Sunday night, Rachel told Addison and Jarred that the van to Rurrenabaque would be leaving at 4 a.m. Monday morning and they would need to be up by 3:30 in order to make it into town before the van departed. They slept peacefully, as if it was the night before Christmas and all through the Internado was well, except for the mice in the wall by their heads. The young, handsome men woke to the booming of a sub-tropical monsoon that little did they know would not cease until 10 a.m. Addison, the bravest of the two, put his life in the hands of the Lord, started the moto promptly at 3:42 a.m., and drove into town through the relentless rain in search of an answer as to whether or not they would be leaving. Jarred stood motionless, watching the taillight fade into the storm and thinking, man, its pretty wet out there. Addison returned at 3:58 with an affirmative response from the driver whom who awakened. Even so, the young men and lady decided not to use their ticket and wait for a time when they thought the rivers were crossable for sure. In a nondramatic turn of events, the vans departure had been postponed until 3 p.m. on the same day. The trio carried their luggage into town along with no idea of when, or if, they would return. They boarded the van along with 11 other citizens of Ixiamas with the goal of eating supper in R’town. The van reached a distance of 200 yards when the conductor received word that the series of creeks between the two towns were un-fordable. The departure was delayed 12 more hours until 4 the following morning. The third time was the charm. The trio arrived in R-town in time for breakfast Tuesday morning and to purchase floata tickets to La Paz. The 20-plus hour journey had the trio encountering a delay due to an apparent landslide of somesort that had held up traffic for an undetermined amount of time. or, predetermined depending on your view of Calvinism. The journey also had Addison fending off a pack of arctic wolves with only a dull arrowhead fossil. Jarred slept most of the time. Rachel talked with strangers. The three amigos arrived in La Paz at 6 a.m. local time, and they are now, with the exception of the lady whose whereabouts is unknown, restfully sleeping in Hotel Sagarnaga after the men hunted and found the #1 Whopper Value Meal.

Nathan ‘Watson and Crick’ Paulk, Jamie ´The Cannibal´ Waldhour, and the rest of the Domestic Staff

Call us at 256’396’2015. We need more work to do and want to fill the remaining Learn and Serve Slots.

Yesterday, Addison and I went to put a tree out of its misery. We needed a couple of good size trees to use as a supporting frame for when we begin the drilling process. Addison had already begun chopping a tree that met our qualifications. It also happened to be the one of the prettiest I have seen in Bolivia. Within a few minutes, the tree lay on the ground and we proceeded to chop it into manageable pieces. I noticed an ant, probably the size of a baby seal, scurrying around Addison´s foot, who by the way was wearing chacos and shorts. We knew immediately what it was and decided we needed a break and would resume at 5 pm in the afternoon. This was around 9 am. This was the first buna that we had seen, an insect which we have heard horror stories about. A bite from its mouth has been known to make women grow beards and men slip into seclusion for months. Ok. Maybe not that extreme but rumor has it they are extremely painful and may cause a fever.

      Early mornings are always crazy in Ixiamas. No one needs an alarm clock. The question of each day is ¨what sound will I wake up to today?¨ Machetes whacking? Dogs dying painful deaths? Children screaming ¨Hermano! Hermano!¨? This morning I awoke to something I have yet to experience. I was convinced for a while I was dreaming the sound, but alas I was not. The pastor had been up since 4. Sometime around 5 he began to play creepy sounding keyboard music which lead me to believe I was living in some haunted hostel or something. I later discovered that the reason he was up so early was that around 4, a group of pigs had gotten into the rice that we harvested last weekend and he had chased them off.

   I dont know where Addison is right now. He walked by the internet cafe a few minutes ago, mumbled something really fast, and left. The motorcycle is broken again and he is wandering back and forth across town trying to get the necessary parts and a mechanic to repair it.

Just an ordinary day in Ixiamas,

Jarred

First off, a hen just walked past my chair in the internet cafe. In other news, Addison and I will be going back to La Paz on Monday night. I am guessing we will arrive there around 10 pm Tuesday night if all goes well. I am not sure what the itenirary is but we will be going to Santa Cruz from La Paz for well drilling training from a group based out of Texas. From my undersdtanding, Santa Cruz is another day´s drive from La Paz in another direction than Ixiamas. Hopefully we will have a good grasp on what to expect with the drilling process after a couple of days and will be able to ride back with Rachel who will stay in La Paz for about a week. Unrelated to that, we will be harvesting rice again this weekend in the Chaco. Unrelated to that, if anyone can overnight me a sloppy, mayo dripping cheeseburger, I will be happy to reimburse you.-Jarred

 

So after supper Rachel asked me if Jarred and I had any plans. (This is last night) We were planning on maybe playing chess with some of the kids and perhaps watching a movie. ha…she needed us to take two of the girls to the hospital because they needed teeth pulled and could not wait anymore. The moto is once again broken so we would have to walk. I went and got Jarred because I did not want to walk alone, because as Jarred put it any robber that sees him coming will most def think twice. The hospital is very centrally located in the exact opposite corner of the outskirts of town. We started that way with Pamela and Irma, after a brisk evening walk we arrived at the hospital were we found the waiting room very easily by sitting on the benches in the hall….we sat for about five minutes and heard a few screams here and there nothing much or according to the girls out of the ordinary. As i listened to the screams it took me a while but I finally noticed a pattern thinking nothing of it I just kept talking to Jarred about how he just used the wrong bathroom and there were what we thought motos for sale in the waiting room/hospital hallway. Suddenly we heard what sounded like a baby crying. I knew I heard it but was not sure what it was I looked at Jarred and asked if he heard that and he was busy reading the walls and wondering why the sign outfront did not say they treated men here…ha…I looked at Irma who confirmed what I had thought in the first place. By motioning here hands as if to throw me a hot potato I understood that we had just heard the sound of a baby being born about three doors down….it was pretty amazing. That was definately a first for both of us. haha…We then got to check on one of our little girls that lives in the internado who was in the hospital. She had fallen off a log while harvesting rice and cut herself pretty badly but is now ok so it was a good night for us. Pamela still has not gotten to get her tooth pulled because the dentist was busy so hopefully today after school.

I was mistaken. The name of the cereal is chocapic…not chocpita