Getting Started

I am now officially moved in here in Puno. We moved the 4th of January, but the house wasn’t quite ready. The people in the first floor hadn’t moved out yet, so all 12 of us (plus the kids) were living pretty much on one floor (the guys had their mattresses upstairs). But now, the guys are back on the second floor, and we’re all in our rooms. The girls are still waiting for their room upstairs, and the parents still have some work being done on their floor. But little by little we’re getting settled in.

As far as the actual move, it went pretty smoothly. The truck came to the house in Arequipa, we loaded it up, and it left. Me and Nelson went out and had a last dinner, then we all hung out in the Linnell’s house until it was time to get on the bus. We got on our bus at around 2am and got to Puno around 8 or 9am. A little later the truck pulled up and we unloaded. But because the first floor wasn’t ready yet, we had to put some stuff in the pastors house. But now we’re all getting settled.

Me and Nelson (all of us here really) have been exploring, both within the city and outside the city. Puno is a little bit smaller than Wenatchee, but with higher buildings, but I think we know our way pretty well now. Here are a few pics of the city.

LEFT: One of the

roads near

our house.

RIGHT: Our house

 

 

 

 

So there are a few photos of our city. But we still have a lot more to get to know. Also, we have two districts I haven’t been able to get photos of yet. I should have them by the end of this week though.

Now, some of the getting familiar with terrain. Also just having fun haha! On one of our days off, Nelson and I decided to climb one of the surrounding mountains. (The above picture is from this hike) Later on, we climbed another. I have lots of pics of these two outings, but I’ll only put a few on here. (I have all of them on my Facebook page I believe)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So there are some of the photos I have. All around, Puno looks a lot like Chelan to me. It’s just a million times higher. Where I was standing in the third photo, I was at 4,017 meters. (About 12,500ft. more or less). In almost all of the other photos, I’m significantly higher than that. Where I was at in the last picture, I was actually starting to get dizzy/feel light headed. Having less air like this makes everything harder, but once I develop my lungs, I should be able to run forever or hold my breath for a ridiculous amount of time. We’ll see how it goes though. Also, to give everyone a better perspective of where Nelson was sitting in the last pic and were I was when I took the previous pic, here’s a video I took to help you out a little haha!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOn3cn0PwxE

We also just started a Vacation Bible School today that will last for a week. It started out with a bunch of wild and crazy kids, but at the end, it wasn’t that bad. I was actually pretty fun. I’ll have a lot of work this week with the VBS, getting to know our three districts, and starting to make contacts. Please keep me in your prayers this week. With trying to figure out how to start, I feel pretty overwhelmed. Prayers, messages here and there, financial support, comments on my blog, everything helps in it’s own way. And from now on I’ll try to comment on my comments haha! Thanks for all the continued support!

P.S. Thanks a lot to a very generous donor who helped me  out a lot on the 6th. I’m not sure who you were, or how you found out about me, but if you read this…Thanks a LOT. That was a big blessing from God and I appreciate it a lot. I will be praying for you.

P.S.S If you would like to donate, sign up to pray, or learn more about the organization I’m working for, follow this link:

http://extremenazarene.org/Volunteer.aspx?ID=107

 

Ahora he terminado oficialmente con mi mudanza y estoy en Puno. Nos hemos mudado el 4 de enero, pero la casa no estaba completamente lista. Las personas en el primer piso aun no habían salido. Entonces todos nosotros estuvimos viviendo en un piso (los hombres tuvimos nuestros colchones arriba e un cuarto del techo). Pero ahora, los hombres hemos regresado al segundo piso, y nosotros estamos en nuestros propios cuartos. Las chicas aún están esperando su cuarto arriba. Y los padres todavía tienen trabajo antes de ponerse cómodos. Pero poco a poco estamos instalándonos.

Hablando de la mudanza, fue buena. El camión vino a la casa en Arequipa, Pusimos todo dentro, y el camión se fue. Nelson y yo salimos a cenar, y pasamos tiempo en la casa de los Linnell hasta el momento de subir al bus. Subimos al bus cerca de las 2 am y llegamos a Puno cerca de las 8 o 9 am. Un poco después llego el camión y bajamos todo. Pero como el primer piso no estaba listo aún, tuvimos que poner algunas cosas en la casa de pastor. Pero ahora nosotros estamos acomodándonos.

 

Izquierda: una calle cerca de nuestra casa.
Derecha: nuestra casa

 

 

Entonces aquí hay algunas fotos de nuestra ciudad. Pero aún tenemos mucho más por conocer. También tenemos dos distritos de los que aún no he podido obtener fotos. Aunque debo tenerlas para este fin de semana.

Ahora, algunas conociendo el terreno. Y también teniendo diversión ajaja. Cuando tuvimos un día libre, Nelson y yo decidimos subir una de las montañas alrededor de la ciudad. (la foto de arriba es de esta vez) después subimos otra. Tengo muchas fotos más de estas salidas, pero solamente pondré algunas aquí. (Tengo todas las fotos en mi página de facebook).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Entonces ahí hay algunas de las fotos que tengo. En total, para mí, Puno se parece mucho a Chelan. Solamente que un millón de vences más alto (en elevación).donde estuve parado en la tercera foto, estuve a 4,017 metros. (Cerca 12,500 pies, más o menos). En casi todas las otras fotos, he estado mucho más alto que eso. Donde estuve en la última foto, empecé a sentirme mareado. Teniendo menos aire hace todo más difícil, pero a la vez desarrollo más mis pulmones, yo debería ser capaz de correr para siempre o contener mi respiración por un tiempo ridículo. También para dar a todos una mejor perspectiva de donde estuvo sentado Nelson en la última foto y donde estuve cuando tome la foto anterior, aquí está un video que grave para ayudarte un poco jaja!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOn3cn0PwxE

 

También hoy comenzamos una Escuela Bíblica Vacacional que será por una semana. Comenzó con uno niños locos pero, al final, no fue tan malo. Realmente fue un poco divertido. Tendré mucho trabajo esta semana con la EBV, conociendo nuestros tres distritos, y comenzando a hacer contactos. Por favor tenme en tus oraciones esta semana. Tratando de encontrar como comenzar me siento muy abrumado. Oraciones, mensajes algunas veces, apoyo financiero, comentarios en mi blog, todo me ayuda de alguna manera. Y desde ahora en adelante tratare de comentar en mis comentarios jaja! Gracias por todo el continuo apoyo.

 

P.D. Muchas gracias a alguien que me ha ayudado mucho el 6 de enero. No sé quién es usted, o como me encontró, pero si usted lee esto, Muchas gracias. Fue una gran bendición de Dios y estoy muy agradecido por eso. Yo estaré orando por usted.

 

P.D.D. si te gustaría ayudarme financieramente, registrarse para orar, o aprender más de la organización para que estoy trabajando siga este link:

http://extremenazarene.org/Volunteer.aspx?ID=107

Christmas and New Years

So again, it’s been a while, but here it is. I still don’t have my residency card yet, but I should be getting it soon. Not having it was a little bit of a concern when I decided to go back to Florida for Christmas to spend it with my brother and sister-in-law. Turns out it wasn’t a huge deal. I just needed to sign some papers and stuff. So in the end, I was able to spend Christmas in Florida. It was a lot of fun. I got to just relax around the house with Daniel and Stephanie, play with their dogs, drive, watch tv, and have american food. We also went to Disney one night to watch the fireworks. We were a ways away from them, but it was still really cool to see. Those fireworks didn’t compare at all, or at least not from where we were, to the fireworks that were here yesterday. Everyone across the entire city was lighting of fireworks everywhere. Not just firecrackers, but fireworks. It was awesome. I also found out that M80’s, or something similar, are legal here. I taped three together and they actually all exploded at the same time. It was pretty cool and REALLY loud haha. Well that’s most of what’s happened since last time.

Now to look at the future a little. We’ll be able to move into our apartment in Puno the 4th of January. So we’re looking at moving pretty soon here. Then our work starts. We’ll start going door to door searching for people who are interested in the bible. Whenever we find someone, we’ll set up a time and a place to meet with them. After we have a few different people or families, we’ll unite a few of them into a few bigger groups. And once we have enough groups like that, would grow into a few even bigger churches until we form a church. That is, a group of 12 members over the age of 15 that meets regularly at a set location.

As the time to start grows nearer, I’m getting more excited, but more nervous at the same time. I have definitely inherited my fear of public speaking from Dad, and it has been a struggle for me at times. But not only am I speaking in front of a group of people, but I’m trying to teach in a foreign language. It has been pretty cool at times though. When you’re not confident about your speaking skill, when you can see you made a difference or said something that impacted someone, or at times when the words just come easily to your mouth, it’s a lot easier to see the Holy Spirit helping you out.

Also, here’s something I heard at a church when I was in Florida. The name of God is YHWH in Hebrew, which are “breathing letters.” The way the pastor described this was that when you pronounce each letter it sounds more like a breath than just a sound. So when God says to not use his name in vain, or in an empty manner, is he saying to not “waste your breath,” or to literally not use “YHWH” in vain? To me, it seems a lot more like God to say, “Don’t live your life wasting your breath, but use it to further my kingdom,” rather than Him not wanting us to say His name. So here’s a question for whoever reads this….Are you using YHWH in vain or are you using YHWH the way you should?

Too Long…

So it’s been FOREVER since I blogged. And quite a bit has happened and I’m sure I’m gonna miss some stuff. So let’s see….Let’s start with the most recent and work backwards. The whole group and I just went to Lima to start our residency process. Everything went very smoothly. While we were there, we went to what to Chili’s. AMAZING! Also my first time there haha I got a steak, mashed potatoes, and vegetables. I haven’t had good meat in a long time. It was like heaven lol While we were there, Ines (a friend from the last time I was here) stopped by and we got to talk for a while in person. It was a lot of fun.

On the not so fun note, I’ve been sick for about three weeks. Actually it’s really stunk. I haven’t let it slow me down and have still gone out when everyone else does and tried to stay involved. At first it wasn’t possible though and I missed almost and entire class, but I think I’m getting better now. Like I said though, I haven’t let it keep me down the entire time. Our group fasted and prayed and each pair used their lunch money for that day to buy food for someone on the street. Our group made around 5 new contacts I believe. Nelson and I bought lunch for an old lady that didn’t seem to have more than the clothes on her back. We bought her a 1/4 of a chicken and a bottle of water. It was really cool to see the look on her face and the true thankfulness in her eyes. It was a great experience.
Also, I got really sun burnt. I was taking some medicine for being sick and didn’t know I was supposed to stay out of the sun. So I tried to tan, but ended up with some blisters on my shoulders and a really red and now peeling back. I learned my lesson though and won’t do that again lol Missing sleep here is miserable, and you can’t really sleep that well when half your body is on fire hahaha But that’s almost all better too.

Our brother Roy had a birthday. It was a lot of fun. We all went out and went horseback riding. Afterwords, Roy, Garren, and I, all went out for pizza. It was a great day, and we all had a lot of fun.

The Cuzco and Arequipa teams have graduated and started work. I’m not sure on a number, but lots of contacts have been made. I think about 25 in Cuzco, and I don’t have an idea for here, but I know they’re working really hard. On a sad note, Daniel was sent home, and Tia won’t be coming back. So their partners will go home as well. Well, sorta. Eli, Daniel’s partner is staying in Arequipa and working at one of the churches, and Rosita, Tia’s partner, might join the 40/40’s in her home town. Somewhat related with that, the pastor of our church passed away two weeks ago. A new pastor will be here in January to replace him, but in the mean time the local pastors will all take turns at our church.
Our team went to Puno again for a couple days to search for a home, but we didn’t find anything and are still looking. Please keep this in prayer. If we find a place, we should be able to move in around the 5th of December. But if not, we’ll have to wait until we find a place.

On a really random note, sometimes living here can get boring when you get too focused in the studies, so one time almost everyone went out for some “fun.” What is “fun?” Well we went to a plaza type area and played guitar and sang and got money for it. But on top of that, talked about who we are, and what we’re doing here. And again, ended up with a few contacts there as well. (I’ll put a link to the video below)

Ah, we moved. We are no longer in the upstairs of the church, but about two blocks away in an apartment. So far it’s been really cool. Chad and Amanda are on the top (3rd) floor, girls on 2, and guys on 1. We also don’t have a cook. We make our own breakfast, go out for lunch to a “Menu” (it’s like a little restaurant that costs about $1.25 or s/.4) and each night a pair makes dinner. it’s been really good so far.

Well I think that get’s you about up to date as far as stuff goes. As far as me, I could use some prayer. Both health wise and spiritual wise. There’s definitely spiritual warfare on the mission field, and I’m feeling it. It’s really hard to get into the habit of reading my devotions everyday, and stuff like that. Every prayer, no matter how short is REALLY really appreciated. I never understood why missionaries always asked for so much prayer until now. Thanks to everyone so much for all the support.

WUW^5JBH7tl4

Trip to Puno

This past Friday, my cohort and I left for Puno. The city where I’ll be working in 4 months. We had a lot of fun. The trip there and back was long, but while we were there we had a lot of fun. It was definitely worth a 4 or 5 hour drive. When we got there, it was late at night, so we just checked into the hotel and went to bed. The next day, we went out to the floating islands, then had lunch at the pastors house, and then went to a youth group that night in our future church. Sunday was kinda of a free day until about 5, so me and my partner, Nelson Guerrero, walked around the city a little. Then we had dinner, went to church, then left for Arequipa again. So now, a little bit more about the things I’ve mentioned here…

So the bus ride…. It was a 4 or 5 hour trip up to Puno. It was comfortable, but sitting anywhere for that long and not being able to move, you start to cramp. Plus, with going from around 8,000ft. to around 12,000ft. I got a headache too. But it wasn’t all bad. They had a few tv’s on the bus, with some army movie in Spanish with French subtitles haha. I ended up just trying to sleep the whole way.

We got in late at night, so our first impression of the city was at night with all the lights every where. We couldn’t really see the lake, but it gave us a good idea of how big the city actually is.  As it turned out, our hotel was luckily in the middle of town, halfway to the church and the pastor’s house, and halfway to the plaza. We found out later that Extreme might buy the hotel we stayed at as our house. It would be super cool. It’s a really nice building, we’d all have hot water, we’d all have our own bathrooms, but we’d also be able to use it as a hotel and make a little bit of money to help out Extreme, and it is a possible new location for the church there. Right now, they’re church is way to small. Please keep the hotel in prayer that the price will drop a little and that Extreme will be able to buy it. Not so that we can be comfortable, but that we would have a building with more functions to further God’s kingdom.

While we were there, we got a glimpse of where we’ll be ministering.  Some of us will go out to the floating islands and talk with the locals there. Hopefully it’ll be me and Nelson. We’d have to row out there, which would take about 30 mins, or we’d have to pay to take a boat. But I would love to be the one to go out there. I’m not a city person, and love the water. Definitely where I want to be stationed. While we were there, we got to ride on a boat made out of reeds.  I even paddled a little.

It only costs around 1,400 soles (about $450). And to make an island is free. Pretty cool I think. It might even be where I end up living after my two years haha. On the way back from the islands, we had an awesome view of Puno.

When we got back, we went up to the pastors house and ate. We went up on the roof and played some soccer, or tried haha It was really hard to breath there. Even just walking for a little you’d start to breath hard. Anyways, the have an awesome view from their roof.

The trip back to Arequipa was pretty uneventful. We left at 8pm and didn’t get back until like 3am. I’m definitely looking forward to living there. I think that’s about all that happened. Now that I have a camera I’ll try to keep putting more pictures up on every post.

Thanks for all the prayer support!

Jugo de Rana y Torre Fuerte

So it’s been forever since I’ve updated. This is going to have to be a quick one though. Recently I’ve “officially” became a 40/40 because I drank Jugo de Rana (frog juice). Which actually wasn’t that bad. I even liked it a little. Anyways, this is a ceremony that normally happens right after the 40/40’s arrive, sort of a “if you can eat this, you can eat anything.” We were just too busy to actually do it sooner. Oh well. I plan on taking my parents to try it, but I don’t know if they’ll have time though. We’ll see.

Also, I’ve been spending a lot of time at Torre Fuerte recently and have really gotten to know a lot of the girls there a lot better. The girls have seen that I do want to get to know them all better, but just haven’t been able to. I’ve been there almost every day now and a lot of the girls really have opened up a lot. In fact, Pastora Indira asked me to be a part of one of the girls Quinceañera, (it a big honor in Spanish culture and the whole event is a big deal. Kind of the Peruvian coming of age).

Having my parents here has been a blessing. Like I said earlier, I’ve been able to go to Torre Fuerte almost every day, so I’ve also gotten to see my parents almost every day. and they brought me down some snacks I’ve been missing from the states.

This next week is going to be insanely busy. I’ll have dinner with my parents and the pastors of TF, I’ll graduate from language school, I’ll get my peruvian partner and go through some training with him, the Quinceañera, and I start classes on Monday. Hopefully everything will work out really nicely though. Highly unlikely, but it WOULD be nice haha.

Well this still isn’t a whole lot, but it’s better haha. Again, I’ll update again later when I can.

But this is all I can write right now. I’ll update more later. Chau!

No sé que yo debo poner aquí

Well a lot has happened since my last post. Roy has been able to invite the owners of a local ice-cream shop to church and a taxi driver. So now I’ve been hanging out with the people at the ice cream shop and talking with them a lot. They would like for me to teach them English, and they will help me with Spanish. So I’m going to try and teach them twice a week. One of those times I’ll teach English out of the Bible. They actually have my Spanish/English Bible until this next Sunday. I’m going to try to find them another Spanish/English Bible so they can study English from there. They seem to be very open to the bible and to church. It’s exciting to see. I tried talking to their parents a little about church and stuff too, but I don’t know how well I did. That was by far the hardest conversation I’ve had since I’ve been here. I’m definitely getting to be good friends with Roy and Noamí. And they’re really helping with my Spanish. That’s really the only interesting thing that’s happened that I can think of. But it was pretty important to me so I might have over looked something else. Anyways, thanks again for all the prayers. They are much needed and much appreciated!

Something Clever Goes Here…

Well today was our first cooking lesson. It was fun. Roy and I made Hamburgers because we don’t like pumpkin. Well it was definitely different haha. They were good though. Roy will agree with me in saying that they were worth catching his hand on fire haha He’s fine though, just hairless haha. Everyone else made a more traditional Peruvian dish. It was all really good.

After school, Roy and I went to Torre Fuerte again, and I was able to sit down with one of the girls and talk with her about her relationship with God and stuff. It was really cool to be able to talk about more than just the little surface topics. One of the girls sat down by Roy as he was going through his pictures on his camera and started teaching him Spanish.

Oh, and on the way home, we had an awesome taxi driver. He was very friendly and gave us a great deal. On the way home though, the car ran out of gas. Luckily it was on the downside of the hill and we could just drift to a gas station haha. But by the time we got were we were going it sounded like it was ganna die again. So I gave him a little extra money to help him on his way. So it was all around a good day=)

Well…

Today I got sick. No bueno. But, I was able to take a group of 17 (including myself) to Torre Fuerte. It was a lot of fun. Also, we started work on one of the roofs of the new churches. I had to leave because I wasn’t feeling good so I don’t know how much got done, but we should have it all done by Sunday I think. Well most of it.

Here is the last update I have on the number of new believers from the events.

Attendance for the Nick Vujicic conferences in all Peru areas were:
June 19th – Arequipa – 10,000
June 20th – Lima – 25,000
June 21st – Chiclayo – 8,000
June 22nd – Trujillo – 9,000
June 23rd – Piura – 18,000
More info to come!

Tired Of Waiting For An Update Yet?

Ok. So it’s been real long since I’ve updated. Sorry. A lot has happened, and I’m still pretty busy. Here’s a lot of what happened.

First off, before Love Extreme even happened (the actual event), I ran out to Torre Fuerte and was able to “help” them to the event. It was really cool to see the faces of the people when I offered. I could tell it really meant a lot to them. I was able to do something else for everyone there later too (you’ll read about it later).

Another thing we did before the event, was Promotion; which consisted of taping posters all over the place, a competition with the taxi drivers to see who could get the most of their passengers to the event (winner got a laptop), and various other things, Construction; we worked on a few churches, one is the church I go to, and it was a surprise for the pastor and his family (it was also where everyone met at the beginning of each day). So that was our main construction focus.

The day before the event, Felix Vargas and his wife showed up at the church. I was able to talk with him and his wife a little since there weren’t very many people there. He is one of the nicest, most massive human beings I’ve ever met. That day I was supposed to help with the setup for the project, but last minute, Scott England changed plans on me, and Jessi (a short term volunteer) and I went to a school with Felix, his wife, John (a professional soccer player), and Pastor Genaro. It was really cool. I got to hear the testimonies of both Felix and John, both of which are extremely powerful, and see well over 25 kids come to Christ. I also made a couple new friends haha. When Felix was done talking and we were ready to leave, all the kids walked past him on the way out and shook his hand. Then one shook mine and Jessi’s before Felix, and everyone from him on followed. Then I was asked for my email address. Then my autograph haha. Jessi and I were both put on pedestals with Felix. It was interesting.

That night, I was security through the night at the event site to make sure no one stole any of the stage equipment. We took shifts, and I was able to sleep around 6 hours, which was well needed because I was security from 6am through the whole event until around 9.

At the event there where three main parts, two of which occurred at the same time. Those were the men’s and women’s conferences. Felix, John, and a few other I think, spoke in the men’s conference, and around 150 men came to Christ out of I’d guess 500. Tammy Trent, Lonna Vopat, and a few others spoke there. Of around 1,200 people, I believe 300 people came to Christ, but it’s been a while so I may have numbers wrong. The other, and by far largest main event, was when Nick Vujicic spoke. There was over 10,000 people there (our goal was 10,000). Of all of those people, around 8,000 people accepted Christ. Now, the other 40/40’s who have been here longer are meeting with the people who filled out some papers to make sure they stay Christians.

During, before, and after the event, I made quite a few new friends among the short termers. I have a most of their emails, and hope to get more later. They were a huge help, and we wouldn’t have been able to do it without them. We had nearly 400 people come and help us. I am very grateful to all of them for coming and being willing to work their hardest every day they were here.

Well here is where you read about the other way I was able to help Torre Fuerte. After the event, Extreme had a LOT of extra food. They had two other orphanages come by and take some food, but they still had around 16 large bags (as in large garbage bag bags) or bread, 2 of hotdogs, and 4 of lettuce. I was asked if I would like to take a group of 15 to Torre Fuerte with the food and then to a few other places later. The plan was that I would go to Torre Fuerte first, they could take what they wanted of the food, then the next closest place, then the next, and so on. But, when we got to Torre Fuerte, they wanted it all. At first the lady’s in the kitchen said they only wanted half, but then Pastor Dorio said he wanted it all. So he had everyone sit in the cafeteria and had a formal thank you to all of us. It really meant a lot to the girls that we brought them all that food, and that we were going to stay and play. Everyone was really happy. And the leaders were extremely grateful for the food. Also, during the thank you, I was able to tell the group the story of the mural of The Lion and the Lamb and tell them that the girl standing next to me was the girl in the story (Delia). I thought it was pretty cool, and it made a lasting impact on all of the people there with me I think.

Through all of this I’ve been asked to be translator many times. As a result, my Spanish is WAY better. I feel like I’ve learned more during the event than I did in school. I’m learning really fast, and was actually able to invite a couple taxi drivers to the event and explain what it was a little (although my Spanish was VERY broken haha). I thank God that He has gifted me with languages.

Now we’re up to date. So, what was interesting today? On my way to work at one of the churches again, which is going very well, a short termer and I were almost T-boned. Neither of us had seatbelts so it would have been bad. And the other taxi was going faster than it should have been. God was definitely looking out for us.

To end, I’ll look to the future a little. Mom and Dad are going to come to Peru in late July/early August. So I’ll be able to see the reactions of the girls first meeting Mom and seeing Dad again. Whenever I go to Torre Fuerte, I am always asked by at least one girl, “When is your dad coming to visit again?” So hopefully Mom and Dad will bring me down a camera so I can take video of the reactions =P

P.S. I’ll try to update again soon.

Things Are Gonna Pick Up

Well this Friday things’ll start to pick up. The short term missionaries will start arriving, and we’ll have lots of other odd jobs to do along with taking care of them. I’ll be a part of some construction work, and will be one of the leaders taking a group to Torre Fuerte. I’m not sure what the construction will be like, but at TF we should just play with the girls and maybe do some face painting and stuff like that. Since they’re all girls maybe fingernail painting or other girlie stuff. It should be lots of fun, but I’ll sure be busy haha. So I apologize in advance for my lack of posting haha. Afterwords I should have some down time so I’ll try to post about all that happened along with add some photo’s to some of my previous blogs. We’ll see how things go though. Thanks for all the prayers and continued support!