The home stretch...

Well everyone, here we are, the final leg of this race.  I need to apologize again for the lack of recent updates, things here are getting so busy (school finishing up, ministries coming to a close, intentionally continuing to build relationships) and so we have not had large amounts of free time to blog.  I will give you an update of where we are at in the trip so far, with not only a weekly update but I would like to leave you with some lessons we have learned while here. 

Visitors to Bolivia:  

Since our last post we have been joined by: a couple from CBM - the Mitchells from Deer Island (who have already gone back home), our professor of Global Christianity Terry Smith (who is no longer in Cochabamba) and a group of 14 adults from Canada (who are here till tomorrow).  There would be too much to blog about if I wrote all the things that have happened over the last 10 days so I will just highlight a few things (if you want you can ask us about them on the comments page).  

March 23 to April 2 - In Fast Forward >>>

We had a sleepover at the Jankes (when Pat and Terry were out of town), Tarryn baked cookies with her english class, Jonathan broke his arm, I taught english at 6:30 am twice this week, we finished up a course with Terry Smith, I've tour guided a group of 14, gave exams to our kids at the school, we watched a documentary on the children who work in the mines of Bolivia, April Foolsed, went to the airport 3 times, went on a sketchy Truffi Adventure, and I wrote this blog.

Important Lessons Learned:

DON'T give Bolivians a reason to paint on eachothers faces, this was our Bolivian friends first St. Paddy's day and I'm pretty sure they did it better than I've ever done it before.

DON'T let Tarryn bake cookies at the same time as teaching to speak a second language, sometimes you want communication to be very clear, especially when you will be eating the result!

DO give Bolivians every right to shove Dave's face in his birthday cake, it proves to be rather therapeutic.

DON'T try to communicate complex thoughts in Portuguese when you are in fact studying spanish.

DON'T try to manhandle the Jankes' Parrot, it will hurt you.

DON'T teach your english class to say, "shut up"... it may be the only thing they say all year

DO eat the street food, who needs a detox program anyways?

DO feed the mangy dogs, they'll only follow you for the rest of your life

DON'T try to play basketball in the dark, at 9000 feet above sea level with Bolivians, they will kick your butt every time

DO read the www.onroutebolivia.blogspot.com blog, it always proves to be a great read!