Thursday morning I awoke at 3:30am to bundle up and prepare to take on the challenge of climbing to the top of Mt Poco Paca to see the sunrise & pray over the city of Huancane. As it turned out, I was the only girl that decided to take the trail up the whole way instead of walking the road. I set out up the mountain following John, Jeremy L, Jeremy S, and Rueben when I turned around and saw that there were no other girls behind me. After the first leg of the hike I was thinking, ¨Why in the world did I choose the trail?!¨ The trail is a straight shot up the mountain which is about 500 ft up. Beginning at 12,800 ft above sea level made the hike even harder breathing in such thin, cold air the whole way. I´ve never had such a hard time breathing! That is what made the hike extraordinarily difficult as well as the fact that I could hardly see what was ahead of me hiking in the dark hours of the morning. Once we hit the halfway point I wasn´t sure if I would made it to the top in time to see the sunrise, but I was sure hoping so. Every time I had to stop for a moment I would say a short prayer for endurance and energy before I continued hiking. I kept telling myself ¨You can do this. With the Lord´s help, you can do this.¨
The very last stertch of the hike Jeremy S & I chose to climb the face of the mountain instead of staying on the trail. It was hard climbing all the huge rocks after such an exhausting hike, but the view from the top of the mountain was worth it all. As the sun slowly rose higher, I could see everything below. Lake Titicaca was a beautiful blue expanse surrounded by mountains. All of Huancane sat below us just beginning to stir with activity. All around us were mountains as far as the eye could see. the sun finally rose up from behind the mountain peaks and painted the sky with spectacular colors. I´ve never seen anything like it.
It only took me an hour to make it all the way up the mountain. It was a hard, painful hour of sucking in cold, cold air. My legs hurt. My energy ran low. My eyes began to water from the dry air & cold wind. My nose was running & stopped up from the cold, but the rest of my body was radiating heat under the several layers I wore. But the hike was well worth the effort. I just kept my focus on that mountain peak and did my best to ignore the pain. When you have a mission of purpose, you must keep your eyes set on that and let all the hardships fall behind you.
The hike taught me alot about what the rest of the summer will be like. Hardships will come. In fact, for many of our team members they have already begun. Like John has told us, Satan doesn´t want us here to share the love of Jesus Christ with the Aymaran people, but this is what God has called us to. He has provided and has brought each of us here. To get through these coming 6 weeks, I must seek the Lord whole-heartedly, find my strength in Him alone, and keep my focus on the purpose for which the Lord has called me here.
Rise and shine to a beautiful day in Conima!
Here we are in Conima. Our whole team is finally together after some changes in plans, no buses in sight, and 2 days of traveling. the hour & a half drive from Huancane to Conima was filled with many beautiful sights and alot of dusty mountain roads. At one point John stopped on the side of the road and let us get out to take pictures of the sparkling bright blue waters of Lake Titicaca nestled in the middle of majestic mountains that towered above the calm waters and reached their peaks to the heavens. The mountains of Peru are gorgeous!
Conima is a small, peaceful town, very quaint & slow-paced. The home we are styaing in is wonderful! It sits right on the corner of the plaza looking out at the lake. It is 4 stories so lots of going up & down stairs. The first floor is the garage, Jeremy´s bedroom & bathroom, and a small garden area out back where we can also do our laundry. The second floor is the kitchen complete with plenty of cabinet space, a refrigorator, and a gas stove-top which we brought with us. The third floor is where the 2 girls´bedrooms are as well as a bathroom for each room. Emily, Heather, & Sarah are staying in the larger room, and Alison & I share the other room. The fourth floor is our meeting room with the gas heater John sent with us. The top floor also has 2 doors that lead out to 2 balconies overlooking the plaza, the town, and the lake.
Yesterday was our first day together just the 6 of us in Conima. Jeremy S has gotten out his longboard, and the kids love it! We have played with them for hours, and when we aren´t plaing with them they are following us or banging on our door to come out & play. Yesterday after we played with the kids for a while and a locksmith-type man was finally able to open Jeremy´s bedroom door that had gotten jammed shut, we packed up lunch and hiked down to the lake as a team to have a picnic. After lunch we worked on memorizing our stories and played with a couple of little boys that had tried to sneakily follow us down to the lakeshore. Jeremy, Alison, and I took off our shoes, rolled up our pants, and waded out in the lake skipping rocks for a while. After a while we came back up to the plaza, split up into 2 groups, and prayer-walked around the town for a good while.
Today has been a busy day of grocery shopping at the market, disinfecting all our food, cooking, and hand-washing laundry. We promised some little boys that we would play with them later today, and we all plan to work more on memorizing our stories. I´ve got half of mine down well in spanish with motions & all, but that still leaves the second half to learn as quickly as possible.
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