ELECTION DAY

For most of us, in the States, election day is like most other days, except for the fact that you make arrangements to take about 30 minutes out of your normal routine to go and vote, then you go home and maybe follow the progress of the "scrutiny."

In Bolivia this is not so! This last Sunday, elections were held for two reasons:

First of all, the people were voting for those who will be involved in the writing of the new constitution. By the way, for those of you who didn't know, the MAS party (movimiento al socialismo) won about 60% of the seats.

Secondly, they were voting YES or NO for departemental autonomy. Boliva, is divided up politically into departments, but unlike the U.S. they do not have autonomous governments, and are governed by the central government in La Paz. By the way, NO won.

Now that is not necessarily what impressed me about election day here. What impressed us the most was the actual election day. You see, on Friday we found out that on election day (Sunday the 2nd), no vehicles are allowed on the streets and everything is closed. On election day, Cochabamba is like a ghost town! It was amazing how quiet it was, except for the noise a some kids playing soccer in the middle of the street, or families riding by on their bikes. What a contrast to a normal day in Cochabamba. We are already ready for the next election day!

A normal day in front of our apartment.

Election day in front of our apartment. One of the main streets on election day.

Butch and Trish

MISSIONARY RECREATION

Atleast we look like golfers!



You might hear some missionaries mention how the golf course can be a mission field. Well, us guys here on the Cochabamba Mission Team have finally found that new mission field. Actually I guess I should be sincere about it, and call it what it really is...missionary recreation! Atleast that is what it is for now!

Las Saturday, July 1st, we all hopped in Josh's Land Rover and headed to "Campo de Amiraya". It is a golf course which is aspiring to someday become a country club, and for now are welcoming us to play any time, since they can really use our green fees.

Hole #1. "This is going to be great!"

It was great to get out of the city, enjoy some silence, and try shooting some of them birdies, which by the way never came around. We had a great time, and are looking forward to many other days of...heading to that mission field!

Oops!

SURVEYORS VISIT

Every other year, Bill Richardson, former co-worker of ours in Santiago, Chile, organizes a survey group made up of students from Harding University. Their objective is to gather information about possible mission points of South America. As a matter of fact, one of his teams scouted out Cochabamba, Bolivia, and shared valuable information with the Austin Ave. church and the Cochabamba Mission Team not too long ago.

Well, as we all know, God works in mysterious ways, and now he returned to Cochabamba with a group of 11 to continue gathering information, but information offered by the team here. It was great to be on the other side of the table for a while, and be the ones answering questions (questions we actually had answers for) and not the ones asking them.

We had a great time, and enjoyed a couple of meals together. We are excited about the possibility of six of them returning to La Paz to work in that city. To one of their questions Drew answered, "we'll help you out if you choose to target La Paz!" It would be great to have yet another team of missionaries in Bolivia.

Please pray the God will continue to open doors for more laborers in this part of the world that has been neglected for such a long time. Thank all of you who make it possible for us to be a part of such a work!

Another exciting aspect of Bill's visit was to lay some groundwork for an internship program here in Cochabamba. Nothing has been set yet, but both the team and Bill are excited about the possibility of bringing summer interns to Cochabamba and helping them get excited about mission work in South America.

As a matter of fact, in a way we have already begun the program in a very informal manner. Lance Wiser, a Harding student, has decided to stay in Cochabamaba for 2 weeks to go through the Runa Wasi Language School homestay program. He enjoys his classes, the family he is staying with and hanging out with us, including JD.

Butch and Trish

25 YEARS

On June 26th, Trish and I celebrated our 25th anniversary! We couldn't have asked for a better gift than to spend it with JD, Denice, Daniel and the whole Cochabamba Mission Team.

25 years seem like a long time when we consider that our oldest, Denice is 23 and JD 20; when we consider that we first arrived on the mission field in 1990; we met in June of 1978 (some of our team members weren't even born yet). For some people it is a whole life time. Yet these years have been wonderful and it really doesn't even seem that long. We are ready for the next 25! Thank you all for your prayers, notes, cards and gifts.

Usually you hear of people taking an exciting trip or an adventurous cruise for their 25th anniversary. For us is was a blessing to have the kids with us, and to be able to spend this special time with our team mates. To celebrate this special day we took then and the whole team to the Brazilian Rodizio Restaurant. We couldn't have had a more wonderful time than with those whom are the closest to us right now. We ate all kinds of meats, including the "utter" kind of meat, enjoyed all sorts of salads, vegetables and desserts. To top it off, Trish got diamond ring to replace the one she got for our wedding 25 years ago and was lost...somewhere, sometime in one of the many places we have lived.

We are grateful that, Denice, Jonathan, Daniel, Billie Gill, Gary, Laura, Nathan, Drew, Jamie, Josh, Julie, Michaela, Jeff, Katie and of course JuJu honored us with their presence.

25 years...what a blessing!


Butch and Trish