The Blessed Phone Call! (and yes, you bet we answered this time!)

When you have a child on a mission, you look forward to the days you receive emails and letters from them. But two days a year are especially special! Christmas and Mother's day! Those are the two days a year your missionary gets to call home and talk with you! I forgot to post about my first Christmas phone call, but am here to post about our Mother's day call. We actually got a pre-call yesterday to make sure we had the proper means to communicate. At Christmas, there was no pre-call. Justin purchased a calling card in Peru and called us. We were able to talk for about 1 hour and 45 minutes. We had a couple of bad connections and lost his call. But he called back each time we were disconnected. At our pre-call, Justin called to give us the phone number of the home he was at and we were to call him there. He was obedient and only talked as long as it took to give us the information. Which was only a few minutes. Still exciting for us though! Once again, I was at the church setting up for a dance when Jim called me to say Justin had called and was calling to say he would call right back to give him the phone number we could call back on tomorrow. I don't think I ever drove home so fast! I got there right before the phone rang. A tender mercy! A quick but wonderful call. Just to hear his lovely voice!

On to the official call. Justin was quick to ask why dad kept hanging up on him. He was saying, "This is Justin!" To only hear dad say, "Hello? Hello? Pause... click!" Twice! Poor Justin was at the Lima airport excited to call home and no one was home and no one would talk to him. At least not on purpose! We explained ourselves and were forgiven. He then flew on to La Paz, Bolivia where he stayed overnight and left for Cochabamba early the next day. So early unfortunately that there was no time for a phone call at the airport. He arrived in between changes and is living with the zone leaders in what Justin called a "mansion." He said the home is really nice and he has hot water (!), and even granite counter tops in his bathroom. He said it is just like home. The owner used to live in the United States (Florida) and now works for the Bolivian government and is wealthy. He said it feels like I am starting a new mission all over again. He didn't remember the people there having an accent. He is having a hard time understanding them because they mix Spanish with Quetchawa. They all pronounce their "r's" like "z's". He said Peruvians speak a pure form of Spanish, but they do not in Bolivia and he doesn't remember that the first time he was there. He was very happy to see President and Hermana Tenorio again and said they were equally as happy to see him as they met him at the airport! He forgot how green everything is in Cochabamba. He really liked that. It reminds him of home. Peru is pretty much a desert with little or no rain. He said the mission went downhill after the North Americans were evacuated. He does not know why but there is a lot of work to do. The zone leader he is with does not want to work, so Justin is a bit frustrated to say the least. He will work it out. He is happy to be back! He mentioned that his camera broke so was not able to take any pictures of his trip back (bummer!), but will purchase a new one and get to taking more pictures for us (yea!). We got to talk for about 1 hour and 15 minutes. Now it is 7 months until the next phone call. After next Christmas we will have one more Mother's day phone call, and a few weeks later, he will be home! I must say, that was the best Mother's day gift ever!