Extreme Peru: Part Six

Puerto Maldonado

The next morning, we got up early and caught our next flight to Puerto Maldonado, located in the Peruvian Amazon. The photographs above show the jungle during our arrival by air.







Motorcycles provide the primary means of transportation within the city of Puerto Maldonado. Many motocycles will stop to give you a ride and take you anywhere in town for only s/.1 (One Sol). Other taxi-like vehicles are really just motorcycles that have been converted into a three-wheel thing with a two-person back seat. Those ones charge s/.2 (Two Soles) to go anywhere in the city.

Extreme Peru: Part Five

Lima

After endless flights, missed connections, and horrendous layovers, we finally landed in Lima. I don't even know how long it actually took us to get there, after we consider the many delays we faced.

Prior to arriving in Lima, we were told to arrange ground transportation through a company called Taxi Green. They operate a counter inside the airport where customers pay before going outside. By paying in advance, we apparently avoid potential conflicts with the driver. In a worst case scenario, some people have even been assaulted by cab drivers. The safest bet is to always call in advance from a recognized company, like Taxi Green.

We found a relatively inexpensive hotel and got the first restful night's sleep in several days. The photograph above is a view from my window at night.

Extreme Peru: Part Four

Buenos Aires

Our condition improved greatly as soon as we boarded our connecting flight to Buenos Aires, Argentina. We transferred to a non-Delta flight and found the level of comfort and service was much better.

As we descended into Buenos Aires, I was impressed by the enormity of the city. A mass of buildings and urbanization stretched out for miles, captured in the photograph above. The culture was also quite different, much more European and sophisticated than other places in Latin America. We had a three hour layover in the airport terminal, which actually reminded me more of an upscale shopping mall. All the big brands were represented, like Gucci and Calvin Klein. The whole terminal smelled to me like sexy men's cologne, like something out of Abercrombie and Fitch. It was all fascinating to be sure, but not really my thing. I would have rather gone out to meet people in the country.

We stayed long enough to browse the mall and check email in an internet cafe. Afterwards, we finally boarded our last connection to Lima.

Extreme Peru: Part Three

Rosi is a fiery, independent, and energetic young woman from Peru.


Carlos and Mirza wait patiently in the São Paulo terminal.

Community

Before embarking on my journey to Peru, I was selected to join this year's cohort of the Leadership Development Program, sponsored by the Community Colleges of Spokane. After an opening retreat, we will gather one day a month to address issues of leadership, community, and professional renewal.

As part of our leadership curriculum, we have examined the process of community formation, development, and growth. The LDP facilitators presented the concept of "communitas," which implies a movement from chaos to order when people join together into a cohesive group. The process generally follows a somewhat organic evolution from one stage to the next, but this does not mean to suggest an easy transition by any means. As groups form, conflicts invariably arise as individual members struggle to identify roles and procedures.

My trip through Brazil provided a microcosm of this phenomenon.

When we missed our connection in Atlanta, five of us were diverted through Brazil en route to Lima, Peru. Before that time, we were basically strangers to one another, but for all intents and purposes, we became a tiny community that experienced all the stages of group development.

As I mentioned before, we met Rosi just after we missed our connection.

A few minutes later, I also met Carlos and Mirza at the Delta gate. They were attempting to resolve the same situation with a Delta agent, and perhaps faced the same level of indifference that we experienced. Carlos spoke with a heavy Spanish accent and the agent seemed to struggle to understand. Assuming that Carlos may not speak English very well, I offered myself as a translator. Carlos turned to me with a hard, red face and barked, "I have been an English teacher in New York City for the last 17 years. I don't need your help!" His wife Mirza smiled apologetically, shrugged her shoulders, and then turned back toward the agent.

I was stunned. I offered my help and had been totally rebuffed. "How rude!" I thought. As far as I was concerned, I didn't care care to ever see that man again. But fate had another agenda. When we arrived in São Paulo, the five of us were grouped together because we all needed to catch the same connecting flight to Lima.

In São Paulo, a Delta agent met us at the gate and escorted us past customs to reach the next gate in time. We in fact arrived as other passengers were still boarding, but the airline would not allow us to board. We were dumbfounded! We had boarding passes in hand and literally saw the plane through the the glass, but they would NOT allow us to board. The man behind the counter claimed that we would put the flight over-weight. "Are you kidding?" we asked in disbelief, "We have boarding passes." The agent argued in our behalf for about 15 minutes until the plane pushed away from the gate and flew away.

As shock settled in, the agent said, "Let me talk with my supervisor and we'll see how to connect you to Lima. I'll be back in 20 minutes."

After an hour, we still hadn't heard anything. Another hour passed and another. Shock turned to despair as no one had any idea what would happen next, or if perhaps the agent had forgotten us or gone home for the day. Soon, our despair turned to anger. We couldn't find anyone that knew anything about our connection. In fact, we couldn't even find a Delta office anywhere in the airport. And of course, we couldn't leave the terminal because we didn't have the proper Brazilian visa.

Our little group descended into conflict. Carlos and I had already bumped heads over my assumption that he didn't speak English. Now our group was arguing about the best way to find a connection to Lima. Carlos and Mirza argued in favor of waiting. "When the agent returns, we want her to find us here."

Rosi, always the spitfire, argued for a more pro-active approach. "The agent has forgotten us. I say we find another agent to get us a ticket to Lima." The three of them argued until Rosi finally decided to strike out on her own. Carlos and Mirza sat quietly in the terminal. Sheli and I took a compromise approach. We took turns waiting at the gate while the other tried to find someone with answers.

After a while, it became clear that no answers were forthcoming. The Delta agent was no where to be seen, and no one could tell us anything. Even Rosi returned to our little group frustrated and angry. After a few minutes, the argument turned away from the issue at hand, and delved into something completely unrelated. Rosi got angry at Carlos for his insistence on speaking English, even when he was clearly a native Spanish speaker. They also argued over the role of women in Peruvian society. Carlos said that women receive better treatment in the United States, but Rosi insisted that the only way for the social situation to improve was for Peruvians to stay in Peru and MAKE changes happen.

Finally Rosi demanded to know why Carlos refused to speak Spanish. He said, "I was born in Peru, but now I am a US citizen. I am an American and I am proud of my new country. I am thankful for everything the United States has given me, and I will show my gratitude by speaking English." As he spoke, his face softened.

I was stunned. Back in Atlanta, I judged Carlos as a hot-headed ingrate, but now I began to see him in a new light.

After waiting five hours in the São Paulo terminal, the agent finally returned with tickets in hand. Unfortunately, they were not tickets directly to Lima, but rather we had to pass through Buenos Aires, Argentina, and then continue on to the final leg of our journey. She had also arranged for us to take a shower in a micro-hotel inside the terminal. She gave each one of us a voucher and then she handed me a collective boarding pass with all five names. That boarding pass formalized our connection as a cohesive group, if only for the purpose of getting to Lima.

The group dynamic shifted after that moment. The scuffles and conflicts ended and we began to identify clear roles for one another. I took care of the boarding pass, while others organized a meeting time after our showers. When someone expressed frustration, Carlos took the role of comforter-in-chief. He became the wise, re-assuring father figure guiding us all. By the time we boarded our connecting flight to Argentina, we started looking out for one another and expressing concern. We became a community.

Extreme Peru: Part Two

Dream World

Several hours after departing Atlanta en route to São Paulo, I sat upright in my seat and stared into the blackness outside my window. I struggled to find a restful position, but instead found a sharp pain in my neck. Sleep deprivation began to alter my perceptions and send me into a parallel world. My internal reality spilled over onto the scenes outside my window.

The boundary between the ocean and sky blended in perfect darkness, while a scattering of stars sparkled above me. In my waking-dream state, I imagined the stars were distant torches on the shores of another world.

And then I saw a single point of light looking up from the sea. Was it an island? A boat? Once again, my altered perceptions created a story. In my waking-dream, I imagined a single house surrounded by coconut trees, white sand beaches, and coral reefs. A man lived all alone on that little island, hundreds of miles from the nearest neighbor. In that very moment, he tossed in his bed because in his dream he felt me watching from the plane 30,000 feet above.

As I envisioned the man tossing in his sleep, a feeling of sadness washed over me. Suddenly I was the man on the island, totally isolated and alone, while my heart ached for my children.

This altered form of reality persisted as long as the darkness remained, even as we passed the brilliant lights of Caracas, Venezuela, and the blackest jungles of interior Brazil. But in the end, the sun rose over the eastern horizon and dispelled the haze of my sleep-deprivation.

As we landed in São Paulo, Sheli and I looked forward with positive expectations for an easy connection to our next flight. By the way, the photograph at the beginning of this post is a scene of São Paulo as our plane landed.

Extreme Peru: Part One

A Process in Surrender

Before this trip, I never had a bad airport experience. Perhaps my luck changed, or perhaps the statistical law of averages simply drew my number for something different.

My flights were supposed to follow a relatively easy series of connections from Spokane to Salt Lake City, Salt Lake City to Atlanta, and finally Atlanta to Lima, Peru. The final segment was planned as a straight-shot, six-hour flight that would have gotten us to Lima just before midnight of the same day. No problem, right?
Our luck began to spoil in Salt Lake City.

Sheli and I arrived in Salt Lake from different flights, but we would travel together for the remainder of the trip. We boarded our connecting flight to Atlanta filled with excitement for the adventures yet to come. But we never guessed the ordeal we would have to endure before our arrival in Peru.

A few minutes after the airline boarded everyone onto the Atlanta flight, they announced a gate change. Some mechanical error had occurred, so they filed everyone off the plane and onto a different, smaller aircraft. We had a full flight, so some people lost their connections altogether, but the airline seemed to understand the special predicament of those connecting to Peru. We thought they were getting us to
Atlanta as quickly as possible, with just enough time to make our connection.

But once we boarded the second aircraft, they discovered a thin layer of frost on the wings, so then we had to wait for the de-icers to do their job.

Up to this point, no one can be blamed for the problems we encountered. Mechanical errors happen all the time, and certainly the weather does not accommodate human schedules. For me, the real human problems began once we arrived in Atlanta.

As the aircraft made its final descent into Atlanta, the captain announced that our arrival would occur only minutes before our scheduled departure to Lima. When Sheli and I explained our situation to the flight attendant, she smiled and said, “Oh don’t worry about that. You’re not the only ones on this flight making a connection to Lima. The captain has already called ahead and instructed the other flight to wait for you.” She told us to go directly to the ticket counter where a new boarding pass would be issued.

The plane landed and we did exactly as the flight attendant instructed. A woman at the ticket counter gave us a new boarding pass and told us to run to the next gate. We had only gotten a few yards when another passenger stopped us. “The plane left,” she said in Spanish.

“How do you know?” I asked.

“Because I’m making the same connection and the airline told me the plane has already gone,” Rosi was the name of the woman who said this. Her name is important because she appears in the story later.

“Why would they tell us something different?” I asked. My trust had not yet been shaken. But sure enough, the reader board indicated that the flight to Lima had indeed departed on the original schedule. They had not waited at all.

Sheli and I returned to the ticket counter, with anxiety and betrayal beginning to build. The ticket agent looked positively frazzled, but she politely informed us that she would print us a new itinerary that we would take to our original gate. “I’m sure they’ll get you on the next flight,” she said. We thanked her and continued onward.

But when I looked at the document she printed, no gate was listed. We finally had to stop at an electronic kiosk where we scanned the form. The faceless computer then spit out a boarding pass for our new flight to São Paulo, Brazil. “This has to be a mistake,” I said. We tried to get a flesh and blood human being to give us an answer, but every agent we found told us we had to proceed to the gate indicated on the boarding pass.

We finally arrived at our new gate and stood in line to speak with yet another agent.

The woman at the gate was having a bad day. As she helped the people ahead of us, she stood with her cell phone wedged between her ear and her shoulder. She hardly even looked at the customers as she complained to someone about working at this particular station. “That’s rah-t,” she whined into the phone, “I ain’t ever workin’ this gate agin. It’s ba-ad.” We must have interrupted her call, because she seemed put-out when we demanded her full attention. She glared at us as she ended her call and began typing into the computer.

After several minutes, she said there was no mistake. We had to catch a connecting flight from the airport in São Paulo to Lima. Sheli and I pushed her to find a different flight, perhaps through someplace closer like Panama or Ecuador, but there was nothing. “This is the only flight,” she said.

I thought I could accept the change, but then the same woman made an announcement over the PA system requesting that all US passengers going to Brazil present their tourist visas for inspection at the gate. I got in line again to inform the woman that we did not have tourist visas. She looked at me down her nose and said, “If you ain’t got no visa, you ain’t goin’ to Brazil. Period.”

“How could you expect us to have a visa?” I asked, “We were supposed to go to Peru, not Brazil.”

“Don’t matter,” she said, “If you ain’t got no visa, you ain’t gettin’ on this plane.”

At that point, I thought one of us was going to blow a fuse. “How do you expect us to get a visa when the plane is boarding in just a few minutes?” Sheli demanded, “Didn’t Delta consider that before they routed us through Brazil?”

The woman seemed to miss the point. “You should not have gotten a ticket to Brazil if you didn’t plan on getting the visa,” she said, “I’m sorry, but I cannot allow you to board this plane.”

“And what about our connection?” Sheli asked, “This was Delta’s choice, not ours.”
From the tone of the argument, I think she actually planned to let us miss the flight.

Finally, I jumped in, “Are you sure that we need a visa if we are only making a connection? I always thought the visa was necessary only to leave the airport.”
“I’ll find out,” she said and walked away. About ten minutes later, she returned and said that we could indeed board the plane without a visa.

By then, Sheli had noticed the timing of our flight. Instead of our original six hour plan to Lima, we would have to take a nine hour flight to São Paulo before we even got to transfer to the final flight to Lima. By the time we arrived, we would miss our connection to Puerto Maldonado. When Sheli brought this new realization back to the agent, I thought the agent was going to blow a fuse. She said, “Look, your connection happens through a different airline. We can’t control that. Delta Airlines has agreed to get you to Lima and we will get you there.”

“But you have forced us to miss our connection. Once we arrive in Lima we’ll be stranded.”

She was unmoved. “Delta will fill its obligation to get you to Lima. What you do after that is your problem.”

In the end, we boarded the plane en route to São Paulo, Brazil hoping for a safe and timely connection to our final destination. With all the anxiety, frustration, and uncertainty of our day, Sheli attempted to offer some comfort in the midst of our powerlessness. “This is an exercise in surrender,” she stated as we flew into the unknown.

South America

Where do I begin?

For the last two days, I have been in transit to Lima, Peru; however, Delta Airlines has cancelled almost every connecting flight. We were supposed to fly directly from Atlanta to Lima in a six hour flight, but we arrived late from Salt Lake City and missed our connection. Rather than get us a hotel and put us on the first flight the next morning, they decided to divert us through Sao Paulo, Brazil. The customer service only got worse as the hours progressed into days.

The flight from Altanta to Sao Paulo lasted a whole nine hours, over the the Carribbean Sea, the Amazon Jungle, and half of the South American continent. Once we arrived in Sao Paulo, we waited another 6 or 7 hours for Delta to decide where to send us next.

It would have been nice to see the sights, but the Brazilian government would not allow us to leave the terminal without purchasing a tourist visa for more than $100.

By this time, we were exhausted and cranky; neither of us had slept more than an hour or two, but I guess the positive side of this whole nightmare is that I got to practice my Portuguese for the first time in real life. I have been studying Portuguese online for the last three or four weeks. Actually, I was surprised how much I was able to understand.

The airline finally decided to allow us to continue our journey to Lima, but they diverted us once again through Buenos Aires, Aregentina. Buenos Aires! I am posting this blog right now from the airport in Buenos Aires.

When we left, I had no idea we would eventually see two states (Utah and Georgia) and three countries (Brazil, Argentina, and Peru). Amazing.

These experience has been an exercise in patience and surrender. I wonder what other lessons I can find to avoid going insane from exhaustion, frustration, and repeated delays.

Golden

Our family took a Sunday drive this evening, and caught the last golden rays of sunset. We paused on a bluff overlooking downtown Spokane and the river. What a wonderful time to take pictures of my children. The last hour of daylight creates such a warm, happy glow.







The sun reflected from the glass of the tallest building in Spokane.



"The Barry," dedicated to TR.

Halloween

Halloween came and went much like any other time, but this year, Dakota carved an apple instead of a pumpkin. What a creative kid!





Whitney carved a pumpkin and looked postively violent as she did so. Actually, this is a look of concentration, not anger. The camera just happened to capture her expression in a rather dramatic, but misleading fashion.



Dakota dressed up in his best goth appearance for Halloween, but every where we went, people thought he looked like Adam Lambert.



The girls dressed as twin babies in their sleeper pajamas.



My skeleton paint from last year was such a hit, I decided to do it again. Sadly, I scared a few kids and even made one girl cry. I tried to use my nicest voice, but the look was just too dark, I suppose.

My Father's Land

On Saturday morning, I made another drive to the Spokane Indian Reservation. Somehow, I managed to find my way back to a small plot of land that may have belonged to my father. I'm not exactly sure, but it fits the description. My father once told me that his land sat on a ridge overlooking the valley. He also said that he logged a small section of land on the bluff to make way for a cabin. Well, a good friend tells me this is the ridge, and as far as I could tell, this was the only spot on the ridge that had been cleared of trees. If this indeed belonged to my father, then the land now belongs to my siblings and me. Maybe someday we'll fulfill his dream and build that cabin.



Later in the day, I stumbled onto an old cabin in the woods. The roof was completely missing and the walls were beginning to fall. My same friend tells me this cabin once belonged to my distant relative Norbert Abrahamson, long since deceased.



Sunrise near my father's plot of land.

Snow

A light snow dusted the ground last week, but quickly melted. Thank goodness. I'm just not ready for another winter.

Recovery

This week I made an amazing recovery from illness.

On Friday morning, the first symptoms of a cold appeared, just in time for the weekend. The physical signs manifested through a scratching ache in my throat, a faucet nose, and an increased sinus pressure. At first I hoped to avert a full-blown illness, but at some point my physical discomfort destroyed all hope. My only escape would be to pass right through the middle of the sickness.

My prognosis provoked a genuine sense of dread. In years past, this same level of infection led to bronchitis or worse. About ten years ago, I caught cold just before my birthday, which progressed quickly into a dreadful case of pneumonia. My temperature rose in deadly fashion to 105 degrees, which probably should have sent me to the emergency room, but I was too delirious from my fever to ask for help. I used to call this my "signature illness," because the symptoms never changed and always progressed in a predictable order from one cruel stage to the next. In the end, I always required medical intervention through powerful antibiotics. I've been lucky the last couple years, but this weekend I braced myself for the worst. I felt sure that my luck had run out.

But then my good friend suggested an herbal remedy that he learned from our tribal tradition. He showed me how to prepare the medicine, which I then took for the next three days. On the first day (Saturday), my health made no obvious improvement, but on the second day (Sunday), I noticed a decrease in sinus pressure. By the third day (Monday), the pain ended. When I woke up this morning, my nose stopped running and all other symptoms disappeared. Never in all my life have I escaped this level of illness without running the entire cycle if my "signature illness." Never.

The gift of plant medicine amazes and inspires me.

Turning

The seasons are finally turning, from summer to fall.

My morning run brought toward a chilling fog that clung to me skin and crackled on the power lines. I began my run with focused intent, but the brilliant fall colors drew me into their spell. By the end, I found myself renewed by the yellow leaves and the cool, damp air.

Leadership

This weekend, I participated in the opening retreat of the Leadership Development Program at the Community Colleges of Spokane. I joined with fifteen other instructors, administrators, and professionals selected from the three colleges and the central offices of our district. Within the first day, we formed a caring, supportive group without regard for degrees or positions. In a small but significant way, we got to step outside our normal roles and to share authentic experiences from a clear heart space. Throughout the year, we will continue to meet for ongoing community-building and professional development.

Before I began, I had hoped to build an increased sense of community and renewal within my career. The Leadership Development Program will no doubt open this doorway to me and all the group.





Our opening retreat convened on the campus of Spokane Community College. During our lunch break, I had the chance to hike the river trail and take some wonderful autumn pictures.

Magnificent

Derrick and I spent the weekend on the Spokane Reservation, driving the back roads and hiking through remote mountain trails. We saw some magnificent scenery, like this sunset over Matthews Lake and the view from Grouse Ridge Mountain. We rested from the pressures of a modern world and immersed ourselves in a time and space apart.

Even my blog took a rest for the weekend.

Unfortunately, I didn't get pictures of the most amazing part of our trip. We went down to the river before sunrise, just as a herd of elk ascended a narrow mountain ridge. They walked in single file and created silhouettes against the pale blue sky. The bull elk stood at the end of the line, his antlers rising toward the sun.

Just a few minutes later, we saw another herd of elk, even larger than the first. They ran across a field toward the east, casting trails of dust into the sunrise. I'm still kicking myself for not having my camera in that moment.







Francis and Derrick walked up the last portion of Grouse Ridge Mountain.

We drove to the top of the mountain on an old, overgrown logging road that became so steep we had to put my truck into four-wheel drive just to move ahead. Several times we also had to forge a path off-road around fallen trees and other natural obstacles. It was quite the adventure.

Pippi

Last week, my daughter dressed up for a pajama/weird-hair day combo at school. She wore monkey pajamas and put her hair in wires, Pippy Longstocking style. No doubt she was the cutest thing at school that day.

Clarification

Some folks have reported problems with the PayPal process.

When you click on the PayPal button on my blog, you'll come to a page that asks you to enter an amount of money. After entering the amount, make sure that you press "Update Total." You MUST press Update Total, or the page will not allow you to proceed.

If you already have a PayPal account, you then simply need to sign in using the prominent blue box displayed on the right hand side that says: "LOG IN TO PAYPAL."

However, if you do not have a PayPal account, you can still make a donation. Look for a statement on the lower left hand side of the page that says: "Don't have a PayPal account? Use your credit card or bank account (where available)." Immediately after that statement, you'll find a link that simply says, "Continue." Press that link to proceed to the next page. (The "Continue" link appears near the credit card logos).

Some people are having problems because they think they have to sign up for a PayPal account, or they already have one, but don't remember the password. This is not necessary. Simply press the "Continue" link, as described above.

After you continue, you will come to a page that will prompt you to enter your information. You will then press, "Review Donation and Continue."

After reviewing the information, you will be prompted to complete the donation.

I hope this helps.

By the way, THANKS to everyone who has donated so far. Your contribution is greatly appreciated. I will be communicating with you shortly to express my gratitude.

Fundraiser

This November, I have the opportunity to participate in a mission trip to Puerto Maldonado, Peru, located on the Madre de Dios River in the Amazon Jungle. I will provide education, inter-personal training, and translation support for a team of full-time service workers dedicated to improving the lives of those they serve.

The mission supports a number of charitable projects, including the construction of Hope House, which provides shelter and vocational training for young women leaving a life of prostitution.

This is an opportunity to make a meaningful impact in the lives of others, so I am requesting the prayers and financial support of my friends. You can donate by clicking on the PayPal button in the upper left column of this page, or you can contact me direclty for other options. I realize these are difficult times for many, so any amount is appreciated. If you have questions about this project, send me an email: barrymoses@hotmail.com

Salt Lake

This last weekend, I made a brief but intense trip to Salt Lake City, Utah. In general terms, I can speak to the purpose of my trip and say that I filmed a series of short biographical interviews, but I do not feel it appropriate to reveal the exact subject matter at this time. Perhaps I will say more after the interviews are released to the public. For now, I will simply address everything that happened between video shoots.

Mormonism resides at the heart of the spiritual, cultural, historical heart of Salt Lake City. It also resides at the center of the city's physical landscape with its temple, conference center, and offices dominating the skyline.

During one of my breaks, I walked downtown hoping to catch a glimpse of the crowds of people attending the fall general conference of the church. Unfortunately for me, the crowds were surprisingly absent. I think perhaps I arrived just after the beginning of the priesthood session, so most everyone had either gone home for the day or had already found their places inside the conference center.



The conference center plaza stood virtually empty under the glow of a magnificent sunset.





My new camera captured some of the finer details of the temple with much better quality than I'm used to getting.



And of course, protesters stood outside Temple Square hoping to sway Mormons from their faith. I always wonder if they ever succeed or if protests end up as a waste of time.



My hosts for this weekend trip put me up in the Anniversary Inn, which is a bed and breakfast that was converted from the old Kahn Mansion. I stayed two nights in a perfectly fabulous room, but I kind of felt that such a beautiful room was partially wasteful. It was like staying in the honeymoon suite without my honey. It got lonely sleeping by myself in those magnificent surroundings.





A view of my bed and the bathroom at the Anniversary Inn.



Early one morning, I got up to photograph Salt Lake City from a non-Mormon perspective. The photograph above was taken from the Catholic Cathedral of the Madeleine.



A stained glass window depicting Mary inside the Catholic cathedral.





Various views of the Presbyterian Church including a gargoyle.



The Masonic Temple.



In between meetings and video shoots, I also got to see a few old friends. I met with Candee and Jason McKnight. Back in the early 1990s, they served in the Quetzaltenango Mission at the same time as I did. We had dessert at the Old Spagetti Factory and laughed for hours about the good time we shared back in the day.



Also had a great visit with my friend Percy...



And my friend Nick...

Unspeakable

Haven't posted in a few days. Been on the road. But even so, some things are unspeakable, beyond words, or ineffable. Sometimes things can't be mentioned out of respect for confidentiality. This is especially true when we work with people on deeply personal level. Other things are beyond expression because they represent some aspect of the sacred. This often happens when participating in tribal ceremonies or other sacred settings.

The best stories can never be told; they must be lived.