week five underway

Hey everyone,
last week´s team left on Thursday morning (normally they leave friday nights) which gave us a free day. Despite most of us being very tired and weary from all the work we´d been doing, we played with the boys all morning (well, we watched a movie with them... the Incredibles) and then took the afternoon to recuperate. I am reading the autobiography of Julie Andrews and I must have read about 150 pages on Thursday alone! by the way, the book is really good if you like Julie Andrews... i grew up with the Sound of Music and Mary Poppins so i really enjoyed it. It´s called HOME.
but enough of the advertisement. The team from last week had 19 people and only two had never been here before. This team is from the same church (Lake Forest Church in Charlotte, NC) and all but three of their group are new to Bolivia! Lake Forest sends two teams and one is returners and one is new. It´s pretty cool that way because the new people aren´t dealing with all the preconceptions from other team members. Other than the leaders on this team, they are all coming in fresh with open minds. It´s awesome!
We just took the kids to ice cream again (they have now had ice cream twice this year!). I´ve been connecting with a lot of the boys this week that i didn´t have as close of a relationship with in the past. Please pray that i have the opportunity to minister to these new boys :).
I know that i mentioned that Victor´s cousin Josue is here at the life center with him now. Every time victor gives me a card or a note he writes victor, adan (or azul) and Josue. It´s like i´ve been inducted into his family and now we´re all related. The other day victor told me he was worried about his cousin. I asked him why... he´s safe here and has so many friends. Victor said, no. not that one. Apparently, josue has a little brother, fabrizio, who is living in cochabamba by himself. he was worried about what might happen to him with no one to take care of him. the next day, i helped anna put the pequenos (the youngest boys of which victor is a part) to bed. we had tickle time with the team, then when they left, we let them watch milo and otis in spanish while some of them finished getting ready for bed. victor was laying in his bed weeping. i climbed up into the top bunk with him and just let him cry for about twenty minutes. when he stopped for a few minutes, i asked him if he was sad. no. if he was hurt. no. if he was scared. yes. i asked why... he said he was scared of what might be happening to fabrizio. it broke my heart. i wish nine year old boys didn´t have to worry about whether their younger cousins will survive the night on the streets or if they will be able to find money or food to survive on without having to find a pimp to work for.
please continue to pray as the boys here are constantly dealing with memories like these. this one hits home for me of course, but there are 79 more boys here with similar stories. please keep them in prayer.
an update on sponsorships, we only have 12 boys left without sponsors. we started the summer close to 30 so that´s such a blessing! please pray for open hearts as this team and the next team are all we have left this summer. we have a couple families who are considering it this week. to specifically pray for the boys who need sponsors, you can go to the website and see their pictures. www.cinonline.net
thanks for all your prayers so far. w e´re over halfway. happy and sad. also, thanks for the encouraging emails... yes, i do get them. sorry i don´t always get around to responding! we´re limited on time here! :)
love to all.
geuder-adam-azul