TrewsNews

We're in the middle of two weeks winter holiday. Long overdue as the last term in school was 15 weeks without a break! Despite the holiday last week was one of 7am rises - because the landlord is repairing the leaky roof. Our prayers are answered. Hopefully our trouble with housing is over. Also this week we have a team visiting from a link church - Knockbreda Parish in Belfast. Eighteen months ago when we visited them we told them of opportunities to visit Pararguay and work with the church here. So they decided to send a team out. They are restoring a church building on the outskirts of the city and have come to see where we work. They came to church today and helped take the service. It's really great to have people from home to spend time with. We're hoping to get out to them this week and see what they have been up to. Here are some photos. Building work at an Anglican church in Zeballous Cue   The children's club Children's club.

Today during assembly we challenged the students to 'Choose today who you will serve' Josh 24:15. We asked them to decide to commit themselves to follow Christ and for it to make a difference to their lives in school. We asked those who wanted to commit more to Christ to come and pray in the school patio at 1:30 during lunch time. Thirty students from several classes came along and we all prayed for each other and for the school. They want to keep praying every Friday for the school and teachers. This was an amazingly encouraging and exciting development! Some of the other teachers said we may be breaking new ground.

Good news today, I do not have skin cancer after all. Dr. Mihm, the skin cancer specialist spent Saturday with Dr Bachetta and they examined the biopsy. It turns out to be a minor skin condition that affects 1 person in a 100. The surgeon wants to remove a slightly larger area of skin and that should be it dealt with.

Today in church we had three families leave. They are moving on to other parts of the world with their jobs. It was a time to reflect and for them to share how their lives had changed over the two years they had been with us. It was amazing actually. Jeff and Maria are moving onto Switzerland. Jeff shared how he had really come to a serious commitment to Christ. He had done an Alpha course last year and it really spurred him onto to reading his Bible daily and taking his faith seriously. They are looking for an Anglican church in Zurich now. Jeff and Maria Christine is moving back to London. She said how she had initially come simply for social contract with English speakers. Now she is leaving with a real sense of commitment and has made contact with a Christian group in her new job and wants to do an Alpha course pretty soon. It was all very encouraging. What have we learnt through this? Being a friend is the most important thing in sharing you faith. Being natural and all...

This evening was the St. Andrew's College Asuncion prize giving for international exams. Our school is the only one in Paraguay that offers international GCSE and AS level exams from the Cambridge University International Exam Board. So it was quite an occasion for the students who were obtaining their certificates. Christine Winterbun, the Charge d' Affairs from the British Embassy, was the guest of honour. It was her last official engagement for the embassy which is now sold. There will be no more British diplomats here after she leaves next Monday. The highlight of the night were two ex-students who returned from studying in the UK and USA. I taught computer Studies to Guillermo in 2001. He's now a majoring in Computer Animation at a university in Florida. They said how much they valued the international education they got in St. Andrew's and how helpful it was to them in their studies. It was nice to hear students appreciate what we do. St. Andrew's ex-s...

On Monday evening we went to the last official embassy event in Asunción.  The British government announced last year the embassy would close to save money.  It was in the Ambassador's residence that has a big for sale sign outside and furniture borrowed for the evening.  The house is normally empty as the ambassador moved on in April and all the furniture is gone.  It was an opportunity to meet the Honorary Consul and our new Diplomatic representatives from Buenos Aires, who now have charge over Asunción. It was actually a very nice evening, the food was excellent.  It's a shame the embassy will no longer be here to pay for the occasional buffet dinner. 

I got the pathology results yesterday and they are not sure what the results mean! They recommended that an expert pathologist, Dr. Martin Mihm from the USA, who is visiting Paraguay on June 25th, has a look at it. Not sure if that is good news or not.

4:58 pm I'm sitting in the waiting room of Dr Bachetta, the plastic surgeon who removed my skin cancer last Friday. It was a straightforward procedure, a quick local anathestic and 15 minutes on the table and that was it. He will have biopsy results I think. To see a consultant here is pretty easy. You just need to ring up their private clinic and make an appointment. All you need to have is the money to afford treatment - $150 to have skin cancer removed. Our school has health insurance which covers general hospital visits, but your average Paraguayan struggles to find the money to see the doctor or buy medicines. Often people are begging in the streets because their child needs medicine. The daughter of members of our church recently had twins 12 weeks premature, they needed a week of neonatal intensive care - at £2000 a day! Hearing figures like that make you thankful for the National Health Service we have in Northern Ireland. 6:14 pm Dr said it is healing well, but no patholog...

On Sunday we went to a British Community Open House dinner. The British Community in Asunción is made up of a mix of old school ex-pats and a new breed of younger (less than 60) families on contracts. The best-seller 'At The Tomb of the Inflatable Pig', gave a colourful caricature of some of the more eccentric ex-pats. Many of them were there on Sunday. We used not to go to these events, but with more families around these days we feel a bit more comfortable. In fact, the invitation mentioned there would be a bouncy castle, and because of that we went. With a six year old and three year old, child entertainment is a priority at these things. I met a larger than life guy called Pete. He'd retired 6 months ago to Paraguay with his Paraguayan wife. He said he was totally non religious, but I invited him along to our small group anyway. I told him it was fine to be non religious in the small group setting, in fact you can ask any question you like no matter how stupid o...

Yesterday we dropped Denis and Andrew off at the airport for their return to Irish soil. We managed to spend more time with them than we first thought, thanks to the generosity of our school principal who gave us time off school. On Thursday I went with them to a community way across the Paraguay River called Remansito. It used to be a shanty town but has matured over the years and now has brick built homes with the occasional shack. We saw the new Anglican church in Remansito which various teams from Ireland and England have built over the last three years. It was really good to see the finished church. I'll try to get some photos on-line soon. Then on Tuesday Eileen was able to visit Zeballous Cue with them. This is where a team from Ireland will visit in July and do some construction work for the church there. It is also a poorer area on the fringes of the city. It is a community badly affected by the supermarket fire in Asunción last year. It goes without saying the cra...

Press reports here say there were 40,000 people at the Franklin Graham Festival of Hope each night. On Saturday 60,000 children and families went to a large youth event.

Our 'boss' arrived today! We'll not really, Denis Johnston is the secretary of SAMS Ireland . He does have overall responsibility for SAMS Ireland staff though. An old friend Andrew Forster also is visiting, he was Church of Ireland chaplin at Queen's University Belfast when I worked there. Great to see him again. We're having dinner later. It was a bit of an adventure getting them from the airport. I was to use the Bishop's pickup to get them and thought I'd get it a early, it was well I did. It had a flat battery and needs to be push started, twice! Then it was low on fuel and because of the another power cut this morning none of the petrol stations had working pumps (welcome to the developing world!). But it was without mishap and I picked them up without hitch at the airport. Another thing starting today is the Festival de Esperanza with Franklin Graham - son of Billy. A massive evangelical campaign that aims to fill the national football stadi...

It's been a busy week this one. We are looking after two boys for a week, their mum has returned to the UK to sort out a new house and school for them when they return to the UK in July. Elijah and Hannah get on with them very well and things have been swimming along nicely, no problems. But by the end of each day we are pretty exhausted and going to bed early. This evening was our second week of the small group - Christianity Explored. Again it was a good meeting. Everyone was very open about where they are at spiritually and hopefully they will feel comfortable to come back and open up some more next week. Just after everyone went home there was a nation wide power cut, the whole country was plunged into darkness. We could not see a thing in the house and did that thing where you use your mobile phone as a torch, to find a proper torch. The sky outside was fantastic, a beautiful starry night. Something we never see because of the light pollution. The Milky Way was very o...

On Wednesday we had our first small group meeting of the year. It was a good night. A mix of those who had done the Alpha Course last year and some new ones. We shared a meal and got to know each other better. Based on the group we decided to do a course called Christianity Explored , which is similar to Alpha. It allows those interested in Christianity to ask questions and explore what the Bible says about Jesus. It felt really good to have a small group up and going again. We believe being part of a small group is an essential thing for any member of a church. After our experience with Alpha we learnt the informal setting that allows seekers to ask any question is a wonderful thing. We're looking forward to the weeks ahead and sharing more about Jesus to our friends.

In the southern hemisphere winter is from April to September, and don't we know it today! It's absolutely freezing! Actually its not, it's 14C but with a stiff wind making it feel about 6C. But when it was 36C last Thursday it feels really cold. So we are all in our winter woollies and the blankets are coming out for the beds tonight. It's also the season for colds and sniffles. Hannah was off 3 days last week with a fever. Then on Friday she came out in spots and we were sure it was Measles. So we whisked her off to the doctor but it tuned out to be just the virus she had coming out in spots with the heat. They have quickly gone with the wind, the freezing breeze. The next day, Saturday, Elijah was at the doctor with an ear infection. Then yesterday I lost my voice. I'm so croaky now I should be a bar maid in Corrination Street. I'm just about to go into 9th year maths, the loudest class in the school. So a wee test was just photocopied minutes ago...

We have had significant interest in the Alpha Course recently. So much so that we are going to start another within a couple of weeks. So pray for people to come and make committments over the next three months.

Our latest prayer letter was sent out today. You can print it off and stick it up on your prayer fridge. We went to a local shopping centre this afternoon only to find it in darkness and all the shops shut. There was a power cut as a transformer in a street nearby had exploded. All the street lights around were in total darkness. Power cuts like this are not infrequent. Last year there was an outage that cut power to the entire country for about 4 hours. Also phoned the dermatologist today, but he does not have the liquid nitrogen to remove the skin cancer. Delayed for 2 weeks.

I went to the doctor today and he told me I had skin cancer. It's a very mild form, Basal Cell Carcinoma , and easily treatable. Still it's a bit of a shock when you're told you have cancer, even if it is mild. I have a month's immunotherepy and then the dermatologist will remove it with cryosurgery - freeze it off with liquid nitrogen.

Valetines Day! I had ordered perfume from the UK and had it was a wee surprise for Eileen today. Later I found it on sale in our local supermarket!! Bizzare. Also it is the first day of the school year today. Back to the fun of teaching IT and Maths in English to Spanish speaking students. Hannah starts the second year of preschool and Elijah starts 1st grade - the first year of primary. They seem happy to be back.

A few days ago we returned to Asuncion from Florianopolis via Foz do Iguacu. We had a nice time in Santa Catarina island - a top tourist resort island in southern Brazil. Excellent sea food especially. Fisherman landing their catch, Santa Catarina Eileen's parents return home tomorrow and it has been great having them here during January. It is the hottest time of the year at the moment but we have been spared with temperatures only in the high 30s. Apparently it had been well in the 40s the week we were in Brazil. in a few weeks time school starts again so until then we plan to enjoy spending some time getting the house and garden in shape.