Show Us Your Life: Mission Trips

Peru! One of my favorite places in the world! I've been on two mission trips with our home church to Peru and Eddie has been on three. Anna and Lance will be going on their first trip this summer.

***All pictures were snagged from friends on Facebook! Sorry!!! Mine are all on my external harddrive and it was just easier to steal!***

The trip is primarily medical- or building-based. I've never been on a building trip. The years I went we had a dentist, an eye doctor, a medical doctor, a physical therapist, and various "helpers." I was part of the Vacation Bible School for children in the villages and Eddie was sort of all over the place - but usually playing with kids or working with translators in evangelism.

Our trips always began in Lima, Peru where we caught flights to Iquitos - a city on the Amazon River. (I could tell you about the year that we flew from Jacksonville to Baton Rouge to Houston to ATLANTA to Lima to Iquitos to Lima to Arequipa to Cusco to Lima to Houston to Tallahassee...but I'll refrain from that nonsense.) Upon arriving in Iquitos we get on a bus and drive to Mike and Susie's base where we begin our stay on this:

The Chosen Vessel! What an experience to live on a boat for five days! (Cold water showers...you have to shower after coming in from working when cold water is appealing!)

If you look very closely and you know me you can see ME in the above picture playing with the parachute!

See the big log in the picture above? It's probably mahogany. They sell the wood there. Looks nothing like what I imagined it to!

This picture was taken in a BIG village/city. Most villages are teensy but this one was large enough that they had their own "market" where someone was selling fish.

Most people sleep in hammocks raised above the floor. I even saw "cribs" that were hammocks!

I would go back to Peru in a heartbeat, I think! The people are fantastic, the culture is so interesting, and it's just such a different world. It's a great reminder of how much we take for granted here!