General Conference Week

Photos  
*Watching General Conference on our computer  

*The ruins of Cienaguilla (several photos)  

*Power poles in the middle of sidewalks  

*The mosaic is in one of the parks here in La Molina that depicts a history of this area of Lima with the final picture being that of the Lima LDS Temple.  

*We pass the Missionary Training Center every day on our way to the office. Sometimes we see families dropping off their children who are beginning their missionary service. Lima has the 4th largest Missionary Training Center in the world.  

*On Saturay night, we were privileged to attend a Dance Festival sponsored by the Young Single Adults (YSA) of our Stake. The members of the YSA in each ward did a typical dance from various regions of Peru. It was amazing to see the elaborate costumes and learn more about the culture of this country.  

Saturday and Sunday last week began with the Semi-Annual General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We were able to watch Conference in English, thanks to our computer and the internet. We enjoy receiving the inspired counsel and teachings from living prophets and look forward to conference each April and October. The photo of the computer on the chair is how we watched General Conference.

We had a shorter week than usual with Thursday being a national holiday celebrating a significant naval battle for Peru at the Battle of Angamos during The War of the Pacific with Chile in 1879 in which one of their greatest naval heroes lost his life.  

Rob has been learning new ways of planning meetings that differ from his prior experience planning professional meetings. In his experience, big meetings are planned a year or more in advance.  Here in our assignment, that is not the case. This has been a growing experience with some discomfort. We were able this week to ship the materials for the Newborn Resuscitation Training to the Amazon cities where the training will be given starting a week from tomorrow. Still on deck for this week is arranging the catering of the lunches and snacks for the 55-60 doctors who will be attending in each of the two cities. We hope all goes well with these arrangements this week.  :-) We attended the Lima Temple Tuesday night and that helped Rob to decompress and breathe a little easier after a rather stressful couple of days.

We also did a lot of logistical work for a number family nutritional projects involving gardening and small animal production in Peru and elsewhere in the South America Northwest Area. Spring is just beginning here so we are working to get the seeds, tools, planting necessities, animals, cages, etc. priced and ordered to allow the initial planting and rearing.  

The Church provides the initial investment and professional instruction in the local area by local experts and the families then implement the principles they are taught and work to make the project self-sustaining so its benefits can continue into the future for these families. The key is to work with them to help them develop the skills that they need to be successful now and in the future. As they develop the skills they can help others to learn the same skills and magnify the positive impact of the project in their communities.

The Ruins of Cienaguilla

Thursday was a National Holiday in Peru so our office was closed. We decided to spend the day learning more about the area by traveling to Cienaguilla to see the Incan ruins there.

Since the holiday fell on a Thursday they declared Friday a holiday this year. That meant we had to get a lot done in our three days at the office (though we did do some work Friday for the wheelchair project coming up in December). We were able to go with some of the other senior missionary couples to an Incan ruin at Cienaguilla, about 30km from where we live in La Molina.


If you look closely at the photo taken from the ruins at the view of the valley, you might be able to see a man with a horse drawn plow in the field.

Additional points of interest:

As we have been helping with the wheelchair projects here in Peru, we have become more sensitive to the obstacles that those who are in wheelchairs may encounter. This was a bit surprising to see power poles placed in the middle of the walk way.