Rock Barney: Peru Day 3

Glorious day three! We were up and at 'em and having breakfast at 7:00, all eager to board the bus and head to the orphanage in Huaycan. It is about a 45 minutes or so by bus to the orphanage, El Niño Emanuel. We pulled up to a big blue gate, handed out balloons (globos in Spanish), and prepared ourselves to play with kids. When they opened the door, confetti burst everywhere. Kids were lined up, hands ready to fling confetti at the nearest living creature. No one was immune to the confetti massacre.

The kids were hugging and jumping and doing anything to get our attention. The balloons didn't stand a chance. We were handing them out left and right, and the most popular activity involving balloons seemed to be blowing them up until they popped. Within about 15-20 minutes, all the balloons were in pieces. We spent time talking to the kids in the broken Spanish that we knew, asking them their name, ages, and other simple questions. The problem is that when you speak to a kid in Spanish, they think that you obviously are fluent, so they start speaking 90 to nothing and assume you understand them. But thank God, smiles and hugs and kind looks transcend language barriers, and we received just as many as we gave. We were taken on the grand tour of the rooms where the kids slept. They were separated by gender and then by ages, so there were two rooms for the girls and two rooms for the boys. The kids were so proud of their beds and their rooms. They would grab you as you walked into their room, shout "Mi Cama!", and walk you over to their bed, beaming as if they had found some sort of treasure. We found out that Direct TV had recently chosen to shoot some film there at the orphanage and had bought new beds, repainted, and installed satellite TV there, which we found interesting, but a huge blessing to them.

They brought us into their church, which was unfinished. The roof was not complete over the building, but what was built was beautiful. The headmistress gave us a warm welcome, thanking God for sending us and thanking us for coming for the week. Some of the older girls led a song and prayer. We were standing in a circle in an unfinished church in the middle of an orphanage, listening to a group of children on their knees crying out to God in another language. It was truly beautiful, a picture of the global church entreating God together. I don't know what those children were praying for, but I know I was praying for the wisdom to know how to love them, the grace to love them more, and the expansion of God's kingdom through these children and this orphanage. God is a global, prayer-answering God.

We all started playing around with the kids while some of our leaders met together in the cafeteria type area. We were just starting to play jump the creek when the guys were called to the school building. Now when I say school building, what I mean is a small portion of a building with a flimsy tin roof, concrete floor, and plywood doors and walls with some artwork or posters on them. The team had drawn four squares on the ground where we were going to have to dig some holes for footers so that the building could add on a second story. This would be no problem in the states, maybe taking a few hours, a day at most. All you would need is a jackhammer and a backhoe and it would be taken care of. But when your jackhammer is a rockbar (which I humorously thought was called a rock barney until I was corrected later in the day) or a rebar chisel and your backhoe is some broken shovels, things get complicated. We pounded through the first layer of concrete and started digging, thinking that surely we could finish one of the four holes in the first day. Not so. We dug about 12-18 inches and discovered to our chagrin that there was a second layer of concrete. We started breaking it up, but it was definitely going to take more than the time we had left. We had to head back to Chosica, a little disappointed that we had not finished, but encouraged by our Peruvian brothers and sisters and the love they showed for these kids.

Laura: So while the guys started digging their holes, us girls hung out with the kids.  We started with a bible story about Jonah told by Caroline.  The kids were actually attentive and although they said they had heard the story before, they were responsive and participated as Caroline told the story and asked them questions.  Jorge, see photo, was a little too excited to sit still and listen.  Instead he was proudly showing off a bracelet I had put on his arm.  Then we embarked on crafttime.  Now I knew this would be interesting, I taught first grade Sunday school for several years and learned that even with kids that speak your own language crafttime can get crazy.  It proved to be pretty funny with kids that could not understand us!  Richard, one of the Spanish speaking members of our team, helped explain the craft to the kids and we went for it.  I was flustered from all the kids grabbing glue and glitter, but the kids were not phased by the confusion at all.  They seemed to really enjoy making the craft and honestly did a great job.  After that we figured the kids had been sitting long enough so it was playtime.  We played with the kids for a while before packing up and heading to the bus.  I remember thinking as we rode back to camp, Lord, please allow me to rest well tonight, I will need it for tomorrow!

That afternoon was really relaxed. We had a long break after lunch, and after swinging around the rock bar and a mallet, a nap was the place to be. After dinner, we headed to the main plaza area in downtown Chosica. What an interesting experience! We had a private bus throughout the week going back and forth to the orphanage and most other places, but this night we took public transportation. We walked a few blocks down the street and hopped on a bus. When you are a group of 15 Americans and 5 Peruvians beebopping down the streets of Chosica at night, you don't get glances; you get stares. We must have been a sight. We took the bus to the plaza and went up to this pretty gazebo type structure. It had a fountain in the middle with a statue that said "La Novia del Sol," the girlfriend of the sun. Unfortunately, all public parks in Chosica are closed on Mondays for maintenance, so we saw pretty much nothing there in the park. We walked down to an ice cream shop, where we all scrambled to find our favorite flavors. Instead of the tried and tested chocolate, I figured I would go local. I tried some lucuma ice cream, which was really quite tasty. I'm awful at describing tastes, but one girl who tried it said it tasted like sweet potatoes and honey, which sounded fairly accurate to me. Since there was nothing else going on in the park itself, we walked over to a small arcade type place with different video games and other fun stuff. I played Jim in a quick game of air hockey, we watched people play basketball and gave it a shot ourselves, and just acted kind of goofy.

It was a fun way to end the day, spending time with our friends. We got to experience some of the things they do for fun as well as enjoy a little taste of home with our ice cream. One thing I really loved about the trip was Jim and Betty's spiritual leadership. No opportunity was missed to spend some time talking about the things we learned or that God was teaching us throughout the day. Every night ended with a time of reflection, kind of recapping the day and sharing what we did and learned. God used so many things throughout the week to teach us about his character and our own lives as well. We headed off to bed around 10:00 looking forward to our second morning at the orphanage and our first night in the churches in town.