots of scratches on her arms, legs, hands, and quite a big bump on her head, and after about 3 days with the Alseths, the little bump on her head started moving down. Thus, back to the doctor she went, this time for an x-ray of her tiny head. Next day, x-ray comes back from the technician, showing a 1 1/2 inch fracture in little Victoria´s skull on the side where the bump had been...Vic hadn´t been left by the river, she had been thrown there--a good 20 foot drop to the river bank...tough way to start life. But God´s grace is so amazing...He saved Victoria (a fitting name given her at the hospital)...He sent strangers to find her, He brought her to doctors that cared for her, and now to a family who will love and care for her until a permanent family can be found. This is just a little glimpse of the amazing stories we experienced throughout our 6 months here...each child had a story, some we knew, some we only knew a portion of, yet God saved them, just as He says, ¨he will raise up the needy and the lost, he will have compassion on the orphans...¨Psalms 73:12-13. This has been a life changing experience for both of us, from teaching us about raising children to teaching us to trust all that God has in store for us no matter where we are in the world.

We´ll continue posting as we make our way back to Peru to fly out on Aug. 6. Thanks for coming along on this wild ride with us...we can´t wait to share more with you in person. -Jen

paragliding

Andrew also went paragliding this month...Jen was a bit chicken and elected to stay home. She saves her money for lattes and La Concha visits. Andrew had a great time, and it did indeed look very safe. He flew over Cochabamba tandem with his guide. Here´s a quick video of his flight (or really, the landing):

A few more pics of the market

These pictures are just for fun...it is impossible to capture the scope of the market...it seems to go on forever. Did you say you were hungry for a salad?

or maybe a baked potato?

Or maybe a cake? Or a small glass of fresh squeezed orange juice?

The choices are so difficult...and lucky for you, I didn't put in a meat department photo.

And to top it off, we ride home on one of these buses...here´s a very decked out one...each driver seems to add a bit of their own flair, both on the inside and outside--you should see how they light up at night!