Olives and Apples

This week we spent two of our days meeting with the two different organizations that are our wheelchair partners. One of them received large number of wheelchairs from the Chinese government and they are charged with performing followup assessments for the deliveries and have asked for assistance to give them additional training to facilitate this. We also discussed with them some of the other challenges they face that they had brought to our attention and we are trying to determine the best collaboration to help them with these needs.

The other partner is finishing this coming week the delivery of the last of nearly 2,000 wheelchairs donated to them by the Church as well as working on establishing the repair parts inventory and delivery system to go with the repair technician training the church provided for them last month. We met with the leadership of both organizations to assess their current and future needs and what role the church's wheelchair program will play in that as we cooperatively work together to help some of the poorest disabled people here in Peru.

We continued work with logistical efforts for some medical equipment donation and school student desk donations. Still underway is the purchasing for some family food production projects in three additional cities and drinking water well projects in two provinces. Lots of detailed tasks to make sure everything is done correctly. Rob finds it very satisfying to be able to accurately complete tasks, something that he took pleasure in doing as an orthodontist.

Thursday marked five years from the day of Rob's ski accident at Alta that ultimately resulted in our coming here. Rob marked it by wearing his "Altaholics Anonymous" t-shirt at home before and after the day at the office. Hard to believe it is ski season back home with us sweating here in the heat and humidity of Lima.

Preparation Day

Saturday for our preparation day we did some exploring in parts of Lima that were unknown to us. We went with another missionary couple and took a city bus line that was new to us and then with Mary as our navigator set off on our adventure in San Isidro. Our first objective was to find one of the two Mexican restaurants in Lima to enjoy as a lunch spot. Alas, it was not to be. We arrived at the place and it was closed for remodeling and will reopen next week.

However, less than a block away was the Parque Los Olivos a place that was on our list to visit. This is also know as the Forest of the Olive Trees. It covers 57 acres and is a former olive grove and many of the trees are over 400 years old. There are about 1,675 trees. At its prime as an operating orchard it had about 3,000 trees. It is said that when the Spanish lost Peru as a colony as a parting shot they cut down many of the olive trees that were in the grove. Many of the trees still show signs of that inflicted damage from some 195 years ago. Rob was interested to observe the cultivation techniques used for olive trees. It was a beautiful park and a peaceful oasis in a very large and busy city.

We continued our walking, eventually walking several miles through several through safe neighborhoods of Lima. We visited the Indian Market for a few handicraft purchases, visited the cat park (Parque Kennedy) which our friends wanted to see, found a place for lunch in a quiet alley cafe, and then made our way to the Malecón on the cliffs overlooking the beach and the Pacific Ocean. The Malecón is associated with a large park system along the clifftops and while we were there it was so quiet and green and different that it didn't feel like we were in Lima at all. It felt more like we were in Southern California.

We then headed home, did our grocery shopping for the week and prepared for the sabbath day. We were pleasantly surprised to purchase some Washington State apples this week! One of the Fujis had a Washington Apple Commission sticker and the other had a Chelan Fresh sticker. A couple tastes from home!

We enjoyed the sabbath day (Sunday) to recharge and prepare for another busy week that lies ahead of us.