A Princess, A Spring Party, an Athletics Coach and a Bug!

Our title to this post may seem somewhat bizarre, perhaps resembling the author of the blog, however it really seems to sum some of our activities over the last few weeks. Let me explain:

A Princess and A Spring Party

Yesterday (September 23rd) was officially the first day of Spring here in Peru (although temperatures have been quite pleasant for a number of weeks now). In order to celebrate this arrival many of the schools organise parties. Sarah's school was no exception to the rule and had arranged that all the children meet in a conference room of a local restaurant for some entertainment from a surprisingly funny clown, loud music and lots of junk food. Of course all the children were over the moon to have such a treat.

As part of the celebrations each class had to select a female best friend and a male best friend and the couple with the most votes from each class would represent the class as the prince and princess. Yes you have already guessed it, Sarah was selected as the Princess and her good friend Josue (a child of some Christian parents we have got to know) was selected as the prince. So as all the other children donned their dresses and tuxedos (yes it was that formal!) Sarah dressed up in a lovely white dress and tiara to partner her Prince Charming!
With each event Sarah seems to be enjoying the attention more and more and was really chuffed that she had been chosen to represent the class and be the centre of attention! We have added some photos to give you a glimpse of the whole affair.

A Bug

Ok this is rather uninteresting but adds to the title! In brief, about two weeks ago I (Dave) was struck down with a stomach bug which left me weak for a few days. The timing of the bug was highly inapproriate as we had the Mission Director, Gordon Darragh and a supportor of the Mission visiting with us and to make matters worse it was within a week of my birthday. For me it was just another birthday but some people wanted to make a huge deal of the fact that it was a major landmark. Anyway without revealing my age the bug was conveniently renamed "thirtyitis!"

I insisted that the bug had nothing to do with the impending birthday but few were prepared to believe me - that was until everyone else started to come down with the bug. In our family Joel was the only to avoid the bug and even our "strong invincible" guests were both eventually struck down with the illness. Fortunately for all the affects seemed to pass within a few days. The fortunate thing about it all is that on my birthday I was well recovered and able to consume large amounts of cake while most other had to pass the offer by - I discovered that a cake between one person is a big cake!

An Athletics Coach

Most of you who know me will know that I am a passionate sports fan and many will know of my interest in football and especially Liverpool. (By the way I did not get too many emails from my good friends who normally email me after and Man U Liverpool encounter. Can't understand why, they must have been eating humble pie!) Some of you will also know that in my younger days (that were not that long ago!) I was a very keen and active track and field athlete. It had seemed that that interest had very much become a thing of the past until about a month ago when news of my former glories spread as far as the current athletics director in Ilo. Consequently, I was approached to help with athletics coaching in Ilo. So far this has been very enjoyable and interesting. As I coach these young athletes I realise how fortunate I was with all the facilities available to me. We train on a dirt track, some days there are lanes marked some days we draw a line in the dirt. In short facilities are basic, there are a few hurdles, a few throwing implements and I am led to believe that some of the athletes are high jumpers but I have yet to see a mat! I was wondering if it was a case of going back to basics and high jumping into sand - not sure how to coach that! Anyway the opportunity to help and be involved in this has been fantastic. My language has really been stretched, I am having lots of fun and getting to know many young people and parents. I am part of this because I want to help, but hopefully in this area I can also be salt and light and I may have more opportunities to share Christ.

On our next post I hope to share a little bit about some of the more intentional ministry opportunities we are involved in. As always we give thanks to God for you all, for your prayers, for your support and for your interest in the work that God is doing here in Peru. God Bless you all.

Some Photos

At the start of the week we said goodbye to Gordon Darragh (the Mission Director) and David Hamill (a believer from NI who had been travelling with him to see the work). Each time we have visitors it is always a blessing to have them and to be reminded of the love, support and prayers of many people back home in Northern Ireland and indeed in varios parts of the world. The visit was a really good visit from our perspective (and hopefully from theirs too!) and after almost a week of constant conversation and almost constant laughing the empty house seemed so much more quiet.

The quietness of the house was added to very soon after the visitors left as most of us fell sick with a stomach bug. (Gordon claimed it was a reaction against the visitors leaving and that they should have stayed longer!) Fortunately it seemed to affect Alicia and I for a short period of time but Sarah seemed to pick up the bug a little later than us and is still off school , although she should be back on her feet again soon. Fortunately Joel seems to have managed to keep himself healthy and remains his happy, bubbly self.

Since we had not posted for a while and had not posted any photos for even longer we decided we would add a few recent ones just so you can see how big and grown up Joel and Sarah are getting and how young and youthful Alicia and I still are! Enjoy!