no fear ninja

this is my tribute to aubren. tributes are for the living, aren't they? maybe i have the wrong word. saturday, the group took a boat to a village across the lake, panajachel. norton and i have been there many times. one of aubren's friends is working there so aubren, the kids and i hopped on the boat with the group and went across. our kids loved it. i took the group to our favorite coffee shop there called crossroads cafe. it is run by a family who see their business as a ministry to the many foreigners in that town. and they make truly awesome coffee. after lunch aubren, the kids and i went back down to the dock to find a boat-ride home. we needed to get back before the group. the afternoon water is much choppier than the morning. but once again, the kids laughed and shrieked with glee as our boat skipped across the lake. after getting to san pedro we found a tuk tuk and headed up the hill to antonio's house. we were dropped off right at the soccer field which was filled with guys playing the sport. i paid the guy. we hopped off and he started back down the hill. it was then that i realized that i had left my backpack in the back of the tuk tuk. i started running down yelling, "alto! alto!" (all the stop signs say that. it was the only thing i could think of) there was a guy standing by us watching the game and he started yelling too but the tuk tuk guy kept going. the helpful guy then went to his motorcycle and offered to give me a ride to go catch the tuk tuk. while i was quickly contemplating this, aubren immediately said, "i'll get on!" and off she went with the hopefully nice, honest, trustworthy man. the kids and i sat on the bleachers. they watched the game. i prayed for aubren. after about fifteen minutes, the tuk tuk guy came back up, waving his hand. i grabbed my bag and was so grateful. "gracias! gracias!" then i continued to pray for aubren. about five minutes after that, she came back on the motorcycle. safe and sound. as she got off, i told her to wait because i wanted to take a picture of her and the nice man. alas, there was no camera in my bag. i guess i can't say for sure that tuk tuk guy took it, but i don't know what else could have happened. big bummer. that was aubren's first superhero action.

when we finally got back to the house, norton was looking really bad. cata offered to call their doctor to come by the house. i don't like that my first thought was, "is he knowledgeable? equipped?" but that's what i thought. but we didn't really have any alternative. so he came by, diagnosed norton with tonsillitis and gave us a prescription for an antibiotic and an antihistamine. nancy said that the pharmacy was open so aubren, nancy and i hopped on a tuk tuk and went down to pick up the medicine. on the way back to the house there is a huge hill. i mean huge. as we got about 1/4 of the way up the tuk tuk wouldn't move and we started going backwards. down, down, down. we got a good start and started up again. this time we got around 1/3 of the way up before it started to slow down. that's when aubren jumped out and started pushing from the side and running along with us. the tuk tuk got some momentum, aubren jumped back on and we made it back to the house. superhero action number two. thank you, aubren.