Hasta Pronto Cusco!

Perspective is a strange thing. The amazingly primitive Cusco airport that I hailed as my "introduction to the third world" just a month ago seemed strangely technologically advanced and westernized this afternoon when Ben and I returned to head home-after all there was a billboard for McDonalds right outside! And the "somewhat backwards" Lima airport seems now to be a perfect hub of technology and modernization. I am sitting in a Starbucks and could buy food at Papa Johns, McDonalds, or Duncan' Donuts. A month ago I would have criticized these restaurants as proof of a homogenous over dominant western culture, but right now I simply welcome the idea of hot cheap food that I know won't make me sick. I'm not sure that that is the change of perspective I expected from a month long mission trip to Peru, oh well.

In all seriousness, I know that my perspective has changed in grander and more profound ways. Honestly, could my eyes, which have gazed into the vacant ones of a shepherd boy left in complete isolation high in the Andes day after day or looked upon stray dogs and crippled desperate women along Cusco's narrow cobblestone streets, ever see the world in quite the same way again. I think that these new eyes may have been exactly what God intended for me to gain from this adventure. Through my experiences in Peru, both good and at times trying, I have learned to see the world and my place in it in a different light.

I now understand rather than simply know that people live in completely different ways than I do, for I have walked past a mud hovel high in the Andes and handed out paper gliders to children living there who have probably never seen an airplane, or taken a shower, or visited a doctor to receive a vaccination.

I now understand that other countries function quite differently from mine, for I have walked up and down the streets of Cusco discussing university strikes, government corruption, and the ordeal of gaining a visa with my Spanish professor.

I can now see more clearly that Christ is the light of the world for I have seen villages dark with hopelessness without him.

I now understand how much I need his light. These weeks alone with my brother in an uncomfortable foreign culture have shown me how much I need God's love, mercy and patience.

I now understand how truly small and incapable I am. The problems of the children at the project were too large for me to solve on my own. What were my corny games and broken Spanish to a hungry child with a broken home? I simply don't have the skills to affect real tangible changes in their lives.

I also understand now that none of us are capable of affecting real lasting change on our own. Only an incredibly capable God working through incapable people can bring real eternal change. I know this because I have seen him working through many people like me in Peru to change lives.

I know that I didn't change the world, or even a corner of it, while I was in Peru. The problems there are so big and my time there was so short. I will be happy if I made one of the kids at CORASON's week a bit happier or encouraged them a bit in their difficult lives, or if I made the load a bit lighter for the owners of the cafe, or brightened someone's day with some coffee and a smile. I may not have made much of a tangible change in Peru, but the change my time their has had on me may very well be eternal. The things I have seen there, the people I have met, and the truths I have learned will affect every decision I make. My eyes have been changed by what they have seen. They have been given a glimpse of God's complex world and his eternal plan. I doubt that they will ever be quite the same. For this I am truly grateful.

Gracias Cusco, and hasta pronto!

Scenes in Cusco

Our time here in Cusco is just about up and we are beginning to set our sights on home. My suitcase is now full of gifts and dirty clothes as I have set out a ration of semi-clean clothes to wear home and am ignoring the others in hopes of not having to pay for another load of laundry. In a similarly frugal fashion, our diet now consists of avocados, peanut butter, oranges, and 20 cent rolls as we are trying to avoid another trip to the ATM. However, though our journey may be nearing an end I have continued to learn from and be surprised by many of my experiences here. Below are a few short vignettes of favorite moments. I hope that you enjoy them and that they paint a clearer picture of what my time here in Cusco has been like.

• Tuesdays at CORASON mean deportes, so we climb up a steep flight of dusty stairs to a cement slab enclosed by a broken chain link fence. Surrounding the slab are dusty weeds and flattish rocks, here we set down our bag full of ratted up balls and puzzles and wait for the kids to descend. And descend they do, with squeals of "futbol", "hermana", and "caballo"-referring to Ben and his piggyback rides. For the next two hours I turn a jump rope, point out pieces of block puzzles, and generally try to lovingly control chaos. Today I watched some of the kids pick through the trash to make parachutes out of plastic bags and ratted string and a two year old struggle up to the top of a ledge to grab a half deflated beach ball and then grin as he threw it down. I listened to girls count off the number of their jumps in broken English and cheer excitedly when they passed 50. In short I watched children thrive in an environment that should stifle them.
• This morning, business at the coffee shop was slow, a general fatigue seemed to have fallen over Plaza San Blas, and no one seemed particularly eager to throw off this ennui with a cup of coffee. So rather than brewing, I sat on a bar stool and watched Cusco through the frame of the cafe door. Quite a picture was being painted outside. Sleepy tourists laden with heavy backpacks and suitcases passed in search of their hotel room and a bed. Native women with babies wrapped on their backs in colorfully striped bags walked up and down trying to sell their bracelets and hand woven scarves. Bohemians and gypsies laid languidly on benches or lazily juggled. Children ran to the corner store to buy candy. Stray dogs of all sizes and an alpaca passed by. As I watched the unfolding scene, I wondered about each character. What were their lives like, where did they sleep, what did they eat, what was the last book they had read? Could they even read? What were they thinking about in this short moment when our lives touched and we became part of the same lazy morning in San Blas Peru.
• It is an hour and a half into my Spanish lesson. The room is cold and my tea has become tepid. My throat is sore from reading aloud, and my mind is numb. My tutor looks tired of trying to come up with conversation, and I wish that I could spare him his struggle. In short, I am not at all prepared to have a serious conversation in Spanish. But that is exactly where I am headed. To practice reflexive verbs, my teacher asks me if I am a dishonest person. To the best of my ability, I answer that I try not to be because I don't think it is right. He asked me why, I respond with some vague reference to my belief in God, and he asks me about this said relationship. In my best Spanish, which is still quite limited, I try to explain my faith. My teacher, a young Peruvian man, probably not much older than I am seems unconvinced. I try again with ample hand motions and frustrated pauses to explain the beliefs on which I have based my whole life, perhaps not surprisingly I fail. At the end of my lesson I have exhausted my voice and my vocabulary. I leave the room with an "hasta manana" and quick prayer that I haven't said anything heretical in my limited Spanish.
• At 7 pm it has been dark for about an hour, and the streets are quite cold. To escape from the wind a bit, Ben and I duck into an open cathedral. For a few minutes we stand inside. Staring at the elaborate gold engravings and the twinkling candles of the faithful surrounding us. Then we leave the warm still sanctuary to go find some dinner. On my way out, I am greeted by three pathetic beggars, a toothless woman, an aggressive crippled man, and a silent defeated looking old man. I put some change in each of their cups and then continue on to a bright warm restaraunt where I eat my fill and then some. The night is lovely and the food delicious but I can't get the image of the three desperate faces out of my mind.

Well, those are just a few glimpses into my life in Cusco, I hope they give you a better idea of what my life here is like. I have loved it, I have learned from it, and in many ways it will be hard to leave it.

Lake Titicaca

For years I have heard about Lake Titicaca in Geography class and read about in National Geographics. I knew it as the highest lake in the world with a terribly funny name ( I mean really how horrible!). But sitting in those classes, I never imagined that I would actually visit the lake. However this weekend during an adventure that involved, reed boats, a sleeper bus with "camas", a tiny motor boats, and quite a few interesting characters and sights I did just that.

The adventure began with a nine hour tour bus ride to Puno. The tour was interesting and the guide nice, although his habit of explaining everything in English and in Spanish became a bit tedious as my Spanish is now good enough that I could fully understand both explanations. We stopped in the small town of Andahuaylillas to view "the sistine chapel of the Andes". It was a beautifully gaudy baroque style church in which the Catholic faith of the Spanish and the traditional belief of the Quechuan speaking locals blended together in a truly traditional syncretic fashion. At the front of the church was positioned Cristo de los Temblores, a statue of an Andean dark skinned Christ that the locals had an easier time accepting because of his dark skin and supposed power over earthquakes. For lunch we ate at a traditional buffet which featured lomo saltado, a beef dish, quinoa soup, and a group of traditional musicians playing covers of famous American pop songs such as "Hey Jude" on pan pipes. We stopped at another town to view some more Incan ruins, which I am afraid to say were a bit lackluster, perhaps all my sight seeing has "ruined" me. There was a festival of sorts in the small town, though I must say it didn't seem very festive to me. The landscape of this area-the altiplano is quite barren and gloomy and doesn't quite lend itself to parties. Gone are the farms, bubbling brooks, and scattered eucalyptus trees that surround Cusco. Replacing these are rolling hills covered entirely by yellow straw. In this almost alien landscape, no trees can grow and the only vegetation to be seen is the small tufts of grass that cling to the hills like barnacles. With the constant wind and dry cold, I can imagine it is quite a difficult place to live and I can't blame the townspeople for being less than festive. Really what kind of party has only trash and fruit peels for decoration and wind for music? The next two towns, Juliaca and Puno, were quite ugly little squatter towns. With no vegetation surrounding them to soften the harsh lines of the concrete houses and tight streets, the towns seem to have grown like malignant weeds out of the yellow earth. The houses are made out of concrete, but are never quite finished due to a tax on completed buildings, so poles of rehbarb stick out of the tops of roofs like spindly cornices. After our long ride, I was quite thankful to reach our hotel. It was very nice and I enjoyed the television and hot high pressured shower-my first in Peru.

The next morning we woke up quite early to eat breakfast and watch the sun rise over the lake's blue waters-truly lovely. Then we boarded a tiny slow-moving motor boat for a tour of the lake's islands. Our first stop was at the Uros Islands, an otherworldly group of islands created entirely out of yellow reeds and mud. The islands were incredible, everything on them made of reeds, homes, boats, gardens, even a mini guinea pig island. The tour book described them as being like something from a fairy tale and I quite agree. Though in true Disney fashion they did seem a bit over commercialized, the local women singing "Row row row your boat" as we left. We then continued by boat to the beautiful Tequile Island. It was a beautiful island of red earth and green trees that rose majestically out of the clear blue water surrounding it, looking quite like an island in the mediterranean. In the distance, I could see the white scraggly peaks of the Andes in Bolivia-amazing. The people of the island were equally impressive. With matador-like costumes and a completely communal way of living they seemed like characters out of a history book. Unfortunately I have no pictures to document them as these people believe cameras steal souls. After lunch of very fresh fish and a walk across the island we boarded the ship to leave. Unfortunately during our stay the wind had picked up creating white topped waves across the lake. Our poor little boat was tossed to and fro by the powerful waves, and for a bit our tour director was doubtful that we would be able to make it back to port. But, after a quite rough ride, we were thankfully able to make it back. Back in Puno, we three waited for our bus home, wasting time and trying to stay warm by hopping from restaurant to cafe to internet bar. Finally, around 9:30 after a brief stay in the bus terminal (quite a cultural experience) we boarded our bus. The bus was nice, with seats that laid back almost completely, and despite the biting cold I was able to sleep for most of the 6 hour journey home. We made it back to Cusco around 4 this morning, quite tired but also very thankful for our interesting, eventful, and most importantly safe trip to Lake Titicaca.

A Few of My Favorite Things

My time in Peru has certainly been a time of new experiences as I have gotten to know my little corner of Cusco more intimately. In all reality, some of these experiences have been unpleasant and uncomfortable-these have certainly taught me a lot about my world and myself and I am thankful for them. However many of the sights, smells, sounds, etc. that I have gotten to know while in Cusco have been lovely. Some of my favorites include:

• The sense of independence I feel walking to the nearby locals' market to buy my daily ration of mandarins and avocados. There is something exhilarating in haggling over a few soles in Spanish with the local women and then walking home through the cobblestone roads.
• The warmth of the sun on my face as I sit on a bench in Plaza San Blas, pretending to read my novel while listening to the babble of the nearby fountain, the whining voices of Peruvian street vendors, and the multilingual chattering of the many tourists who inhabit the square.
• The lights of the houses that dot the hills surrounding the city like Christmas lights, transforming Cusco into a fairyland of sorts at about 6:00 every evening.
• The pungent smell of fresh coffee when I manage to make a drip latte perfectly.
• Hearing the children at CORASON call out "Hermanita, hermanita" when they want my attention.
• Abram, my favorite little two-year-old's snotty dusty smile when I kick him an inflated rainbow beach ball. He truly is the only one who will ever be impressed by my soccer skills
• The sound of popular praise and worship songs sung in Spanish.
• The sound of firecrackers going off in the plaza every morning. Of course I enjoy this much more if I am already awake.
• The shining image of Cristo Blanco illuminated with arms outstretched that I can see on my walk home at night.

Sorry that was a long list, I suppose I have found a lot to love in Cusco. As we continue our last two weeks here, I would ask that you pray for:

• Ben's health, his allergies have really been bothering him lately and this has made him quite miserable.
• Ability to communicate in Spanish.
• The cafe is undergoing a bit of a change in leadership, so a smooth and peaceful transition for all involved.
• Openness to what God is trying to show us in our time here.

Thanks for joining us in our time here!

A Weekend Adventure

This weekend Ben, Kahler, and I embarked upon an adventure of sorts through the Sacred Valley (an area of small colonial towns and ruins about two hours outside of Cusco). Early Saturday morning Americo, a taxi driver, picked us up in San Blas Plaza and for the next two hours we winded down dusty roads listening to a strange conglomeration of American pop music and traditional Quechuan tunes. The rolling hills, patchwork farmland, and scraggly snow tipped peaks, provided comfortable landscape for my meandering thoughts. I enjoyed watching Peru from my car window, it is strange that women in completely traditional dress and livestock of any kind, donkeys, pigs, sheep, even llamas have become so familiar to me that I don't think twice when we pass them on the road. On Saturday, we visited Chinchero, Moray, Salineras, and Ollantaytambo. In Chinchero we climbed some incredibly steep cobblestone steps to see some traditional Incan terracing, and an ornately decorated colonial Catholic church that was being bedecked with flowers in honor of an approaching wedding. In Moray we hiked down a terraced ampitheater of sorts which Ben aptly named the Incan Coliseum. The travel book claimed that the ancients used the site as a laboratory of sorts to try different farming techniques at different elevations, but I am not convinced that it wasn't simply an ancient concert center. In Salinas, we saw hundreds of salt pans used to mine salt from a nearby salty spring. It was a strange sight, hundreds of little white pools full of coarse, shiny salt crystals. Ollantaytambo, is a quaint little colonial town that is one of the only cities that still looks as though it might have in Incan days, small cobblestone streets, water diverted through the main road for irrigation, etc. I enjoyed walking through its charming streets and among its impressive ruins. Atop a mountain near the city is an impressive stone fortress where the Incans took their last successful stand against the Spanish. It was a truly awe inspiring place. Ollantaytambo was a lovely place during the day, but after sundown, around 6:00 in Peru, it became quite a ghost town. So, we three simply returned to the small, clean, spartan hostel room we had found earlier and entertained ourselves with the limited non-electronic supplies we had been able to fit into our backpacks. This morning we explored the HUGE market in Pisac. The Sunday market there was incredible, tiny stands selling stuffed llamas, traditional textiles, pan pipes, ceramics, and more all for a "special price just for you" as far as the eye could see. We enjoyed walking through the labyrinth of stalls and bargaining with the vendors to buy gifts for friends and family, resting only to enjoy empanadas baked in a huge traditional "horno". The empanadas were "muy rico" but I couldn't help but be a bit disturbed by the cuy castle right next door. The squeaks coming from the guinea pigs that I knew would be sacrificed to the fire had a stifling affect on my appetite. It was a lovely weekend capped by two church services tonight, one in Spanish and one in English. I feel blessed to be on such a grand adventure and look forward to another week of work.

Getting into the Swing of Things

Over the past few days I have developed a routine working in the cafe, going to language school, and volunteering at Project C.O.R.A.S.O.N. Though the days are a bit long from 8:15 to 7:00 with just a 45 minute break, I have thoroughly enjoyed the work. Working in the coffee shop is fun, I enjoy meeting people from across the world and making drinks. Currently I have mastered most of the coffee drinks and can make pseudo lattes, cappuccinos, and mochas using a drip coffee system (which may seem rather ghetto but is really quite mod according to a New York customer yesterday). Language school has been really helpful but also really intense. Basically for two hours I sit in a room with a Spanish teacher and we have a long conversation in Spanish. It has forced me to build my vocabulary and really think about the tenses I use. For the most part I can manage decently but yesterday when the conversation turned to faith and the Bible I felt as though I was in way over my head. My teacher expressed his own doubts about religion and asked me if I had any, in the end I just said a quick prayer, answered as well as I could and hoped that I didn't say anything heretical. After language school, I work in the cafe a bit more then head to Project C.O.R.A.S.O.N. By bus, it is about 35 minutes away. Riding the bus out to the project was quite an experience. A Peruvian bus is not really a bus in American terms, rather it is a large van with poles on the ceiling, stuffed with people standing and sitting haphazardly. A little boy runs by the side of the bus, calling out what stop the bus is approaching and jumps in when he can no longer keep up. It may be a bit of a crazy ride, but for a fare of only 60 sentanos, I am willing to squish against my fellow passengers and duck my head. The project is very well organized, with great facilities and many kids who come regularly. Some highlights of the past few days there were, watching the kids try for two hours to blow up a massive beach ball by passing it around and blowing for about five minutes each, painting the kids faces to look like animals, and playing "Simon dice" with some enthusiastic little girls. Over all I like working there and hope to develop good relationships with the kids.

Well that is basically what I have been up to these past few days, it has been busy but I am enjoying having work to do and look forward to the rest of my time here.

The past couple of days.

After our travels across Peru, Ben and I have finally settled in Cusco and have spent the past two days getting our feet under us and learning the lay of the land so to speak. Kahler, who has been traveling with us, returned to Casa del Aguila where she will be teaching English. So Ben and I were on are own to explore the town. Some highlights from the past couple of days included:

• Shopping at a Peruvian supermarket-mayonnaise is sold in bags, milk comes in unrefrigerated boxes, and the fresh meat market smells interesting.
• Exploring the rainbow flag covered plaza mayor. The rainbow flags represent Cusco not the homosexual movement as I initially thought
• Eating dinner at Senor Carbon-literally Mr. Meat, where one is fed meat until he or she surrenders.
• Going to church at the meeting place- a much needed opportunity to worship, focus on the word, and fellowship with other believers from across the world.
• Seeing the Temple of the Sun, with a Spanish convent built on top of it in the middle of Cusco.
• Meeting the other volunteers I will be working with.

As you can tell it has been an interesting couple of days. Tonight we are going to an English pub with some other volunteers to play Pub quiz-a British tradition that we Americans had never heard of before. And tomorrow, we will begin our work here in Cusco bright and early!