The Mother of All Blogs

Yep, I haven’t written for a month, and yep this is a series of blogs and pictures to make up for it, so hang on, almost got a book going on below this comment, and yep this probably means that I won´t be writing for a while again!

Blond Moment #2

The other day I was flipping through my friend Colt’s snowboarding magazine. I came to the Q&A page and came to a question I found quite entertaining. It said, “Are there ways to work on style, or is our style just a natural thing we’re stuck with?” Before even thinking, I opened up my big mouth and said, “What is this magazine, Cosmo or something?” Colt was kind of blown away by the question and asked why in the world I would say something like that. I read off the question sarcastically, but hardly finished before he cut me off and said, “It’s talking about your snowboarding style you idiot, not your clothing style!” After that, the whole group we were sitting with busted out laughing. Decided it was time for me to just sit back and listen for a little while…

I Can’t Believe You Just Said That

Lauren is a stick…
Melanie is a stick…
Julie is a stick…
Mindy is most definitely a stick…
And then there is me…

I definitely would not call myself fat, but don’t think that I fit in the stick category like the rest of the traveling team girls. Last week someone informed me that I was “mas gordo” than the other girls, for those whose Spanish is extremely limited, that is the same is saying “fatter”, but the person said that was okay because it made me more beautiful. What an insult, right?

Last week I also got an extremely huge zit on my face and as much as I tried to cover it up, it was quite noticeable. The first day after it appeared and I decided against the route of plastic surgery, one person came straight out and asked what was on my face. I explained exactly what it was, taking into account that zits are not an extremely common thing down here with the locals. The next person that asked me about my blemish though also had them on his face, and I thought to myself “You know exactly what it is, you have them all over your face, why in the world are asking me, didn’t your mom teach you any manners?! You have successfully aided in slaughtering my self-esteem for the day!”

A few weeks back a little girl came up to me and asked me if I was a “pela cara” (translation: face peeler), which refers to the white people that sometime come down here, pose as tourists, and then kill people for their organs. I told her no, then thought, “wow, that took a lot of nerve,” but she continued on with no concern to the seriousness of her accusation. She went on to tell me that her dad said we were and that she should be careful around us. I couldn’t help but smile at what should have been a really awkward conversation.

Some people would get pretty offended over comments like these and at times I have, but well, that is exactly the way the Peruvians are…no beating around the bush, just pure bluntness. The thing to learn is not to take personal offense to anything; Peruvians just are bold and usually say what is on their mind. They are not afraid to confront one other, on even awkward things.

This year I am trying to learn to be more like this people; so often I sugar coat stuff or avoid problems as long as possible. Why talk about things when you can ignore them, pretend like nothing is there? There is always someone else who will work out the issue if I stay quiet long enough, right? Don’t get me wrong, I do not want to become a brutally honest and hurtful person, but I have found the importance of facing your problems head on, and not being afraid to confront others. Communication can do wonders, sometimes harsh words spoken in love can be difficult to hear at first, but appreciated later. Sometimes when things are brought up, better understandings can occur between people. So although I think Thumper’s mom had some pretty good words of advice, I think it is okay to say things that aren’t always nice, but to do so with the right attitude and intentions, and with perhaps a little more tact than the Peruvians.

God’s Gift

I first remember meeting Daniel and Noah one of the nights when we were sitting around waiting for the truck after a hard days work in the clinic. My friend, Martin had a huge group of kids around him, not a huge surprise since he always is out meeting new people, and he motioned me over to meet a few of them. It was pretty dark and I could not see the faces of the kids really well, so by the end I had pretty much completely forgotten all of the names and who they belonged to. During this, Martin decided to introduce me to the kids as Dr. Gimbel, and as much as I tried to persist, the name stuck. The next week when we moved into our new house, there were two little boys who would always run by and say “Hola Dr. Gimbel.” As time when on, I learned more about these boys and their family, the good and the bad. As hard as I tried not to have favorites, they quickly became some of the kids that I enjoyed the most because they were so loving, they were not annoyingly hyper, and they did not constantly ask me for things.

Martin, at the same time was getting really close to the boys too, and was trying to be a good mentor to them. You see, the boys’ real father had left years ago and did not interact with them much anymore, their stepdad was never around and when he was he only caused problems. The mom decided to go to the coke fields to work for fast cash, and one of the older sisters left with the littlest sister to live with a boyfriend. The boys were left in the charge of their older 17 year-old sister. She was pretty lazy and overall let the boys do whatever they wanted. With all of this in mind, school was going to be starting soon, and was not looking like a huge priority. Martin and I began to wonder if anyone was going to be responsible for getting these boys to school. After talking things over, Martin and I decided to leave getting the uniforms up to the mom when she came back, so she would be involved in the process, but decided to sponsor getting the kids school supplies, etc.

So Martin and I started the huge process of trying to get these kids enrolled, talking to teachers, working with the sister, getting supplies lists, etc. Martin decided to help Noah, and me Daniel. The boys both said they wanted to go to school, but when it came down to the first day of school, when I got back from visiting, 15 minutes before classes were about to start, neither of them were ready to go or even intending on going. I patiently talked with Daniel, who said he did not want to go because he did not have the uniform to wear, but then promised to go the next day. Slightly frustrated, I let him off the hook, but then did not give Noah much of an option, just told him to get ready and I was taking him. The next day, Martin and I started hounding the kids around 11 AM, but once again Daniel was refusing to go. Martin sat down and gave him a talk and finally Daniel stalked off to school, but was obviously angry at us. All of the other SMs kept commenting on how ungrateful the kids were being, but I just tried to let it roll off my back keeping in mind the home life the kids had. The next day though, I was out and about visiting and got back late to find that once again Daniel had skipped school and was out swimming, and that is when I snapped.

I do not think I can use the word love, to describe my feelings toward these two boys, but I definitely really liked them. I felt a certain since of responsibility for them. They had such awful lives, the reason I wanted them to go to school was so that they could continue their education and succeed in life. I wanted to instill in them the importance of education, so they could have a different mindset than all of the other people that we worked with on a daily basis. Everyone down here wants to go to America, because they want better lives, more things, etc. But what they do not understand is that the key to moving out of the slums is not finding an American to take you to America, it is getting an education. I could not understand why these two boys were not embracing the opportunity that we were putting before them. It hurt me to see that I was not making an impact enough upon them, that they were not embracing the vision, that they would grow up and live exactly as their parents did. I realized that in all reality I was not mad at them, I just ached inside because I knew that in not responding to this gift, they were deciding their future.

It was while I was still upset over the boys’ actions and attitudes that I had a “aha moment,” as a previous professor used to put it. I decided that God sometimes must feel a lot like the way I did. Here He sent His Son down to die for us and literally gives us the free gift of salvation as long as we accept it. But the thing is, many people don’t! How His heart must break, seeing us try every other thing in the world to find happiness. We think we truly know what is important and what will be us success in life, but in reality we don’t have a clue. God put everything in place; He gently guides us, but refuses to force us to do anything. He knows exactly how to make us happy, but He must give us the choice. I don’t think He ever gets angry at us, but just feels a great sense of loss and pain, when we don’t choose His way. The great thing is though, that He will never give up. He will forever have great aspirations for our lives and His grace is unfailing.

Who knows what will end up happening with these two boys, but I hope that through the experience that I had with them that no matter where I end up in life, that the most important thing is too maintain my relationship with Christ and daily except the gift of salvation He so freely gives us.

All for Show

Last Sunday my friend Martin and I went to visit a family that used to live near us, but then moved back to their town house with school starting again. This family runs the menu at a local school and feed about 2,000 students every day, wow and I thought it was bad to cook for 12! Keeping this in mind, they are a little bit better to do, but still not amazingly rich or anything. Anyways, from the moment we said yes to coming to visit them, they began bragging about everything they had and really building up the visit to their house.

I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, but the entire Sunday ending up feeling like a huge show, and I wasn’t quite sure how to respond. I wanted to be appreciative and a good guest, but had to admit the whole thing was kind of humorous. When they put my clothes in the washer (which was brand new), they explained to me how the whole thing worked and then we all sat around and watched to clothes when it went to the spin cycle. I tried to act really stunned at this helpful clothes washing device as if I had never seen one in order not to look like a rich snobby American, but inside I was cracking up.

Next, they took me downtown and began telling me where everything was, even though I have been there more times than I can count. While in town, we stopped at Los Andes, the biggest import store in Pucallpa. I used to go there every day off to buy American things, but once again tried to act flabbergasted as the lady gushed on about how much stuff there was in this store. Occasionally she would stop and just look at things and ask what brand was better, as if she was actually going to buy something. She took me down every single aisle and explained to me where everything was.

By the end of the day, I was on the verge of telling them that I had already seen everything before, but didn’t want to offend the family. I felt bad that they felt that big of a need to impress us just because we were Americans.
I hope that I never become a person who is so focused on material items that I feel like I must show off everything I have in order to impress others. Because I tell you what, as nice as it was to use a washing machine and get to go to town, I would have liked hanging out with one of the local families in their shacks just as well. After a day with this family and seeing all that they had, I did not think of them as any better than any of my other families, in fact I think I thought a little less of them. What we have should never define us, what should matter is who we really are!

HERE THE PICTURES ARE!!! Got ear irragations with Melanie, picts of Iquitos, and Josue and I visiting in the rain!