I took a fair about of equipment with me: my digital SLR still camera, all 4 of my lenses for it, flash & other accessories, video camera & accessories and my computer with case. That left room in my luggage for one shirt, one pair of pants and either a toothbrush or toothpaste. Many people, mostly locals, told me to be careful with my equipment. Perhaps I was taking a chance to carry it all, but if you want good photographs you have to carry your equipment. I generally took it with me everywhere I went since I was not sure where it would be safe to leave it. At the clinic, however, I left it in the pharmacy or behind one of the medical stations. I was quite the tourista walking back and forth from the clinic three times a day carrying all of my stuff. The straw hat didn’t help the image.

This afternoon we finished packing the clinic. Actually, I should say the others finished packing the clinic. I went to see the church building in San Juan, about 15 minutes away. Lindsay Green, Cindy Green & the Mechems also went and Julio drove us. Julio worked with the clinic this week. He is a taxi driver and driving people around was him main job. He was the one who kept asking me to do my John Wayne impression. I got a first-hand view of the lack of traffic control. I saw a few traffic signals along the way in the busy part of town, but generally it was biggest vehicle goes first. Some of the roads had marked lanes, but apparently the lane markings are merely suggestions.

The church building at San Juan was in much better condition that the one in Villa Maria. It is also a school—for Kindergarten through 3rd grade, I think. Last year’s clinic was held in a courtyard next to this building. It is bigger than the space we have for this year’s clinic. We have roughly 2500 sq. ft. this year.

The houses and business looked better the further we were away from the part of Villa Maria where we were working, although nothing that compared to the U.S.

After returning, the local Christians gave us some straw hats as gifts: some cowboy hats, fedoras and bonnets. They are really quiet fetching. (Those who are not native Southerners can look up “fetching”.) They usually give a gift of some type to the mission team. Last years it was t-shirts that said “Church of Christ” in several languages.

Then about twelve of use took a tour of Villa Maria in “Mosquitoes”, the tiny taxis that are everyone in Villa Maria, and apparently a lot of the surrounding area in Lima. We packed two into the back seat of each one with the driver in the front. We went to the park first. It was a bit of a shock—it was as neat as any park in the U.S. When we turned onto the street the park was on, a police officer stopped us and talked shapely to our driver who was in the lead. He said something in Spanish that included “Americans”, “Tourists” and “Photographs”. The police officer then let us through. The park had a slide and climbing thingy like any park in the U.S. They had a fountain in the park and they turned it on for us. When we left the park we went up on the hill surrounding Villa Maria. So far on the tour the town looked better as we drove away form out clinic. Now it stared looking worse than out area. We went up the hill on a one lane road the had two way traffic, but not much. The houses got worse as we went up. When we got to the top there was a gate with a police officer. Again, the police officer did not seem to like seeing us. Our driver who was in the lead talked to the police officer and he let us thru. We found out later he had to pay 5 soles to the police officer at each place to let us thru.

The houses at the top of the hill were the worst in the area. When you look-up the word “hovel” in the multimedia dictionary, you will see a video clip of these houses. Think of the houses you see in television commercials asking for money to help children in third-world countries—they were that kind of house. However, there were a few soccer fields in the area that were reasonably well maintained. Off in the distance we saw a cemetery. One of the drivers said it was the largest cemetery in the world.

After we went back down the mountain, they drove us to a traffic circle in a busier part of Villa Maria, or maybe it was an adjacent district. In the middle of the traffic circle was a tree statue. I can’t explian it–you have to see the photograph. It was a memorial to the victims of political violence. Then they took us to our hotel. The price for this hour-long tour of the city was 5 soles per person, about $1.90.

Thursday night was the last church service. The sermon was translated into English for the second time during our trip. The cell phone rang again—in the house attached to the back of the community center. This time the girl ran up, unlocked the door and turned it off right away. I went to the children’s class again for part of the service. This time, in addition to the dog outside the circle, there was also a dog sitting inside the circle.

After the final service, we had to say our good-byes. In Peru and other SSSA (Spanish-Speaking South American) countries, hellos and good-byes are very important. Each of our group needed to say goodbye to each person in the group that worked with us in the clinic this week. You don’t need to speak Spanish—goodbye or adios we all understand.

You may remember Catherine from an earlier post. She is the girl who tried to give me her toy monkey on the first day. She is the one in the “Rodeo Girl” t-shirt in Saturday’s photo of me with the monkey around my neck. She didn’t work in the clinic, but I think her parents did. She came by the clinic for a little while every day and always came over to talk to me.

After I had said goodbye to most of the people, Catherine ran up to me and threw her arms around me and buried her face in my shirt. She didn’t say a word; she just held on tight. I reached down to hug here and pat her shoulders reassuringly. She didn’t speak or even look up at me. After a few minutes, I tried to tell her I had to go, but she just clung tighter to me and said “No.” I didn’t have the heart to just pry her off of me so I kept saying “Yo neccestio vir con mi amigos”, and “El omnibus va sin mi“—the best I could say “I have to go with my friends” and “The bus will leave without me”. Catherine just kept sayings “No, no.” A real heartbreaker. After a few minutes, some of the ladies from Villa Maria convinced her to let me go. I was the last of our group to leave the community center.