January Thaw, How the time flies

Jason as "George" and Jenna as "Sarah" in the play "January Thaw". 11 years ago this January we met in Dram Club for this play.

Jr/Sr (Prom) Jason's Senior year 2001. We we best friends at this point but still denied anything more than friendship.

So much for "just friends".

September 2007

Cowboys, Crocodilians, and Quicksand

Sometimes it feels like I’m living in a western with the wide open space out here and people who stop by on horses. The other day a “cowboy” rode up looking for his lost horse. Unfortunately he was a day late. There was a horse wandering around our yard the day before but had moved on.

Other times it feels like something out of Indiana Jones when I take a hike around our landlord’s property and suddenly find the ground beneath me trying to make me a midday snack. I’ve run into “quick mud” before or sand that sinks relatively fast but this was the real deal quicksand. Everywhere I stepped the ground turned to liquid and so I could not backtrack, I had to find a new path. The faster I moved, the quicker the what felt like solid ground liquefied into a soupy mess. How to survive quicksand: Don’t run, you’ll only make the quicksand “quicker”. I feel like there is a moral in there somewhere.
And then there are Crocodile Dundee moments like Tuesday night when all the dogs were barking more intensely than usual. I went out to investigate only to find a hissing pair of glowing eyes in the bushes surrounded by the dogs. At first I thought it was a small wild cat but it turned out to be a Spectacled Caiman, a smaller relative to Crocodiles and Alligators. Those of you who know me know that of course I could not leave it alone. Soon I was traipsing up to the house to display my 5 foot Caiman to Jenna.

Quicksand, Caimans, Snakes in my seedling fruit trees, and tarantulas on the porch, it has been an adventure as usual. The new year promises to bring lots more exiting things, in addition, of course, having a little one around. Last weekend we had our team out to our house for a meeting to plan for this coming year. There are a lot of projects and ministries we hope to accomplish this year. Hopefully we can get the chicken project running smoothly and put in the nutrition garden for the children’s center early this year. We have several trips to the Beni (Amazonian part of Bolivia) where we will live on a boat going up and down various rivers to various communities to provide medical aid. Often times doctors, dentists, or church teams come down from North America to help out. Our big team dream is to find a plot of land for a camp that would eventually be converted into a bi-vocational (Bible and other vocational options) training center for indigenous peoples of Bolivia, provided funds become available. I cannot wait to see some of out plans become reality as well as experience the realities we did not plan on.

The SAM Bolivia Team at Conference

Back to Santa Cruz

After only a few days in our new home out near Pailon, we had to move back to Santa Cruz. Well, not really, but we spent 5 nights back near Santa Cruz which is as long as we have been at our new house. We went back for conference, a week long retreat where all the SAM missionaries get together to get away. I am not sure we were quite ready to "get away" after just moving but we really enjoyed conference. Jenna led worship and I just sat back and enjoyed the retreat, well that and led a nature hike. I think I turned all the kids into little naturalists.

As for our new home, we are loving it. We were enjoying settling in, getting to know our neigbors, and watching Simon make friends with our landlord's dogs and chasing cows around our backyard. Below are some photos of our new place.

Dining Room

Our Bedroom

Soon to be baby nursery

Living room

Kitchen

Christmas Time = Weigner Family Moving Time

Christmas Day 2009

Jenna at 23 weeks pregnant

Yes! It's that time of year again! Christmas has come and gone and again we find ourselves moving. We have moved for the last 3 years the week between Christmas and New Years, and it's beginning to feel like a family tradition. We have been married a little over 2 years, this is our 3rd country we've lived in and we just moved into our 7th house! We are definitely ready to settle down for a little while- like a year and a half.

Christmas was great this year. The week before Christmas we attended several Christmas dinner parties where I accompanied a trumpet player from our mission as the evening's entertainment. We also were able to attend a Christmas Eve service at the English speaking church in town. I sang "Breath of Heaven"- which seemed very appropriate since I'm is getting bigger day by day. We opted to head home after the service for a quiet evening- which was interrupted by a very interesting Bolivian tradition of fireworks starting at about 8pm and reaching its crescendo at midnight. Imagine the biggest 4th of July fireworks display you have ever seen and multiply that by about 4 and that was what we saw and experienced at midnight on Christmas Eve. Everyone in the city buys fireworks and sets them off from their yards, filling the air with the smell of smoke and making it sound like a warzone. It certainly was not a "silent night", but it was fun to see that many fireworks.

As I mentioned before we just moved into our 7th house of our marriage. We will post more pictures soon. We are now living much closer to our ministry site, Poza Verde, and are about 1.5 hours from Santa Cruz. The house we are living in is owned by another missionary family that has to live in the city for now since their kids are in school. We are also located next door (about 400m) from a Trans-World Radio station where we have lovely neighbors who have already made us feel at home. The house is beautiful, in a great location and it is wonderful to be back to country living. We have a cow pasture behind our house and the occasional smells remind us of central Pennsylvania in the summer, not to mention being surrounded by lots of Mennonites who speak only German or spanish.
We have been greeted in German several times now, and I'm wishing I had paid more attention to my Grandfather when he tried to teach me a few basic German phrases. Spanish works as a nice intermediary for communication.





I think thats it for now. Stay posted for more pictures- coming soon! (After we get our internet set up in our house!)

Like a chicken with its head cut off

The dirty deed is done. We butchered the 120 chickens out in Poza Verde. After two days of butchering, everything smells like chicken. It may be a while before I can even look at anything made from chicken.

Paul and Bubba plucking Chickens. This was by far the longest part of the process.

The first day, three of use SAM missionaries went out to help. It took us 3 gringos along with Cesar and Mirta 5 hours to finish 40 chickens. It must have been amusing watching we three Gringos try to butcher chickens. I have only butchered a few at ECHO, Paul did it a few times in Peru many years ago, and Bubba had only researched chicken butchering online. We all had our "unique" ways of getting the job done. Finally Cesar showed us how it was done while a unified, drawn out "ohhhh" escaped our lips at the revelation of a simpler and more effective way. A few times over the course of the day, some of the Ayore children joined us to watch and snack on chicken blood and feet. Yes, you read correctly.

Gusto, one of the Ayore kids snacking on a chicken foot.

On day two, Bubba and I made our way our to Poza Verde dreading the 80 more chickens especially since we were down a man. To our relief, this time the community was involved and already a good portion of the way through. Not only did the increase in numbers speed up the process, but exchanging Gringos for Ayore women who are accustom to plucking and cleaning chickens increased our efficiency. We finished the last chicken around lunch time and all the Ayore who help were rewarded with the chicken innards. Now all that is left is to sell the chickens which has not been too hard, most are already spoken for. All the profits will go to Cesar and Mirta and their work in Poza Verde. I think we unanimously agree that we will be switching to raising chickens for eggs rather than for meat.

Gusto roasting his chicken foot

Election Day: Trapped!

So you have probably had school canceled, work canceled, maybe even had your city shut down, but how about your whole country? Today is election day, and for 24 hours, everything is shut down. Alcohol, meeting in groups (including church), and driving vehicles are all banned for the 24 hour period. There is nothing to do but hang out at home or go out and vote.

As you probably guessed, elections are a big deal here. The differences in political parties here make the Democrats and Republicans look like best friends. Whatever the outcome could mean large changes for the country. We personally do not know enough about the politics to presume to know what result would be best for the people of Bolivia. We can only pray for the best.

Little Weigner

Sorry it has been so long since out last post, there is a lot to catch up on. Today our baby had its second photo shoot, this time in 3-D! The baby was rather stuborn for a while (already taking after one of its parents), turning every way but the way we wanted it to, but eventually the baby turned and we got a few good shots. It was a lot of fun to see it moving around. Still hard to believe there is a little person growing inside Jenna. The baby still apears to be healthy and growing normally. We are very thankful that everything has been going so well. We also found out that we are going to have a... oh sorry, I almost forgot, we're not telling yet but if you care to guess, visit http://bebepool.com/jjweigner and take your best shot.

The finished coop with chickens

We finally have the chicken coop finished in Poza Verde (well, we have a few last little details to finish). I am excited the my rainwater, gravity fed watering system is working! Rainwater off the roof of the coop runs into a holding tank then in to water dishes that refill as the chickens drink. There are now 135 chickens enjoying their new home and they will enjoy it for a few more weeks before they become 135 Christmas dinners. All profits go to help the couple living out there and their ministry.

Cesar cleaning up after his chickens

On one of the trips back from Poza Verde, I was introduced to a new part of life in Bolivia, bloqueos or blockades. Some of the people in the country were feeling ignored by the government so the desided to hang out in the middle of the only highway back to Santa Cruz. They made a baracade of old tires and tree branches. Apparently this is how people strike here. It was not in any way violent (for those of your parents who may be concerned) and it eventually dispersed and we were able to make our way back home.

We have our own car now, a Hyundai Galloper. Never heard of it? Well that is because it does not really exist in the USA. We have been enjoying using an SUV for what it was made for, and that is not exactly cruzing down highways! The 4x4 has been handy lately as the rains have started and the roads around our house have been torn up for new sewage lines. Getting to and from our house has been interesting since each day we have no idea which road is going to be impassable. Last night we drove all over our neighborhood trying to find a route back to our house that did not have a large trench dug out of the middle. Always an adventure!

Jenna's Thanksgiving Pies

SAM Thanksgiving Dinner

We will be moving out of Santa Cruz between Christmas and New Years. This will be the thrid year in a row we will have moved during the holiday season. We decided to move out near a town call Pailon which is closer to Poza Verde, the comunity we spend most of our time working with. We found a wonderful house owned by some other missionaries from another organization.

With Christmas coming up, I'm sure some of you will be doing your shopping online. If you are an online shopper, consider shopping through www.iGive.com. By going through this site, a percentage of your purchase will go toward our ministry. All you have to do is go to iGive.com, sign up for an account and specify South America Mission IRE Mercy Ministry as your charity, then shop your favorite sites like Amazon or Ebay though this site and any business you buy from will give a percentage to our ministry. Get your shopping done and help us out at the same time!