Friday

Hello! We have not taken any pictures yet because we keep forgetting the camera, so I just went outside to our balcony and took a picture looking east. We are right next to the entrance. You can see the guard shack on the right. They have good security here. As you can see, the grounds are rather dry. The locals say that it did not rain much this past year, and now this is the dry season. They call it "summer," and schools are out for about two months. Since they are on summer vacation, the Christ for the City staff also took a break. There are no classes and no kids clubs; however, another lady who is full time staff in the capital will be here for two weeks, staying at the rental house to teach sewing. She will have one class in the morning from 8 - 12 to teach how to make bags, and another in the afternoon from 2 - 6 for sewing. She is a very nice lady. Pray that she will be able to guide the conversations to spiritual matters.

Yesterday we had to go to a big town 45 minutes away to get our local bank account upgraded. We have not been able to access our account using the Internet because they have added another layer of security besides the usual passwords. It is a security token. Security tokens are used to prove one's identity electronically (as in the case of a customer trying to access his bank account). The token is used in addition to a password to prove that the customer is who he claims to be. The token acts like an electronic key to access the account and it produces 35,000 different numerical combinations, a new one every time. The problem was that we were in the US when they implemented this extra level of security, and we had to go to one of the main branches to get it. Not only they require it, but they charge you $5.00 for it! So, 45 minutes up to town, one and a half hours getting our information updated and the token, and 45 minutes back. That was the whole afternoon.

Last evening we went to visit another family. They have three kids. They actually are the landlords for Christ for the City and live behind in another house. They are very good friends. We invited them to come to the couple's conference, and they also invited their neighbors. I hope they all attend.

We actually went to the beach yesterday morning, but the water was too cold! Not as cold as California, but we are spoiled. We will try again this afternoon. The best event of the day was the arrival of the German Bakery truck. (German chocolate cake, Rubia!) Best bread and pastries in the whole province at your doorstep. Who can complain about that? I know... it is tough, but somebody has to do it!

Until next time, from the beach...