There are two sides to every coin...at least, I'm trying to convince myself of that.

My head keeps flashing the remaining number of days I have left here, and with that comes flashbacks of beloved moments spent in and outside of the orphanage. I took down all my cards and one wall of pictures in my room the other day as a physical sign to help my mind believe it. I can't believe I'm leaving. In January when I first got here, I remember thinking that staying a whole year felt like forever! Now that the time is almost upon us, it seems like forever is not long enough. There is SO MUCH that I'm going to miss. It's impossible to list it all, but I will highlight a few major things. As a weaning attempt, I will also list things that I am not going to miss.

-I will miss helping Cristina learn to ride her bike because her father is not present to do it himself.



- I will NOT miss the need to wipe coal dust off of EVERYTHING due to living right next to a carbon factory.

-I will miss miss my "therapy" time with Jessica and getting to see her grow, develop, and make this insanely cute face.



-I will not miss Peru destroying all my clothes.



Check out my butt. Don't be shy, go on. This happened as a result of being hurriedly rushed out of the micro at my stop- they almost pushed me out the door, but my pants were still caught on the door handle!

-I will miss living in community with other volunteers on fire for God. They truly have led me, encouraged me, inspired me, and brought me deeper into prayer and relationship with God, and for that I'm truly grateful.


This was after our icing fight. David, this is what you get for not participating-you are not in the picture.

-I will NOTTTTTT miss the smells of living next to both a slaughterhouse and a chicken coop.

-I will miss the ridiculous randomness of Peru: clowns and people on stilts everywhere, old ladies at the post office and church asking you to their house for dinner, programs or events starting TWO HOURS LATE because they are still practicing, and TONSSSSSSS of home-made decorations!!!!!!












-I will not miss waiting for the micro in the middle of freaking nowhere for 20-30 minutes and then riding it at least 35 minutes to get into town to civilization! I can't wait to see my car again!

-I will miss eating a delicious meal for as cheap as sixty cents!! And delectable treats like churros!!!!



- I will NOT miss the carb triple threat: eating bread, rice, and potatoes almost every single day!

- I will miss teaching English to the madres, staff, and kids who are failing English in school. I will especially miss snickering when they mispronunciate "teeth" as "teet".

-I will not miss eating organs of animals. Enough said. I don't want to puke...
again.

-I will truly, madly, deeply miss these children who I have come to think of as my own. I will miss the tangible feeling of God working through me in such a real, powerful way that results in these children learning how to smile (when before all some of them knew was abuse) and come to life again. I'm so thankful that God allowed me to take part in blessing and enriching these little lives when He himself is more than capable of it. And now, I feel a good cry coming on...

Crazy-cute kids and vampire bites

The kids celebrated their school's anniversary last week with--any guesses???? That's right...COSTUMES! And adorable, creative ones at that. My favorites were Adam and Eve.






Covering his eyes out of shame of his nakedness



Eve

There were also animals---



A spider



A cat



A rat


Lions



A turtle



A dog


And a whatchamacallit



Oh and a Hawaiian girl, too






And a girl with a painted heart.


Another volunteer, Ashley, has gotten me all excited about the Twilight movies. I NEVER thought I would ever say that. I was anti- all that stuff before this trip! However, they are kind-of entertaining and addictive. So we we went the night after Breaking Dawn premiered here. It was even in English!



A pre-flick bite. Notice the dental work and lovely hand-made earrings.




A little more normal

Oops! I did it again...

I played with your heart and fell off the blog train. I got Britney on the brain right now because my sister, brother-in-law and the Guatemalan in-laws are jammin' out right now to her concert in Abu Dhabi thanks to free tickets! But I digress...

This past weekend, my roommate and I traveled to the land of mountains, amazing dairy products, and legendary Inca baths where famous kings and royalty once dipped their toes while planning their next attack... or something like that.
The journey lasted about six hours by bus. We pulled into the station around 4:30 am (the overnight bus left at 10pm) and thanks to connecting with past volunteers from the orphanage, we were offered free housing in a church.



We passed out for a few more hours and then made a plan for the day to head to the Plaza de Armas (center of town-each town has one), climb the steps to Santa Apolonia (where the Spaniards ambushed Incan Emperor Atahualpa in 1532) and bathe ourselves in the famous hot springs. The altitude of 9,000 feet made its presence known right away-- I almost needed an inhaler after climbing a few stairs!


Stephanie and I in the Plaza de Armas



What is a day in Peru if you DON'T see a jester on stilts?!



The steps leading up to Santa Apolonia (white church with white cross above it)= HOLY out of breath.



Almost there!



Looking down





The Plaza de Armas from above (zoomed in with the cam)




So much more green here than in Trujillo!


I made it! (representing in my Cards gear!)

It started to rain at the top of the hill so we took shelter in a micro and headed for the baths. We splurged $6 for a massage and entrance into the Incan baths aka mildly-warm pool.



The entrance to the Inca baths








The scalding-hot water from the volcano- this is what I THOUGHT I was going to submerge myself in.



I was a bit disappointed at this public lukewarm pool. All the Peruvians thought it was lap swim and swim lesson time instead of soak-and-relax time.



This might have been one of the best ice cream cones I've ever had.(We were smart and went back the next day!) It was made with manjar blanco, a sweet milky cream made famous in Cajamarca. It is similar to dulce de leche and not too far off from sweetened condensed milk.


One of the markets



A moto taxi



Beautiful churches in the Plaza










We randomly attended a children's music concert. The streets were jam-packed with adorable kids in different native dress and we just had to attend. Yes, we were the only gringas in the entire enormous auditorium.

Amando Abel (Loving Abel)

To be completely honest, some of these kids in particular are, at times, difficult for me to love. Their lack of positive role models, discipline, love, attention, and consistency didn't give them a good platform to jump from. Abandonment, abuse, and broken relationships can make some kids (and then adults) just plain miserable to be around. You feel like they will NEVER learn, things will NEVER improve and it's just so hard to deal with them and the consequences of the crap they've been dealt in their life.

Tonight I was doing my daily laps around the orphanage as a way of battling the carbs' advances on me, and one of the special needs/ "difficult" kids yelled at me from the top of the slide as I was approaching. As soon as he got my attention, he turned around and stuck out his butt and started doing a butt dance at me and then slapping his butt. He has been told an insane amount of times that this is inappropriate. I told him again and then decided to try to redirect him, even though I figured it was a long shot. I said, "Abel, look at the beautiful sky! God made that for us! What colors do you see?" (it actually was a gorgeous sunset so there were plenty for him to choose from.) I continued my walk and the next lap, instead of a butt dance, he pointed to the sky and said, "Dios hizo (God made)." His speech is really hard to understand but I'm positive that's what he said. I had the biggest smile. He proceeded to walk calmly (if you know Abel, this is totally the OPPOSITE of how he ALWAYS is) about 7 laps or so, "answering" (or just saying unintelligible sounds) my questions and even chiming in to the praise n' worship song I was singing. It was a beautiful moment and I'm so glad God allowed me to see that side of Abel that I usually don't take time to see. Thank you, Lord, for loving me when I'm not the easiest to love myself.



Abel


Trying to correct his crossed eyes with patches


Being tough


Abel with his brother, Italo


Oh, Abel!