This morning I started the day-long task of buying furniture for the new house. First, it was off to the bank to get some money, and then off to the "Casa de Cambio" to change the dollars into Bolivianos. (The Boliviano is the national currency here, but most people keep their bank accounts in US Dollars, which we do for the ministry as well.) The cost of the items we were going to buy today: furniture, dishes, beds, etc. was going to be around $2000 USD, which is how much I got out of the bank, and then I exchanged that into Bolivianos. Well... at about 8 Bolivianos to the dollar... I didn't quite think about the logistics of having that much money on me. That works out to be 15,900 Bolivianos at the current exchange rate. The lady wanted to give it to me all in 50b bills, but fortunately finally got some 100's. Still, that makes 159 bills, which is both a lot of bills to count, and a lot of bills to carry around without being obvious about it. Fortunately I had a money belt... unfortunately, only about a third of the bills fit in it. God's providence was that as I was leaving the office to get in my car I ran into my friend Scotty, who lent me his money belt for another third, so now I am only carrying about 5,000 B's in my pocket... definitely better than before!
So we headed up to El Alto, which sits at about 13,500 feet and on Thursdays and Sundays happens to have the largest and cheapest market in the city from anything from sewing equipment, to appliances, to monkeys, cats, parrots, and... furniture. It took us a few hours of looking over furnture, bargaining for prices, then buying everything and looking for a truck to hire to load it all into. After getting everything loaded into a truck and tied down, Tuny and Sheila headed off to the home while I tried to do some more shopping for the home. A couple of hours later... most of the time in traffic... I too was headed down to the city enjoying a beautiful view of Mt. Illimani from across the city.
Tomorrow the boys will move into the home, and it promises to be a busy and exciting day.
-John
2 Comments:
At 6:22 PM,
Lisa said…
Aren't you glad you have cool friends like us to give you money belts and mush food to baby consistency?? :)
At 12:24 AM,
Unknown said…
Wishing you ALL God's blessings as you move into the Bethany Home. What a wonderful family that will be moving into it! You will all be in our prayers as you make this house YOUR home!
Our love to you all,
Jim & Linda
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