Andrew and Janelle’s visit

It was very nice having my cousin Andrew Phillips and his wife Janelle to visit me this month!  It was a bit of a culture shock for them!! Haha especially the first day, but then they got used to tearing around the city with us I think!  They met all our contacts, came to the gospel meetings and studies with us, and we even found some time to do a bit of tourism!  I hope they don’t mind me pirating their photos, here they are…

You may or may not remember that Betty Martinez is the mother of these men that have professed last year, and also the wife of one of them (Alejandra, Emilio’s wife).  Betty’s estranged husband was always a drunkard and she would take the kids to the meetings when they were little.  They didn’t want it then, but now her efforts are paying off!  Lorena is her daughter who has just come out of a cocaine addiction, and a wild, rebellious life and is also listening (when the kids are quiet!!  She is expecting her 8th…the two eldest have left home, but that leaves 5 lively, noisy little children all clamouring for our attention…soon it will be 6!!  Hopefully the last.  But we love them all!!!! 

More random photos, and an ant bite…

I took some shots while I remembered of where we sometimes hang out at the convention grounds.  It is a private school that belongs to our friends, Gimber and Elizabeth Olmos, and their son German (pronounced Herman) and his wife Rosemarie, and daugher Elizabeth and her husband Gustavo.  Elizabeth senior (Liz) came to Argentina as a Yugoslav immigrant with her parents, after having met the workers in Yugoslavia, and wanting freedom to serve God.  Her parents were secretly baptised after they met the workers (Jack Craig, Roy Price and Ralph Seyb being some of them).  The old parents died faithfully here in Argentina.  Liz married Gimber from here, and they started the school from scratch, now years and much hard work later, it has a kindergarten, primary and secondary school, with nearly 1,000 pupils!  We use it at convention time for the meetings and housing the workers.  During the year we use a flat at the back of Elizabeth and Gustavo’s section (they all live side-by-side), as a semi-bach, ie we can chill out there, store things there etc.  At cons time it can sleep up to 7 sister workers.  Here are a few pictures…

Florencia Olmos’ golden retriever pup wants to play with Yanka the collie, but he goes in and eats all her food!

(the spots on my other foot are mozzie bites!)

Buenos Aires 2013

 

Out with the old…

And in with the new!!

June and Mirna Barjacoba

Mirna is from Rio Cuarto, Argentina, is 42 years old and has been in the work for about 20 years or more.  Two years ago she very unexpectedly suffered a stroke, which at the time was terrible, and noone knew how she was going to end up.  She has recovered pretty well, her speech wasn’t affected, but her whole right side was.  She still hasn’t full use of her hand, and limps especially when she’s tired.  Emotionally she doesn’t have the strength that she used to either, but little by little she’s getting better.  She has a cousin in the work, Patricia Oberto, and an aunt, Sara Barjacoba, who works in Peru.  Mirna worked 10 years in Colombia, but came back 5 years ago. 

It was great to have Doug and Joan Beach here for a few days.  They had come primarily to visit their ‘other son’ Rob Shultz, and spared a few days for me too!  Here are a few photos of when they were here:  We took them to the river delta, called Tigre.  It’s an enormous area of islands where two rivers join.  Lots of the islands are inhabited by permanent residents or holiday homes. 

Joan with Florencia Olmos (17).  Doug in the background

Puerto de Frutos (Fruit Port – named so because there used to be big fruit plantations on the islands, which supplied the city’s fruit.  Due to flooding and disease they were eventually abandoned and is now a popular holiday area)

Florencia and Joan on the launch

 

A jetty going down from one of the houses

These are the islands – they are formed of silt and sediment brought down from the rivers.  Obviously they need to have good retaining walls to stop erosion.

 

More of the islands along the way – the area in total is 17,000 square km!  A lot of it is uninhabited though.

The Mighty Doug Beach!

There are some more photos of this trip somewhere, I’ll put them on later.  But here’s how their stay ended… it couldn’t be any other way!!

The set-up.  Calling Doug out to pose for a final photo…

The pouring of the water down the neck, while Joan still looks demurely at the camera.

Well once he was wet, why not stay for more??

But then the thirst for blood got too strong for him…

Revenge will be sweet…

Oops, now I’m in trouble – look at his face!!!

 

But we parted friends!!!

Florencia and I cooling off in their pool after taking the Beaches to the airport on a sweltering afternoon.

Meanwhile this is the photo that Joan sent on their arrival home!!  Brrrr….