Iquitos

Mansur, the dancing machine

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Here’s another video of a few of the boys from Puerto Alegria dancing to a mix of songs by DC Reto.

One of the boys in this group has quite an interesting story. The boy in the yellow hoodie is Mansur. A few years ago, while he was living in Puerto Alegria, he was climbing in a tree and fell out of it. He broke his leg, arm and damaged his spine in the fall and Gene, the house father, rushed him to a hospital. Since Puerto Alegria isn’t in the city of Iquitos, it took a while to make it to the city and then to the hospital. When he reached the hospital, the doctors would not operate on him, claiming they didn’t have proper equipment. After hearing this, Gene took Mansur to another hospital, where he was met by a capable doctor. The doctor said that because of the delay and lots of movement since the accident, Mansur might never walk again. Throughout the night, the doctor operated on Mansur and set his broken bones. While the doctor was working on Mansur, Gene was out in the waiting room praying for his recovery.

Thankfully, Mansur made a wonderful recovery and can be seen dancing as part of the younger boys choreography. I did not know Mansur before his accident, but can say now that he is a boy that truly enjoys life and loves playing around. I frequently saw him running around the house, dancing, playing soccer and lots of smiling.

Goodbye Amazon, Hello Andes

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This morning was my last little bit to spend time with the boys at Puerto Alegria. Out of anticipation of leaving and wanting to take advantage of the little time I had before departing the house at 8:30, I woke up at 5:45 to shower and pack the few things I still needed, like my tent. If everything had worked perfectly, 5:45 would have been a perfect time to wake up. On my way to the shower, I ran into Lilia, one of the cooks, who informed me that there was no water – somebody forgot to fill the tank with water from the river the night before – and I would have to wait for him to get up and do it. So, I returned to my room and finished packing.

At about 7:30, the boys were all up (I also forgot that they sleep in on Sundays and don´t wake up at the normal 6am!) and ready for breakfast. Since it is Sunday, they didn´t have their typical morning devotional since they were to meet later on in the day and we proceeded to have breakfast – my favorite Puerto ALegria breakfast, pancakes! But before we ate, Willy, the caregiver spoke to the boys about the team from Nebraska that left the day before, about how they had come from such a long way away to share God’s love with them. Atfer mentioning the team, he changed topics and started talking about how thankful the boys should be for me – for the 2 months I spent playing, dancing, hugging, singing, and supporting them in their lives. (Me?! I was only doing what I thought I should be doing.) This made me realize that these were my last moments with them and, of course, made me cry. Things did not get better when they started to sing one of my favorite songs, La Niña de Tus Ojos, a song I woke up and fell asleep to every night while in Puerto Alegria.

When it was time to go, I carried my bags down to the maloca (the gazebo by the river) where all 43 boys were waiting for me. The littlest, Luis (who I have written about before), ran up to me and asked where I was going. I explained that I had to go to my home, that I loved him very much, and that I would miss him. He said that it was okay because he was going to come with me. After telling me this, he ran over to his Papi Willy and told him that he was going to go with me, wherever I was going. After loading my bags into the chalupa (boat), I returned up to the maloca for the final goodbyes. They charged me and one by one, I said goodbye to each boy. Some came multiple times and the whole time I was hugging them, Luis was standing at my feet with his arms around my knees and his head buried in my legs. Of course by this time I was crying and he asked me over and over again, “Why are you crying? Why are you sad?”

At some point it was time to go, time to make the last trip into Iquitos, time to leave Puerto Alegria for the last time on this trip.

(As I write this, I´m sitting in Billy’s apartment in Lima, waiting for our 11pm bus to head up to Huaraz, where we´ll take a little van to Yungay and a taxi up to our Girasoles home in Kusi. Today I will have traveled by boat, plane, bus and car to go from the Amazon jungle to the Andean highlands – all in 24 hours.)

Final Days in Puerto Alegria

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Today, Friday, is my last full day of normal life at the Casa Girasoles home in Puerto Alegria since tomorrow, I will spend all day in Iquitos, giving a tour of the Belen market, medical clinic that Scripture Union runs and spending an afternoon at Quistococha (which is a local zoo and lake where we will go swimming). After a long day tomorrow, I will leave the team in Iquitos to stay at a hotel, and return for my final night in Puerto Alegria before returning to Lima on Sunday.

When I first arrived to the jungle at the beginning of July, I did not know what to expect. Would I make it in the heat, with the mosquitos? How would I handle a slow, very relaxed life? What I completely forgot about is that when you live with 40 boys, there is never a dull moment. Between stories, jokes, photos, hugs, swinging in a hammock, soccer games and work teams, the past 7 weeks have been full of good memories.

A few days ago when I was heading into Iquitos very early in the morning with Gene, we were talking about my time here in his house. He couldn´t believe that I had been here for such a long time already and didn´t realize that this was part of my final week working with him, the Girasoles boys and work teams. I told him how happy I was to have spent my summer at Puerto Alegria and how much I would miss each one of the boys and people at the home. He laughed, smiled, patted my shoulder, and asked when I would be back.

I could easily spend another 2 months here in Puerto Alegria.

Singing & Dancing

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These are a few of my favorite moments from being in Puerto Alegria.

One of the educator/assistants at Puerto Alegria, Rodbin, entertaining a couple boys by singing “Si Tuvieras Fe/Te Adorará” (one of my favorite songs) one afternoon.

(Here’s part 2 of the song. When Rodbin noticed I was recording, he stopped for a few minutes and then started singing again)

One of the weeks in Puerto Alegria, we divided the boys into two teams, Grupo Rojo (Red) and Grupo Azul (Blue) and had various competitions throughout the week. The final night that the team from Alabama was with us at the house, there was a choreography, song and skit competition. This is one of the many choreographies that was presented that last night by the Grupo Rojo. Marcelino is in the white t-shirt, Geilerson is wearing yellow, and Luis is the little boy doing his own thing in front of Marcelino and Geilerson.

Ronald, one of the older boys from Puerto Alegria dancing to El Pato, even though he clearly didn’t want the attention.