rainy season

Rainy season has started and with it an adventure. I, Jason, drove one of the motorcycles into town with Kody, another missionary, so he could mail some things for his visa. we got to town just in time for the store to close. all the stores close here from 12 until 2:30 for some reason so we went to the pastors house here in town and they fed us lunch. the pastor has about 10 mango trees and he let us pick some mangos. there is a type of mango called the manga rosa, which i believe means pink mango in english. it is soooooooo good and we were able to take about 15 home with us! we finally got everything done in town and the wind picked up really hard and the sky turned black. we headed out of town really fast narrowly missing the storm there. on the road back we could see lightning and rain to our left and lightning in front of us but it wasnt raining on us. with about 3km left it started raining and it felt like needles were hitting me in the face. i was pretty muddy and wet when we turned into our driveway, only to discover there were huge trees down in front of us so we could not make it to the school. we cleared a path off the road in the jungle to go around the trees only to find more trees down. we pulled what we could off the road and cut the vines with our pocket knives. we made it to school just as the storm there was leaving. we found out it had been really windy at the school and about 7 papaya trees had blown over among other limbs and trees around the campus. carrie had spent the last half hour squeegying water out of our house. everything was soaked inside. but praise God Kody and I had missed the worst of both storms and made it safely back. the boys were able to go cut the trees that fell with chainsaws so the truck could leave and pick up people from the community for church the next day. we have started putting up the internet antenna. it is about 60 meters high and i had the opportunity to climb it as we are working on it and install some cables. the sun was setting and it was a beautiful view from up there. we should finish this week and have internet next week at the school. this weekend, friday, saturday, and sunday, the fourth year students took over all of the jobs of the missionaries so they could get a feel for what it was like to teach and be in charge of different projects. i think they learned a lot and had a good time. on saturday night all the staff threw the boys in the river because they like to throw us in and since the roles were reversed we took advantage of the situation. on monday classes were cancelled so we could all go work in the chaco, which is where we plant rice. there is still more work to be done but we are making progress. God is so good and we are continually learning more and more each day. God loves us so so much and we are looking forward to sharing with everyone when we get back the wonderful things He is doing here in Bolivia.