On the Road Again

After a travel hiatus for missionary work, we started and ended this week traveling.

We attended church here in Cusco in the morning and then took a bus out to Sicuani.  We needed to be there before 5:00 as there was a satellite transmission for the South America Northwest Area on ....
ta da!  self-reliance.

The area presidency presented a discussion with a question and answer period on the new self-reliance program.  All stake and ward leaders were requested to attend.  Everything they went over has been exactly what we have been presenting to the leadership as we travel around the mission.  At the end of the presentation, the area presidency asked each stake &/or district to follow a step by step process in implementing the program, from forming their self-reliance committee, training the members of the committee, opening up a self-reliance center, identifying members who are not self-reliant, calling and training self-reliance facilitators, holding Mi Camino firesides and offering the workshops to members in need.

We are sure all the self-reliance managers have been working with leadership as well trying to implement this same things.  The fact that the area presidency felt they needed to hold this area wide training meeting with the leaders would indicate to us that the leadership throughout the South America Northwest Area have not done real well putting this program into use.  So perhaps our frustrations with the failure of the leadership in Cusco to step up and do their part to get this program off the ground for their members here is par for the course.  When the leaders feel the heat from the area authorities higher up, they tend to make things happen, so it will be interesting to see if this has been enough to light a fire under them for good.

Right after the satellite transmission, we held our Pathway fireside with the members in Sicuani.  We had another full chapel, about 100 members in attendance.  We used the same presentation we had developed for Puno and held a Q & A at the end.  We did not, however, talk to the leaders about applying to make Sicuani a Pathway location.

Above, Freddy, our self-reliance specialist and below Oscar, our high council representative over self-reliance.

Sicuani is 2.5 hours by bus from Cusco.  It is pretty common for people to travel to and from Sicuani to Cusco for various reasons.  We figure the members who are serious about participating in Pathway will be willing to make the trip each Thursday.

After the fireside we went to eat pizza with these two leaders.  Our SR specialist shared with us what his family is doing with the business workshop and what the members have done that are participating with the workshop.

The members decided to hold a picarrones activity as a group to put into practice the principles taught in the workshop.  They each contributed a small amount of money for supplies and each had an assigned role to play.  Then last Saturday they held their activity selling picarrones in the street to the citizens of Sicuani.  He reported that it was a very good experience and a success.

His family is also meeting together and going through the lessons of the workshop.  One of the habits the workshop teaches is to save.  Each week the participants are supposed to save something, no matter how small an amount.  There are 7 from his family participating. They decided to pool their savings during the 12 week course.  Each member committed to save 10 soles a week, that would be 70 soles each week.  This will give them 840 soles at the end of the 12 weeks.  Their plan is to use that savings to start a family business and to continue saving together even after the course ends.  This sounded super great to us.  It applies Stephen Covey's principle of synergy which the peruvians seem to have a hard time believing and accepting.  We hope they are successful

Since the fireside went pretty late, we spent the night in Sicuani.  The first time it wasn't real cold overnight.  It was actually comfortable.

We returned to Cusco Monday morning.  Monday, November 9th, we hit our 17 month mark.  We've sort of stopped tracking how many months out and have been tracking how many months left.  We are actually down to tracking how many weeks left, since the last return missionary training marked only 6 weeks left of the mission.

We are continuing with our English classes with both the members and the full-time missionaries.  We are probably only going to be able to keep those going through the month of November.

Wednesday was the birthday of one of my cute little piano students, Britney Melani Aimachoque Montoya.  (How's that for a name?).  We were invited to their home for cake.  Elder Rhoades had already planned a drywall class with the members so he was not able to attend, so I went by myself.

We bought a small gift bag and filled it with candy from the states that we had and included a four colored BYU pen to give as a gift.  She was so excited and happy when she saw what we gave her.  It's amazing to us how little it takes to make these people happy.  Usually, a birthday means well wishes from others and a cake, but not many get presents for their birthday, unless their family is better off.

 Here is the birthday girl.  She turned 15.  Usually the 15th birthday is kicked off with a big hoopla, almost like a wedding, but none of that for this girl.

Look how short she is!!

Our manager Carlos Hale came up from Arequipa on Thursday.  He arranged to meet with the stake leaders of Inti Raymi here in Cusco.  We have been trying to get them to meet with us with no success, so it was good have the chance to hopefully get them moving on self-reliance issues.  Carlos attributed his success in meeting with them to his bribe of free food as we met over lunch.  Food talks to Peruanos.

We headed out early Friday morning with Carlos to Andahuaylas.  It is the farthest unit we visit.  We love the members out there but it is a chore to get there.  It pretty much takes all day.  Our last visit was two months ago and they still had not started the workshops, which was disappointing but our task this weekend was to hold the first class of the business and the education workshops with them and get the ball rolling.

Due to the climb up and over a couple of mountain ranges and constant hairpin curves you have to navigate to get there, it is our custom to not eat anything prior or on the road.  Despite, our precautions, this time, I had the pleasure of leaving some bio-degradable contents from my stomach on the side of the road just before we reached Abancay, the half way point in the trip.  Good times on the mission!  I just told myself, sacrifice brings forth the blessings of heaven.

The weather was wonderful, sunny and warm!  Plenty of flowers everywhere.  It is nice to not have to wear heavy sweaters and an overcoat at all times.  

Here's what our hotel grounds looked like this time.  Gorgeous!

We dropped off our things at the hotel and headed out to eat something because by now we were famished and it was mid-afternoon.  We had heard the restaurant Puma de Piedra was a nice place to eat so we elected to go there.

Here is what we found.

Gorgeous grounds and a resort type atmosphere, in little old Andahuaylas far off the beaten path for tourists.

We also ate some of the best food we have ever had here in Peru and the plates were heaping full of food.  So not only quality but quantity as well.

They had a cage with an eagle, parrot and owl.  The parrot had been taught to whistle at you and both the eagle and the parrot would give you the "eagle eye" when you visited them.  I felt bad for the eagle being caged up and never being allowed to soar in the sky.  I thought of the parable of the eagle being raised as a turkey and the line that says "You were meant to fly".

Since the day was so nice and we were pretty stuffed after lunch, we decided to take a stroll along the river walkway.  It is pretty nice, with ponds, fountains and statutes.

The wind had picked up so the sweater had to go back on.

As we were heading back, we met two hogs taking advantage of the nice weather as well and strolling down the avenue in search of food.  

They were huge!!

Dave got some up close and personal photos of the pair.

Friday evening we held a business workshop.  Our facilitator that we had trained two months ago was there but was not prepared to take charge, so we had to do more than what we had hoped to do.  We walked her through most of the class and asked her to do as much as we could get her.  Hopefully, she will be able to continue the class on her own.

Saturday morning we almost didn't hold the Education class.  No one showed up for the longest time.  Finally an hour late, we started.  There was a young adult who is currently using the PEF there who had been asked to facilitate, but again, we had to do most of the work but we walked him through the process as well.

Sister Rhoades sits next to the Education facilitator and helps him through the class.

It was after 12:00 noon before we were able to leave Andahuaylas and head back to Abancay.  None of us had eaten in the morning, knowing we were going to be traveling and it is a three hour drive back to Abancay.  

We took even longer, as Dave had heard of some ruins that were just off the road between Abancay and Andahuaylas that he wanted to go see.  We found them and even had a small tour by a local campesino who lives on the grounds and is responsible to watch over the ruins, apparently.

 
 The ruins are just off the road in the middle of nowhere.  That's the thing about Peru, ruins pop up everywhere!

Our little unprofessional guide shows us what looks like a big hole in the ground, but according to him, it is an entrance to some underground tunnels that the Incas had build and used back in the day.  Now it is blocked off so you can't go in.  Too many off shoots for people to get lost in is the reason he gave.

The views were excellent.  This road more than any other in the mission really makes me feel like I am on the top of the world.

We made it back to Abancay late in the afternoon.  We again we're famished.  We had a hard time finding a restaurant that was open.  We had to settle for some greasy chicken and fries.

We had the night off as our appointments in Abancay were for Sunday.  We took advantage of our free time by going to eat ice cream sundaes.  It is warm enough in Abancay to want to eat ice cream.

Spiritual Thought for the Week:  Henry B. Erying

"Our faithful effort to offer to our family the testimony we have of the truth will be multiplied in power and extended in time."

Here is our testimony as expressed by Gordon B. Hinckley.  We couldn't say it better.

"Happiness comes of righteousness. Sin never was happiness.  Selfishness never was happiness.  Greed never was happiness.  Happiness lies in living the principles of the gospel of Jesus Christ."

What??? November!!!

Well, it has finally happened.  We are in our last full month of the mission.

We started out the week, visiting San Jeronimo ward in an effort to get some self-reliance groups started there as we have had some members from that ward visit us in the center asking to join a self-reliance group.  We were pleasantly surprised when the bishop told us that he has already asked two of his members to spearhead that up and they are both people we know!  Two of our Pathway students, Carlos & Delfin Valencia, brothers.  We quickly set up a time to train them this week.

We invited a young single adult, Emma Faris, to dinner Sunday afternoon.  So many of the members in their 20's and 30's are single adults.  There are way more women then men that are active members.  Emma is a return missionary from Ecuador that served her mission here in Cusco.  Her family is not members and they did not support her going on a mission.  She developed some health problems while on her mission as a result of some immunizations she received and now can't tolerate living in warm climates, where her family is from in Ecuador.  So she now resides here in Cusco and doesn't have much contact with her family who doesn't know about her health problems as they would blame the church and her mission for it and she doesn't want that.  She rents a small room and works as a nurse.  She is very sweet, but never really has had a love interest in her life.  She serves as an institute supervisor and goes to the YSA activities and is well liked by the members, but I still think it must get lonely for her at times.

We feed her BBQ chicken and it was tasty!  The nice thing was the left over chicken made great BBQ chicken sandwiches during the week.

We also had the start of our new business workshop formed after last week's Mi Camino.  It was cool for a couple of reasons.  One, we had two business groups meeting at the same time in the same chapel, both facilitated by members.  This new group ended up being so big that it was decided they would split into two groups from now on.  Way cool!

 Above shows our faithful group that is well into the workshop.

 These show our new group that was so large we needed to split them into two.

This week we had a returning missionary training on Tuesday, Nov. 3rd.  It was a group of 15 and by far the most we have known in one group.  There were only 2 or 3 we had never met. It is also our last group to send off and we stay.  The next group we will be going home with them!  Yikes.

Our cohort at these trainings is Hno. Segundo Regueati, who is the institute director here in Cusco.  He comes in and talks to the missionaries about the importance of attending institute after their missions.  We've become good friends with him as his office is in the same chapel as ours and our mission working with Perpetual Education Fund and Pathway often times is with the young single adults whom he knows very well.

Back row L-R:  Elder Sanchez, from Chile.  His English is quite good. Elder Largent from Oklahoma, not sure who is next, after him is Elder Zerillo.  He was a zone leader here in Cusco.  We really liked him.  Then Elder Bryant.  He has been serving as a zone leader here in Cusco as well.  Then Elder Salvatierra.  His name in Spanish means Save Earth, so we joked with him that he could be a superhero.  The next elder we didn't really know, the following Elder is Elder Cahua, whom we didn't know either.  The last elder before us is Elder Felix.  We really like him as well and he has good English.  We are pulling for him to get into the Pathway program.
Front row L-R:  Hna. Gonzalez from Mexico, Hna. Rodriguez from Trujillo.  She was in Cusco and attended our English classes for quite some time.  The next sister we really didn't know much, Hna. Tango.  Next is Hna. Hollingshead.  She served in Cusco for a long time and so we got to know her quite well.  She worked as a Disney princess (Pocahontas & Jasmine) before the mission at Disneyland, Japan.  That was how she earned her money for the mission.  She was great!  Then comes Hna. Mendez from Argentina.  She was so afraid to speak English when she attended our classes but she is a sweetie.  Last, Hna. Holland whom we really didn't get to know much in the mission.

It was the best group we've had as far as their preparation of their "Yo en 30 segundos" or "Me in 30 seconds".  Way to go guys!  All the best to you all.

November 4th was Empe Dolmo's birthday.  We've become good friends with her and her family, so we took over some flowers and chocolate to her tailor shop and sang happy birthday.  We kept it low key as the next day we were going out to lunch with her and planned to give her presents, but we didn't want her to feel like she needed to respond in kind for Sister Rhoades' birthday because that is how the latinos think.

Wednesday evening we trained the Valencia boys about facilitating the self-reliance groups and asked them to let us know when they scheduled a Mi Camino with their ward council.

We also watched a webcast from BYU-Idaho's new university President, Clark Gilbert on Pathway.  He outlined the history (started only 6 years ago in 2009), purpose and future plans for the program.  BYU-Idaho now has more students that study online with the university than on campus and they know that will only grow.  How exciting to be part of this fulfillment of prophesy and vision by the leaders of the church!  And how exciting to know that the Lord is mindful of all his saints wherever they might be and wants to bless all of them with opportunities to grow and progress.

President Clark Gilbert of BYU-Idaho

The following day, November 5th, was Sister Rhoades' birthday.  It started out with a mounds candy bar and serenade from Dave.  Once we got to our English classes and other activities the members were so sweet.  They don't have a lot of financial means to give gifts but they make sure to extended wishes and compliments to the birthday girl or boy.

Here is what one member, one of her piano students, Yeni Montanez gave her.  A very sweet note and her son, Dallin, who is in to origami, made her a flower.

We did go out to lunch with Empe and her two children.  We forgot our cameras so no photos.  We took her to the meeting place at San Blas and introduced them to waffles and some great milkshakes.  We had a good time but left very full!  We gave her the presents we had picked out for her.  She is the recipient of the Yahtzee game, Merlyn brought down for us and I picked out two of my clothing items, my winter hat (which I love and was hard to part with) and a scarf (which she put on and looked great in).  She was overwhelmed.  She kept saying it was too much.  She gave me some jewelry (necklace, earrings & bracelet), which I thought was too much for her to give.

That evening was Pathway and luckily I escaped without them knowing it was my birthday.  I was so afraid Elder Rhoades would spill the beans, but he took pity on me.  I did find out that one of our students, Angel Alvarez, the one that really was the impetus for getting Pathway in Cusco, has the same birthday as me!  I knew there was a good reason I like that kid!

I got to skype with Alyssa & her girls that night.  It was a nice ending for the day.

Friday we continued the birthday celebration, hooking up with the other two missionary couples, Hasler & Johnson, for a luncheon that we didn't have time for the day before.  I was wanting to eat tacu tacu (a rice & bean dish here in Peru) so we ate at the Abrasador.  We ended up having food coming out of our ears (not literally but we walked away so full, it felt like it)

Here is my plate.  The tacu tacu is under the beefsteak a lo pobre (that means a fried egg on top of it) and the fried bananas on the side.

 Here is a sample of some of the other dishes enjoyed.  Above is Elder Rhoades lunch which is tacu tacu topped with lomo saltado.  He said it was delicious.  Below are the Haslers' lunch.  Brother Hasler is pretty adventurous with his food choices.  part of his meal are intestines from a cow.

The Johnsons had brought individual pieces of cake and candles to light and they sang me happy birthday.  We each tried a small piece of each of the 3 different flavors.  Then if that wasn't enough the restaurant brought out a dessert made especially for me and it was on the house!

Crepes with peaches and chocolate sauce spelling out Happy Day, Hna. Rhoades

They were delicious despite being already stuffed.

Friday evening was one of our Education workshops.  This group is nearing the end of the lessons.  Our Saturday evening Education workshop, which just started last week, was cancelled due to the Cusco stake's Couples Convention being held over the weekend.  That is one of the challenges of these workshops is to find a day and time when members can attend that doesn't interfere with other church activities during a span of 6 to 12 weeks.  Almost nigh impossible!

Saturday morning, I met with a Pathway student, Helen Melissa Bravo Rodriguez.  She is one of the youngest participants, only 17 years old, but she is very sharp.  She has been asked to be the lead student on November 19th and she is scared to death.  She will be the first female student to lead the group and the group is mostly male with a lot of return missionaries and other church leaders, so a bit intimidating.  Her English is good, but her speaking ability is not as fluid as others so it will be a challenge for her.  She asked for some tutoring to help her understand her presentation and prepare how to give it in English.

Helen and I looking over the presentation outline and planning what she will say and do.

Saturday afternoon we had some free time so we decided to see if we could get some more souvenirs and gifts bought.  We tried to find purses for Dave's sister, per her request.  She must have liquidated their supply because the stall where she bought them no longer had them and it was like looking for a needle in a haystack to find more.  Our mantra in Cusco for American items has been "when you find it, buy it" because you never know if you will find that item again.  It looks like it may apply to these purses.

A red version of the brown purses Carol bought while here.

Dave headed over to Barriottio, the Saturday flea market he loves to visit.  He took some photos I want to include.

This is SOOO typical. 

And so is this...

And so is this...

although usually the baby isn't so far out of the blanket.

I think this market is going to be one of the things Dave misses the most.  He loves to go treasure hunting there.

Spiritual Thought for the Week:  Luke 6:45

A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh..

Also a great self-reliance scripture using the word treasure - Proverbs 8:21
That I may cause those that love me to inherit substance; and I will fill their treasures.

Back to Normal

So we started the week going to church with Cathy & Charlie one more time.  We had a special area broadcast by satellite for all members in Peru & Bolivia.  The broadcast originated from Salt Lake.  The fun part of this was the general authority directing the meeting was Marcus B. Nash, who we knew growing up in Seattle and whose father was our stake president for a time.  His Spanish was excellent as he served his mission in El Salvador just like I did, but a bit before me and he has also served as the area president for South America Northwest area (this area where we are at) for five years and just before the current area president, Juan Uceda replaced Elder Nash.

Marcus B. Nash  of the Seventy

We also heard from Neil L. Anderson, one of the 12 apostles.

 I was quite impressed because he gave his talk in Spanish rather than have someone translate for him.  He served a mission in France so he speaks French and from time to time his pronunciation suffered from a French and/or English accent, but he did quite well.  It made me think of Elder Rhoades at times, but I think it should give Elder Rhoades some encouragement in his efforts to learn the language.

After the conference we had time to fix a nice meal for them to eat before we sent them back to the airport hopefully for good this time.

They did have some delays en route home and it took them way too long to get back, but mission accomplished, home sweet home for them.

It was a good thing because we had missionary work to do Sunday evening.  It would have been hard to come to their rescue again.

We no sooner got them sent off, then we had to head to the Tullumayo chapel for the rest of the day.  We had our business workshop meeting.  This group is going well as the facilitator is responsible and comes early and regularly and so are the members of the group.

We also had a Mi Camino scheduled with the Tullumayo ward.  The bishop had come to us asking us to help them hold this meeting with his members.  What we really liked was that he asked us to meet with him and his counselors in advance and train them in what they needed to do, so we were able to assign most of the presentation to the ward leaders, which is always the better way to go.

They had good attendance and we ended the night with two new self-reliance groups, a business and an education.  We had three people show interest in the Job Search workshop that will need to be incorporated into other groups.

Monday we started the week taking some time to attend to some housekeeping chores.  Elder Rhoades has become speaking partners with quite a few Pathway students and we've added a return missionary, Luis Alzamora, from the Cusco mission who lives in Trujillo to our list of skyping partners as he is trying to prepare himself to sign up for Pathway in January.  We now skype on Mondays, Wednesday and Fridays with people related to Pathway.

We held our English classes and piano lessons like normal, only the piano students are starting in on Christmas songs, because our next piano recital will be December 4th and of course, they need to play christmas songs!  It takes them longer to polish up a piece of music so normally I don't like started so early, but they won't be ready if I don't.

Our religion classes continue to be a highlight of our week, particularly the Pathway group.  But Tuesday night has become just a read out loud verses from the Book of Mormon class as those attending really have limited English ability.  We figure the best thing we can do is read with them and help them to understand what they are reading.

The Pathway program has some great activities programmed into the course work and the students do the presenting, which works great most of the time.  Here are some photos from this week's Pathway group meeting.  Don't you wish your college course work was this fun?

The Pathway students participating in one of the group activities for the lesson.

Friday and Saturday night we held Education classes.  It's nice to have more than one group going at a time, especially when the members are doing the facilitating.

Saturday was Halloween, last day of the month.  We had a pretty open schedule until the evening, so we decided we needed to check out the Catholic cathedral, San Francisco.  We walk past it all the time and we had heard that there were skeletons in the basement so we figured October 31st was a good day to finally visit.

Now those are some doors!

Welcome plaque to the church.  Translation:  The Lord bless you and keep you.  Show you his sacred faith and have mercy on you.  Turn his faith to you and give you peace.  The Lord bless you.

Here are the skeletons on display.  Pretty gruesome.  

Entrance to the basement display of skeletons and bones.  We were told they were bones of benefactors and monks & priests

They didn't allow us to take many photos and it was too bad.  It has some awesome artwork in this cathedral, some of the best I've seen here in Cusco and Peru.

So November 1 is Day of the Dead when the Latin people remember their dead ancestors by taking flowers to the grave.  It reminds me of Memorial Day.  The custom is to make sweet breads in the shape of horses for the boys and in shape of dolls for the girls and they give them to their kids.  I bought one just to try it out, but a much smaller version.

Spiritual Thought of the Week:  2 Nephi 2:6:13, 17

Wherefore, they that fight against Zion and the covenant people of the Lord shall lick up the dust of their feet; and the people of the Lord shall not e ashamed.  For the people of the Lord are they who wait for him; for they still wait for the coming of the Messiah.

But thus saith the Lord:  Even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered; for the Mighty God shall deliver his covenant people.  For thus saith the Lord; I will contend with them that contendeth with thee --