TrewsNews

We had a visit from the anti-Dengue authorities today. They looked at our garden to see if there are any places that mosquitoes could breed. Apparently we have 18 cases of Dengue in our block and they were surprised we have not had it in our family yet. We need to keep burning the spirals and plugging in the mossi killer.

Dengue Fever Hits Paraguay By REUTERS Published: March 4, 2007 ASUNCIÓN, Paraguay, March 2 — A Supreme Court justice, soccer players and a senator have come down with dengue in Paraguay, as the worst outbreak in the country’s history hit the well off as well as its usual victims among the poor. On Friday, a nurse who worked with the public health service died after being hospitalized for dengue. Ten people have died in Paraguay, which had never had a dengue death before, and more than 15,000 have been infected in the last two months. The dengue virus causes high fever, headache, muscle and joint pain and potentially fatal internal bleeding. Brazil and Bolivia are also fighting major dengue outbreaks and, like Paraguay, have declared health alerts. The outbreaks are thought to be linked to unusually hot and rainy weather that has allowed the mosquito that carries the disease, the Aedes aegypti mosquito, to proliferate. “We’re really scared,” said Amalia Benítez, an herb vendor in Asunci...

The Dengue Fever has now made international news. Today this report was on the BBC BBC NEWS | World | Americas | Dengue sparks Paraguay emergency Paraguay has declared a 60-day state of emergency to deal with an outbreak of dengue fever which has killed at least 10 people in the past two months. Officials say 14,654 people have been diagnosed with dengue. But doctors say the figure is 10 times higher, and are worried about a new more virulent variant of the disease. Read more. The other day a young SAMS volunteer who has only been in the country a month was hospitalized with Dengue. He had been ill then started developing nose bleeds. The missionary family has was staying with were pretty worried it could be hemorrhagic Dengue so they took him straight to hospital. After a day of test and a night in hospital for observation he was allowed home again. It looks like a bad case of classic Dengue. We also took Eiljah and Hannah for Yellow Fever vaccines last weekend. There alread...

Here are some specific prayer requests from Paraguay for the Woman's World Day of Prayer. Please pray for the continued growth of the evangelical churches here, and for the Anglican Church and St. Andrew’s schools. The Bishop of Paraguay retires in October and the church is currently looking for his replacement. We shall be returning permanently to Northern Ireland in July and St. Andrew’s school really needs more Christian teachers willing to serve here. The next year will actually see the school short staffed. Pray for the ministry of the school to the young people and the support St. Andrew’s gives to the Annex shanty town school and rural development projects in the Chaco.

Woman’s World Day of Prayer event this year on the 2nd March is praying for Paraguay. Over 170 countries will be joining together to pray for this nation. You can read more about this and events in your area on the Woman's World Day of Prayer website .

In Asuncion at the moment there is a major Dengue Fever epidemic. Almost 10,000 people have come down with the it, which is like a severe flu, but some 400 have contracted the hemorrhagic form, some of whom died from internal bleeding. There are signs up all over the city warning people not to leave water lying that can be breeding areas for mosquitoes that carry the disease. A number of colleagues have come down with it and a couple have had a rough week in bed. Doctors are predicting that the outbreak could continue to May and cause 60,000 cases.

The new school year has just started and we are now back in normal routine. The year started with an assembly where Eileen and I played and Mags and Gwen, the principal and VP spoke on 'How God knows, and yet still loves us'. There was a very good atmosphere and the year seems to be starting very well. This year once a week pupils will be bussed to Surubií where the school sports grounds are. New classrooms are being built along with a 400m running track. There will be sports lessons and even normal classes once the classrooms are finished out in the countryside. A shortage of cement in the entire country meant there is a month delay with the building work.

We had a great Christmas and New Year, one of the best actually. We know for sure now that we are returning for good to Northern Ireland in July 2008, so we decided to make the best of celebrating this time around. There was a good crowd for church on Christmas Day and we had some good friends around for dinner. We'd been given a large turkey and the Paxo stuffing had arrived in the post, so it was a traditional dinner with all the trimmings. It was also the first Christmas when the children have had all day in their own house and time to play without rushing about. A great time was had by all. We saw the New Year in with a few more friend around and we laughed and danced, let off fireworks and played silly games. It was pretty hot and we were all hot and sweaty by 3am when we finally got to bed. It was a fantastic time and one of the most memorable New Years we have ever had.

The last month in St. Andrew's has seen Eileen and I busy with end of year preparations and exams. The international GCSEs are in full swing with my students taking Maths and IT exams. Eileen is busily writing reports and organizing practices for her Christmas plays. It's been a bumpy ride for us as Eileen's mum has been in and out of hospital over the last couple of months and has been diagnosed with Non-alcoholic steatohepatitis ( NASH ). She will need a liver transplant in the next 12-24 months. The stress of dealing with this at times was very difficult, but we're glad a rough period seems to be over for the time being. With the end of the school year approaching and Christmas on the horizon we are doing some Christmas preparations and the children are starting to get into the spirit. We dug out the Nativity set and Hannah is having great fun recreating the cattle shed scene many times over. It's hard to believe another year is almost done, time flies.

We we're back to school after a week's spring break. We had a short holiday in Buenos Aires which was excellent. Some pictures are in our online photo album . The week before the holidays was one full of activities. Primary had sports day, you can see Elijah doing long jump, and secondary had youth day as well as sports day. All the students really got into the spirit of it all and it was a great week. Next Monday is the start of the IGCSE IT practicals. My students are practicing hard and a little nervous about their first exam. I'm sure they'll be fine though.

The chaco trip was great. It was amazing to see a church in so remote a part of the world celebrate 100 years. The old man in the first photo is holding a 1911 Bible in Exlet. This version is incomplete and is being revised by a SAMS mission partner - Tim Curtis. The inside of Makxawaya church was decorated with baloons and tinsel(!). It was good to see many of the local community turned up to celebrate this special service.  

  

Next Sunday sees the 100th anniversary of the first Anglican church in Paraguay. Special services will be held in the remote village of Makxawaya in the Paraguayan Chaco. At 4:30 in the morning we'll be catching the bus for the 5 hour journey to the middle of nowhere! There'll be a church service and a barbecue lunch. Then it's back on the bus for another 5 hour journey home. Should be very interesting. Some photos hopefully next week.

Here are some photos of the prayer room used for the 24-7 Prayer. The first is the lower floor with a comfortable chair and world map, and the other is the prayer wall - were everyone could be creative in their prayers. Update - the 24-7 prayer was amazing! We carried on for 2 full weeks of solid prayer 24 hours a day. This is very worthwhile doing in your church.

This week we're taking part in a prayer marathon - non-stop prayer for 24 hours over 7 days. The Spanish speaking congregation have converted a room in the cathedral into a special prayer room with comfortable seating and things to help focus our prayers. It is part of a worldwide 24-7 prayer initiative , and 16 groups worldwide praying at this time. Members of the Spanish congregation, English congregation and pupils from the school are all taking part to pray for Paraguay, our churches, school and needs worldwide. Eileen took a turn this morning and found it really rewarding. Both of us have more slots later in the week. There has been a fantastic response with all the hour long slots being filled each day. We look forward to hearing how it develops.

This winter has been a strange one. We'd hardly had any cold weather at all, temperatures stayed in the mid 30s through all of July. Then last week it dropped, we had 4 degrees in the mornings and the maximum was 13. This week it is back to 36. This is more like mid summer weather temperatures. Last Saturday Eileen had the toy library again and 50 children came along to play with good educationally stimulating toys - something they would never get the chance to anywhere else. The children who come are street children, they get a shower and some breakfast then have time to play. They just love it. In church we are planning some shared lunches, aiming to invite some new teachers who recently came to the American school. Then later we hope to have another Alpha course. We pray we might make the contacts and be able to invite new people to church and the course.

It was back to work yesterday. We had two great weeks holiday with some fine people. Last night was a bar-be-be-que for all the Project Paraguay teams, nearly all from Northern Ireland. We met some folk who had been in Concepcion, like Rachel and Noel from Donegal and Diane and Debbie from Derryloran.

We have been having great craic with Hannah Collins and her lot from Dollingstown. They took the entire service on Sunday to give us a break, and excellent they were too. We've been cooking for them sometimes in the evenings and having such a laugh. We also went out to see the other group from St. Marks Parish Portadown, they are building a retreat centre about 30 miles outside Asunción. It's an isolated rural location (the middle of nowhere), and they seem to be suffering from food poisoning a bit and severe mossie bites. But the work they are doing is fantastic.

A few days ago a group of 30 arrived from Northern Ireland, only 3 of their cases arrived! While they are all here Varig, the Brazilian airline they travelled on is in collapse . All the Varig flights have been cancelled and the team had an 18 hour wait in Sao Paulo trying to get another flight. Virtually any flight arriving into Asuncion has had luggage delayed by 24 hours. Great fun when you are going 500km north with only the clothes you arrived in!

The winter break starts on Monday 10th. We really need it. It's been a 13 week term and pretty busy with school and church to organize. We're looking forward to these holidays. Lots of people are coming out from Ireland over the next three weeks. Today sees our good friend Hannah Collins arrive with a team from her church, St. Saviours. They will be working for two weeks doing a children's holiday club and painting a mural on a foster home run by friends of ours. Other groups are coming our with Project Paraguay to work on building projects, children's clubs and medical work in Concepcion and an area outside Asuncion. It will be great to have some more Northern Irish accents around the place.