After teaching last fall at KCU, and keeping a full speaking schedule as well, I traveled to Thailand to teach to first two weeks of the new year. After a grueling, yet great trip to a part of the world I had never worked in, I returned to the States and spent five short days with my wife, recovering from the jet lag and two thirty hour trips. With that short recovery time, I boarded another plane for Colombia, as there was pressing work I needed to get to down here in Colombia. On the 22nd of January, I flew back into Bogotá and began to get things in order down here so I could get back to the work. It took my longer than normal, as I was still recovering from my long trip to the far east and the jet lag that leaves one to deal with. But each day I would get some things done and then rest a bit. After a week, I had all of the bills paid and every urgent thing taken care of.
After that I traveled back down to the camp in Villavicencio, in order to get ready for a work crew of one! We had several other scheduled, but one by one they had to cancel or delay. Brother Bob asked if I would prefer him to delay, but I sent back a hearty request he come ahead. We wanted to get the electricity in and functioning in the new dorm building and he is a very skilled electrician! He arrived a week later and I traveled up to Bogotá to pick him up. We spent the night at the apartment in Bogotá and then traveled the next morning down here to Villavicencio. We rested up a bit that Saturday afternoon but Bob was already checking out the work in the dorm building and getting ready to get started. Sunday we went to Church in Villavicencio in the morning. We had a lunch of fabulous Colombian Ox Roast, then headed to Puerto Lopez for the afternoon church service there. We got back in early evening then after a dip in the camp pool we hit the sack.
Bob was up early and tearing into the work in the dorm building. He worked hard both Monday and Tuesday and was getting done much more quickly than I expected. On Wednesday, we went into the church to look at a job they needed done and size that up. In the afternoon he did a few more projects out here and finished up the dorm building. For Thursday and Friday he worked on the church building and had that all finished up as well. For Saturday it was a light day and we worked on a weed whacker that was not starting and a few minor projects. But that was a rest day. Sunday was a day given to worshiping with the church in Villavo then Bob packed his suitcases and got ready for his trip back home. Monday morning we traveled back up to Bogotá and in the evening I picked up Gordon Clifford. Tuesday morning I took Bob to the airport. He left us with a usable, though unfinished dorm building. But with electricity we can begin using the building for some things while we continue to work on finishing up the construction.
Now Gordon is here and we are working on the publication ministry projects. As I do that in the afternoons as we work together on editing, training new workers, and moving different projects along. Gordon works in the morning by himself out here at the camp as I go into the school almost every morning to work with the kids. I spend my mornings working at the school as we try to head off any problems before they become severe. At the same time we are doing the groundwork for the deaf camp we will host in about a month. And on Saturday afternoons I spend time with the scout troop as an adult leader. So my first month back in Colombia has been a busy but fruitful time as I get back to the work here.