The Georges in Peru

For the last 2 ½ years, Allen has been experiencing some heart-rate irregularities (Atrial Fibrillation) when running or swimming hard, which he has been trying to get to the bottom of with different tests.  Some who have read our blog for awhile may remember Allen thinking it might be his myocardial bridge (See Blog from Jan. 27, 2021).  After some contemplation, however, it has been decided that due to too much exercise (who knew that it gave such!!?), some of Allen’s nerves have begun misfiring occasionally, signalling his heart to make extra beats. This is MB’s layman explanation.  If you would like something more technical you may want to ask Allen. 

On Tuesday, we saw heart specialist and friend, Dr. Porter, to solve the question about whether Allen should do surgery… Allen says I should call it radioablation and not surgery because surgery implies cutting and no cutting is necessary for this procedure.  Back to layman explanation- they can apparently kill those nasty nerves- if they can figure out which ones they are.  Amazing!  Dr. Porter said that at this point he thinks the risks of ablation outweigh the benefits, and put Allen on some medicine (Flecainide) which he is supposed to take before hard exercise.  We have decided to try this solution for a while but are not ruling out “surgery" in the future.

So it is with heartfelt excitement and twinges of regret that we leave our home-continent and head south once again.  We have flights booked for March 8th.

One task to do before we leave is to sell our beloved home-assignment “home” (a 2016 Black Nissan Rogue with 122K miles).    Update:  Sold on 7MAR2022!

Yesterday we went to the Mennonite Heritage Villiage Museum in Steinbach where we learned about Mennonite persecutions and migrations and saw how the pioneers had lived when they first moved to Canada.  There's a wind-mill on the property that grinds freshly harvested grain into flour (That happened earlier this fall), fun old tractors and even a sod house.  We decided it would not have been very nice to live in, despite the cool reprieve it gave us from the warm day.  When a local man started talking about 'jantsied' (Low-German for the 'other side') Allen nodded his head knowledgeably since Mary Beth had just explained to him that 'ditsied' and 'jantsied' referred to Mennonites who had settled on different sides of the Red river (What a quick learner!- Mary Beth).  After the museum tour we went to DQ for lunch where Mary Beth ordered a coke.  "We don't say the 'C'-word around here! You're in the wrong town to buy a Coke," the man behind the counter told her.  "Yeah," she said.  "I should be ordering Papsi and Ravels."  They shared a good laugh.  The Low-German Mennonites who settled in the area speak English with a strong accent which they have passed on to their children.  Pepsi or 'Papsi' is the most highly-desired pop, not Coke! and is often enjoyed with Revels, pronounced, 'Ravels'  which is ice-cream on a stick and covered in chocolate.  

Two weeks ago, we weren't sure we would be able to get into Canada. Now we aren't sure we can get back into the US! Saturday, the US extended the ban on Canadians entering by land until September 21st. Of course, they can still enter the country by air, through an expensive, time-consuming and circuitous route through Toronto and Detroit. It appears some think, that to control COVID, crowding into three different jets with 150 strangers from around the world for several hours is better than driving across the border in a private vehicle with your spouse, but I digress. If only there were a way to fly Mary Beth across the border in a private plane and pick her up on the other side! Today we found someone who has been doing exactly that during COVID, so we will be able to return to help Christ Community Church celebrate their one-hundredth year anniversary. Keep posted for more details!

We bought a new (to us) car!  Actually, we've had it for a while.  We bought it the day after Mary Beth's brother's wedding (married June 18th).   Yesterday, we finally arrived at my sister's house near Crete, NE, which will be our US address during our time in the States.  So, this morning we took our papers to the county sheriff's office and county clerk to get our car registered.  "They didn't sign the title," they pointed out.  The papers had actually gone ahead of us and were waiting for us here so we hadn't had a chance to look at them for ourselves.  "You'll have to send the title back to the car dealership in New York and have them sign it." We were planning on traveling west tomorrow, and the thought of FedEx-ing papers back and forth and then getting the plates sent somewhere seemed nightmarish.  "I'll talk to the county lawyer," said the clerk.  Mary Beth started praying out loud, "Lord!  Please let this paperwork go through!"  "Let me call the dealership and see what's up." I pleaded.  The car dealership said that the certificate from the NY Dept. of Motor Vehicles in the envelope was sufficient.  The Saline County clerk wasn't convinced.   Then the clerk called Lincoln and the person on the other end of the line said that they had just had this happen for another car from the exact same dealer in NY and said everything was fine and they could issue a new title.  Phew!  Answered prayer!

Today is election day. Yesterday, the streets were packed with panicked shoppers buying up all the rice, eggs and sugar in the city in preparation for possible rioting after the results come out (we hope they may have over-reacted). People are fiercely divided about having Fujimori’s (a former Peruvian president) daughter in office and about having a president with supposed communist ideology. Today however, the city is silent except for voters heading to the polls to fill out their obligatory votes. There is not even any church, since public gatherings are illegal on election day, and church members need to go fulfill their civic duty.

While Peru is focused on elections, we are thinking about packing! Next Friday we plan to have a large garage sale where we’ll (hopefully) sell half our worldly possessions. The rest of our stuff is going into boxes and into storage. The plan is to fly to New Jersey in two weeks for my brother Paul's wedding and then for an 8-month home-assignment. When we return to Peru we'll move 3 hours away to a Peruvian coastal town to do a church plant.

What to do on such a day as today? Running seemed like a good idea! Since November, I (Mary Beth) have been working towards my goal of running a half-marathon distance. It’ll be too hot in New Jersey when we get there and with the traffic down to just voters, today seemed like just the the right day to go for the big run. Allen and I left the house at 6:15 am to run and run and run and run for 2 hours and 43 minutes and 26 seconds. We ran 358 meters up the mountain (there’s nowhere flat to go) to the biggest bridge in Peru and then ran back down. Allen went with me and encouraged me and gave me water, expired packets of runners' GU (very strange stuff, though it does give one energy. I think they should call it 'ice cream topping' which sounds more appealing than ‘goo’) and told me stories to distract me from niggly aches. I did it!  Before surgery, I would have said it was impossible for me to run a half marathon. It feels good to be alive!

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