The Georges in Peru

Tuesday we decided to rent a house while we wait for the house we'd like to buy to get its paperwork updated.  A contact we made when we went to La Punta two weeks ago has a house to rent, so we took a YouTube video tour and told her we'd take it! (see below)

Wednesday morning we woke up a bit before 6 am and went out looking for gas.  The gas station two blocks from our house had gas and there was no line, so we filled our tank and went back home.  That was easy!  

We thought Thursday would be a good time to move to La Punta, but they planned to do some major work on the plumbing of the house we were staying in on Wednesday, so we decided that since we had gas we might as well just go!  We packed our car the fullest I've ever packed it and we drove the 2.5-hour trip to La Punta!  It took over an hour to unload it!

Our rental house for the next month or two in La Punta

 

This is a recap of today's activities:  We got up and went for a 6-km run to the ocean and back.  At the beach we saw a couple of people working out, but no other runners.  On the way back I saw a van I recognized.  It was the MMI (Medical Ministries International) van and they were in La Punta distributing wheelchairs!  Shortly afterward we met the team of a dozen people and chatted a bit.  After breakfast and devotions, we went out looking for the wheelchair project.  We were told it was in the sports complex, but there are 4 or 5 in this small town.  After asking a few strangers where it was, it turned out to be in a tiny village about 1km outside of La Punta.  Luckily, we were on our bikes, so we could get there quickly.  While at the medical campaign we met some people from the mayor's office and when we got home, a pastor from a local church that we've been hoping to meet arrived at our door!  We had a great time talking to him and his family over lunch and talked about how we can help them and their church in the future.  They are having their church anniversary tomorrow night, so we're going to help with the preparations.  I then made arrangements to get internet in our house and we took these pictures before going to the fruit store to get a mango for supper.  While there, a man named Villaomar came in the door and said, "Were you the two people we saw running this morning?"  "Yes!  Were you the people working out on the beach?!"  "Yes!"  We're going to love living in a small town again!

The view of La Punta a short walk from our house

 

Blessings pour like refreshing rain from heaven.  

As we think back on our home assignment and our arrival here, we are so thankful.  We are thankful to the many people who hosted us for the night and took us out for meals.  We are thankful for my parents who gave us their ‘Country Cottage’ farm house to stay in during the three months we were in Manitoba and for Ron and Lynn Tanner who generously let us stay in their Omaha house during January and February.  We were so glad for a place to receive guests and make memories.

It’s good to be back in Peru again.  Besides the sunshine, birds singing and fresh air coming in through open windows and doors in a mosquito-less land, we’ve been enjoying walking to nearby stores which are laden with things we have missed while in Canada and the States like mangoes and Peruvian peanuts!  It was encouraging going to our old church on Sunday and feeling the enthusiasm during singing as well as seeing the good church attendance.  Our friends there are sad to see us go to the coast, but are looking forward to coming out for visits and supporting us in our ministry there. 

For the last 2 ½ years, Allen has been experiencing some heart-rate irregularities (Atrial Fibrillation) when running or swimming hard, which he has been trying to get to the bottom of with different tests.  Some who have read our blog for awhile may remember Allen thinking it might be his myocardial bridge (See Blog from Jan. 27, 2021).  After some contemplation, however, it has been decided that due to too much exercise (who knew that it gave such!!?), some of Allen’s nerves have begun misfiring occasionally, signalling his heart to make extra beats. This is MB’s layman explanation.  If you would like something more technical you may want to ask Allen. 

On Tuesday, we saw heart specialist and friend, Dr. Porter, to solve the question about whether Allen should do surgery… Allen says I should call it radioablation and not surgery because surgery implies cutting and no cutting is necessary for this procedure.  Back to layman explanation- they can apparently kill those nasty nerves- if they can figure out which ones they are.  Amazing!  Dr. Porter said that at this point he thinks the risks of ablation outweigh the benefits, and put Allen on some medicine (Flecainide) which he is supposed to take before hard exercise.  We have decided to try this solution for a while but are not ruling out “surgery" in the future.

So it is with heartfelt excitement and twinges of regret that we leave our home-continent and head south once again.  We have flights booked for March 8th.

One task to do before we leave is to sell our beloved home-assignment “home” (a 2016 Black Nissan Rogue with 122K miles).    Update:  Sold on 7MAR2022!

Yesterday we went to the Mennonite Heritage Villiage Museum in Steinbach where we learned about Mennonite persecutions and migrations and saw how the pioneers had lived when they first moved to Canada.  There's a wind-mill on the property that grinds freshly harvested grain into flour (That happened earlier this fall), fun old tractors and even a sod house.  We decided it would not have been very nice to live in, despite the cool reprieve it gave us from the warm day.  When a local man started talking about 'jantsied' (Low-German for the 'other side') Allen nodded his head knowledgeably since Mary Beth had just explained to him that 'ditsied' and 'jantsied' referred to Mennonites who had settled on different sides of the Red river (What a quick learner!- Mary Beth).  After the museum tour we went to DQ for lunch where Mary Beth ordered a coke.  "We don't say the 'C'-word around here! You're in the wrong town to buy a Coke," the man behind the counter told her.  "Yeah," she said.  "I should be ordering Papsi and Ravels."  They shared a good laugh.  The Low-German Mennonites who settled in the area speak English with a strong accent which they have passed on to their children.  Pepsi or 'Papsi' is the most highly-desired pop, not Coke! and is often enjoyed with Revels, pronounced, 'Ravels'  which is ice-cream on a stick and covered in chocolate.  

Two weeks ago, we weren't sure we would be able to get into Canada. Now we aren't sure we can get back into the US! Saturday, the US extended the ban on Canadians entering by land until September 21st. Of course, they can still enter the country by air, through an expensive, time-consuming and circuitous route through Toronto and Detroit. It appears some think, that to control COVID, crowding into three different jets with 150 strangers from around the world for several hours is better than driving across the border in a private vehicle with your spouse, but I digress. If only there were a way to fly Mary Beth across the border in a private plane and pick her up on the other side! Today we found someone who has been doing exactly that during COVID, so we will be able to return to help Christ Community Church celebrate their one-hundredth year anniversary. Keep posted for more details!