Encouragement

Thank you so much for your responses. We are hearing from so many of you and it carries us through our days. So glad you are enjoying our adventures and mishaps! We want nothing more than to be used for your entertainment!

We are feeling more at home here as we begin our second week. At the moment, we have run away from our babysitters to spend some time on the internet. Hope it doesn´t cause an international incident. If you read in the papers that we are missing, it is an exaggeration. We miss you all, can´t stand the thought of being away from you for 5 more weeks, but aren´t suffering from homesickness. It´s weird though how you can be tootling along just fine and something will hit you. I was feeling great this morning, ready to get busy with my readers and took a minute to look at my love cards for the day. There was one from my sister and her family and I just lost it. In a good way, but unexpected. I wish I knew which days to bother with mascara and which ones not to!

Our first party last night was a success. We started 40 minutes late. You think people at Park Plaza are late? These Peruvians have you beat hands down. We had about 25 readers/visitors in addition to many church members. We played a mean game of ¨spoons¨ (has nothing to do with Will) and then played ¨take a hike¨. They loved both games, love to compete. Several students stayed for the worship service afterward and 3 other visitors scheduled reading sessions with us for this week. I made choc chip cookies from a mix that I brought from the States and they were a hit. Our desserts are too sweet for them but they inhaled these cookies!

Okay, let´s talk about our living conditons. To picture our street/neighborhood, envision what you´ve seen on tv about Harlem. It´s not that dangerous and we are never alone but that´s what it looks like. Every building is a store front, all covered by iron bars. Even when they are open, the bars are closed-you just knock and they let you in. Most people live above, behind, or next to their business. Marcela, our hostess, runs a hardware store with a walk-up window. There is a little door next to the business that goes to the house. You walk down a dark, short hallway and enter the living room. There is a dining room and a very small galley kitchen. Up some narrow stairs are our bedrooms and Marcela´s. Erin and I share a small room with bunk beds. Booker and Marie have adjoining rooms at the other end of the hall. All of us share a bathroom. We have a shower but not always hot water-I was a little shivery this morning! Behind the dining room, outside, are some stairs that go to 2 more floors with rooms that open to the outside. These are all usually full of visiting Christians, etc. Sometimes church members spend the night here since many live 1-3 hours away by bus. We are really appreciating the comforts we have in our US homes! Sarah and Deborah, it´s about as clean as the apt. in Kiev used to be.

They are such sweet people and loving toward us. Millie (age 18) spends every morning with us and our readers. This morning, she showed us how to take our laundry to the cleaners, another new experience.

Not through with all my thoughts but out of time. We have readers in 15 minutes and must get back to the church. Thank you all again for your encouragement of us. Sorry I can´t answer each email, we only have about 30 minutes/day on the internet. We miss you and are already looking forward to seeing your faces again.