Christmas is certainly celebrated differently here! The biggest celebration takes place Christmas Eve. On Christmas day everyone sleeps in and takes it easy. Not much work happens that day.
The big thing here is chocolate parties. We have had two here at the home in the last few weeks, one at the school on Tue and one at the church on Sunday. They make a huge batch of hot chocolate and serve it with paneton (a sweet yeast bread with candied fruit).
Church started earlier than usual on Christmas Eve. Stan shared something about the Christmas story while Juanito interpreted. Juanito is a tour guide and speaks a good bit of English. He often sits with us during the service and does some translating for us. Israel then shared a short message. After church they played musical chairs and then brought in a huge kettle of hot chocolate and some paneton and we had a short time of fellowship.
For the most part it was a normal day here until about 4:00 or so when everyone was sent to take showers and dress for the evening. Here in Peru they have a tradition of wearing new clothes for the Christmas Eve celebration. Here at the home they try to wear something real nice if they don’t have anything new. Of course this is a big deal for the girls ☺️. Around 6:30 people started trickling into the dining hall. Around 7:00 the games started. I have learned that here in Peru people seem to like playing group games. After the games came the Christmas story with question and answer time. Then it was
time for our Christmas meal which consisted of chicken, rice, potatoes, purple corn juice (which is absolutely delicious!), and paneton.
Last of all were the piñatas. This past week we divided the kids into 4 teams for a piñata contest. There were some great designs but the spider man one was the winner. They divided the kids up into four groups to bust them. Another tradition they have here is to put corn starch in the piñatas with the candy so that everyone gets dusted when they bust it. It’s a mess but they think its great fun! Christmas Day was a very quiet day. I did a bit of laundry (by hand) and cleaned up the house. After a late night last night we will all be happy to see bedtime. Tomorrow real life begins again ☺️
Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas!
Ruth
Stan Schrock Family Serving in Peru 