Wednesday June 24th

This post was obviously made a little late but you understand.



Before I begin I would like to make a interesting observation. We are located near Chiclayo which is located between the ocean and the Andes Mountain range. This forms a strip of desert between the ocean and the mountains. We are living in a DESERT. THe average rainfall here in one year is less than an inch. I did my first and only load of laundry last night and I hung up all my clothes outside on a line hoping they would be dry in the morning.

It rained last night.

In a desert.

Seriously.



Moving on...

This past Wednesday we worked all morning while the other team was still here. We said a record in cement mixing. This has got to be a world record. In one morning we made 81 batches of cement in a giant cement mixer. This means the 81 one 60 pound bags of cement were lifted into the mixer. This means that 405 huge buckets of sand were heaved into the mixer. This means the 486 buckets were filled with rock and once again, heaved into the mixer. 405 massive wheelbarrow loads of dense cement were lifted, pushed, and lunged into 9 massive wholes. That morning it was estimated that we moved 50,000 pounds of cement, all by hand.

That was one morning.

We usually work all day until dinner.

Nice job team.



In the afternoon a special day with the kids at the school had been organized but there was nothing "organized" about it. It was mass chaos.

Let me paint the scene for you...


Hundreds of children on a large grassy field.

Thirty children huddled around me.

Six children laying on the ground and holding onto my ankles.

Three children climbing on top of my shoulders.

Two children hanging with the arms around my neck, cutting off any chance of air.

One exhausted American.


We played with the kids all afternoon. We had face painting and we played games such as "Pato Pato Ganzo" ("Duck Duck Goose") and "Tackle the tall white guy!" Weather the kids were playing games or lined up in front of me waiting to be thrown high up into the air, they all had a great time.

I wish I could say more but we have a long day of pouring cement ahead of us and my team is waiting for me.

Hope all is well at home.

If you are still reading this post it probably means you are one of those people I dearly miss.


Te amo.



Zack