September 20, 2002

We were back behind the wheel again the beginning of July. This time we accompanied Pastor Pablo to Yrybucua to deliver a motorcycle to Pastor Luciano. Pastor Luciano is the local "District Superintendent" and has over 40 miles of dirt road to travel in his region of 5 scattered churches. Some of these roads are crossed by make-shift log bridges. Note in the photo the logs are going the wrong way!

We also had the opportunity to visit Quinta Linea again . This area will probably be the site of one of our first wells. The area has a small church and school, and is about 2 1/2 hours off the paved road (in good weather). The church is a small wooden building harking back to the old country churches in the US of the 1900s.

Church at Quinta Linea

Three room school at Quinta Linea

Pastor Felix is a wonderful man who lives in a small parsonage next to the church with an extended family of 12 people. The Methodist school has about 75 children in attendance in three rooms. The two teachers also live on the grounds in a small duplex. With all the activities, they need lots of water! They currently have a hand dug well, but the soil is very sandy and the water table is over 40 feet deep. Their first well collapsed, and the second well is not deep enough to produce sufficient water for all of the activities.

The 4th week in July, we had the fortunate experience of accompanying the mobile medical clinic to Colonia Guaraní. This is a very small pueblo, north of Ciudad del Este, just west of the Brazilian border. As with most mission projects, we received such a blessing! Many of the people in the area only spoke Portuguese, others only spoke Guaraní; communication was "interesting". We set up the clinic at a building that the government constructed within the last 5 years. However, our medical team has been the only group to use the facility, and this was our 2nd time at this location. Our team consisted of Ed (assistant to Mark) and Linda (cook), Joanna (LPN) and Mark (ophthalmologist) Waltz, Joy Varga (RN/Pharmacist), Norival Trinidad Jr., (Doctor), Ben Reyes (front desk coordinator, local district superintendent). The clinic building served as an office for Norival and kitchen/dining room. Our mobile unit was used by Joanna to see patients, Joy as a pharmacy, Mark and Ed to see patients for eye glasses.

This is an overall view of the building with our mobile unit.

Here is Ed helping a patient select a new pair of glasses.

When we arrived at the building, we had no electricity, which means no water since the well pump was electric. Our mobile unit has a generator, but as things can go, the generator died mid-week. So, we managed to see 425 patients in only 4 days with limited electricity and water! Fortunately, one of the neighbors had a well and allowed us to carry buckets of water over to the clinic. We have a filter system we used to provide drinking water and cooking water for the team. Cooking was done on 2 Coleman stoves.

The benefit received by our 425 patients can only be equaled by the joy we received on this trip! We slept in tents and every night we spent around the campfire, sharing stories, laughing, enjoying fellowship! One night we even had "eat-some-mores". These are a real treat as we don't have marshmallows or graham crackers here in Paraguay. Joanna had brought marshmallows back from the US with her, we used a substitute for graham crackers, and bought the chocolate in Brazil. What a treat! The area where Colonia Guaraní is located is a flat plain, used for agriculture. Sunsets were spectacular! The moon rises were also awesome! One late afternoon Mark said "Look, the clouds are even lining up for us!" We looked up, and over the Parana River on the Brazilian border, the clouds were, indeed, lined up, perpendicular to the river. Then looking at the sky across the land, the clouds were also lined up, parallel with the river! A spectacular sight! The Southern Cross was also very visible each night. This week was truly a gift from God!

One day we had rain. The soil in the area is a very sticky clay, so the rain meant sticky muddy feet for our patients. However, this didn't deter them from walking up to 10 miles, some with no shoes, in order to see a doctor or have their eyes checked. In the eye clinic, many of the people came for reading glasses but couldn't read. Thus the questions is "why do you want reading glasses?" The answer - to see to pick out the "picas" (little worms) from my feet! Well - we aim to please all our patients!

After the team left Colonia Guaraní, we stayed in Ciudad del Este and had a chance to visit with Ben & Jenny Reyes. They are also missionaries with MSUM. Ciudad del Este is about a 6 hour drive from Asuncion, so opportunities for visiting are limited.

We attended a beautiful Methodist church in Brazil which is the home church of Jenny (Jenny is Brazilian). We had a chance to fellowship with Jenny's parents, sisters, brothers, cousins, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews! This small village of about 500 people must all be related to Jenny! In addition to visiting Brazil, we also had a chance to visit Argentina. The Iguasu Falls borders both Brazil and Argentina. This was our first opportunity to view the Falls from Argentina. They are equally spectacular from Argentina (click the photo for a full size view)!

While in Argentina, we also attended a crafts fair. Jenny bought a $3 (US) necklace, gave a $5 (US) bill to pay, and received change in 3 currencies - guaraní (Paraguay), pesos (Argentina) and reales (Brazil)! Keeping up with the exchange rates in all 4 currencies was difficult! At the end of our visit, we pooled together our Argentine pesos (the 7 of us had 36 pesos, about $10), and were able to buy 3 large pizzas and 2 large bottles of Coke! As you may remember, Argentina's economy fell a few months ago.