Dean and Ruth's Diary

En domingo tuvimos una despedida muy linda en la iglesia CCE. Estaba una opportunidad para agradecer muchas personas quien nos ayudaron durante nuestro tiempo en Bolivia.

This Sunday we had a lovely goodbye party at the CCE church. It was an opportunity to thank many people who had helped us during our time here in Bolivia.

Hemos hecho una pelicula con muchas fotos y videos de nuestro projectos. Estabamos muy tristes a dejar nuestros queridos amigos y nuestra familia Boliviana. Siempre vamos a extranarles. Siempre tenemos un lugar muy especial por ellos en nuestros corazones.

We made a film including many photos and videos of our projects. We were very sad to leave our dear friends and Bolivian family. We will miss them but will always have a special place in our  hearts for them.

Recibimos muchos invitationes por cena y almorza durante las ultimas dias. Fuimos a la casa de Daniel y Pepe Moya, la casa de Daniel y Karen Carazas, la casa de Rodrigo y Emelva, salimos con David Salinas, con Limbert, con Julia y Isabel… quien es Julia… no no es Neyda! y por supuesto con Jan y Phillipe.

We received lots of invitations for dinner and lunch over the last few days. We went to Daniel and Pepe´s house,  to Daniel and Karen´s house, to Rodrigo and Emelvas house an went out with David Salinas, with Limbert, with Isabel and Neyda and of course we saw lots of Jan and Phil.

No tenemos las parablas a explicar como sentimos. Solo queremos decir que LES QUEREMOS !!! Vamos a extranarles mucho, y Dios les bendiga para siempre. xxx

We do not have the words to explain how we feel. We just want to say WE LOVE YOU LOTS!!! We are going to miss you so much and hope that God blesses you forever.

Vamos a poner fotos cuando tenemos tiempo en Inglaterra… espera!

This month we had to say goodbye to the children we have been working with at Horno K’casa. It was very sad, but also great to see how much progress had been made and how much had changed in the two years we had been working there.

We had a “party” with a few games and a cake. The children gave us cards they had made for us with lovely messages. We were able to say a little about how much they mean to us and what we had learnt from working there.

Earlier this month we had bought a New Testament for each child and written a personal message inside. We gave these as gifts with a photo of us as a momento. The bibles are written in easy to understand Spanish rather than the traditional wording which they find hard to follow.

We went to another fancy dress party this month…. Here are a few photos. Los chicos malos y las chicas buenas.

Newsletter from June – open each page separately and click again to enlarge…

Here is our latest newsletter for May 2009, click each page to open and again to enlarge.

Enjoy!

Here are a few extra photos from Dean’s birthday party….

Here is our newsletter for April … you’ll need to open each page by clicking on it and again to enlarge it.

We’ll be seeing you soon, when we return in July.

Our church have a group who travel locally to do evangelism and mission. They invited us to go with them this weekend to a place called Tomoyo. It is a small community of 23 families spread out over a large area which is not accessible by road. We had to walk about an hour across 3 rivers ( carrying all our stuff) to get there.

Sadly when we got there we found out that the teachers and the children had all gone to Potosi for the weekend!!! So the people we were planning to work with were not there!! But the team didn’t loose heart, they set about cleaning a newly built but unused health centre, and visiting families to invite them to spend time with us the next day.

The community speak Quechua… and a little Spanish, so playing games was a challenge… we used lots of demonstrations and sign language. It was fun to see them play parachute games and watching the dramas. The team had bought solar powered radios which are fixed frequency to a program which reads the bible in Quechua. Each costs the equivalent of £7 and we gave them to different families, many of whom cannot read and work out in the country miles from anywhere.

The journey home began at 5.30 am with a wake up call and breakfast. Followed by packing up and carrying all the stuff back to the road. We were at 3400m ( about 3 times the height of Snowdon), the sun was only just up, the water was well over over knees and the bottom of the river was covered in rocks and gravel. We have never been so cold in all our lives!!! It was painfully cold and it was only half an hour later did we regain feeling in our toes.

Brrrr….

Here is our newsletter for March, click on each page to open and again to enlarge…. please leave a message.

We had two other striders visit us last weekend, one from Switzerland named Regula who is a nurse working in Trinidad and the other from Columbia named Gabriel who is working with students in a small town named Llagagua. – a truly international weekend.

It was great to show them around Sucre, to take them to church, the market and visit our projects. On the Sunday was a festival in a small town called Tarabuco about a hours drive which happens just once a year. It is a parade through the streets of dancing in traditional costumes and a presentation of food and gifts to “Pacha Mama”. The clothes were amazing and the colours were fantastic. Each village has a distinct fabric and costume and all are very proud to have been selected to dance or march to represent their people. Each village had the traditional woodwind instruments and many wore belts filled with bells and special shoes with metal disks. The air was filled with singing, laughter and music… the traditional style Quechua singing is very high pitched!!!

In the afternoon each community had brought a selection of food they had grown, gifts of coca leaves, tobacco and other strange things all presented on a giant ladder to offer to Pacha Mama – the mother earth god. The young ladies and men did a stamping dance and were “whipped” by the elder of the villiage if they made a mistake… although they only pretended to whip each other with many smiles and laughter. We enjoyed seeing how the traditions of the rural communities are kept alive and how proud the young and old people are of their culture.

The photos don’t really capture the atmosphere – yes and it is me dressed up in the traditional costume…. they always seem to pick me out of the crowd for these silly things.

Also – as a strange add on – on the micro (mini bus) I bumped into a person who used to work at Abbot’s Hill school with me. I was speechless when a stranger came up to me and asked…”Are you from Hemel Hempstead? I used to work with you?” In the middle of nowhere!! It really is a small world.