Week Numero Dos

Monday, July 20, 2009 (Day 10):

Today was very uneventful. We got to sleep in and just have a low key day again. After lunch, we came back to the hotel and got our crafts together for this upcoming week. We discussed our story plans and memory verses to go over with the girls. This week we are going to spend the week and a girls home just a little bit outside of Lima. All of the girls have been taken from their homes because of sexual abuse. We are going to work with the teens in the morning and the younger girls in the afternoon. The younger girls go to school in the morning and the teens go to school in the afternoon. Since Robyn, Allie, and my room is the biggest, we opened all our humanitarian aid suitcases and organized everything. We had stuff all over our room! We had a lot of fun talking and sorting. Once we finished organizing everything, we went to a Chinese restaurant to eat dinner. The dinner could have seriously fed about 12 people. There was so much food and we hardly put a dent in it. There were some other Americans at the restaurant that stopped and talked to us for a bit. It's pretty obvious down here noticing other Americans. After dinner, we decided to venture onto the bus for our ride home. Wow, that was an adventure! We hopped on and before we were even seated, the bus driver had already taken off like a shot. Just about fell down in the aisle, but caught myself and quickly found a seat. Luckily, it wasn't a typical Peruvian bus crammed full of people. It was pretty empty. The bus driver was driving what we felt like was a 100 mph. We were all thinking this is so crazy, but Kelli told us the bus drivers like to race. It was still a fun experience and we definitely want to ride the bus again. Allie, Robyn, Meredith and I all stayed up a little to late getting our fill of American TV in. We watched last weeks episode of The Bachelorette on my computer. I seriously have not laughed that hard in a while. Probably since the live chicken fell off the back of the van in Uganda. That's a whole different story in itself that I'll fill you in some other time if you would like to know it.

Muchas gracias for your prayers!

God Bless,
Dawn

Tuesday, July 21, 2009 (Day 11):

Today we headed out to the girls home in the rain trying to figure out what we were going to do with the girls since it was raining and mostly everything is outside. Once we got there, we found out school has been canceled for two weeks due to you guess it, swine flu. That meant our plans had to be changed all together. Uganda taught me to be flexible with plans and time, same goes here in Peru. Several girls ran up and starting hugging us. They were very excited to see us! The June Interns had gone to the same home, so all of the girls were asking about the people that were on that team. It's amazing how the Lord worked all of this out. This particular home was not even supposed to be visited by either team. Last month when the government was not letting Americans go to any of the government run homes due to the swine flu, Julie just kinda fell upon this particular home. Apparently the Lord was thinking this particular home was more important for us to visit! The girls were great! We gathered all the younger girls together and Julie told the story of David. Then we went to the other room to work on the craft, which was decorating a foam picture frame. Meredith took pictures of all the girls and we are getting them printed off for the girls to put on their frames. One of the little girls took to me. Her name is Sulay. She is absolutely adorable!! I sat at the table with her and helped her with her frame. The nun, Mama Rita, that runs the home has a birthday coming up and all the girls wanted to make her something. You can tell they definitely love her. They were asking me to write for them. They would dictate to me what to write. Then we all started coloring pictures of Disney princesses. Once of the little girls colored me a picture and I thought she was going to throw a fit when we took the colors away from her because it was lunch time. After we ate lunch, we all actually fell asleep in the van. We took about a 20 minute siesta and it felt great! Once we all woke up, we figured the girls would be done with lunch. They were not. Julie went to find out what was going on. Come to find out, the home doesn't have very much food. The director tries her best, but since it is a privately run home, she doesn't have all the money to go buy food. Julie had Mama Rita make out a list of food she needs. We left to go get some of the supplies, but found out we could get it cheaper somewhere else. So, on our way to the home tomorrow morning, we are going to stop and get some food for them. We know it won't last long, but it will definitely help. It broke all of our hearts knowing these girls are going without food sometimes. Julie told us that when she told Mama Rita what we are going to do, she started crying. Julie said that Mama Rita doesn't want to ask for help, but we assured her we want to help. Once we got back, Sulay was the first girl to come up to the van. She grasped on to me and pulled me inside and took me to her bunk house. We climbed onto her bed and watched some crazy movie all the girls were watching. The older girls went and listened to the story and did their crafts. I felt kind of bad because I didn't really help my team, but I was loving on little Sulay. All she wanted to do was cuddle up next to me. She kept hugging me and telling me about the movie. Of course both were in Spanish, so I just shook my head and said, "Ahhh, ok."

I cannot even begin to imagine what these girls are going through, but I do know that they are some happy girls. All they want is someone to love on them and pay attention to them. Just like the home we were at in Cusco. I didn't let the language barrier get in the way today. I just played with the girls, hugged and loved on them. It was awesome hanging out with them today! I just love all these kids! You just want to take them home, but I know I can't.

Another cool thing about today...Kelli and the June Interns taught the girls the song, "Lord I Lift Your Name on High." When Kelli asked them to sing the song today, they all knew the song. It was so cool to hear and watch them do the motions!

Again, thank you so much for your prayers and support!

God Bless!
Dawn

P.S. Kelli made a slideshow of pictures to put up on the Buckner blog. Check it out at this address http://blog.itsyourmission.com/. The title is Peru Interns Part II.