Skip to main content

We Arrived with Everything Intact...Barely

Just wanted to let you know we are back in Paraguay after our two day journey. We did have an adventure or two, though. Of course, with us...there always seems to be adventure in the air!



On Wed. we were waiting in the bus terminal in Buenos Aires and while I was taking a walk with Timmy, Norb sat on top of our luggage reading a book in a corner. A guy walked past him and dropped his wallet and walked on. Another man asked if the wallet was Norb's and he responded that it was not. The man suggested that it belonged to another man that was walking up the stairs and that Norb may want to return it to him. Norb was hesitant to do so, but the other man offered to watch our luggage while Norb returned the wallet to the stranger. Norb quickly ran up the stairs to do a kind deed and by the time he was at the top, the luggage watcher had ran off with our laptop. Norb panicked and asked bystanders which way the thief went. They responded that he went left, when in reality he had gone right. However, Norb was so afraid that someone else might take our bags while he was on the chase, that he just stayed put resolving himself to the fact that we had lost our expensive computer donated to us by dear friends. He was devastated.



The amazing ending to this story is that a police officer saw the whole thing from upstairs and had radioed his partner at the entrance of the station and stopped the thief just before he was making his getaway. The thief dropped the laptop and escaped the cop, but we recovered our computer!!!



We consider this no less than a miracle. Our friends had their laptop stolen last year from the same bus terminal and they did not recover theirs, unfortunately. The cops even said how rare it is to recover items, because the thieves are so quick and sneaky. We are grateful to God for his GRACE to us, even when we did not deserve to have our computer returned to us. We are also thankful that there are a few honest police officers in South America. We certainly learned a few lessons and we just keep thanking God for watching out for us, even when we make mistakes.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Christmas in Paraguay!

If you're wondering what Paraguayans do at Christmastime, they have some great traditions , including the " noche buena " meal on Christmas Eve at midnight.  They eat lots chipa guasu (a type of corn casserole, stay tuned for a recipe), asado or grilled meat (some eat it cold), salads, especially fruit salad, watermelon and drink mucho terere . Families travel from all over the country, many even return from working in other countries like Brazil, Argentina, and Spain, to celebrate with loved ones. This is us at last year's Kurrle celebration in Asuncion. Festivities are anything but a silent night with fireworks, loud music and drinking cidra (hard cider).  Most Paraguayans do not decorate Christmas trees (we decorate ours in shorts!) or emphasize Santa Claus.  Instead, they put beautiful nativities " pesebres " in their yards and in store fronts.  Kind of novel to focus on Christ at Christmas, isn't it! To beat the heat, many Paraguayans g...

Paraguayan Weddings

On Valentine’s Day, we had the joy of attending the wedding of Sandra and Anastacio, young leaders in the church. Sandra is my assistant with Children of Promise and Anastacio, apart from his carpentry job, has a popular youth-focused radio program every night at 8:00 on our station. We’ve been to quite a few weddings, and these are some of the uniquenesses of southern Paraguayan wedding celebrations from our North American culture: 1. Nothing is fancy. Emphasis is placed on the act of marriage and not on the decorations or food. 2. It is not an expectation that parents help pay for expenses. Most families just make it each month with regular expenses and cannot afford to pay for eleborate feasts. Most couples have to spend months saving for their own wedding. 3. Borrow as much as possible. Many times wedding dresses are borrowed 5-10 times, because few women can afford their own. Flowers, decorations, shoes and ties (Norb loans out his ties often...since he never wears them!...

How to make Rosella (Roselle) Juice and Tea

This is rosella (not to be confused with grosella, which is gooseberry).  Rosella is from the hibiscus family. It's harvest time here, and we use the rosella to make juice and tea.  It's properties are absolutely tremendous.  It helps sooth colds, coughs, helps digestion, promotes healthy kidney function, is a treatment for cancer, and reduces a fever and that's just a few of its benefits!  To make rosella juice, first de-pit the fruit and wash the skin thoroughly. Put the fruit into boiling water until the water is bright red (about 15 minutes).  The color is so vibrant, Roselle is sold to make dyes.  Strain the fruit (which can be used to make a delicious jam) and refrigerate the juice.  Add a few squirts of Stevia for a healthy drink. The finished product looks exactly like red Kool-aid, but is entirely full of nutrients.  We can't get enough of it. We dehydrated the petals for hot tea.  All you need is two dried flowers to infus...