Thanks to your amazing donations and prayers, Edith’s family is now in a pre-fabricated house. However, it was an ordeal. Two Saturdays ago, Edith; her son, Gino; her sister, Nancy; Nancy’s daughter, Lauren; Edith’s brother, Juan and I went to the pre-fabrication shop to order the house.

When I first went to Chincha to visit Edith’s family, Edith told me that it was her hope to buy a house for her parents. They lost their home in the August, 2007 earthquake. She told me that a pre-fab home would cost $200. Now, I asked her several times about the price. $200 seemed very low, but then again, we are in Peru.

The first shop that we stopped at, we could have a pre-fab home without the roof for about 1,800 soles or roughly $630. That did not include delivery which is about 3 hours from Lima. So, we went to another shop. This one offered a 15′ by 20′, with a roof for 2,100 soles (appx $740). Now, these prices were a far cry from the $200 Edith told me.

I wish I had more time to organize the whole process. I sent out the e-mail on a Sunday and the next day, David came home to say that we were being transferred to Chile the next week!!! Oh my gosh, what about my house project. Thankfully, many of you wrote to tell me the amount of your donation that you had sent to Maine. So, I had a rough idea how much money I was working with.

On Saturday, I had just about enough money to purchase the house with the roof, but not enough to transport it. Edith and her siblings said that they would pay for the transportation….although I knew they didn’t have the money. So, with a step of faith, we ordered the house, signed the contract and said we would be back Tuesday to see the finished results.

Late Tuesday afternoon, Edith and I went to the shop to see the new house. It was all built and in pieces on the ground. We waited for about 1 1/2 hours before they decided to assemble it. They tried to tell us that it was large and they didn’t have enough room to put it together. I told them that I wasn’t going to purchase something that I hadn’t seen. Finally, they started to assemble it. However, by the time they finished, it was fairly dark and difficult to see any flaws that might be on the house.

In the meantime, Edith was having quite the discussion with the woman manager….we had dealt with her brother on Saturday. Evidently, Edith understood from the brother that the price included one of their workers to ride to Chincha to assemble the house. Now, this woman, was saying it was going to cost more money. Conveniently, her brother, whom we dealt with was not available. Oh my gosh, between waiting forever for the house to be assembled and the price going up, I was ready to slap this woman. She was so indifferent to anyone and anything. Plus, I couldn’t help but feel because I, an expat, was paying, that they were going to get more money. The siblings decided that they would have someone in Chincha assemble the house and not give anymore money to the shop in Lima.

After seeing the house and agreeing that it was built the way the family had requested, we said that we would be back on Wednesday to transport it to Chincha. I decided that I wasn’t needed on Wednesday as Nancy and Juan were going to go with the truck.

Juan and Nancy were at the shop around 10:00 AM, the woman didn’t show up until noontime….I am so glad that I wasn’t there, I just have no patients for people as mean and arrogant as this person was. David said that what I went through to get this house, was just a small sample of what he dealt with daily with his contractors…telling him it would be one price, it was always more; saying it would be done at this time, never done when they said….I now understand why he was pulling his hair out and banging his head against the wall. Oh my gosh, these people do business so differently.

Finally, at 2:00 PM, the house was loaded on the truck and its way. Edith told me that they arrived at 5:30 and no one, except her brother-in-law, was home!!! It turns out that Edith’s mother was at an orchard picking fruit to sell. Her father, a truck driver, was out on his route and wouldn’t be home until the weekend.

So, the family proceeded to take down the old house and put the new one together. Edith’s mother arrived home at 8:00 PM to a half-constructed new home!!! She was overwhelmed when she realized that she had a new house. Oh, how I wish I had been able to be there! From what I heard, she ran around the house and kept asking “this is my house?”, while crying tears of joy! The house was finally completed at 11:00 PM.

Last Saturday, David and I had made plans to travel with Edith to go to Chincha to see the house. However, David’s body had other ideas. On Friday, David started to feel a little under the weather. By Saturday morning, he knew that he needed some medical attention…boy, did he ever!!!

At the clinic, they diagnosed the problem and told us that he needed minor surgery. OH MY GOSH!!!! Excuse me, but we are leaving the country on Thursday, I have to packers coming on Monday and you need to operate on my husband today????

They admitted him and at 4:00 PM, he was taken down for surgery. Three hours later he came back to the room. He was a little groggy but doing well. He was kept overnight and released on Sunday.

Everyone at the clinic was wonderful. He received wonderful attention. Remember, we are in a Spanish speaking country. What an experience to go through in a foreign country!!! With my limited understanding of Spanish, some words of English and a touch of “charades”, we were able to communicate!

Monday the packers came and packed our belongings. Monday afternoon Edith and I cleaned the apartment. Monday night, David and I moved to a hotel and have been running around Lima to finish odds and ends before we leave on Thursday night.

David is well on the mend. Life is good! We are so blessed and are excited about our new adventure.