Koplin Family Mission: Poco A Poco... Little by Little We Settle In

Today marks eight days in Lima so far, the time is just flying by. We finally received internet service last night and so here is a brief update. I'm sorry that the pictures are out of order but I was having such trouble with it that I decided to just post them as they came up.

We moved into our apartment little by little through out the week as we waited for each item to arrive. Finally the mattresses arrived this past Monday and so we are now living permanantly at our apartment in Surco. We were tremendously blessed to have stayed one week with the brothers and sisters of Koinonia Surco, they truly are a family and we thank God to be part of it. Although we have gone through many trials this past week it has touched us so to be with such caring people. Eddy's family also has went out of their way to help us run here and there buying different items and lending to us when we have been in need. We have been blessed abundantly by the generous hearts of those here in Peru.

The kids had been stuggling a bit with sickness and the lose of their friends from home. Hadassah who is quite sensitive has picked out many of the negative aspects of Peru already and at one point had decided she did not like it here. That all changed this past sunday when we went to church. She and Josiah were able to make friends and spent the day with some of the younger girls in the fellowship. We took them to a nearby park and the kids were just delighted with the friendship... they now ask everyday to return to church.

Getting settled physically has been a struggle, if you all remember from our last trip things are much more complicated here. We were promised our mattresses on Saturday only to make a sale, they didn't arrive until Monday but we were promised a comforter for the delay. The mattresses came after a whole day of waiting but no comforter. Today it came and the guy offered to sell us a set of sheets to match, after we bought them we realized they most likely were to be included in the set but he pulled them out for a quick sale. We waited until today as well for our refridgerator and now that it has arrived, it doesn't fit. Did I mention you can not return items here for a refund? We've removed the cabinets and will have someone reinstall them a few inches higher, way to high though to be usable on a daily basis. The stove arrived yesterday but the gas and connection valve didn't, today the situation is now under control and we are cooking finally. Eddy also had the phone installed yesterday but much to his disappointment the man also lied to him. We have just four minutes a day to make calls and no option to change this until December, it doesn't matter that the guy lied to him about the plan, that is just the way it is. It is a new way of life for us but sometimes we just have to laugh because of the complete insanity of some things. It is an adventure for sure and it is fun experiencing a new way of living even when it is different. God must be answering our prayers for more patience.

We are thankful that little by little we are settling in. We do have a home telephone number now that you can call, apart from the local number we left you all with in NY. The phone we received from the telephone company will not work with the Magicjack so until we get one that does we can only receive calls to our Lima telephone number. I'll send out an email with the number shortly. I'll also send out an update with prayer requests as well. Continue praying for a smooth transition for our family and feel free to drop us a line, we love to hear from you.