A trip to the Baratillo and a Primary Activity

 Our internet was down again one day this week and after studying our scriptures and language and doing everything else we could think of we turned to our window again for entertainment.  Here is the building they are working on across the street, We keep guessing how many more floors it will have.  These big strips of foam are used as forms to pour the floors.

The narrow streets in historic Cuzco.

First Day of School and every student wears uniforms, including shoes and socks that are the same.

Burgers, fries and onion rings in Historic Cuzco, what a treat!

 This is a lady Elder Hasler talked to all the time coming and going from the place he does records preservation. She is not a member of our Church. One day she asked him what he did and she was so excited to learn about family history that we took her to an internet cafe and gave her this book and set up an account for her.  She had the same reaction that so many others have - when she saw the  birth certificate of her father, she just broke down and cried,  It was the first time Elder Hasler had ever seen that.  After almost 3 years of taking pictures in a small dark office of the records here in Cuzco, he finally saw in person the significance of what he is doing.  We were all teared up.  She said she had many friends that would be interested in family history.  The Spirit of Elijah is everywhere.

We finally made it to the Baratillo,  We have talked about it since we first arrived.  It is a huge Market/garage sale that is sets up every Saturday morning along these railroad tracks and into several streets in Cuzco.  It starts out with the sale of animals. 

 This may be one of the reasons there are so many dogs in Cuzco.  How could you resist buying one of these for your kids?  And they even come with a cute outfit.

The store behind this woman is also full of these egg crates.  The eggs here are so fresh and delicious.  The white shelled eggs cost more than the brown.  The shells are extra hard so I guess that is why they can stack them so high.

 This is a freeze dried potato that Peruvians invented centuries ago, perfect for food storage.  There are black ones that they actually actually walk on as part of the freeze-dry process.

 The lady in this picture is making corn beer, they let it sprout, mash it up and let it ferment.  Then they just put it in a bottle to sell.  Here she is making it on the street.

 These women are selling coco leaves.  This is what they put in hot water to make a tea that helps with altitude sickness.

Fresh-squeezed orange juice.  We sure wished we dared to drink all the juices that they sell on the street. They  look so good,

 This is only one street of this giant Market.  We have been waiting to come here to get Lyle a better looking hat.  But, Elder Hasler told him he would give him one of his hats when he leaves in May, so Lyle decided to keep wearing the one he brought from home.  So much for the good-looking hat we were going to buy here.
Things are a lot cheaper and in greater supply here than they are in town.  It is wall to wall people so we came early when it wasn't too bad.  I am sure this is where some of the street vendors in town buy their goods and then turn around and sell them at a profit. There are a lot of police here because of all the pocket-pickers.  The vendors were so sweet to tell us to keep our money and valuables close.
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 Lyle is eating a corn tamale that the woman behind him is selling.  He likes these a lot and feels like they are safe because they are served hot and wrapped.  He said they are like a nice hot corn muffin.

This man has a hand full of things to sell.  I wonder how many years he has been selling at this market.

That is a donkey head for sell.  This lady is selling magic things and potions.  Any ideas what a donkey head is good for?

Elder Hasler has bought a few old coins at this market.  He is kind of an expert on them.  The smaller coins that are in front of this man are Spanish coins from the 1600's.  There are a lot of counterfeits so it is buyer-beware, 

 Here are the guinea pigs that are a national delicacy.  At least this one died happy.  And, no, I still haven't brought myself to eat one yet.

I love all the beautiful flowers you can buy everywhere.

This is Lyle's favorite place.  All kinds of fresh nuts and dried fruit.

A farmer and a reluctant llama.

Some sort of  athletic training,  these young men must have great lungs running at this altitude.

On Saturday we helped with a Stake Primary Activity.  We taught about family history and why it is important.  This one of the girls that came.

The children were told they could have the chocolate, but they couldn't use their bodies to get it.  It was an object lesson on vicarious work for the dead.  All of them just stood around the table looking at the chocolate and trying to figure out how to get it, They were so frustrated.  Finally one of the children volunteered to take chocolate to each person.  Everyone was happy and the lesson was learned. It was so fun to be among the children again.

Lyle took me out to lunch for my birthday today. He had them make me this beautiful dessert.  It  is crepes with some sort of caramel inside. So delicious.  We had the restaurant to ourselves with nice music and a fresh salad bar with 12 kinds of salad.  The meal was Rodizio style where they bring the meat to the table throughout the meal. It was so good.  We had a really nice time together.

A couple of interesting things I have noticed here.

One of the nice things I have noticed here is that no one smokes.  I have seen literally hundreds of people in the 2 and 1/2 months that I have been here and I have seen only a handful of  people that smoke and most of them are tourists. It is the same with tattoos and piercings.

Only about 25 % of the population drives and only 1/2 of those have licenses.  Anyone can be a taxi driver.  Many lawyers and professionals will drive around after work and make a little extra money by driving people places.  To get a taxi, you just put out your hand and someone picks you up.  They let you know they are a taxi by honking.  Some taxi drivers actually have taxi written on their cars the majority don't.

Pregnant ladies and parents with children and older people are given a lot of respect especially on the buses. The passengers give their seats to them.

There are only 40 watt light bulbs in the houses and other buildings.

Pedestrians have no rights.  You take your life in your hands when you cross the street.  Luckily we have figured out the few places where there are lights that stop the traffic so you can cross, but you still have to watch those turning into your street.

An amazing weekend in Espinar, Peru

 Elder Poulsen does not think he is on time unless he is at least 10 minutes early, which means he usually has time to wait.  Here he is waiting for our next appointment.  While he takes a small siesta I decide to see if I can get some interesting pictures.  Lyle is lying on the grass at one of our LDS churches.  It is pretty safe because all the churches are surrounded by nice fences and walls, which dogs can't get through.

 Which is important because this is a typical sight here.  (I took this picture looking out across the street from the Church where Lyle is taking a nap). There are collection areas in town where people take their trash. There are no animal control people here, dogs get to roam free where ever they want. So the dogs go through the garbage until it is cleaned up by the city.  The end result is garbage and dogs everywhere.  The people here just take it in stride, no one seems upset about it, but it was one of the first things I noticed when we arrived.
The dogs are pretty tame though and they don't really seem to bother anyone.  They are even experts a crossing the crazy busy streets here, which even I have a hard time crossing.

This adorable family has not been to church in 10 years, they have decided to come back and with the love and support of the Sister missionaries.  The girl in front is nine and just got baptized on Saturday, she couldn't stop smiling.  The father is so excited about family history and is planning on going to the Temple again in August with family names.  The pictures below are in his house as we work on finding names of ancestors to take to the temple.

The Sister missionaries are so loving and kind to everyone, here they are helping us get the information in familysearch. What you don't see are the baby chickens under our feet and the guinea pigs in the cage on the dirt floor right behind the  boy in the back.  It is perfect, dinner is growing right here in the kitchen.

We headed South to Espinar on Saturday.  It sits at about 14,000 ft in elevation.

 Elder Poulsen insisted that I take a picture of this.  This is a typical sight at the bus stations.  People are trying to sell food to all the passengers as they get on and off the buses.  They have plastic bags with juices, potatoes, fried cheese and yes, chicken soup (remember my last post about the woman holding up the bus while she dashed off to get her chicken soup).  It looks good but we don't dare try any of it, we just need to be so careful about what we eat.

putting the baggage on the roof of our bus

buying the tickets

We arrived at Espinar and we saw people selling their wool on the street just like they do everything else.  Look at this big pile.

We had reservations for a hotel for the night, but we couldn't find it.  We arrived at a tall cement building that had a hardware store on the main floor.  It was exactly where the hotel was supposed to be.  We looked in this little door and it looked like a construction site.  Well, Elder Hasler and Elder Poulsen went in to explore.  Julie and I waited and continued looking for something that resembled a hotel.  We felt like we were in the Twilight zone, with a missing hotel and with our men disappearing  somewhere inside this door.  After asking one more person where the hotel was and being told it was through this door, we went inside.  There were stairs leading up somewhere and we decide to follow them.  Finally after 3 floors of huge empty unfinished rooms we found a landing with a foyer and a desk.  There were our men checking into the rooms.

 This is a picture of our room, nice and clean and totally hidden from the world.  They actually had several rooms and they were full.  I don't know how anyone would know to find this place.

This baby alpaca is so cute.

This is a store that sells wool.

The following pictures are of the work we did Saturday night in Espinar after we did a fireside.

 These people were waiting for us and had all these computers set up.  This is an amazing ward, the people are so loving and full of faith.  We went to Church the following day and it was Fast Sunday.  The testimonies were so pure.  Everyone testified of Christ and the truthfulness of the Gospel.  It was one of the best Fast and Testimony meetings we have ever been to, and I didn't even understand a lot of what was said.

 Later in the day, we were surprised by one of the members with dinner and she invited over 25 people.  The Haslers lived and served here 18 years ago and raised their kids here. Since they are going home to the U.S. the end of May they wanted to give them a warm thank you and farewell.  The people here are so full of love, they just put their arms around us and included us in everything.  It was an incredible Sunday.  We have only been in this ward once and already feel like they are one of the best Wards we have ever been to.

Below are some pictures I took on the streets in Espinar

These little women are cleaning the streets with shovels and brooms, they work for the city.  We have seen women in Cuszco do the same manual labor for the city.

This lady is on a bicycle pushing a cart.  We have seen a lot of people doing this.  She will probably fill it with things to sell.

A whole family on a motorcycle. Check out the llama between the man and woman, and the baby on the mother's back.

The following pictures are of the drive back from this remote city.  Isn't this beautiful country?

look at the beautiful mountain peaks in the background

 The missionaries in Espinar on Sunday March 6, 2016

Some of the people in this amazing, loving ward.  The tall North-american in the center served his mission here a few years ago and is doing an internship in Cuzco, he just happened to be visiting this Sunday also.