Making dreams come true!

So Grandma Sue (Anna's mum) had a dream where Daniel spoke to her in his present state as a newborn. We decided to reenact the dream as told by Grandma Sue...

Sweet revenge?

So in Peru it is not rude to comment on people's weight - much to Mark's dismay. Humberto thinks it is hilarious to keep telling Mark to go on a diet, even though a recent photo of him showed an extending waistline. Anyway, I decided to teach him a lesson and sent him this photo... However, Humberto's latest come back was that we just superimposed his head on to Mark's body...
The saga continues...

More about Peru.

The Andes 400m metres up. This is a very typical landscape barren and desert like.

The Andean Condor in full flight, taken in the valle de Condor (Condor Valley , in la canon de Colca (Colca Canyon) near Arequipa.

The Cathedral in the centre of Cuzco. Every town has a large Catholic Cathedral.

Us at the most famous site in South America, so they say (who are they?) - Machu Picchu, which means 'big mountain' in Quechua, the language spoken by the descendants of he Incas. Not quite so spectacular now in name is it? The famous mountain you can see is not actually Machu Picchu but Wayan Picchu, little mountain. Machu is behind, which we never saw because it was cloudy. Next time hey? When one of our lovely readers comes out to see us.

This is a classic shot of a Lima Shanty town shack. This is actually a picture of the house of our good friends Richar and Marinella, (I've spelt those correctly by the way) and their daughters, Angie, and Anita, (or little Ana). It is very normal to add '-ita' or '-ito' on the end of people's names. ('-ita' for women and '-ito' for men). Therefore Anna was called Anita and Daniel will be called Danielito. It is a very cute way of talking, but only refers to those smaller or younger than yourself. Therefore due to my size and also social standing (as a white western male missionary i am the ultimate power, scary I know and what a responsibilty) i was never called Markito. My more preferred name was gordito, (little fatty). Doesn't sound so bad in Spanish, but does in English!

More Photos of the Lil Man.

So true!!

I love my daddy.
No really

He's smiling now.

Peru

(Mark) The Peruvian people are wonderful. They really understand about servanthood in a way that we westerners do not have a clue. Our friends Humberto and Esther have been really helping us sort things out in regards to Peru and all the possible options that we need to deal with. Peruvian bureaucracy and also unhelpful western missionaries can really make you feel your call is not exactly right but Humberto and Esther have come through for us. They have been a real example of what the majority if Peruvians seem to be like, thinking of us 1st before themselves.

Volcano Misti

This is a very faint picture of Volcano Misti the striking feature of Arequipa's horizon. This is still active, although no real threat.

Musings

(Mark) Last Sunday Giles Holloway spoke at church on how your calling is not your calling is impossible. Well i suppose moving to Peru is not impossible but quite hard, therefore our vision needs to be a little harder. Fortunately God already knew that about Giles' sermon, and a few other things, and therefore gave us an impossible vision, to plant churches and set up Form our discipleship year. I cannot wait to get going, but hey we have to wait as nearly always with me. My timing is normally too quick.

Anyway we're looking at flights and also looking at what we can and cannot take. The practical really does take some sorting, fortunately I (Mark) am married to Anna who has a honoury doctorate in organising. We have discovered a wonderful invention spacebags, bags that with a vacuum shrink material goods by up to 75% according to the blurb, probably about 60% in reality. www.spacebags.co.uk. These will really help our packing, as with tourist visas we cannot ship anything over as we have to prove we will be in the country for more than 9 months. Ah doh.

Humberto and Esther

A picture of our best friends in Peru Humberto and Esther, so you know what they look like, as we'll be working with them when we go to Peru. This is a picture of them with their son Baruj. Pronunced Ba rook. Humberto is umberto and Esther, Ester (the H isn't pronounced in spanish)

Peru- A little Info

I thought as we were moving to Peru in September (all being well) i thought i'd give a little info on our previous trip and what we have learnt, and are learning about our calling and the lovely home of Paddington. Some basic geographical info.

Peru has just over 26 million inhabitants. It's capital is Lima, and has 14 million people, at least living there. Other major cities include Arequipa, Ayacucho, Iquitos, Huaraz, Cajamarca, and Puno.

Peru is bordered by Ecuador and Colombia to the north, Brazil to the east, Boliva to the south-east, Chile to the south, and the Pacific Ocean to the west.

Smiling in the morning

It's half term here so we're all enjoying lazy mornings in bed. Anna is enjoying being able to have a shower without having to rush before Daniel cries because he's lonely. Looking at brightly coloured birds with weird black and white checked bellies seems only to be interesting for about 5 mins max!

Daniel with Mum and Dad

Daniel 9 weeks old

Daniel at 9 weeks old after a bath with daddy!

Baby Pictures

Just to let you know we will put more pictures of Daniel on the site so you can see how he develops.

Arequipa

We are currently praying and thinking about our Peru' calling being initially to Arequipa and not to Lima as we first thought. This is through our good friends Humberto and Esther who work as Peruvian missionaries with American missionaries, who are part of celebration church in the USA. This would potentially give us the visas that we are searching for at the moment, as the leaders are part of Destino a Charismatic leaders group, who could sponsor our visa. Will let you know how it changes.