Truck Accident

April 19, 2012

 

 

Friends,

 

We've been so busy at this school! Here is an update from Min followed by a few comments from me:

 

Something bad happened last Friday. The day started off like a normal day. The whole week, we were preparing for Communion on Friday night, as the worships in the morning where about preparing our hearts...etc.. This day, the girls dean and director of the school took some kids in the big truck to the river for their swimming classes. Now this truck is huge! Its like a huge vegetable truck or like one of those trucks that carry livestock. The cargo area of the truck is hard wood. Anyway, the kids piled in the truck and away they went. I went to the river to wash my clothes and Scott went to town to do some errands. Then around 12pm I saw a small pick-up truck pull up , then all of a sudden people started swarming around it and some were crying and people were calling for someone to come help. I ran over there to find out that there had been an accident. I saw two girls, wet from swimming, one was laying on the back of the truck, crying with some cuts, and the other one was in the cab in pain. Apparently, the kids that had gone swimming earlier in the morning were ready to come home. When the truck tried to do a 3-point-turn and for some reason, the brakes failed and the truck suddenly rolled backwards down the embankment into the river. When this happened the kids couldn't hold on and fell on top of other kids, squishing them against the bottom of the truck.

 

Five girls were hurt. But at the time I ran over there, we really didn't know what the situation was exactly. One girl told me that the truck fell off the bridge into the river and I was thinking the worst. I saw one of the teachers, who was a paramedic, trying to stabilize one girl just in case she had any spinal injuries...it was a lot of  stress, confusion, and not knowing for sure how badly injured the girls were. We didn't know if there were any broken bones..etc. I was scared for one girl because she was pinned to the bottom since all the kids fell on her, and she wasn't moving very much. It was a very stressful time, because some of the kids' parents who live near the river came with and were distressed and crying and telling us that their kid was dying and we needed to do something quick...etc. You know, when a kid is injured and the parent is there, it is very difficult to calm the kid down, especially when the parent is crying. Most parents were angry too. It was a tense situation; very emotionally stressing. During this chaos, one girl found out that her sister was injured and when she saw her sister, she went into a panic and started hyperventilating. The injured girls were rushed to the hospital in town as soon as possible, while we stayed and prayed to God that they would be alright. By then most of the girls were crying and everyone was scared.

 

This one girl who went into a panic, stopped breathing and it was quite an ordeal to get her breathing again. As soon as I would get her to breathe, she would do so for about 30 seconds or so, then her eyes would roll back, and she would stop breathing again. This went on and on for 15 minutes or more. She wasn't even in the accident, but I was more worried about here, because her pulse was starting to get faint, and I knew that if she didn't start breathing pretty soon, I would have to breathe for her. Long story short she started breathing on her own. Thank God.  Three other girls were injured and taken to the hospital. It was hard to just sit and wait at the school not knowing how serious the injuries were, but all we could was pray, and pray we did! At the hospital the girls had to wait till 5 or 6pm just to get the x-rays done. They mostly had muscular injuries, some girls had injured knees and most of them injured their backs, none of them fractured any bones. Thank you Jesus. There was one girl that hit her head really hard and I was concerned that she may have a slight hemorrhage since after the accident her vision was affected and she started getting dizzy. But thank God, she is getting better now. The girls that got hurt got some massages and hydrotherapy from me, which they enjoyed. Today, all the girls seem to be doing better, except for one girl, whom the director took to the doctor to make sure she didn't have any nerve damage to her legs. Apparently her injured leg doesn't have the same sensation as the good leg... We are praying for her too.

 

It just seemed like the Devil threw an attack at this school and of all days, for we were supposed to have Communion that night. Well it was canceled, obviously. Most kids were traumatized. From 6-930pm Scott and I sat and watched the truck to make sure that no one came and stole parts. This past Sunday they were able to get the truck out, with the help of another truck, but now it has to be fixed since the brakes are bad. Monday morning, Scott drove the truck to town. I didn't want him to do it since I was scared that with the breaks malfunctioning, I didn't want him to be in a situation where he couldn't stop and hit someone or another vehicle. But thank God, Scott went around 5am to town when there were hardly any cars and was able to put it the shop to be fixed. This afternoon we will be checking on the truck to see if they are able to fix it or what kind of parts the mechanic may need. I'm just thankful that in spite of the accident that God protected the kids and that no one died. And that the injuries are not life-threatening. We are still taking care of the girls injured and praying for a quick recovery.

 

With so many kids here, I'm worried sometimes that something life-threatening may occur and we may not be able to get them to Santa Cruz and they may die. We are out in the middle of no where and even in Guayara, there isn't any emergency type of help or "hospitals" that can take care of something serious. Another reason why the director says "We need a plane stationed here." This is very important because, usually if someone gets hurt and needs to be flown out, the director has to call the pilot in Santa Cruz, but its 3.5 hours flight away, and by the time he is able to come it may be 8 hours later, or even not till the next day. We are praying that there can be a plane stationed here, just in case any emergencies take place, Scott can take them to Santa Cruz. I'm afraid in serious circumstances, the patient may die due to too much time wasted.

 

 As you already know, Scott and I moved to Guayaramerin, which is at the northeastern tip of Bolivia, literally on the border of Brazil. There's a primary and secondary school here that we are helping out with. Scott is teaching Chemistry, Physics and Math, and I'm teaching piano and Choir. Scott has found it challenging to be teaching in Spanish...the first couple days it was frustrating not knowing Spanish terms and looking them up in the dictionary. But he is trying his best and the students seem to be understanding and respectful even when he can't communicate well.

 

We are both learning Spanish faster than we ever had before :) I have 10 piano students and they seem to be loving it!  However, I don't have my keyboard with me since there was a problem with 6 keys and we left it in Santa Cruz to be fixed. Well, it looks like they don't have the right part for it, so for now I don't have a keyboard, but at the school there is one, so thank God we can use that. I've never taught choir before and thought that it wouldn't be too hard...however many of the kids need to learn how to carry a tune. I didn't think I would have to deal with this problem, but its been a challenge just trying to teach kids the melody of a song and making sure that when we begin or end on one note that I'm not hearing 5 or 6 different notes :)

 

I don't know what to do about the kids not being able to sing in tune... I thought about separating the ones that can carry a tune and the ones that can't. But then again, I don't want to do that because I realize that most of the kids that can't sing in tune were raised in homes where they never heard music or sang before...and I don't want them to feel like they're not good enough...etc. I at the least want them to try and try and improve. Its frustrating, but oh how they love to sing. You know what, I am more thankful that I grew up in a home where my parents sang and that I got the opportunity to learn how to sing and play different instruments. What I consider easy and natural, as in singing, is not to most kids here. I realize that I am blessed. Lately we have been borrowing a guitar that a student has here and Scott has been doing really well, learning how to play it. He really likes the guitar! Someday we want to get one in town.

 

We've been here 3 weeks already and are starting to get into the routine of things. Its so much different than living in Santa Cruz. Well, for one, we are "faculty" which means that we have some 50+ pairs of eyes watching whatever we do and how we act, say things, etc.. I'm realizing more and more that we are examples to these kids. The kids that are in secondary school just warmed up to us really fast and love talking with us. Over here, half the students have class in the morning while the other half work in the rice fields, cooking, cutting the grass, getting firewood...etc. And then after lunch, they switch. The students here work very hard and aren't lazy for the most part. I've worked in the "chaco", or rice fields, with the kids and I've had numerous opportunities to speak in Spanish for hours and learn not just the language but talk one on one with the kids...and this gives me opportunities to listen to their experiences from where they come from. Other times they have questions about me or just want to talk about something. Most kids come from broken homes, or where the father drinks and is violent or where one or both parents left the home. So they have their baggage with them, but I also see that they are just so happy to be here and they laugh and smile and are really thankful to be at this school. There's a roof over their head, rice to eat every day, and a small river to wash in, and they are thankful!

 

Since we've been here, there have been challenges I am still getting used to. We eat mostly white rice and beans with a little salad. I like rice, but I may be cured of it by the time I leave here!  There are also lots of bugs here. Every week I'm seeing something bite me that I've not seen the previous week.

 

I really like the worships and the singing kids (even if they don't sing in tune), and the fact that we are out 2 kilometers off the main road, its quiet and you can hear the birds and there's nature all around you. Just the other day I saw a wild pig that was about the size of a piglet. And today as Scott and I were walking the 2 km to the main road to hitch a ride to town, we saw HUGE iridescent blue butterflies that had a wingspan of 8 inches!!! So beautiful.

 

Anyway, Scott and I are doing fine, praise the Lord! Thank you to my friends and family for your love and support and for your prayers. We need them every day. Thank you so much for being there. We love and miss you.

 

Min

 

 

And from Scott:

 

Driving the truck to town to get it fixed was a scary thing. Fortunately a student and I went through the cycle of bleeding the air out of the brake system three times and finally I had enough braking power that I decided to make the trip to town. I had to drive very slow through town, shifting down to 1^st gear and pumping the brakes rapidly to stop at the intersections. God blessed and I made it all the way to the mechanic without a problem. It turns out there is a hole in one of the rubber seals in the master cylinder. The school uses the truck at least once a week to bring students to town for Service Day, and to bring home food for the school. They fill the tanks with diesel and siphon it out later to power the electrical generator at the school when they need to. On Service Day the students break into groups and go to different parts of our area, doing service for those in need and trying to be a good witness for Jesus Christ. I really like the idea and the kids love to do it. Especially they look forward to going down the river to visit the people who live along side it. They have a long wooden boat with a motor just big enough for a group of kids and teacher to ride in. They load it in the truck early in the morning on Service Day and drop it off in the river.

 

With all this happening every week I'm determined to fix the truck as fast as possible. I am in town today to get the final verdict on what parts need replacing and what the total cost will be. Then I will be traveling sometime to Riberalta, the larger town 1.5 hours away. There we can hopefully find replacement parts and bring them back to the mechanic.

 

I really have enjoyed playing the guitar recently. I took some lessons when I was just out of high school, but what I learned never came together very well. Now I've been playing hymns and with some help from Min, it's all coming together. I'm now able to quickly pick out the chords for most songs based on the key it's in and start playing along right away. Often I change to the wrong chord the first time through, but by the 2^nd or 3^rd time through it sounds good! I'm so thankful. We should be getting our own guitar soon. Originally Min wanted to learn, and I'm getting all of the practice. I want her to learn too.

 

I've gotten to see God's hand at work here. The students are great. They are teenage kids, but for the most part very respectful, helpful and caring. During their free time I often hear the sound of their plastic recorder flutes playing hymns. Or I hear singing. The boys are skilled at construction and one showed me how to lay bricks this week. I went to harvest rice with them, and got a visual lesson of "the harvest is great but the laborers are few" (Luke 10:2) There is a huge area of wetland in the back of the school where rice is growing. As I looked over it and at the 10 students that were with me I didn't know how it was all going to be harvested before it fell over and was not harvest-able. I'm sure the practical labor teaches the students valuable lessons, and working alongside their teachers gives them more love and respect for us. Fruit is scarce here and expensive, so we've tried to maintain a little stock of it at home to supplement our meals. We ran out last week, but God provided in different ways. Some of the students wanted to thank Min for massaging them after the truck accident, and gave her oranges and tangerines from a stock their parents had given them. As I was waiting by the truck when it was in the water, some students came on a motorcycle from the nearby village, carrying fruit. They gave me some oranges and a big chirimoya (custard apple)! The students were without calculators and needed them for my class, so Min and I looked for some simple solar powered calculators in town, hoping to get enough for them at least to share. Praise the Lord, we found a school supply shop with just the kind we were looking for, and for only $2-$4 apiece. We were able to get enough for each student to share with one other. They were very pleased!

 

God is clearly working on me and I know He's using me to help these students. I hear that many of them want to be missionaries when they leave here. I pray that they will be a blessing wherever they go. Please pray for us and the students.

 

God Bless,

 

Scott

 

Update from Min

Hi friends, this update is from my wife, Min:

Today, Scott and I took the missionary van to pick up a missionary couple,
Clint and Mindy, from the hospital in town. They work at a missionary
school in Guayaramerin, 3.5 hours by flight from where we are. This past
Friday, there was an emergency to pick up Mindy, who was 5 months pregnant,
and started going into labor. It happens to be that when she was 3 months
pregnant, her placenta started to detach and she had to stay on bedrest for
about 2 months to help the placenta re-attach itself. Unfortunately, she
started to bleed and went into labor last Thursday night when they placed
the call for help. Our main pilot, Herman, couldn't pick her up that night
since the runway closest to the school didn't have lights. So he flew first
thing in the morning and took her to a good hospital here. She had to have
a C-section since the placenta started to come out first. The baby was lost
in this process. I feel very sad for both of them. This is the
2nd miscarriage she has had. They looked ok when we picked
them up, but I could tell that they were sad.
We had the funeral yesterday and they buried their child
together, saying their good-byes in private. With all this that has
happened, this couple will be leaving to go back to Canada this coming
Thursday. They have been through a lot, and they need time to heal.

The director of the school in Guayara, Suzie Cornejo (she's an American
nurse, married to a South American), accompanied Mindy and Clint during the
flight and took care of Mindy in the hospital. Just yesterday, Suzie
mentioned that they need someone to teach science classes and possibly a
music class. With Mindy and Clint leaving now, and another missionary
couple who is out of the country, they are short-staffed, and desperately
need help out there. The school in Guayara has about 30
preschool/elementary kids, and about 40 high school kids. Only the high
school kids board since they come from all over Bolivia. Many come from
broken homes, or have been abused in some kind of way.

Anyway, Scott and I felt that we needed to pray and ask God what to do
since we felt that there was a need that we could possibly fill. Scott is
strong in the sciences and I love music. We have never taught before, and
this factor intimidated us. So we prayed about it, and talked with Suzie,
and she was so excited saying "This is an answer to prayer!" The staff at
the school were praying that God would send the right people to them, and
someone else that was supposed to come ended up not being able to.

So Scott and I now have decided to pack up our few belongings and join the
missionary school in Guayara. We are hoping to fly out there this Wednesday
or Thursday. We are excited and nervous because it's a new place and things
will be very different there. But we know that God is leading us there.

Suzie says that fruit is expensive there, and other people tell me that
people don't have much variation in their diet: Rice and beans, beans and
rice… This will be a challenge for me, since we live close to Santa Cruz
(about 30 minutes by car) and here, fruits are in abundance, there is more
variety of food to buy, and food is cheaper. I didn't realize how blessed
we were until I thought about not being able to have that variety in our
diet. Other than this, we know that it's going to be a little hotter over
there, and we will be washing our clothes in the river J Kinda like
camping!

We will be living in the hut that Mindy and Clint were staying in. Right
now, someone is packing up their few belongings and putting it on a plane.
We don't know if they will be coming back to Bolivia or not. We hope they
do, though. So for now, Scott and I will be packing up our things and
running to town to get some supplies we may need while we are out there. I
understand that were we will be going to, there will be electricity (this
is a recent thing, since they didn't used to before), cell signal and a
small town 35 minutes away if we need to get something. As excited and
nervous as we are, Scott and I just want God to lead and guide us, and to
try our very best to be of help there during this time. For the time being,
we plan to be there until other volunteers re-place us. There is also talk
that if they get permission for another plane to fly, that Scott will be
stationed in Guayara and fly from there. We don't know what God has planned
for now, but we trust that He is with us. We talked to David Gates, the
director of the ministry about what he thought about our plans to help out
the school and he approved our decision and says that its great that we are
willing to help them out during this time, since the Bolivian government
could shut down the school if the required classes aren't being taught. We
don't want this to happen, since this school teaches young people about God
and trains them how to reach out to others. Scott and I hope to be good
examples to the kids there, because 75% of them come from non-Christian
homes. Please pray for us, as this is a big change in roles we are filling.
Pray that God will give us strength, wisdom and courage to face whatever
comes with this new adventure!

When Scott and I
back to Bolivia, the airplanes still didn't have permission to fly, so
Scott has been doing other things that have been keeping him busy. It so
happened to be that the cook left again for 2+ months to plan her wedding
in Guyana, her homeland, and during this time I filled in for her. I also
taught piano to the 8 missionary kids here. I enjoyed this very much! Scott
has been such a big help to me with running the kitchen. He has gone to the
market many times to buy food for the week and just did all he could to
lighten my load. I am so thankful for him!!!

I am glad to say that the cook came back 2 weeks ago, and things are a lot
better, in that Scott and I can focus on other things now. I just help
mostly for lunch now and help clean-up…etc. Although I was super excited
that the cook came back, I also knew that she was physically exhausted when
she left and I decided that things would go better if she had some help.
She appreciated this very much.

Before our decision to move to Guayara, we were approved to build on a plot
of land that was part of the pilot's side of the property here in Santa
Cruz. You can imagine how excited Scott and I have been. We worked on
designing our small 2 bedroom house and clearing some land for making our
garden. By the way, clearing a 10X10ft piece of land for the garden was so
exhausting and hard work! I slashed away with a machete, and Scott dug away
with a hoe we got from town.

During this past couple months, a lot of construction was taking place.
Three missionary homes are in the process of being built, and Scott has
been helping with this too. Also, he is one of 2 people that are allowed to
drive missionaries to town with the van. A new Romanian family moved down
here 3 months ago and Scott has been really kind in taking them where they
need to go into town and translate for them…showing them the way…which bus
to take…etc. A couple months back, Scott helped Norbert, the Romanian man,
start a couple beehives over here. Of course the bees had to be bought from
town and this took a while, mostly of going back and forth and helping
Norbert find the best bees and buy whatever he needed. Another set of bees
had to be bought since one beehive disappeared! Well, right now, the bees
are doing great and Norbert and his family are slowly adjusting to the life
down here. They are learning that things in South America don't go as fast
as in the States or Europe. They used to be so frustrated that things
happen so slow over here and people don't seem to care to be on timeJ But
now, they are accepting a different culture and learning Spanish. (From
Scott: "One hard thing to do is to be on time and very productive, even
when it seems like the whole world around you isn't.")

I will miss the people over here, but I know I will make more friends in
Guayara. This is the newest news I can tell you right now. I am happy that
we can take Raisin, our sausage puppy, with us AND our kitty cat, Olive.
Scott absolutely loves his kitty cat!!! She's 99% black with tiny white
hairs on her chest. She will run up Scott's back and sit on his shoulder
when he goes for a walk. Olive loves to take walks with Scott in the
morning. So ya, Scott walks the dog and the cat in the morning. Raisin, our
dog, used to be terrified of Olive, but now they play together. Actually,
Raisin mostly bullies Olive, and sometimes Scott has to "save" the kitty!

We are very happy together and with our pets. And we are learning more and
more about each other. One thing that we are working on is dying to self
(Gal. 2:20). When self is alive, its so easy to be selfish…but when we ask
God to help us, its amazing how He changes our attitude and actions for the
better.

Yesterday Scott and I went to the US consulate to try and see if they could
do my fingerprints that are required for my US Immigration papers that I
will need to send back to the US. Unfortunately, they couldn't do it here
and referred us to La Paz, a main city here, which is an 18 hour bus ride.
We emailed the Consulate there, and called, but we haven't gotten a
response. If we aren't able to get the fingerprints done in La Paz, our
next option is Lima, Peru. We are trying our best to get this done before
heading out to Guayara because we hear that doing paperwork from way out
there is very difficult. We will see what happens. For now we will miss the
free flight to Guayara this week and try to catch the one going in the next
two weeks, and see if we can get the fingerprinting done.

Take care and may God bless you.

Min

Back in Bolivia

Friends,

It's been a long time since I have written. Here is what has happened:

We made it successfully to the United States. God chose not to allow us to bring our dog with us, and for good reason. It seems that there is a rule that airlines will not accept pets for transport if the temperature at any of the destinations en route have a temperature forcasted to be above 85 degrees F. This happened to us. Looking back, it was a blessing that we left Raisin behind because of the expense of bringing her back to Bolivia, and the additional paperwork. We were only in the U.S. for 10 weeks anyway. We were sad at first, but the time went very fast. This also allowed us to send some money back that we borrowed from a friend, and send a little more to help to a missionary who we left behind. I felt good about the outcome.

Arriving in Collegedale, TN we had $5 to our name but we were happy and in the hands of family. Our first goal for coming to the U.S. was to attend Min's brother's wedding. Bruce and Keturah were married in a beautiful wedding in Lake Lure, NC. They accomodated us well, and we had a great time with the family. Everything came together for the wedding, and they are now happily married. 

Our second goal in the U.S. was to save up enough money to file for U.S. citizenship for Min. She has been a legal resident with a "green card" for several years. Jobs are scarce and the price for applying is $680. By God´s grace, the next day or so after we returned to Tennesee from the wedding, my mother-in-law received a call for me. She had a friend who might employ me if I call him right away! Sure enough, he was a tree worker who needed help working on several jobs. I started working the next week. Our time in the U.S. was a blur for me, every day either asking questions and making sure Min´s application was filled out correctly with all necessary attachments, or working to pay the application fee. God knew we would need a lot more funding than I could earn in that short time, so he sent donations from several sources to help provide for other needs, including travel, communication, and necessities for returning to Bolivia. I was even able to fly to Washington for a few days to have Thanksgiving dinner with my parents (a week before Thanksgiving). I hadn´t seen them in almost a year. One excellent testimony to God´s provision: Min´s paperwork was sent with the fee just two weeks before our target date to return to Bolivia. I had no money for airplane tickets and prices would only go up as the time approached. A missionary bought us two tickets knowing we would pay him back. I worked as I could for two weeks, and with some family help we paid him back and flew to Bolivia. While in the U.S. we gave mission updates in three churches, and saw family and friends when we could and the whole experience was a blessing.

We´re back again in Bolivia! I´ve been helping however I can, and getting our living area more livable. I put in shelves and a place to hang our clothes, and even installed an electrical outlet professionally with conduit and a junction box. It´s different here, because the buildings are made of cement and bricks - no drywall. A HUGE blessing this time was being able to bring Min´s electronic piano with us. She likes it a lot better than the ones available for her use here, and we can travel with it too. 

I´ve been blessed to find a Bible study interest in the community next to our property. His name is Jimmy (doesn´t sound Bolivian does it?), and he drives a bush taxi. He is interested in Bible prophesy. My level of Spanish is just enough that I would attempt this on my own, and so far God had blessed. We covered Daniel 2 last time, and I plan to go through Daniel 7 next time. An unexpected surprise the last time was that he wanted to do the Bible study inside the little office they have where the bush taxis stop near our property. We ended up with an audience of four, and afterward they asked if I would teach english. I taught an english lesson and everyone wanted me to return the next week! His car broke down this week, and I really want to keep the study going so please pray that God intervenes to make sure it doesn´t fizzle out.

Min´s been giving piano lessons to five or more missionary kids here. Along with helping in the kitchen it´s a full load! We´ve been asked to be part of the music program at the Hamacas SDA church. At first we were hesitant, because we prefer our small church at Pedro Lorenzo. Hamacas is perhaps the largest church in downtown Santa Cruz with many members and many of them trade professionals. I found out it is also perhaps the most influential church in Santa Cruz. It may turn out as a calling though: Our ministry in Bolivia is a ¨supporting ministry¨ not funded or governed by the local SDA conference. This is not common here in Bolivia, and since its inception, our ministry has been looked upon with skepticism by the local leaders. We have wanted so much to work together with the conference while maintaining our own leadership and TV content to ensure the highest standards. This last year that door has opened. The new president of the Santa Cruz Mission of SDAs came to visit our facility and express the desire to work together as brethren! I believe the pastor of Hamcas was with him and some others. Now the Hamacas church has identified us as theirs, and our station director is in charge of the music program there. So we can see that by participating in the music program, we are strenghtening the ties between our ministry and the local churches and knocking down the walls of fear! 

I´ve not been flying lately. Our chief pilot is not here, and right now I am the only pilot. The planes should have permission to fly soon, but I´ll need to fly with another pilot for many more hours before flying on my own here. 

Please pray for us, and one of our missionaries, Daniel. He had a motorcycle accident today. He is fine, but someone else was injured badly and he is not sure what the government will do to him. The injured person was taken off to the hopsital by an ambulance. 

God Bless,

Scott Sterling

http://www.missionpilotscott.blogspot.com

 

Good News and Bad News

Friends,

 

I´ve got good news and bad news this month; the bad news first:

 

Our airplane was robbed! We have a Cessna 182 turbocharged airplane that we have been working on permissions for as our workhorse. A few days ago, we were contacted by someone at the small municipal airport where the airplane was parked, stating that the propeller was missing from our plane. Jeff rushed down to the airport and discovered that at least the following were missing: Variable-pitch propeller, brakes, pitot tube and some antennas. He´s talked to the airport police and filed a report. Fliers were handed out at the airport and local bus station with a reward offered. So far to no avail. The sad part is that donations have come in enough to pay the import fees (around $16,000), which we paid and filed paperwork for importation. This plane and the Cessna 172 are the two planes that should have unlimited permission to fly in Bolivia soon. The 172 is a small plane and more suited for short flights within the jungle. This plane was going to work here, and eventually in La Paz, where only a turbocharged plane can go. (We should be able to import planes for free when the laws are enacted in our favor to do so, but for now we have to pay.)

 

There is some good news, however. In the process of talking with people at the airport about the incident and looking for a safe place to put the airplane, Jeff met two people who have hangars and are willing to let us keep our planes there. Hangar space is expensive, and we are not rich, but the owners for now are letting us stay for free. What a blessing! Our planes are much more secure now.

 

The airport closes at sundown, and everyone goes home including the police. It´s possible that someone who owns a hangar at the airport stayed late and stole the parts off the plane when everyone went home. I pray that God will forgive those who stole the parts, and that they may be saved someday. As for us, God can provide another propeller since He owns everything.

 

On to more good news:

 

Min and I received our 30 day visas! We traveled to the border between Bolivia and Argentina. The city on the Bolivian side was called Yacuiba. Our goal was to cross the border into Argentina where there was a Bolivian Consulate that would process our paperwork. We hopped a bus from Santa Cruz at 9:30pm and arrived at 4:30am in Yacuiba and made it to the border ok. It was a little scary because Min was denied entry into Argentina because she was Filipino. Three of us did our paperwork while she had to wait at the border. We stayed the night, and the next morning applied for a visa for her at the Argentenian consulate on the Bolivian side of the border. They finally decided to grant her a 3 day visa for $50! That was a high price, but we paid it and that afternoon she received her 30 day Bolivian visa as well. We traveled home safely, just in time to play instruments for a wedding. We have been applying for our 1-year residency since we returned to Santa Cruz. There is a list of 20 papers that we need in our application. Most of them have a cost attached, so I´m watching our money disappear more rapidly than I´d like. It´s ok though; we need this to be done in order to work here in Bolivia. Our only other option is to apply for a working visa each month at $105 per person per month. Instead we´re going to pay about $600 per person for the year (paperwork included).

 

While we were in Yacuiba, we met some Seventh-day Adventists who run a vegetarian restaurant. We ate there and talked with them and while we were there a little boy came in with some hamsters in a cardboard box. We´ve wanted to get a pet, but are worried about having to travel. We decided to buy two hamsters for his asking price of 40 bs ($6). After bringing them home, we found that another missionary really liked hamsters. In fact, they seemed to bring him so much happiness just holding them, that we decided to give them to him. He was VERY happy. And so we were petless. A few days later we went with this missionary to town to pick out a cage, and saw some dogs and cats. Min seemed interested in getting a dog, maybe even one like the Dashund she had when she was a kid. The next week we stopped at the same pet sellers on the way home and guess what? There appeared to be a pure-bred Dashund puppy for sale! We had enough money (the man wanted $65 but we talked him down to $50) and we bought her. Min was _really_ happy. $50 is a lot of money as a missionary, but for comparison, these dogs sell for $200-$500 in the U.S. With that in mind, it seems that God took something that would normally be outside our means and brought it down to our level! We´re happy with her and named her ¨Raisin¨ (she´s mostly black). So far I´ve learned more patience, waking up at 2am to let her pee, cleaning up after her during potty training, teaching her not to chew on everyone. I think I´m being prepared to be a father someday, should the Lord tarry. We´ve been blessed so far, as she was potty-trained in one week, although these dogs are notoriously hard to potty-train. I´ll put up some pictures of her soon.

 

A new missionary has arrived here. His name is Jon and this is his first mission trip. He´s been a blessing so far, and he´ll be here 5 months. He´s from Michigan and his girlfriend worked at one of our projects here in Bolivia. He´s just starting to learn Spanish, and we took him to town with us to buy groceries and show him around. He´s got quite a testimony, having rebelled and gotten into drugs, and then delivered. He is so serious about getting away from his old environment and temptations and getting closer to God that he came all the way out here to volunteer in Bolivia. So far he hasn´t been turned-off by the 3rd-world difficulties, the different culture, or the prospect of hard work. Please pray that his motivation continues and that God answers his prayer for a closer walk with Him in a mighty way.

This last weekend a group of us went for a weekend retreat to the hills of Palermo. Santa Cruz is very flat, but as you travel to the southwest, the terrain gets more and more mountainous. We went on the road to Samaipata, which is somewhat of a tourist destination. My friend Daniel suggested we hitch a ride on a truck coming from the market in Santa Cruz. There are buses and bush taxis that go there, but he insisted that trucks are much more comfortable. It turned out he was right - we tied our hammocks up in the back and had a relaxed three-hour ride. Before we reached Samaipata, we got off the vegetable truck we were riding in and walked up a road that went a mile off into the hills. There was a small home and church that we stopped at and spent the weekend. The home belonged to a couple of missionaries, Matteo and his wife Paola. They run a lifestyle center out of their home and local Seventh-day Adventists come to the small church next-door. Min and I stayed in a bedroom behind the church and the others stayed in the house. It was a reverent and awe-inspiring weekend. Worshipping in the small church with windows all around displaying the high hills around us was a great experience. After lunch we went hiking up into the hills for a few hours. We returned on Sunday after visiting a churchmember who had a sugar cane farm. She sent us home with two bottles of fresh-squeezed sugar cane juice. We caught a ride home on the back of a truck carrying cement to Santa Cruz. I highly recommend taking a trip up into the mountains if you live in the lowlands or city. The tall mountains made me feel small, and more in the presence of God. Oh, and stars were so much brighter out there!

Please pray for us, as we have more needs now (see ¨How to Help¨ above for details), for our missionaries, including Jon, and that God would open the doors soon for us to resume mission-flying here or show us if he has a different plan, and finally that the building projects go forward here with good speed.

God Bless,

Scott Sterling

http://www.missionpilotscott.blogspot.com

 

News

Friends,

A lot of good things have happened here in Bolivia. Our chief pilot, Jeff, has returned along with two more missionaries, D.J. and his wife Jodie. D.J. is a pilot and Jodie is a teacher. They have been a blessing, since there are three girls who share the cooking duties right now, leaving Min some time to hang out with me :) 

Jeff is also the manager of our building projects here, and so a lot more is happening on the grounds here. We are submitting plans to the local government for our property and paying taxes on all the houses. Once they are approved, we will not have to worry about the government putting roads through our houses, land, etc. 

We have a machine for making cinderblocks and are getting it running with the right mix of sand, rocks, concrete and water to make blocks for building houses. Supposedly we can make 1000 blocks a day with it. The blocks take 6 days to cure, and then we can use them to build. Another project far to the north wants to use the block machine as well, and they will tow it up there and use it. Until then, we are going to make as many blocks as we can and have them ready for construction projects here. 

One of our pilots, Steve, is getting married this November. His house is the next to be built, and I´m sure he´d like it if it were finished for him and his wife to move into when they return after the wedding. This will be one of our main projects in the coming months.

Jeff is working on getting permission for our planes to fly, which involves getting them imported so they become Bolivian airplanes. Normally, this costs 30% of the airplane´s Bolivian value, and this has been a major obstacle for us for the last few months. However, God has provided another way. The government in La Paz, Bolivia is so interested in having our planes flying and doing the work we do, that they are willing to write whatever laws we need (within reason, I´m sure) to get our planes flying. So far we´ve asked for free importation of the airplanes (as they will be used only for humanitarian work). 

Another requirement will be that our pilots need to be Bolivian residents with Bolivian pilots licenses to fly these planes. I´ve heard from 4 different people here that doing paperwork in Bolivia is very difficult, especially if you´re American. There´s always another stamp you need, or another certified document, or the person you need to sign you off is arguing with you, telling you that you can´t do what you are filing paperwork to do. I talked to a pilot who ¨convalidated¨ his American commercial pilot´s license so that he could use it in Bolivia to work as a pilot. They did it, and put a restriction on it that he could not work for money... which is the only reason most people get a commercial pilots license! This was very frustrating for him. Jeff is going to work with the government in La Paz to make it possible for our pilots to obtain residency and licenses without roadblocks.

After talking with David, my parents, Min´s parents, and reflection in prayer, we believe God is leading us to come back here and work as missionaries. Jeff said he and the others would be glad to have us on the team, and I am happy about that. It also simplifies our plans, since now we can leave our belongings here when we go to visit the U.S. this September, and we can start on our paperwork for Bolivian residency.

My tourist visa has run out, and I am now racking up a fine of $3 per day that I will need to pay when I leave the country. This was the plan, and I was saving $200 to pay my way out of the country in September. This was the only option I knew we had at the time in order to help out here until September. Now we are putting that money toward our paperwork to become Bolivian residents. This will cost us a total of $600 each, is what I am told. To start out, we are applying for a work visa for $80 each. This will allow us to be in the country for 30 days or more to apply for residency. Residency can take 3 months or more, but we can ¨pause¨ the process by withdrawing our passports. This we will do when we come visit the U.S. in September. We intend to visit family, apply for Min´s U.S. citizenship (she is here as a Filipino), and attend her brother´s wedding. It stresses me out a little to imagine how we are going to do all of these things quickly and return here, especially since some of it costs money we don´t have yet. However, our experience so far and the experience of others here is that God finds a way every time, and we can count on Him to lead us through.

We are leaving this Tuesday on a bus to the Argentina-Boliva border to exit the country and apply for our work visas. We will take the bus in the evening and arrive in the morning. Apparently the buses are really nice, even better than a commercial airline inside. We´ll try to get some sleep on the way, and file our paperwork during Wednesday. Wednesday or Thursday night we´ll return here, Lord willing. We need to, because we´ve been given the opportunity to play music for the reception at a Menonite wedding on Friday. There are several Menonite colonies in Bolivia, and near Santa Cruz. Hopefully this experience will allow us to meet some of them and make friends. 

Please pray for us, that all goes well with our travels and work visa applications. Please pray for D.J. and Jodie as they plan to travel to Guyana and work there for a while. Finally, please pray that Jesus will come soon and that we all will be ready!

God Bless,

Scott Sterling

http://www.missionpilotscott.blogspot.com

 

Photos!!!

Friends,

I´ve finally posted photos. They will run as a slideshow at the top, or you can click on the slideshow to go directly to the album. You must go directly to the album if you wish to see the descriptions I made for each photo. They are ordered by subject but not chronologically. Enjoy!

If you are reading this on facebook, go to http://www.missionpilotscott.blogspot.com/ to view the photos.

God Bless,

Scott Sterling

More News

Friends,

 

I haven´t communicated in about a month, so here´s what´s going on:

 

Min made it back safely on her trip, and with presents! We had four missionaries request special items from the United States, and we had our own list of things. Nutritional Yeast Flakes, Insoles, McKay´s Chicken Seasoning, raw cashews, vegetarian jerkey, italian seasoning and rechargable batteries were among the requests. She said Pearl´s wedding was great, and she brought back a hand-carved pair of giraffes made in Africa that each guest was given. (Apparently the bride´s family bought them in Africa and brought them to the U.S. for the wedding).

 

Cooking had been a bit stressful for Min. She had been cooking 3 meals a day which meant getting up at 6am to get breakfast going, followed by a cleanup, worship, a two-hour break and then get started on lunch. After cleaning up lunch she was off for 3 hours and then started dinner... finally finishing her day at 7:30pm! If she did laundry on her breaks she would have a 12-hour day. Thanks to a missionary named Carmen who came to visit, we´ve adopted a new schedule and Min´s very happy. She now only cooks breakfast and lunch, and is off Saturday and Sunday. She also wanted to cook meals just for me and her, so I bought a gas cookstove and put it in our little kitchen. We´ve cooked one meal on it so far!

 

We have an airplane! It´s not for very long, but we´ve been granted permission to use our Cessna 182 Turbo for 1 month, ending June 27. Apparently when you bring an American airplane to Bolivia, you either pay 30% of it´s Bolivian-estimated value as an import tax, or you ask permission to fly it as an American airplane. Since the second option is free, we´ve been doing that on all our planes for about a year. Sadly, it´s getting more difficult to get permission, and we think they are pressuring us to import them. This amounts to $16,000 per plane and we have at least 5. We´ll see what God does. It´s been 6 months since we´ve had permission to use an airplane so we haven´t gotten many calls yet, as people are just becoming aware that it is available. We´ve taken a pastor out to San Joaquin to work in a village for a month, and Friday we brought David Harding out to Familia Feliz orphanage in Rurrenabaque, Boliva. David´s daughter started the orphanage. We also brought them 30 or so baking pans for making bread, and took a man home to see his family who had been in the hospital in Santa Cruz. It seems that there are other mission pilot organizations in Bolivia, so we just work one area that no-one else serves, called The Beni. It is mostly jungle with few passable roads. You can read about it at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beni_Department . I´m learning to communicate to air traffic control in Spanish. Technically English is the official language of aviation worldwide, but that doesn´t apply in small regional airports in Bolivia. I had a fellow pilot tell me sometimes they can understand ATC´s Spanish better than he can their English! It´s very difficult for me, but it´s coming slowly. Herman, one of our pilots, told me even though he is fluent in Spanish, they sometimes use terminology with him that baffles him. So I´ve got a big learning curve to meet!

 

Another project here is the runway. We have a grass runway prepared on the property right where we live. Right now it´s 550 meters long (about 1800 feet) and ultimately we plan to extend it to 1200 meters. So far it´s been smoothed by a tractor dragging a large log up and down it, and good grass has been planted. Now we´re working on the requirements to get it certified for use. We need runway beginning and end markers, markers on the sides every 50 meters, and a windsock. Last week and this week we finished the markers. Being in Bolivia, we opted for large PVC pipes to mark the ends, and buried tires painted white for the 50 meter markers. I think in total we spent less than $50 so far.

 

On a sad note: Red ADvenir, our Spanish TV network is off the air. We´ve been waiting on some donated funds for some months now and praying, but finally we had to cease transmitting our signal last week. I hear that sufficient funds have been donated to keep us on the air, but they were sent from another country, through the U.S. and the funds are tied up in the U.S. Maybe the U.S. government thinks it´s drug money... or, more likely, Satan doesn´t want our station on the air. Just a week before this, we had a fire break out in our most critical computer room. Richard (the station manager) called the station watchman to tell him that he wasn´t receiving the signal. The volunteer watchman went out side and saw smoke coming from the transmission room! Apparently a power surge had started an electrical fire and the main power cable was fried. The fire had started underneath the signal amplifier, a $70,000 piece of equipment needed for transmitting the signal to the satellite that needed to be imported from the U.S.. By God´s grace, all that needed to be replaced was the fried power cable. The signal amplifier was completely undamaged. Within 6 hours the signal was back on the air.

A couple of good things are coming out of our current situation: Richard has had plans for relocating some of our equipment to better serve the station and aid expansion in the future. This project requires us to be off of the air, so we are going forward with it now. Another possible blessing is in working with the Seventh-day Adventist conference in Bolivia. In the past, it seems, our ministry has been regarded as a nusance and we have not had a good working relationship with the conference. However, new leaders have been appointed to the conference positions here in Bolivia, and they have already come to visit the station and extend the hand of fellowship. Here´s where the opportunity comes in: Even though we are off the satellite, we still have several TV station licenses around Bolivia. These stations were receiving our signal via satellite, and re-transmitting it via cable or over-the-air waves. The conference has an official TV station in South America called ¨Nuevo Tiempo¨. We can work together at this time by telling our TV stations to receive the Nuevo Tiemo signal via satellite and transmit it in place of Red ADvenir for now. That seems to be the plan, and in the meantime we´ll prepare for when we can be back on the air again, should God re-open that door.

 

Thank you for praying for us! Please pray for the station, the aviation program, the other missionary efforts here in Bolivia, and that Min and I would continue to be a blessing here.

God Bless,

Scott Sterling

http://www.missionpilotscott.blogspot.com