Kaliedescope

My Sister in Peru-One Story

( I can't figure out where the pictures went for now, sorry)

After the earthquake--

Ysabel Cuya is a mother of 5, whose husband was put in jail 4 years ago. She is very active, has an autistic child and lost her job at the hospital when the earthquake took it down. She lives in a tent. Three of the children have been put in a state school for their education and protection. She is living off of her food storage. She has title to her land and so she is on the list to have a new house. She is becoming a bricklayer in our education program so she can help build her home. They are both our missionaries from 20 years ago.

We spent a few more days in the earthquake zone. The first house is one that is waiting for the roof to dry. The second is the house they are making for my missionary, Ysabel. She has 5 kids, 3 are in a youth house in Ica going to school because she doesn't have a house. She has been living in a tent for over a year.

They have started her house. She left her 12 year old daughter and her autistic 14 year old son, who doesn't speak, to come to the church and sign her loan papers so she could take electrician, bricklaying and plumbing classes. While she was gone, people stole 3 of her bricks. She will have them all stored in her tent by morning.

In Pisco, many people are still living in tents even a year after the earthquake. Grim.

The Church donates tons of goods down here. Today we were asked to represent the Church at a Prison in Callao for a large Church Donation. We went and as we were going into the prison we saw one of our missionaries that we had not seen, David Piscoya, he is a doctor and was inside the prison helping. After we took the picture we had to turn in our camera. Then we sat on the stand with the Senator of Callao and he said a lot of nice things about us and the Church in a televised ceremony. There were other things involved, but we had donated over 30 wheel chairs and 1,100 blankets and 1,500 hygiene kits. It was crazy. I am watching the TV now to see how much of us are on there.

When the earthquake hit Pisco, several hundred people were trapped in this church and werekilled. Now they are bringing it down. Notice the mound that they had to build up to getmachine in there to tear it down. That is an interesting solution to the problem.

We are virtually starting from zero here. We are working on a lot of loans to teach people to work in construction and build their own houses. The Laytons, Greadings and Allands and others are building like crazy down here. (private builders from the States-good volunteers)

Ysabel Cuya now has the shell of a house. She wanted us to come down and dedicate it for her so we did. We had a nice little prayer and that was it. Her autistic son was cooking rice over an open fire when we got there. They don't have electricity yet but they are working on it. They have been living in a tent for over a year. They actually still are but are slowly getting things together for the house. She plans on selling things out the front of the house to students in the two schools that pass by her door and are very close. She does have a job right now.

With everyone gone, it really became a thing of just doing it myself. I do not know the final countbut I processed, approved and communicated with in excess of 210 loans during the last coupleofweeks. We did 184 loans all of last year. We are up to 500+ new loans plus we process the ongoing renewals which would be a whole lot more. We are both very busy.

Douglas Earl

(vjc)