Trip to Yanas

This last weekend, I (Mark) went off to Yanas, a village in the region of Huanuco in the mountains of Peru. I went with Alfredo to see about the possibility of setting up a new school there, through a contact at the current school Alfredo has set up in Ventanilla.
The bus ticket said the bus was to leave at 7pm, but obviously this was pre-empting Peruvian time-keeping, as the bus timetable actually said 7.30pm. However, it was 8.30pm before the bus actually left and 10 minutes later after a bump in the road, the bus had to pull over at a garage for an hour to have the large dent in the wheel straightened out and a new tyre put on. (Worryingly, a sign at the garage read ‘wheel-fitter needed.’) 9.30pm came and went before the bus pulled out of central Lima.
The journey was not very eventful, although Felipe helpfully told us just as we were setting off that it would be cold going over the mountains. What an understatement! My jumper and blanket were NOT sufficient!

Views on the way to Yanas

Arrived in La Union at 8.05am and told there would be no public transport to Yanas until 1pm. True to Peruvian form a minibus (or combi as they are called here) turned up 10 minutes later, but we had to wait until it was full 1 ½ hours later.La Union at it's busiest. The banner is advertising the local festival 2 months ago!

Yanas was a ghost town but very beautiful set in the green mountains. We were hoping to be able to spend time with the different churches there, but on arrival we found that they were very cautious of us, fearing we could be a sect and also a previous group of missionaries had stolen from the churches. The people in the mountains are generally more reserved and closed too than the coastal people, and so we didn’t feel that welcome to begin with, which surprised us.
The main focus of the trip was seeing the plots of land that could potentially be used to build a school. One was larger, but further away and the other was more central but owned by someone who may not be looking to sell it.

Alfredo by one of the plots of land.

I also preached in a church on the Saturday night after we had been vetted by the pastor!

The village is built on a hill so I found it very difficult to breathe because of the altitude and so that didn’t help my appetite when I saw what was for lunch. I’m still not sure what it was, but here is a photo… The drink which accompanied it was apparently ‘good for your kidneys’ – but that is if you can keep it down with the frogspawn texture. Food generally here seems to be basically starchy carbohydrates – potatoes, yucca, maize and cereal crops. Of these products the people have an abundance, but they have no money to buy other products like oil or rice or fruit and vegetables.
We were staying in Felipe’s family home and Alfredo and I were shown where we were sleeping. A wooden double bed with no mattress!! Despite finding out that the local hostel only charged s/4 (80p) per night, we didn’t feel we could reject their hospitality. Needless to say, it was the worst bed I think I have ever slept in and that night’s sleep was sporadic!
Breakfast was 2 stale bread rolls from the day before with ‘coffee’ – which was more like very weak ‘hot’ chocolate with fried flour – yes fried flour. What was the most unbelieveable however was Felipe’s enthusiastic murmurings about how tasty the flour was ‘no?’ Alfredo turned to me and whispered: ‘There aren’t very many nice dishes in the mountains’.

Yanas' tourist trap! Some people thought I was there to see it

A local girl in La Union who befriended me. Didn't understand what she was saying most of the time as she spoke Quechua, the local language

All in all the trip was physically challenging with the different food, the cold and altitude (not to mention the two over-night trips to get there and back) but definitely worth it to help Alfredo discern if this could be a potential place for another school. Logically it seems a little crazy, but then God works in mysterious ways! Watch this space...!