March 27

  We went on a bike ride with three other people from the office on Saturday.  This is a park along the Mopocho drainage.  

In one of the parks along the bike path this statue of a llama made of plastic parts. Notice the person underneath to see how big it is.  There are parts of barrels, garbage bins, plastic car bumpers in it.  

Here we are in front of the Costanera Norte building. The highest in South America.  

We want to rent this apartment that we checked out this week. The bedrooms are upstairs and this is the stairway to the up stairs.  It is pretty narrow.  

This is a metal kitchen cabinet which still has doors to put on it. We put it together thinking it would only take a few hours...about 6 hours later we still are not done. We bought 4 of them because houses here generally come only with a kitchen sink and cabinet below it. LUCKILY we paid to have the others assembled. 

This is in the house where Jacob Roberts will be staying. Once again our paths cross. Elder Roberts is Emily Gilmans son. He was named after our oldest son Jacob. Emily used to babysit Jacob when he was a small boy and she said she wanted to name one of her children after him.

January February

It looks like we are posting monthly now.  We have been here about 4 months now.  It is starting to feel like the new normal for us  The normal life functions such as driving, shopping, using Whatsapp are not so stressful. 

For those of you who are from Hockinson I found this good photo of the big spider. The rest of you have missed out as it has been gone for years. 

We attend the Recoleta congregation. About 30 people attend.  They Zoom the meetings for those not comfortable attending. People in Chile are concerned about Covid.  A large majority wear mask all the time. For church meetings we have our temperature checked and show our covid passport. We are hopeful that the reduction in cases will allow us to back off on mask wearing and social distancing.  

This is the van we drive. It is a Hyundai H1. It is a good vehicle we can haul 9 people or several beds and mattresses, fridge and washer.  We paid some guys down the street to wash and shampoo it.  They did a decent job for about 20 bucks. 

I thought that this guy had interesting eyes.  It is a poster that was plastered along the streets. 

We have enjoyed this Peruvian restaurant. Good burgers, good prices.  A dollar is worth about 800 pesos.

This is a big pool in the park on the hill nearby.  I don't think anyone was swimming in it. 

This is an apartment that we just rented called Principal. It is an addition to a larger house.  The apartment has an upstairs but the floors were soft and we didn't need the room so we blocked the stairway off.  

We cleaned it up and added misisonary furniture.  It was marginal but turned out better than expected.  The landlord cleaned up the out side as well making it more appealing. This has been a big part of our work getting apartments rented and prepared for missionaries.

It is starting to cool off a bit.  We have a portable air conditioner but don't use it often.  

One of our coworkesrs is from Columbia and with the help of a Columbian friend made us a big Columbian dinner.  Lots of good food.  

Wheat flour is not typically used in Columbia. Instead they use a tapioca flour or corn flour. All of this food including the bread biscuit was lovingly prepared for us to experience the Columbian foods.

We went to a Thai restaurant fot Hermana Granges birthday. This little paradise is hidden behind two large tall doors on a busy city street. It is amazing to find such beautiful courtyards.

 

The food was fabulous. They brought a Grange watermelon birthday cake. Some wanted chocolate for dessert  so the plate below which looks like a fotograph really is a delicious treat. 

                                                       Notice the paradise back ground.

We were sent this cute picture of the twins (Jacob and Tatia's) raiding their Dad's ice cream stash.

Ross Grange and wife Sashiko live here in Santiago. We have had the pleasure of getting together with them atleast 3 times now and hope to again soon. This was at a great Japanese restaurant close to their                                                                 rock and mineral shop.

Jackie loved the rock shop (the Drewery blood likes rocks and minerals) and purchased a few cool                                                               rocks and plans to go back for more.

                     

                       This is the park outside our gate. Jackie is feeding the birds some bread.

You notice we are still wearing masks here. They moved to phase 4 and no longer have PCR tests required upon entering the country and no required quarantine for arriving missionaries. The masks have not been lifted as of yet we will still wear them everywhere in public.