I have often wondered what ‘missionaries on leave’ get up to during their 3 months or however long they have. They always seem to be quite busy but what do they do? Well, after writing about our typical week in Cusco in a newsletter a few months ago, I thought I’d give you an idea on the blog of what a week here is like ‘on leave’ (except that there isn’t a typical one, it’s very varied!) Here’s this week:
Monday
· Travel to the Latin Link office in Reading for chats about finance and to meet a couple who will be coming to work with us in Cusco this year.
· Lunch at the office.
· Travel back to Eastbourne.
Tuesday
· Jenny and boys: Toddler group in the morning and a birthday party in the afternoon.
· Roland: Admin such as planning our visits for the next 3 weeks, replying to emails, designing some publicity for one of our projects in Cusco.
· Evening: Speaking at prayer meeting at Kings (our home church).
Wednesday
· Jenny: Doctors appointment, shopping for books and other bits to take back to Cusco.
· Roland: Playing with the boys at home.
· Afternoon: Jenny with the boys and cooking tea for us and the Kettle family, Roland preparing for a meeting in the evening.
· Evening: Speaking at a prayer meeting at our friends’ church in Hailsham.
Thursday
· A quieter day! Jenny with the boys and then some preparation and a meeting for a seminar at the Children’s Ministry conference next week. Roland doing a bit of admin and then with the boys.
· Evening: Travel to London to Jenny’s brother’s.
Friday
· Late morning appointment for Ben for a vaccination at the travel clinic.
· Afternoon and evening visits to various friends/supporters.
Saturday
· Playing with the boys’ cousins in the morning.
· Two visits to friends/supporters in the afternoon.
Sunday
· Church (Kings) in the morning.
· Lunch with friends.
· Emails and phone calls in the evening.
It was Sammy’s turn this week to come out with a funny quote. In London we had a couple of spare hours so decided to show the boys Buckingham Palace. I explained to Sammy that it is where the Queen lives, although as I said it I realised that perhaps he didn’t know anything about the Queen and I would need to explain further. Anyway, he just said, ‘Will the Queen be there?’ I said I didn’t think so, and then he said, ‘Will we see Lightening McQueen?’ and it turns out that he thought we were going to see the house of the star of his favourite DVD ‘Cars’! Fortunately he wasn’t too disappointed as we got there just before the changing of the guard and he saw lots of soldiers marching about and playing their instruments.
We are now spending nearly 4 weeks in Eastbourne after a lovely time over Christmas – a few days with Roland’s family, a week at New Year with all my family (all 17 of us in a rented house in Devon) and a quieter week following that with my parents in Dorset. The boys have had so much fun with their cousins but they also appreciate coming back here and sleeping in the same beds as they did before Christmas. I think we slept in 10 different places during our first two months back!
