Immigration

If you are ever going to travel to Peru, please let me give you a friendly bit of advice: when you are getting off the plane and going through customs and immigration, they give you a little slip of paper about the size of a small receipt when they hand back your passport.  Although nothing is said about this tiny little paper - it's important! It's not a receipt, you will pay 18% more at hotels if you don't have it and you will need it to leave the country.   No, we didn't lose ours but we also didn't realize how necessary that little scrap of paper would be!
OK, back to our story - When we'd first arrived here in Peru, we had to go to Interpol and get our teeth checked, fingerprints taken and some paperwork filled out.  We later sent our passports back to Lima (on a bus) with a general power of attorney so that we could get a card to stay here for more than the 183 days allowed per year. We didn't have an ink pad so we broke a pen and got the ink out and took our fingerprints with that to send back up to people in the area office who were helping us (that's Marco sitting by Curt at Interpol).  Thursday we went with some great Elders to immigrations and filled out more paperwork and got our fingerprints and picture taken again and were given a card (carne de extranjeria) that allows us to stay here for a year.  Here are some pictures of our interpol/immigration adventures.

 We happened to be in Lima on Cinco de Mayo and the Myers and ourselves were able to wrangle an invitation to go celebrate.  There was a group of senior missionaries (about 2 doz) that got together and went to a little Mexican restaurant they'd found that was having a big cinco de mayo celebration - including a fun but very loud mariachi band!  In the group were the Lima MTC President and his wife, a couple of the area doctors and their wives, some humanitarian missionaries and I think some self reliance missionaries in the mix.  It was fun to get to meet some new people and hear about some of their experiences.

We stayed at a bed and breakfast this trip and we had a nice little balcony outside our room.

Okay, you're in Lima.  You've been kinda sick for a few days.  What would you do?  Well, let me tell you what my adventurous sweetie did - he bought a slice of cake with a custard filling from a kid (out of a duffle bag). The little guy was trying to raise money for a scouting activity. I am freaking out a little bit and he just asks me what it's going to do?  Make him sick?  Well, he's eating and enjoying his (not so yummy) cake and he gets almost done and he takes a bite and says, oh, I don't think I should be eating this!  That bite tasted bad!  So I snapped this picture as a before in case we ended up in the ER with an after picture but, he's good now.  He makes life so fun!

 On Wednesday, there was a specialized training for the hermanas in our mission.  Sister McGinn let the two senior sisters help out a little with putting it together.  It was informative and a lot of fun and I think the sisters enjoyed the day together.  I loved getting to know the sisters outside our area a little better. They are such wonderful young women and they are trying so hard to be excellent servants of the Lord.

We were also able to attend a day of training on Friday that included the physical and mental health of the missionaries.  We had a couple of area doctors come and talk to all the missionaries from the Lima area, the McGinns will be taking the training to
the rest of the missionaries in a week or so.
                             ***
These are pictures near where we were staying in Mira Flores.  We went with the Myers to Larcormar on Tuesday night after we'd arrived in Lima. It's a big mall inside a cliff next to the ocean that caters to the tourist.  We had a good old fashioned hamburger!  The old lighthouse was across the street from the B & B we'd stayed at.  There is a long narrow strip with a beautiful park that runs between the road and the ocean. There is a gorgeous view.  If you decide to walk down the steps to go to the beach - just let us warn you it's a long way back up -especially if you start         feeling ill!  Life worth remembering!


B&B Key - pics upside down but this was a cute inexpensive little place to stay and they had the sweetest little receptionist!

More Food!  Delfino Mar Restaurant

Starting the almost 8 hour bus ride back to Nasca.  Hurry and send a text to Jessica before I lose service and then ... nap time?!