Friday was packed with both awesome ministry and tons of laughter.  We began the day praying with a Christian lady who had been paralyzed from the neck down in a bus accident a year ago, but she herself wasn’t the main appointment: she said she was fine, but that we needed to pray for her husband to accept Christ.  He did, during an amazing time of prayer.

    After that, we visited another elementary school.  Yesterday, it had been the other participants who had been mobbed by tons of little kids, but today, they mobbed me to get my autograph.  Well, I made them line up in an orderly fashion and only signed my name for those who stayed in line.

    Call it “the revenge of the person who hated it when other children cut her in line when she was in elementary school.” 

    After the school visit, I was talking with some of the guys from the church, and one of them made a comment about Edith eating ice cream from a little corner store.  "Your solitaria must be very happy," he laughed.

    Then he asked me if I had my solitaria, too.

    Not 100% sure as to what he was referring, I replied hesitatingly that I was single.

    This provoked bellyaches of laughter from the church guys, and Edith explained to me that “solitaria” means a parasite that lives inside your intestines.

    “It’s long and thin,” she said.  “It makes you want to eat sweet things.”

    “A TAPEWORM?!” I cried.  “They asked me if I had a TAPEWORM?!”

    “I’m not sure of the English translation, but that’s probably correct,” she said.  “And then you told them that no, you didn’t have a boyfriend.”

    By now I was beet red with embarrassment.  Really, who talks about tapeworms in public?

    “They’re malcriados,” Sara agreed when I told her the story.  “Very naughty.”

    But at least it makes a funny story. 

    After lunch, we took our group pictures and then went to another school to make presentations to the children there.  Unfortunately, there were no children there.  It was a teachers’ planning day, and no people under four feet were present.

    So we just went to a nearby sports field and made our presentation there.

    A lot of kids showed up, as did a nice, little Quechua couple from the local Assemblies of God church.  They told us they would pray for our ministry the remainder of our time in San Juan de Lurigancho, and things were good.

    I then took out bubble stuff and began playing with the kids, leading them around with a trail of the round, soapy orbs.  I taught them the English word “bubble,” and then I ran onto the bus.

    “Hey, Angie,” I said to one of our team members.  “Lean out the window and say, ‘Bubble.’”

    She looked at me strangely.  “OK.”  She opened her window.  “Bubble.”

    Instantly, she had about 30 kids beneath her window.

    “Bubble!” they all shouted.

    She looked at me in confusion.

    “Say ‘burbuja,’” I advised.

    “Burbuja.”

    All the little kids shouted, “¡Sí!!” in unison (‘burbuja’ is the Spanish word for ‘bubble.’).

    “What have you gotten me into, girl?”  Angie looked around helplessly as the kids began to chant, “Buh-bble!  Buh-bble!  Buh-bble!  Buh-bble!” in unison.

    Finally, she found a bottle of bubble stuff in the back of the bus and began to blow bubbles out the window, much to the delight of the children.

    But she was not pleased with me. 

    Saturday, we held a kid’s carnival in the district’s zonal park.  Besides taking part in all the skits and leading the song time, I was put in charge of the “dancing” station.  We had a dancing station because we didn’t have enough craft materials at the other stations for all the kids.  Unfortunately, halfway through the first song, the kids at the dancing station said they were tired and didn't want to dance anymore.

    So I pulled out the bubble stuff.  Which led to several hours worth of kids asking me if I would give them each a jar of bubble stuff right now, and why I wouldn’t give them each a jar of bubble stuff right now, and could they please have the bubble jars even though I had said no already.

    But, mathematically, there weren’t enough bubble jars for all the kids.  I had three.  They were more than a dozen.

    But logic didn’t sway them.

    So, finally, I put the bubble stuff up and went around translating for people who needed me to translate for them.  Finally, when all the children had been taken home, we adults had some games of our own: Marinero (“Sailor,” Pastor Pedro Miguel’s wife Lina’s favorite game, because she got to be the captain every time) and Woh-be-oh (Deb’s favorite nonsense game).

    That got our blood pumping after a couple long hours’ sitting around while the kids ran helter-skelter from station to station.

    Sunday, we had our last morning service with the church, and then we had ATL (“Ask the Lord” time, which is when we ask the Lord what ministries He wants us all to go do on our last day in our ministry area).

    I was assigned to a group going up to help encourage a new Christian, a little Quechua woman named Paolina who lived near the top of a cerro.

    We brought her keke (pound cake) and Inca Kola and spent time introducing her to the lay pastor, talking with her about her life, and praying with her.  It was hard for me to translate at first, because she didn’t leave time for me to translate after she said a phrase and because she had a thick Quechua accent.

    It was fascinating talking with Paolina, because her accent sounded exactly like how one of my anthropology books last semester had said that it would—only three vowels (“ee,” “ooh,” and “ah”), and a constant stream of endearments to fill the space around her sentences.

    Example? “Oh, my dear little sister, pretty little sister, little sister, it was so kind, pretty little sister, of you pretty little brothers and sisters to come and visit me, oh, pretty, sweet, little sister, pretty little sister, pretty, pretty little sister…” etc.

    Paolina lives all by herself and doesn’t have a waterproof roof or running water or electricity, and her sons are drunks.  It’s very hard for her, since she is old, and she is often very lonely.

    But we were able to pray for her, for her to know she’s not alone, for her to get plugged into the church so she won’t be without a support system, and for her to be filled with the Holy Spirit, who is our Comforter.  She seemed much better as we left.  She held her head high instead of slouching, and her eyes shone brightly.

    Thank You, Jesus.

    In the evening, we had a good-bye service, and although I haven’t gotten as attached to the congregations these past few projects as I did during my first one or two, I did get teary-eyed as I waved good-bye to all the children and teenagers.

    Each of us got to speak a few words as we bade farewell to the congregation, and these were mine:

    “Remember the children.  Love the children; protect the children and guide them.  They are the future of our church.

    “Remember those who don’t have anything in this world.  Jesus said, ‘Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh. Blessed are you when men hate you, when they exclude you and insult you and reject your name as evil because of the Son of Man.’

    “When people reject you for Him, you are blessed.  Don’t be embarrassed of Jesus.  Preach Him; our reward is with Him.”

    Monday was the group’s last day in Peru.  We first went to the Center, where Wanda had arranged for us to meet up with Samuel, her Peruvian “son,” after he got off work.  She asked him to call my Peruvian cell phone so we could let him know where we were.  So we went sight-seeing (saw the Plaza Mayor, peeked inside the Cathedral, got a totally unplanned and impromptu Stella-guided tour of the Inquisition Museum—that last one was fun, but I would have liked more preparation), but Samuel's calls to my cell phone couldn’t come through to my cell phone, and whenever I tried to text him, my cell phone would start a very unnecessary search for a tower (i.e., it already had 5 bars and was still searching for a new tower.). 

    Finally, however, he found us, and he and Wanda were able to talk as we shopped in the Inca Market (I translated.).

    “You know, your cell phone is a very old brand, and that’s probably why it has trouble finding the towers,” Samuel told me as he was getting ready to leave us.  “Your chip is fine; it’s the actual phone that’s giving you all your problems.  I can help you find a new one that works better, if you’d like.”

    Well, it had not been my intention to buy a new cell phone while I am in Peru this summer, but if the one I have doesn’t work, there’s not much point in having it.  So I just might take Samuel up on his offer.

    After we went to the Inca Market, we went to the beach.  I sat down and contemplated the waves against the sand and was startled out of my reverie when I saw a number of our group wading and cavorting in the water.  I was startled because the coast off of Lima is infamous for its dirtiness (raw sewage is being dumped into the sea until a new sewage treatment plant can be built), and I would not wade in it unless my life depended on it.

    But it was too late to tell them not to get in, and, after consulting Deb, I decided the lip should stay zipped. 

    Finally, we went to LarcoMar, where one of the ladies treated Edith and me to dinner at Tony Roma’s.  I got a steak and portabella salad and a Peruvian-style strawberry milkshake.  It was yummy. 

    After a bit of that wonderful Liman ice cream, we all met up at a park along the Costa Verde to pray for Peru.  Usually, we go up to the cross on Morro Solar, from where you can see all the coast of Lima.  However, the roads up the hill were all blocked because of a celebration to Saint Peter and Saint Paul.  We had to be content with our park’s good view of the cross.

    And as we circled up to pray, we heard someone playing a quena (traditional Andean flute) version of “Shout to the Lord.”  He continued until we were done with our prayer, and then he disappeared into the night shadows.

    Coincidence?  I don't think I believe in them. 

    Because of the late hour at which we got back to our hotel, we were unable to debrief our trip as we usually do, but both Deb and Sabrina prayed with me before we went to bed.

    Given the group’s early flight time, it would be a short night, but some sleep is better than no sleep at all.