Percy Sighting

Last weekend we were in the plaza, walking and observing all of the Easter weekend festivities. For whatever reason, during Holy Week women flood the street with their vendor carts, selling candy apples, candy strawberries and candy grapes. We ventured out and tried the candy covered strawberries, but with a definite consensus that they were NOT good! We subsequently gave them to a little girl that was begging on the street with her brothers, and she was quite proud to have been the one selected for this gift. She taunted her brothers for a moment before deciding to share this strange treat with them.

As we walked off laughing from this experience, we stumbled upon some familiar faces - Percy's new parents. (Percy is one of the boys that was adopted from our children's home about 3 weeks ago.) I was probably too excited to see them and they looked a bit startled when we gave them an eager greeting! Percy was wrapped around his mother like a little monkey, arms around her neck and legs around her waist, gazing into her eyes and smiling. His parents quickly recognized us and returned our warm greeting, but it appeared that Percy didn't recognize us right away. He looked at us complacently for a moment until it dawned on him who we were, then smiled and called out our names, never once loosening his grip on his mommy. We communicated with his parents through hand gestures for a moment to combat the Italian - Spanish language barrier, then gave them hugs goodbye and were on our way.

As we walked away my eyes just filled with tears as I realized just how happy and comfortable Percy is with his new family. That first moment of introduction, full of hesitation and insecurity, is now a distant memory and he hardly remembers us, the ones he clung to just one month ago! Amazing. God is so good and this little boy is finally resting in the parental love and adoration he deserves. What a joy to see that!

You be the judge!

While not a common experience, we have occasionally been asked whether we are the parents of the kids we happen to be out with from the children's home. This makes logical sense given the age of the children we're usually asked about and in many ways, yes, we are their parents.

But tonight we had to laugh when our waitress asked if Tony was Ben's father. Ben is a 21 year old American friend that has been here for several months visiting his girlfriend, Angelica. We often go out with them to play Rook, one of our favorite card games, and usually find ourselves at the same coffee shop, same table and with the same waitress. So it's not like she just saw us once and misjudged either Tony or Ben's age from a brief interaction.

Tony claims that she must think Ben is much younger than he is, because it couldn't possibly be that Tony looks old enough to have a 21 year old son. Ben claims he has too much facial hair to be mistaken for any less than 18 years old. Above is a picture of Ben and Tony together, and to the right is our latest blog feature - a poll where you can submit your vote about the matter. So, you be the judge!

1 - Does Ben look far younger than 21 years old?
2 - Has Tony aged significantly from the stress of directing a children's home?
3 - Is the waitress crazy?

Smokey the Bear doesn't live in Peru!

Our friends, Luis and Karen, were over for dinner tonight with their little boy, Luis. They brought several toys for him to play with, but eventually he grew tired of the selection and needed new sources of entertainment. He tottered around the living room, played with his reflection in the glass door and eventually needed his mother's full attention. I was dying inside when I realized that Karen had handed Luis a box of matches to play with!! I could not tune out the mantra of parents in the US, "Don't play with matches! Don't ever play with matches!" while I was watching the delight of this darling one year old as he dumped the box of matches out and spread them across the table. Even more amazing was the ease with which his mother watched on and continued to pick the matches up off the floor as they were dropped from his little hands. I had told her before that I would take some pictures of their family tonight, and I knew she wouldn't think a thing about it if I started taking photos of him playing with matches, so I grabbed my camera and started clicking away. This is one of my "We're not in Kansas anymore..." moments!

March Madness

It's the time of year when we would generally be filling out brackets and trying to catch every NCAA game possible. My dad raised me on ESPN and I enjoy watching just about every sport, thanks to him. My favorite, however, has always been NCAA basketball. Tony's done a pretty good job keeping up with sports statistics through espn.com, but I'm pretty out of it and feel pretty lost looking at the teams for the brackets, etc. I've been surprised to realize how quickly significant cultural events like March Madness, the Super Bowl and the Academy Awards lose their relevance when you're not living in the culture that makes them significant.

All the buzz about basketball upsets, favorite Super Bowl commercials (the ones we saw were all for Peruvian products and cell phone companies!), and most liked films give those events a lot of their prominence in society. The people we work with think basketball is kind of a funny sport to begin with, so after explaining the concept of a March Madness bracket they think we're quite strange! We invited a group of boys over for the Super Bowl, but because we hadn't heard much about the seasons leading up to it, the Giants upset over the Patriots didn't have the same effect as it normally would have. Last month I read on a friend's blog that Girl Scouts were canvasing the neighborhoods with boxes of Samoas and Thin Mints. Together we bemoaned the fact that there are no Girl Scouts here in Peru, thought of proposing an international distribution plan to the Girl Scout leaders, but then realized that when no one else is eating Girl Scout cookies it takes away from the "season" of Samoas and the cravings pass!

But we've managed to create a bit of our own March madness lately by keeping busy with the home and church responsibilities. We took a break over the weekend and spent Saturday morning with some friends at Sabandia, a beautiful area outside of town. We rented horses for an hour long ride - quite an adventure! Here we are, posed for a picture just before Tony's horse started kicking...

Tony has pictures on this same tree from years ago with his siblings and childhood friends, so it was fun to take a picture here now that we're married and back living in Peru.

The rainy season is coming to an end here and we're looking forward to the return of consistent blue skies and warm weather in Arequipa. The rain has created deep cracks in the dirt roads out in Pachacutec where the orphanage is located. As the weather starts to clear up the community members will start to come out and work at filling the cracks and repairing the roads. So we're looking forward to what March will bring! Enjoy some Girl Scout cookies for us!

Arrivederci!

On Friday morning we stood outside the orphanage doors, waving goodbye to Percy and his family as they drove away. Percy's little hand was sticking up above the seat he was strapped into, waving and waving as they pulled out. The moment of goodbye had come, but because of the time we were able to spend getting to know his new family, it was easier than I had pictured it to be, thankfully.

His parents arrived for the first visit on Wednesday afternoon after traveling through the night from Italy to Lima, and then straight to Arequipa. His parents arrived with their son, Carlos, and two representatives from the adoption agency and the Peruvian government. The moment of uniting Percy with his new family was truly one of the most amazing experiences in my life. Percy's parents had been waiting for a child from Peru for over 3 years, so their hearts were just longing to know this little boy that was finally theirs! Percy walked into the office and greeted his family - "Buenas tardes, Papa. Buenas tardes, Mama. Buenas tardes, hermano." (Good afternoon daddy, mommy and brother!) His new mommy swept him up into her arms, tears flowing freely as she held this boy she'd been dreaming of for the past few years. I felt so privileged to be sitting there, watching this union between our sweet little Percy and these strangers who suddenly felt like dear friends for the abundant love we could see in them.

After their initial meeting, we let Percy lead the way in taking them around the home and showing them his bedroom, kitchen and living area. He was proud as could be to have his parents by his side. He would occasionally get distracted in times of play with his friends, then suddenly look up and see his parents watching him, run over and wrap himself around his dad's legs, saying, "Poppi, poppi!" It was the sweetest thing to watch.

While the nature of our work has given us a great deal of insight into the unique needs of orphaned and abandoned children, this adoption experience has revealed to me just how deeply the desire to be part of family runs within these kids. That desire, placed by God and part of His plan for humankind before sin entered the world, does not dissipate no matter how many years go by. We've had heartbreaking conversations with other kids at the home, older and younger, learning of their dreams and wishes to have a family come and get them as well. Because of the governmental regulations, very few of the kids in our home have a chance of being adopted so it's been a hard issue to address. We come back to God's promise to be a father to the fatherless, as well as the calling of God's people to care for the orphans and widows. We as Christians are the means God has provided for caring for these little ones who will never know what it is to be loved by parents. Thank you for your prayers and support as we seek to provide that love to these kids at New Hope.

Corte de Agua?!

Bertin, the Peruvian administrator of the children's home, just called to make sure that we heard the news about the 2-5 day corte de agua (water cut) that starts tomorrow morning.

Tony's response: Oh, we hadn't heard. Thanks for calling.

Julie's response: A what? The city is seriously cutting off water for 2-5 days? How do we wash dishes? How do we shower? What about flushing toilets? What in the world?!

Apparently this is something they do occasionally down here, so Tony is used to us from when he lived here as a teenager. It hasn't happened yet while we've been here so I'm not really sure what to think of it. Maybe this is a good excuse for Tony to take me out for dinner these next couple of nights. Tony's filling all our mixing bowls with water to use for flushing the toilets, something I wouldn't have thought of!

But I'm off to take a shower right now, and Tony's headed to buy a few big bottles of water. The workers at the children's home and strategizing and filling all their buckets as well. Could be an interesting few days!!

Sun, sand and a little bit of sickness

These three things characterize some of the major elements of the week we spent at camp with the kids last week. The weather was gorgeous - sunny with a cool breeze nearly every day. I discovered that the camp is essentially a walled in plot of sand with guest accommodations and a concrete soccer court, which made for sand ending up just about everywhere imaginable. I started the week off with a touch of stomach trouble, and Tony ended the week with a miserable battle against food poisoning it seems. But despite the tummy troubles we had a wonderful week with the kids!

The campers were divided up into four teams on the first night. Throughout the week they would compete for points, battling for the winning prize of a basket full of goodies and sodas to share. To earn points they cleaned dishes, performed skits, competed in afternoon games and theme nights, raced to the top of mountains, and decorated their rooms each morning with original ideas and any materials they could find. The room decorations were a highlight for me. Each morning before breakfast the teams had to complete their decorating and we would judge the rooms while they ate. These were the decorations from Wednesday morning:

Team Octopus

Sand art for Team Dolphins

A cemetery of all the dogs the orphanage has had over the years!

A beach side snack bar

Julie saving Tony from a killer shark!

We spent the afternoons at the beach while some played soccer in the sand, others swam, and others watched after the little ones running after the baby crabs that were scattered around each time the waves came in. I spent my fair share of time in the kitchen helping the other women with the cooking. Cooking here is quite an ordeal because everything is made from scratch. I never realized how many processed items I rely on for my recipes until I moved here and realized I actually have just a few recipes I can make here without major modification! Those times of cooking are some of my favorite moments with the women here. Conversation flows right over the interspersed commentary on so-and-so's method of peeling potatoes, slicing onions - and yes, I'm usually the so-and-so they're talking about! But I don't mind anymore because over the course of the afternoon I get to hear the women's stories, their memories and reflections on the road they've walked in this life.

The other joy of the week was getting to be a part of so much play and laughter. I loved watching the kids personalities come out as they competed in the games, relaxed together on the beach and whispered together about the cute boys and girls they were hanging out with. Here are a few pictures that help to express that fun side of camp that did us all good.

Ximena on the swing set

Rinds left over from the watermelon eating contest
(the team representatives had to eat an entire watermelon -
I was waiting with Pepto Bismol pills right after they finished!)

Johan playing with his favorite toy

Tony making the kids laugh (and scaring some of them)

Sofia relaxing in the hammock The last, and perhaps biggest, adventure of the week was trying to make it home from camp in our Jeep! What should have been a 2 hour drive home turned into a 5 hour excursion with the many stops we had to make due to consistent overheating problems. We eventually made it home safely and the Jeep is now being tended to in a local shop. We leave you with a few pictures from the trip home...

Tony looking concerned at the water bubbling out of the radiator water reservoir

The most common sight on the trip home:

Our faithful friend, Milton - a true jack of all trades!